Posts Tagged ‘Burnley’

Sniffer Nose 30/03/10: Leeds United, Burnley, Shrewsbury Town, Ipswich Town, Newcastle United, Portsmouth, Swindon Town, Sheffield United.

Mar 30th, 10 / Comments Off

 

This is Clarkeonenil’s regular comment column, cutting through the various passing issues of football and getting to the core principle in the shortest time.

Hidden within the myriad of idiocy that is the Leeds United news merry-go-round last week was a comment from Simon Grayson indicating that all discussions with players whose contracts were ending had stopped until season’s end. Well you can see why, poor Shaun Harvey and Gwyn Williams can’t possibly discuss terms and conditions whilst they have all the important work to do in the last 8 game run-in, like discuss terms and conditions! Of course this unique style of man management where you incentivise all your players to seek Bosman’s is also copied elsewhere, the mighty Crewe Alexandra are also using this template of the successful, financially secure club (although to be fair to Dario Gradi he is doing the equivalent of Grayson’s, Harvey’s and Williams job at Gresty Road). Bottom line is Marques, Ankergran, Hughes, Somma and Judas are on their way out, Dickov and McSheffrey have nowt to come from us come season end and Doyle and Lowry are going back (thankfully). The amount of ins and outs to come at Elland Road this summer, regardless of which division we are in, will rival that of Burnley.

Turf Moor will be an interesting place once relegation is confirmed, what with Brian “1 win in 10” Laws trying to convince the board he can bounce the club straight back up, regardless of the fact nearly all of the present squad will want to leave pronto, it could be an interesting time for outsiders to observe. One of the things we may spot is how little home grown talent is available for the Championship campaign. It is one of life’s great mysteries as to why promoted clubs take on another 15 overpaid professionals (most of which usually have a track record of relegation) and immediately stifle any prospect of a decent young player making a break-through. Oh for a club that gets promoted into the PL and just buys a couple of players to go with what took them up and allows players to progress through!

Meanwhile in Shropshire the stirrings of discontent can be clear heard from the Shrewsbury Town direction. It seems the new stadium and a couple of flirtations with the play-offs have created that old monster expectation in that quiet part of the world. I confess to not being sure how to react, on the one hand there is no reason why the club shouldn’t aim to replicate its 1980’s status as a side in the second tier but equally perhaps the fans should remember they dropped into the Conference not so long ago. The question is this, can Paul Simpson do any more with the players and resources he has? If the answers no then the abuse he complained about this week isn’t worth the effort is it? Speaking of effort, the amount Ipswich Town have to put in to deny “Roy Keane to get sacked this week” stories is astonishing.

The problem at Portman Road stems from Keane’s own reputation. After bailing from Sunderland because he got bored he attracts the attention every time the job looks tricky. This site has suggested before that if a club gives a manager a 3 year target they have to let them use that time. Keane, whether through ability of luck has just done enough to avoid relegation and as such it’s now up to Keane to rectify whatever wasn’t right this season. Constant press speculation isn’t helpful but to be fair the amount of press attention Keane generates can’t be all bad for the club, although they would have to go some to match the amount Newcastle United can generate.

So to clarify, one of your players is in hospital with a wired up jaw because of an assault that had nothing to do with why the club pays the two local boys involved. Got to be said, how Carroll isn’t up for another criminal charge to go with the one he is already facing beggars belief but much worse than that Taylor has to witness Newcastle acting like West Ham did when Hartson so publically attacked his team-mate. When are clubs going to stop indulging thugs and start sacking them?

The sack would be too good for the likes of Portsmouth’s “footballing consultant” Peter Storrie. I look forward to his advice to the administrator after relegation is confirmed and the PL pass on to the FL the dossier than would have made Chainrai fail a “fit and proper” test had the PL had the balls to do one. The problem for Chainrai is that he needs to close the book on all the infighing and intrege around Pompey but that can only happen if he re-buys the club and that opens up a whole new can of worms. The administrator, Andrew Andronikou has been laying the ground work for Chainrai to become official owner; we shall see how the FL reacts.

In the Championship next season Portsmouth could play the club Andronikou last was administrator for, Swindon Town. Notwithstanding the complications of the L1 promotion race one can only marvel at the job Danny Wilson has done at the County Ground. He even saw something in Jonathan Douglas that we never saw in 160 appearances. Wilson must have loved the win at Hartlepool last week given how they ignored his record and dismissed him. Sometimes a manager needs a couple of jobs to get his ability back on track and in this case well done Mr Wilson. Some other managers however could get a million jobs and still be rubbish.

Competition time, who does this quote belong to? “It’s a big rebuilding job here. Let’s get real – you can’t keep [making progress] with part-time staff. There’s only nine players left at the end of the season. Seven who played on Sunday won’t be here in a few weeks. People criticise knowing the problems there are here you get frustrated because you know how great the club is and what’s expected. I know what the fans want because I want exactly the same”. Leeds United and Luton Town fans disqualified because they will have heard it all before from the best Mr Delusion in football management history.

The Other 91 Basket Cases

Sniffer Nose 14/01/10 Gambling Special: Leeds United, Burnley, Liverpool.

Jan 14th, 10 / Comments Off

 

This is Clarkeonenil’s regular comment column, cutting through the various passing issues of football and getting to the core principle in the shortest time.

Gambling on idiocy.

So Beckford is still a Leeds United player (but Showumni isn’t so thankful for small mercies) and the stand-off between club, player, agent and suitors continues. Ignoring this morning’s garbage about “the manager decides” (comments that would lack credibility with any club never mind coming out of Bates mouth) this is still a very simple equation in my mind. Beckford is a declining asset, like renovating a house in LS11 no matter how much time and effort you put into it there is a ceiling price. The ceiling price on a L1 player with 5 months left on his contract is £1.5m maximum. He will not be the difference between automatic promotion or not, this is a no brainer, stop playing Texas Hold Em and cash in.

The other gamble that the club has taken is to suggest that it is entirely reasonable to withhold all information about players and whether they want to play for the club, a kind of mushroom mentality towards the fans, just continue pumping shite on them and keep them in the dark. That no-one, including any of the fans organisations, have sought to question this shows it might be working. But there hopefully comes a point when it won’t; if Beckford signs a pre-contract with anyone, which he will surely do if no move has materialised by the week after the Spurs game, and the fans find out via the media then this gamble will have back-fired.

We will be left with a dead asset, Beckford’s motivation will be diminished and Bates’s credibility will have taken another knock (but he hardly had any to lose).

Gambling on saving pennies.

What to make of the appointment of Brian Laws to the Burnley job? Well let’s try and give credit, if the reason O’Driscoll wasn’t offered the job is Burnley weren’t prepared to make him an offer before agreeing terms with Doncaster Rovers then well bone Mr Kilby. Equally if they are using some of the Bolton compensation to ensure they don’t go into the red whilst in the PL, again I can see some merit in that. However that is not the same as understanding why a manager looking so bereft of ideas at Sheffield Wednesday got the job so soon after his recent sacking. Curbishley, Coppell, Hoddle, Hughes, Pearce et all were available and would have cost nothing but wages to employ. This looks like a gamble of prudence.

Laws himself has taken somewhat of a gamble also, his reputation at Burnley will be formed on his capacity to plug a leaky defence and improve a shocking away record, all whilst not undermining the passing mentality Coyle introduced (unless he wants to be the new Gary Megson). He will need to keep in mind that some of the players not quite up to the PL mark are popular at Turf Moor and trying to replace them with dross that spends its career hopping from relegation threatened club to relegated club will not endear him. Also if he goes back to Hillsborough for players it is probably for the best if it wasn’t Francis Jeffers or Leon Clarke he picked up.

Laws has a contract for 30 months, he might want to work on the assumption at least 12 of those will be in the CCC and plan accordingly. If the Burnley board have understood that then maybe this gamble isn’t so costly.

Gambling on other peoples careers.

Wasn’t it a joy to watch, Liverpool conceded a penalty, at Anfield, in stoppage time, superb, it will be happening to the Germany team in a World Cup game next! Benetiz really has lost the plot, Reading were worthy of that victory and to cap it all both Torres and Gerrard went off injured (and in the ultimate irony Liverpool then improved!). It is well known both players need surgery on long standing niggling injuries but Benetiz is refusing to let them have the rest and recuperation till he has taken Liverpool out of contention for all possible prizes! He is gambling with the long term careers of both men and particularly with their presence in South Africa.

Now to be honest, if Gerrard finishes up spending June in his bling Merseyside mansion I won’t be too bothered (and in fact if he wants to have a career ending injury that’s fine by me, small price to pay for perverting the English justice system I think) but I would be a little more concerned if Torres wasn’t part of the Spain team likely to take their first World Cup. This is where Benetiz is misreading his hand, Torres knows that in order to get fit for South Africa he needs a two month break, either he will get one of those mysterious injuries which allows him to get that rest or he will have to force the clubs hand by threatening to leave if he isn’t allowed the surgery. Now given that Liverpool don’t have a pray of getting 4th in the PL they take their future football credibility in their hands if they lose Torres.

Of course the real gambles at Anfield are keeping on Benetiz and the owners financial mess, but even on the latter side they are just amateurs compared to Manchester United and their American owners.

The Other 91 Basket Cases

The Original Grumpy Old Man: 2 down 1 to go.

Jan 13th, 10 / Comments Off

 

Welcome to a new regular column from an old favourite. The Original Grumpy Old Man (OGOM). This week OGOM looks at the relegation scrap in the PL and renames it the CCC waiting room.

This time last year, on a long forgotten forum dedicated to the idle, I wrote a long piece about the contenders for relegation from the PL in 2008-09 which I subtitled “The Hull Line”, basically stating any team that got above Hull City would stay up (at that point they were 8th or something) and until they did overtake the boys from the KC they remained in a relegation battle. As we know Hull City finished up just above the line themselves (by the skin of some very rotten teeth). This season and a similar number of teams stand in the midst of a 12 team melee with only the team most advanced of the pack, Fulham, looking relatively safe, this unfortunately makes coming up with a snappy clique for this seasons madness problematic, so I won’t bother.

Let’s however be clear, there isn’t just a 12 team competition to avoid the financial despair of relegation (sorry your suggesting there is another despair that goes with relegation are you? Well would have agreed with you once but it must be over a decade since anyone in the media looked at relegation other than a £30M+ disaster), there are two relegation groups of clubs, the first is where the fun is, the stick-on certainties, the clubs with financial issues already, iffy and complicated ownership structures and needing to offload players as we speak and there is a bigger group tossing the hot potato of the last relegation place around which is where the action will be.

This is the crux of the relegation issue; too many clubs are always in the waiting room to the CCC. Some clubs pop in and out every 2 or 3 seasons, some others don’t believe they are ever part of the club and thus when reality hits them Newcastle United/Middlesbrough style it’s more of a shock. In general however about 6-7 clubs will always be in the waiting room season in, season out, that is a third of the PL always worried about relegation (and we call it the best league in the world!). How do the supporters of such clubs cope with the tediousness of season after season striving for 15th? Where is the ambition, the thrust for success, well the term has been reassessed and now equates to just being there. For what exactly pray tell? The dubious honour of seeing your clubs wage bill for average players go idiotic? Pathetic it is and all due to the ridiculous chasm in finance between what is still really Division 1 and Division 2. Occasionally a club bucks the trend and raises the game a little, some fly too close to the sun and burn (Portsmouth) others hopefully, like Fulham can make it into a “outside contenders” club, small at the moment but hopefully growing by the season.

We shall not detain ourselves at this time with an extensive analysis of who is going to be the unlucky third relegated club alongside the stick-on two, its perm 1 from 10. Of that bunch, whilst it’s a shame Stoke City, Everton and Sunderland are in a league with too many poor teams to feel threatened and an act of faith tells you Wigan Athletic and West Ham United will be ok, you are still left with this group of road-blocks: Blackburn Rovers, Bolton Wanderers, Burnley and Wolves. After the decision to play his Sunday pub team at Old Trafford Mick McCarthy has made it difficult for neutrals to care for Wolves and the decision by Burnley to employ Brian Laws makes suggesting they can avoid relegation intellectually problematic. Equally the distain for Blackburn Rovers and Bolton Wanderers is so complete that you wish Gartside and Allardyce could work together again at a merged “Lancashire Lumpits” club so the PL could be rid of both of them. Basically I could waste my time and energy putting the case against all 4 but I’d rather just admit I don’t care which one goes, they are all worthy of relegation, and instead focus on the stick-on two (although if you push me for an answer to has to who will go I’d say Burnley made that decision easy for me today).

Membership of the stick-on group was set almost before the season started, Portsmouth and Hull City and in some respects well deserved it is. Starting with “the humiliated of Hampshire”, a club so in disarray it evokes sympathy from Leeds United fans. Al Faraj may well exist (stc) but he clearly isn’t spending cash, all of Portsmouth’s dealing seems to be predicated on borrowing money off banks. In the midst of all this remains the man who was there in their CCC days, there when the stabilised in the PL under Mandaric, there when the Gaydamak’s came in and the FA Cup was won, there when the wage bill went through the roof (John Utaka, a permanent substitute on £80k a week!!!), there when the money dried up, there during the Al Fahim debacle and is still there as they go from daily crises to daily crises, take a bow Mr Peter Storrie (stopping off at Criminal Court with Mandaric and Redknapp over tax matters).

On the pitch, two successive mistakes in employing L2 standard managers (Adams T and Hart) followed by employing a man who despite once managing Chelsea to a CL final has in fact spent most of the last 4 years doing the non job version of a Director of Football. Grant has not a dot of experience of battling relegation in the PL, he won’t be given the opportunity to wheel and deal, he is stuck with the sub-standard Smith’s, Webber’s Brown’s and Wilson’s of this world and also has to motivate a large group of foreign players who have been messed around something rotten the last 2 seasons. With the likes of James, Kaboul and Belhadji looking to find a club that pays its wages on time the chances of fluky wins at Coventry lifting the season are remote. Pivotal I think is this, their best player whilst being glued to the bottom of the league has been Jamie O’Hara, he is now back at Spurs and that is a miss Pompay can’t afford. In my book they have gone already, it’s just a case of how badly they go down, I suspect they will drag it out until April but will never once give their support any real hope. The fans can look around Fratton Park next season in the CCC and wonder what did those 8 years achieve? Well not a lot financially or in the infrastructure.

Meanwhile on the East Coast sits a basket case of a club desperately hoping Portsmouth beat them to administration. Hull City are a real mess, the owners have literally done a runner, handing over the club to Adam Pearson with a mandate to pass it on to someone else (and if he can get new owners to take on the insolvent debt levels then Mr Duffen and co will be very grateful!). In the meantime the club has publically stated they have to ship out a significant number of players (most of which have contracts that they are unlikely to get elsewhere) all whilst the same squad has struggled all year. Part of Hull City’s issue is what allowed them to rise in the first place, a disengagement between ownership of facilities (the council built KC stadium) and the football club. Factor in the towns relative isolation and its extensive social issues and it’s a wonder they even had last season as a PL club never mind this.

The present squad reflects how fortunate the Tigers were to ever go up and certainly to stay up. Contained within that ridiculously large group of players is very little quality and what little there is gets stifled by Phil Brown (who in my book would be lucky to manager of North Ferriby United if jobs were allocated on ability rather than mates in the media). Doyle, Dawson, Ashbee, Gardner, Barmby, Fagan and Folan, just 7 examples of players not good enough for the PL (and there are another 15 like that) who play alongside the has-beens of Boetang, Kilbane, Mendy, Barmby (yes in twice for a reason, he is both rubbish and past it) and Hesselink who play alongside the compulsory imported likes of Cousin, Sonko, Geovanni, Ghilas, Olofinjani, Halmosi and Altidore. Local young talent has no chance in that set-up, not when the likes of Paul McShane are around. Even the better players have issues, Bullard hardly plays due to injury, Zayatte wants out and Myhill is shell-shocked. Hull City are well and truly doomed, a repeat of their form this time last season and they are down by March. If that happens, put your mortgage on them being the first top flight club to fail to finish the season.

Personally I would like to see the PL bunch up a little, for the relegation candidates not to really emerge until February, for all 20 clubs that start the season to have some form of contention in their make-up. But alas the CL monies will continue to distort the competition for years to come. Whilst I can console myself that Manchester United, Chelsea and Liverpool may have financial disasters to come, that is not the same as expecting any of them to ever be in a relegation review. Over the next few seasons I hope we do see some unexpected names doing a Newcastle United and been replaced by clubs hitherto outside the largesse of the last 6 years. It wouldn’t do some of the cocky top half clubs any harm to have temporary seats in the CCC waiting room and it certainly would be good for English football.

Football through a hardened glare