LJ publicly puts pressure on SL for signings

[spudski]

7 minutes ago, hoxton casual said:

Havent they sold more players than us, which always restricts their push for promotion?

I'd have to check as I don't Know...however...like us, they are trying to compete in this division by finding value in players that are considered under valued the majority of the time and are willing to give players a chance, whilst not having experience in this division. They've made many connections abroad, especially with scouting and development players.

[Mr Popodopolous]

7 minutes ago, chinapig said:

1. The model we operate would usually include a DoF.

2. We don't have one.

3. LJ reports to the Chief Executive.

4. I wonder what that tells us about who is the de facto DoF?

Our model seems a bit of a mess really.

The scouting somewhat of a choppy structure all told, based on LinkedIn and who is scouting and in what position anyway. Could be inaccurate I guess. However the model...on paper great, but seems to have some  gaping holes/flaws. As you say no DoF which is quite unusual.

[hoxton casual]

10 minutes ago, spudski said:

I'd have to check as I don't Know...however...like us, they are trying to compete in this division by finding value in players that are considered under valued the majority of the time and are willing to give players a chance, whilst not having experience in this division. They've made many connections abroad, especially with scouting and development players.

yep they seem far more canny with foreign scouting and agents. I think our focus on British only is short-sighted.

[Davefevs]

19 hours ago, YorkshireSection said:

Yes we've had injuries and LJ is now publicly asking for his team to be strengthened with funds from SL & the board.

A few things that bother me about this ;

why wait until the transfer window is shut and just over a week until the loan market closes to address the problem. We are not just a player short are we....

How can we be so far away from having the correct balance and personnel, with 4 games already played! is the loan market going to provide us what we need.

If we were looking at the loan market to say solely, replace an injury to a CB, then that would be ok, obviously providing you had the said player in mind and knew he was a realistic target.

Why send out ZV to a rival, especially when BW is injured, Baker is a sick note and doesn't seem to want to be here.

Why are we IMHO, still without a strong spine to the team. We lack a commanding Keeper, to organise and dominate in set pieces. A ball winning leader at CB, someone like......Flint. How about a creative CM or 1 who can put his foot in and give us some much needed bite. Last but not least a big, ugly CF, who will hold up play, be a ball ache at set pieces at both ends and most importantly, be in the middle for our wingers to target, we finally get the service and threat correct from the flanks, but unbelievably have np big man to cash in on the crosses.

This transfer window has been a farce. 

I firmly believe that public whimper, his cry for help is just too little, too late. I give LJ until XMAS.

The current balance of this squad screams out problems, serious problems

 

I think it was said a bit for effect....I think he’s had his money this summer, and he knows it.

5 hours ago, RobintheRed Red said:

Plus allowing Duric to move with no replacement

We sold Reid and Djuric, we brought in Weimann and Eisa.  The elephant in the room is Diedhiou’s ban.  Once returned, the need for a striker diminishes.  You could question whether we could’ve persuaded Djúric to hang around til the end of the month though? 

6 minutes ago, hoxton casual said:

yep they seem far more canny with foreign scouting and agents. I think our focus on British only is short-sighted.

Dean Smith said that they don’t use statistics, whereas that seems to be the route into the funnel.

[man in the middle]

6 hours ago, hoxton casual said:

I give you Brentford FC. They have smaller budgets than us and attract far more talent. Something is wrong in the scouting/negotiating part of the recruitment system. We cannot rely on an Level 2 Academy to get us where we want to get to. We need to be canny in the market. Do players not want to come here because they don't believe in LJ, and the overall set up? In the dark days of Bristol Rugby pre-Pat Lam, any talented player would not touch Bristol with a barge pole because of Robinson.

Lets hope we can show some real clever moves with loans in the next few weeks but the experience of Kent/Leko not being played may count against us. Not playing Da Silva until last 20 minutes of game 4 does not also give a great view to Premiership clubs that their loans will play regularly.

I think another reason young players don’t want to come sometimes is because it’s Bristol and not London, that’s one of the reasons Freeman and  Bolasie left.

 

[chinapig]

13 minutes ago, hoxton casual said:

yep they seem far more canny with foreign scouting and agents. I think our focus on British only is short-sighted.

Possibly, but so was our belief that European signings guaranteed value. I well remember Ashton saying there weren't many gems in the lower leagues so would be shopping in Europe.

Typically, we have gone from one extreme to another.

[Rob k]

44 minutes ago, Kid in the Riot said:

That's the rhetoric coming out of the club mate, all the while it's boom time for our off-field revenue and crowds have never been higher (they'll be top 10 in the Championship again this year). Steve Lansdown continues to make more money each month than most of us will in our lifetimes and clubs I would consider 'smaller' than us continue to find a way to get promoted from this division. I still think if he really wanted to 'go for it' he could, whether that would involve breaking the rules or not - he could afford it. Entirely up to him of course. But other clubs have found ways to do it on a budget and Lansdown has said himself that our budget is not small - I suspect around midtable. 

I agree - Bournemouth did it by breaking FFP, QPR got away with it however SL is not going to do it, our budget won’t be small but I suspect if league posistion was decided by it we would be coming in around 15th 

[ScottishRed]

6 hours ago, Mr Popodopolous said:

Actually think a lot of PL sides can be quite lazy in scouting because they are so cash rich. Easy when you have a lot of cash to look at player here or abroad, and as Andy off Little Britain 'I want that one.' That said, get what you're saying- we need a top class scouting network. Atletico a strong example, Brentford one closer to home-  Italian clubs are a good place to look for this, plenty re-invest wisely- because they have limited cash so have to make each pound count.

In a sense risking short-term future, but actually such is wage inflation with young players in the UK, not wholly convinced that a lot of those Wolves players (from Porto etc) were on such big wages when signed. Very shrewd (if ethically debatable) of Wolves IMO and of course it would have brought about losses, but not by as much as people may think.

The 'Wolves' model is very smart. I read the the weekend that Man City see Neves as a target next summer - £60m, so, if it happens, £45m profit.

If they do get relegated they have a good few talented players who they can sell at a profit and stave off any FFP concerns, along with the fact that they have £100m+ in the bank. This will allow them to 'go again' as someone I know, says frequently!

It would appear that Forest are going down the same direction of travel and if it works for them following on from Wolves success last year, you can bet a few more will follow suit next season.

Its another step to PL2 but I suspect that won't be troubling us.

[ScottishRed]

23 minutes ago, man in the middle said:

I think another reason young players don’t want to come sometimes is because it’s Bristol and not London, that’s one of the reasons Freeman and  Bolasie left.

 

That's  the same Bolasie that , I assume, lives in the North West currently and may well be moving to the North East!

 

[man in the middle]

43 minutes ago, ScottishRed said:

That's  the same Bolasie that , I assume, lives in the North West currently and may well be moving to the North East!

 

The club openly said at the time of moving to palace that he wanted to move back to London. But when Everton came calling I assume he could overlook that one due to probably a large pay rise? 

[Mr Popodopolous]

1 hour ago, ScottishRed said:

The 'Wolves' model is very smart. I read the the weekend that Man City see Neves as a target next summer - £60m, so, if it happens, £45m profit.

If they do get relegated they have a good few talented players who they can sell at a profit and stave off any FFP concerns, along with the fact that they have £100m+ in the bank. This will allow them to 'go again' as someone I know, says frequently!

It would appear that Forest are going down the same direction of travel and if it works for them following on from Wolves success last year, you can bet a few more will follow suit next season.

Its another step to PL2 but I suspect that won't be troubling us.

PL2 has been mooted for many years. I remember it in the early 2000's...think with size of out potential fanbase we might be involved in such a hypothetical setup tbh. I'm always against it though, current system of meritocracy is as it should be!

Agree on Wolves. Forest and Wolves models are similar but different, Forest seem to have gone down a route that I'm unconvinced will be allowed- I see the similarities but debt write-offs by new owners- if that's disregarded they  could well be breaking the financial rules such as they are.

However yeah, super agents to get players through mutual connections on not huge wages in ways like Wolves and Villa have done, very smart.

[Back of the net]

The model of buy young, sell high and reinvest is not the problem, providing we continue to grow with it.

Our ability to pay higher wages should increase year on year, we should be strengthening the first team and squad depth. 

Now we’re at a stage where it’s likely to take £7-8m + on a player and paying £30k wages and we’ve bottled it and reverted to false economies. 

Look at what Burnley did with Andre Gray. That’s the point where we should now be at, attracting those players and still keeping with budget and within FFP because of outgoings. 

 

[Kid in the Riot]

2 hours ago, chinapig said:

And plenty of smaller, similar size and bigger clubs haven't got promotion, so I'm never quite sure what this proves.

Surely most Championship clubs, and a few League One clubs (with a certain obvious exception)  could say the same thing? In which case why haven't they all been promoted?

Name me a bigger club than us that hasn't played Premier League football. The only contender I can see is Preston...

1 hour ago, Rob k said:

I agree - Bournemouth did it by breaking FFP, QPR got away with it however SL is not going to do it, our budget won’t be small but I suspect if league posistion was decided by it we would be coming in around 15th 

I agree he won't go for it and all the while he doesn't, and employs inexperienced people in key roles at the club, people can and will question how much he REALLY wants Prem football.

[chinapig]

16 minutes ago, Kid in the Riot said:

Name me a bigger club than us that hasn't played Premier League football. The only contender I can see is Preston...

I agree he won't go for it and all the while he doesn't, and employs inexperienced people in key roles at the club, people can and will question how much he REALLY wants Prem football.

Ah, so you're talking about a longer period rather than just the current regime. In which case, fair comment.

[BobBobSuperBob]

1 minute ago, billywedlock said:

Some very good comments on here.

I am a little surprised that we are taking on board the transfer policy excuses. If I was SL I would be saying to LJ, well yes we sold Flint, but we signed Webster for 3.5 M rising to 5.5 M. That was after we got in Flints replacement, a year earlier, Baker for 4.5 M (Villa accounts) . Yes Reid was sold, but we did bring in a player from Derby, who is paid (probably) multiple times more that Reid was. Bryan of course was a last minute sale, however we let Maggers go as you felt Kelly was going to fill that position. Bryan was replaced with a top Chelsea youth player who played a full season in L1 with great success. Yes we are struggling with CB  injuries, but why did we loan a CB to another Championship club, when you had doubts about BW fitness from pre season, and Moore is not yet ready. You wanted leaders, where are they ? You got rid of the players that formed that group that made new player integration so hard. 

We lost 3 very good players it is true, for mixed reasons, one was certainly wages , or that started to get people looking around, but also they lost belief. In the club, LJ, whoever, but there was never any doubt for all 3 of them, they would not be in the Premiership with BCFC. 

When you lose that hope, or belief it becomes a great load. A load that has as we know reached the terraces (stands) and most certainly the rest of the squad. Others will know the wages the 3 that left are getting, they also know they are not getting promoted anytime soon with BCFC. 

I cannot for one second believe SL wants to settle for this level of football. But he may have understood, even with his wealth, he cannot affords to fund a Prem push. Even that I am struggling a little with as a thought process, as the cost is what, 30 or 40 m, and he was spent a lot more than that. I actually believe January transfers were the breakpoint for much and many at the club. I do not feel SL is convinced himself of what is happening right now and no matter what anyone says, Diony and Kent were our targets, they were the players LJ wanted and were far from the economy option.. But SL has a very low level coaching set up, surely you would want far better if you need to work to this business plan ?

I will be interested to see how Bristol Rugby get on this year, because the approach there could not be more different, and I think on paper they have everything to compete at the top of the table. That may make SL think again. He has spoken about becoming less reliant on his money, but the best exit he could have is to get into the Prem and sell the club if he wants to have an exit strategy. But we will not get promoted to the Prem with the current approach and complete inexperience off the field. The club need to create hope, and it needs someone to become the leader. It is not LJ. We need much much better. He should have been a number 2 or looking after the Academy for a few years at a top club. I see no leaders on the pitch either, and the real worry, and I think why so early fans are concerned, is that we know what a relegation side looks like too. In the next 2 months, there needs a quantum change in gears on and off the field, or we are looking at our worst fears. 

At the centre of all this is SL he has to decide what he really wants, and then be convinced by it. If it is break even and survival, that is fine too, but everyone at the club has to stop talking about the Prem. It can remain a dream, and one day who knows.

Let's hope something useful comes out of the QPR game to get the season rolling. 

Great post 

Really really good imho  , thoughtful , well written and argued / points

Tip my hat 

[RobintheRed Red]

5 hours ago, Davefevs said:

I think it was said a bit for effect....I think he’s had his money this summer, and he knows it.

We sold Reid and Djuric, we brought in Weimann and Eisa.  The elephant in the room is Diedhiou’s ban.  Once returned, the need for a striker diminishes.  You could question whether we could’ve persuaded Djúric to hang around til the end of the month though? 

Dean Smith said that they don’t use statistics, whereas that seems to be the route into the funnel.

Even allowing that fammy will be back soon we still need another striker if he gets a long term injury were stuffed again with the likes of Taylor whom I had great hopes for this season and Eisa is still a season away for the Championship

[Alessandro]

On 19/08/2018 at 08:29, spudski said:

Whilst the Clubs philosophy is admirable...It's not going to give us a chance of any type of Promotion in the near future.

However...I'm not sure of a solution anymore, as we cannot compete with the amount of money floating around in this division. And it's only going to get worse imo.

What we have developed is way of competing in this division, without the money, that will give us a chance to establish ourselves in the division, but not a chance in hell of promotion.

It's a catch 22 tbh.

When fans talk about brining in a new coach or manager, I'm not sure there are many out there that would agree to work under the Clubs philosophy...as it is long term, and the majority of managers work short term. It's how it is...regardless of what's agreed at interview stage. Once a manager or coach has got that 3-4 year contract under his belt, the mindset is all about self survival, not Club survival, as it's their career...they need short term success to keep in the shop window.

I can see us becoming like the 'Crewe' of the Championship if we continue in the same philosophy. LJ being like Dario Gradi.

Whilst I believe LJ wants the philosophy to work, he's now finding out how difficult it's going to be, especially when you do have a half decent season and you lose 3 of your better players in one go. That's the future under this philosophy.

At some point the pressure will become too much and either he will leave, or get sacked, and the next coach manager will be an inexperienced coach or manager at this level, who see's it as a big opportunity and will say anything to get the job.

Not many experienced managers would come here and actually work with the Clubs philosophy.

I can see it becoming like when Mick was at Ipswich...knowing the limitations and doing the best you can...being very honest in interviews but with an air of frustration as deep down you know you are just keeping a ship afloat.

Excellent post @spudski and very much my thoughts - I said similar things in another thread. It's very much catch 22 for BCFC.

I was listening to someone on the radio today, maybe Burnley chief exec (?) and he talked about how vital it is these days to be ready for the premier league when you're promoted.

Not just in a football sense, but more importantly in a commercial sense.

FWIW - my feelings are that SL wants (in the shorter term) the club to work along the self-sustainability idea, making steady progress, one step at a time on and off the pitch. Putting all the pieces in place, the pieces we don't see as fans on Saturday afternoons. The sponsorship, the academy, the training facilities, etc etc, many of which are expensive to put in place. From a financial view, he probably can't do it all in a year or two whilst funding the 10's a millions needed in the squad too. 

My hope, is that when these pieces are in place, he will find the cash to plunge into a real promotion push, so were we promoted we would be in a much better position to attract the best youth in our area and compete commercially to tap the millions of the premier league. 

For now, we're all seeing that as long as the team is ticking along in this division, he is probably happy, be it with LJ or not. But clearly he's invested in LJ now, so I can't see him going.

Yes, we can all point to numerous examples of LJ getting it wrong tactically, or with the starting line up, or in a press conference or with a new signing - but so does every manager in football. I think the people who are willing to take a step back and look at the bigger picture will see that what happens on the pitch, is the end product of a whole line of people and processes. 

Or in simple English - not everything that goes on on the pitch is down to the manager.

[Mr Popodopolous]

4 hours ago, Kid in the Riot said:

Name me a bigger club than us that hasn't played Premier League football. The only contender I can see is Preston...

I agree he won't go for it and all the while he doesn't, and employs inexperienced people in key roles at the club, people can and will question how much he REALLY wants Prem football.

A few questions on this:

• How do you propose he goes for it? Could you elaborate?
• Inexperienced? Over what time frame- Coppell had a wealth of experience- which went well. James, Hunt, Stewart,, Stead to name 4 (probably missed a few) all experienced in Championship and above.
• O'Driscoll had managed for 11 or 12 years. Quite well for the most part...until his stint here. Is that not experience.
• Mervrn Day, while not fantastic, isn't inexperienced in the Scouting Dept. Find it odd though that he was promoted from International Scout to Head Scout or whatever the titles were, when his experience is grounded in UK- why was MLJ not replaced with someone with a similar skillset and experience internationally. Mathieu Louis Jean I believe found or played a key role in finding Kodjia.
• Lil Fuccillio has been in and around scouting since 2008- again fairly experienced I'd say.

Otoh though, yeah the coaching team has not been in management/assisting as managers long atm, but it's a mixed bag and not entirely true to speak about inexperience and lack of desire IMO.

@Alessandro

Funny you should mention about best talent in area. Southampton obviously seem to hoover up a certain amount, and I would also suggest down the years (could be changing now) Exeter. What did/do they do that we didn't? Ollie Watkins one prime and recent example.

[cidered abroad]

Several very well thought out posts. 

Running a Championship football club is now a really complicated financial business and I consider that many of us may not fully appreciate this. 

What Bristol City seem to adept at in the last twenty five years, is having a blinkered approach to what our existence depends on. 

A team, of coaches and players that are competent enough, at a realistic cost, to keep us afloat at this level without the regular yo-yo of visiting League One every few years. 

If we cannot afford to pay to bring top wage earners in on the playing side, at least have an experienced coaching staff to develop our own Academy boys and young recruits "For the Future", to perform competently at this level for a couple of years before they are sold on. 

We are penny pinching in both management and playing staff. It's like having a school class of sixteen year olds being taught by eighteen year old teachers. It just does not produce any solid results. 

[havanatopia]

8 hours ago, hoxton casual said:

yep they seem far more canny with foreign scouting and agents. I think our focus on British only is short-sighted.

I don't believe it is inspite of no foreign signings this summer. Did Ashton actually come out and say that? If he did he is less qualified for his job than I thought.

8 hours ago, chinapig said:

Possibly, but so was our belief that European signings guaranteed value. I well remember Ashton saying there weren't many gems in the lower leagues so would be shopping in Europe.

Typically, we have gone from one extreme to another.

There is a level of naivety there if that were the case. I am not convinced the club have shut the door on overseas at all.

6 hours ago, Mr Popodopolous said:

PL2 has been mooted for many years. I remember it in the early 2000's...think with size of out potential fanbase we might be involved in such a hypothetical setup tbh. I'm always against it though, current system of meritocracy is as it should be.

Where is the meritocracy? It went the day the PL began.

Right now the FL are saying this; if you have been to the prem before you are favourites to go back up. As for the rest of you we love u so much we want u here with us so here is our big FFP stick which we are going to beat you with.

Trouble is the stick is a thin bamboo pole which breaks easily enabling the owners with cojones to gamble, pay a negotiated tiddly fine and get promoted.

There is no meritocracy a definition of which I would understand. If the Championship was one division with no promotion to the star ship Galactica maybe.