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Holden - sack or keep?


Major Isewater

Holden - sack or keep?   

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3 hours ago, Street red said:

That's exactly what this is take Williams for example he's had previous with a thigh injury Mawson his knee etc etc We are paying the price for having a CEO recruiting players getting these sort of players reduces the price which makes Ashtons figures look good.

Precisely.
And then he hopes to sell them on at a profit. IMO Ashton is taking the piss out of this football club, as we all know what happens when he runs out of “family silver” to sell. The club is going backwards currently, don’t really understand why some on here can’t see it as it is blindingly obvious to me.

Losing interest in City currently which is a real shame as started supporting them as a 12 year old when they got promoted to the old Div 1. 
Ashton needs to go and FAST. He is in the process of screwing this club. FFS wake up SL.

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33 minutes ago, GasDestroyer said:

Precisely.
And then he hopes to sell them on at a profit. IMO Ashton is taking the piss out of this football club, as we all know what happens when he runs out of “family silver” to sell. The club is going backwards currently, don’t really understand why some on here can’t see it as it is blindingly obvious to me.

Losing interest in City currently which is a real shame as started supporting them as a 12 year old when they got promoted to the old Div 1. 
Ashton needs to go and FAST. He is in the process of screwing this club. FFS wake up SL.

The re-incarnation of Tony Rance !

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56 minutes ago, GasDestroyer said:

Precisely.
And then he hopes to sell them on at a profit. IMO Ashton is taking the piss out of this football club, as we all know what happens when he runs out of “family silver” to sell. The club is going backwards currently, don’t really understand why some on here can’t see it as it is blindingly obvious to me.

Losing interest in City currently which is a real shame as started supporting them as a 12 year old when they got promoted to the old Div 1. 
Ashton needs to go and FAST. He is in the process of screwing this club. FFS wake up SL.

It stands out like a sore thumb and yes he is taking the piss,I've not been a fan of his since day 1 and it's definitely not going to start now.. We give a ***t about this football club more than he ever will! 

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7 hours ago, Kid in the Riot said:

I wouldn't say inevitable because as confirmed by football financial experts such as Swiss Ramble and Kieran Maguire, we do actually have plenty of headroom in regard to FFP. We could afford to offer those players new deals, if we wanted to. The current climate does however provide an opportunity to clear the decks and start again. I am merely speculating that it is more likely we will let a new proper manager help steer that recruitment instead of Dean Holden. 

I really hope I'm right. 

Big caveat here.

Those figures were for 3 normal seasons.

What nobody yet knows is the following:

1) Which costs/losses specifically will be excluded from FFP over this and last season? EFL site suggests "Covid costs" but devil is in the detail.

2) As part of the rejig, this and last year were rolled into one year where the result of 2019/20 and 2020/21 are added up and then halved- after relevant deductions and whatever allowances for Covid.

3) Clubs in general including us might have less revenue over the next couple of seasons. Economic uncertainty...but then again wages might fall.

4) Owing to that roll up the 2017/18 £25m loss remains on the books. As will the PL and Championship results, and all clubs have their March 2021 submissions to consider.

(Structure usually is T, T-1 and T-2 but is currently T-3 (2017/18, T-2 and T-1 and T combined).

If you look online you'll see lots, perhaps a majority of players still out of contract not yet renewed at our level. Certainly in the age bracket of 23-30!

5) More material uncertainty. Due to the roll up the 2017/18 still remains on the books, but will that roll up continue into 2021/22?

If it reverts back to normal, the new starting point would be 2019/20 £10m loss, denying us the chance to utilise in full our 2018/19 profit.

Assessments are in-season remember, as well as forward and backward.

I must add we seem to be better placed than many at our level but just how big an advantage remains to be seen.

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This summer will see a huge challenge for the club (all clubs). People keep quoting the external reports that claim we are well placed for FFP, well those numbers are retrospective and do not include the huge losses we are building up this season. You would think the loss of crowd income will be mitigated in the calculations, but with no sales , our income is rock bottom, and our wage bill now very high. We cannot afford to offer contracts to the OOC players because we will have to cut the wage bill by millions. In that context, it makes sense that we will have to use the younger players more (ridiculous that we stopped signing young talent mind) . So when they do decide to dump Ashton and Holden, and if the owner does not, then he needs to go as well, we need a substantial reset in how the coaching and player identification process is managed. 

We missed the boat 18 months ago, held onto LJ too long, and then made an almighty mess up of the replacement and the coaches hired. To put all this right is not going to attract the people we could have back then, that ship has sailed, but we still have enough to offer to someone who has the desire the create something special. The way we are going, you would think, and we are specialists at this, next season looks like a relegation battle. All of the elements are in place for that, awful signings, poor coaching, no direction. 

 The owner is the one that needs to up his game first, it is in his hands. He needs urgent help to build a club for the next phase of development.But if he thinks all is good, then how many failings under his watch is it going to take before he accepts that his approach is not a good one. If he carries on as is, then he risks destroying his own personal credibility , and in turn, his frustration at not having the fan base blindly follow his every move (and he has clearly shown he believes the fans should be eternally grateful to him) he will sell the club. That would be a shame, he has funded more than adequately the club, but the money has been so badly deployed. He deserves his day out in the Prem, but he is not seeing that anytime soon if he carries on with his approach. 

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I take absolutely no pleasure at all in voting for Dean to be removed but he has to. I do feel he's a victim of both the situation and the somewhat cynical way the club have handled the pandemic and its' effect on finances.

A scapegoat, no doubt a well paid one but a scapegoat all the same. 

I couldn't decide between now and at the end of the season but the present awful football is hardly going to tempt anyone wavering over whether to renew (if we can) while a new incumbent may, plus they could also assess those that are OOC in matchday situ.

If the vote was about MA, I would suggest it would be an even larger majority. 

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8 minutes ago, Psychopomp said:

This summer will see a huge challenge for the club (all clubs). People keep quoting the external reports that claim we are well placed for FFP, well those numbers are retrospective and do not include the huge losses we are building up this season. You would think the loss of crowd income will be mitigated in the calculations, but with no sales , our income is rock bottom, and our wage bill now very high. We cannot afford to offer contracts to the OOC players because we will have to cut the wage bill by millions. In that context, it makes sense that we will have to use the younger players more (ridiculous that we stopped signing young talent mind) . So when they do decide to dump Ashton and Holden, and if the owner does not, then he needs to go as well, we need a substantial reset in how the coaching and player identification process is managed. 

We missed the boat 18 months ago, held onto LJ too long, and then made an almighty mess up of the replacement and the coaches hired. To put all this right is not going to attract the people we could have back then, that ship has sailed, but we still have enough to offer to someone who has the desire the create something special. The way we are going, you would think, and we are specialists at this, next season looks like a relegation battle. All of the elements are in place for that, awful signings, poor coaching, no direction. 

 The owner is the one that needs to up his game first, it is in his hands. He needs urgent help to build a club for the next phase of development.But if he thinks all is good, then how many failings under his watch is it going to take before he accepts that his approach is not a good one. If he carries on as is, then he risks destroying his own personal credibility , and in turn, his frustration at not having the fan base blindly follow his every move (and he has clearly shown he believes the fans should be eternally grateful to him) he will sell the club. That would be a shame, he has funded more than adequately the club, but the money has been so badly deployed. He deserves his day out in the Prem, but he is not seeing that anytime soon if he carries on with his approach. 

Agree with a reasonable chunk of what you say, but if a lot of other clubs are in a similar or worse boat financially this will mitigate the downsides that you point out.

Might even push wages down, and again if the roll up continues that £10m profit in 2018/19, net of allowable costs will put us ahead of a lot of clubs.

The lack of contract renewals across the division feels quite notable at this time.

I think we still have a window of opportunity but it has to be this summer. We get this summer wrong and we've got big problems moving forward.

Think we should be looking strongly at free agents this summer, in the Championship. Lots of decent ones might be available this summer.

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4 minutes ago, Mr Popodopolous said:

Agree with a reasonable chunk of what you say, but if a lot of other clubs are in a similar or worse boat financially this will mitigate the downsides that you point out.

Might even push wages down, and again if the roll up continues that £10m profit in 2018/19, net of allowable costs will put us ahead of a lot of clubs.

The lack of contract renewals across the division feels quite notable at this time.

I think we still have a window of opportunity but it has to be this summer. We get this summer wrong and we've got big problems moving forward.

Think we should be looking strongly at free agents this summer, in the Championship. Lots of decent ones might be available this summer.

Yes wages will decrease, but that is not going to help you with contracts that are still current. Palmer, Kalas, Wells etc. So your ability to dump wages from your fixed costs is related to either selling or not renewing. We have no choice to not renew the contracts expiring as it is the only way to get the spiralling wage bill , not under control, but pointed back down. I do not see the big window of opportunity you describe, unless the FFP calculations are modified due to Covid in a way that favours us. Even losing the players OOC our wage bill, and losses will be enormous. That we might be less in the mess compared to others is true, but there is no great window of investment , the window is just one to rapidly dump costs and contain losses . Our ability to sign players in the summer, even at reduced market wages, will still be very very limited. We will need to use the under 23 squad far more. No bad thing IMHO. There will be lots of free agents, let's hope some of them are up and coming talents not journeymen average players. Whatever, it is going to need a damn good recruitment team and coaching to put it all together. With no incoming transfer fees from the Prem, it is melt down time for the Championship . A well run club that gets parachute payments will be so so far ahead of the rest. 

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38 minutes ago, Psychopomp said:

Yes wages will decrease, but that is not going to help you with contracts that are still current. Palmer, Kalas, Wells etc. So your ability to dump wages from your fixed costs is related to either selling or not renewing. We have no choice to not renew the contracts expiring as it is the only way to get the spiralling wage bill , not under control, but pointed back down. I do not see the big window of opportunity you describe, unless the FFP calculations are modified due to Covid in a way that favours us. Even losing the players OOC our wage bill, and losses will be enormous. That we might be less in the mess compared to others is true, but there is no great window of investment , the window is just one to rapidly dump costs and contain losses . Our ability to sign players in the summer, even at reduced market wages, will still be very very limited. We will need to use the under 23 squad far more. No bad thing IMHO. There will be lots of free agents, let's hope some of them are up and coming talents not journeymen average players. Whatever, it is going to need a damn good recruitment team and coaching to put it all together. With no incoming transfer fees from the Prem, it is melt down time for the Championship . A well run club that gets parachute payments will be so so far ahead of the rest. 

A well run club with Parachute Payments (plus the carrying over of the higher loss limit in the PL) will absolutely have an advantage you're entirely right.

It's a hugely important summer I agree. Management, coaching, recruitment it has to be on point. I personally think it's been a mixed bag, now it has to be very good indeed.

Wages will drop off. So too will amortisation and if a lot of our signings are frees and loans there is still time to turn the tide IMO.

I'd say Brentford if they stay down would be quite well placed. Some parachute clubs in particular of course, Swansea to an extent if they stay down. Barnsley, Luton, Preston seem to have fairly low cost bases.

Millwall seem to have spent a bit more than usual of late, guess they had a bit of room for manoeuvre.

If the new starting point is the £10m profit that'll put us ahead of a lot, if it's a £10m loss then it'll mean that the rollup was one season only and the worst of all worlds.

We can only speculate as to the model next season. To have a rollup then a switch back at the same loss limits would be an odd way to proceed...and we more than many would lose out!

The window of opportunity might arise as removed wages, removed amortisation. Lot of decent free agents, wages in general falling. If starting point £10m profit our headroom will be higher than a lot of competitors. It's very much a one hit opportunity though, we get it wrong and we're hamstrung for a while moving forward.

When other clubs, a fair few anyway, accounts are out it'll make our position look markedly better.

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As for Holden, I have some sympathy because I'd be interested to see what he could have done if half (I exaggerate for effect) the squad wasn't injured on a rolling basis. FFS, even recalled loanees got injured- he's surely 100% blameless with respect to the injuries. He makes some curious tactical decisions though- and the whole throw on all the strikers when chasing wore a bit thin, seems to have been varied now. High balls to Diedhiou when chasing the game v Cardiff- vs 3 big CBs- made little sense.

However it feels like it could be a hold the fort for the year, steady the ship- and then look with a bit more ambition in the summer. Clotet at Birmingham a similar precedent, potentially Bowen at Reading too albeit that decision was made much later- though if they don't go up FFP issues surely await.

Tindall at Bournemouth a similar one perhaps. Hold the ship through Covid- downsize on relegation, look to go again in Summer 2021?

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2 hours ago, Psychopomp said:

This summer will see a huge challenge for the club (all clubs). People keep quoting the external reports that claim we are well placed for FFP, well those numbers are retrospective and do not include the huge losses we are building up this season. You would think the loss of crowd income will be mitigated in the calculations, but with no sales , our income is rock bottom, and our wage bill now very high. We cannot afford to offer contracts to the OOC players because we will have to cut the wage bill by millions. In that context, it makes sense that we will have to use the younger players more (ridiculous that we stopped signing young talent mind) . So when they do decide to dump Ashton and Holden, and if the owner does not, then he needs to go as well, we need a substantial reset in how the coaching and player identification process is managed. 

We missed the boat 18 months ago, held onto LJ too long, and then made an almighty mess up of the replacement and the coaches hired. To put all this right is not going to attract the people we could have back then, that ship has sailed, but we still have enough to offer to someone who has the desire the create something special. The way we are going, you would think, and we are specialists at this, next season looks like a relegation battle. All of the elements are in place for that, awful signings, poor coaching, no direction. 

 The owner is the one that needs to up his game first, it is in his hands. He needs urgent help to build a club for the next phase of development.But if he thinks all is good, then how many failings under his watch is it going to take before he accepts that his approach is not a good one. If he carries on as is, then he risks destroying his own personal credibility , and in turn, his frustration at not having the fan base blindly follow his every move (and he has clearly shown he believes the fans should be eternally grateful to him) he will sell the club. That would be a shame, he has funded more than adequately the club, but the money has been so badly deployed. He deserves his day out in the Prem, but he is not seeing that anytime soon if he carries on with his approach. 

By my spreadsheets I estimate we will save £5m on wages and £5m on amortisation off we don’t re-contract any of the players who expire this summer.  So, £10m saved.  But I think income will be down £12m (possibly more), and then you load the cost/income deficit and I reckon we are staring a £30m loss in the face....minus any transfer profit from sales where realistically Bentley is the only players we might clear several million.  I don’t see another player who’d clear £1m based on current value, because I think to get anyone off the wage bill you are gonna subsidise the transfer fee.

Pretty stark.

So, some big, big decisions to be made.  The only positive is that the remaining contracted players leaves a reasonable foundation to start again from.

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20 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

By my spreadsheets I estimate we will save £5m on wages and £5m on amortisation off we don’t re-contract any of the players who expire this summer.  So, £10m saved.  But I think income will be down £12m (possibly more), and then you load the cost/income deficit and I reckon we are staring a £30m loss in the face....minus any transfer profit from sales where realistically Bentley is the only players we might clear several million.  I don’t see another player who’d clear £1m based on current value, because I think to get anyone off the wage bill you are gonna subsidise the transfer fee.

Pretty stark.

So, some big, big decisions to be made.  The only positive is that the remaining contracted players leaves a reasonable foundation to start again from.

I agree, pretty stark. We will not have money to sign players for a fee ( Baker, Fam, Weimann were all sunken money, with no upside or partial return on spend) . So OOC players, and I hope, a focus on using the younger players. THey will need to learn and grow quickly, but more fun watching that , than a bunch of has beens who never ever made it higher anyway. 

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I voted keep till end of season. 

Its 3 things: 1 its covid season lets keep the costs down and 2: With MA in charge its not gonna make much diff if new manager comes in now due to all our injuries. (You do got to question why we so easily injured) 3: MA controls the wages/contracts and signs the players in right? He agrees/disagrees to who comes in and who to big for yes? (i may be wrong i am the un-informative one afterall), but if true, new manager now vs in the summer? Both need to go. MA cos he is sitting happily on 500k per yr doing the bare minimum and DH for not being able to to cut it in this league. 

Thats my 2 pence. 

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20 minutes ago, CrazyInWeston said:

I voted keep till end of season. 

Its 3 things: 1 its covid season lets keep the costs down and 2: With MA in charge its not gonna make much diff if new manager comes in now due to all our injuries. (You do got to question why we so easily injured) 3: MA controls the wages/contracts and signs the players in right? He agrees/disagrees to who comes in and who to big for yes? (i may be wrong i am the un-informative one afterall), but if true, new manager now vs in the summer? Both need to go. MA cos he is sitting happily on 500k per yr doing the bare minimum and DH for not being able to to cut it in this league. 

Thats my 2 pence. 

I’m no fan of Ashton, but how do we know he’s doing the ‘bare minimum’? We don’t. 

For all we know; he may have actively identified plenty of good players in January but they didn’t want to come or play under Holden.

I’d like to see Ashton go, but I think criticism should be levelled at what we can see and measure. His choice to appoint Holden being one of those factors.

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I voted to sack now, and that goes for the assistants too. Sadly, I have no confidence that the current coaching team will improve things. Yes they’ve had to contend with a horrendous run of injuries, but the way we play lacks any shape or coherence, let alone any flair. We need someone to galvanise the team and get them organised and playing to a system. 
 

And for what it’s worth, MA and the medical team should go too. Our recruitment strategy leaves me perplexed, and the number of injuries we’ve had makes me think that something is badly wrong somewhere. 
 

It really feels like we are at a crossroads. The sense of momentum we had in that season when we got to the League Cup semi final seems like a distant memory. Compared to that team, we  have few players who are assets. We lack leaders on the pitch. We sign players seemingly on a whim or in desperation and then don’t know how to use them. Our playing style is dire. When fans are allowed back to games, I can imagine quite a few of the supporters who attended to get our crowds up to an average of 20K won’t want to bother after what’s been served up for quite a long time. 
 

A fresh start is needed. 

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17 hours ago, Mr Popodopolous said:

As for Holden, I have some sympathy because I'd be interested to see what he could have done if half (I exaggerate for effect) the squad wasn't injured on a rolling basis. FFS, even recalled loanees got injured- he's surely 100% blameless with respect to the injuries.

This is the main reason why I voted the third option. How can you work at your best if you have to cope with continuous injuries and change/try things because of it?  The second one is financial/Covid-related. Both make me think that appointing a new/better manager right now wouldn't change much: obviously if things got worse (dropping too much in the league's table), sacking would become unavoidable.

 

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8 hours ago, Offside said:

Our recruitment strategy leaves me perplexed

You are obviously very much ITK so would be interesting if you could explain exactly what the strategy is that leaves you in such a quandary.

51 minutes ago, Major Isewater said:

Looks like we’re safe for the moment.

God no not Tisdale.

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19 hours ago, Phileas Fogg said:

but how do we know he’s doing the ‘bare minimum’? We don’t. 

I understand, but that was 'my 2 pence' As a how I feel, in my opinion. I think someone said he was a WBA fan? I don't know if true. But sitting on 500k a year seems pretty cushty to me doing what he (to me) seems to be doing. 

I haven't seen what Watford fans think of him, but apparently they (of what I have read on here) they didnt like him either. 

This is a forum, I can express my opinion. I'm not stating a fact. 

My opinion was get new manager now (who would work under MA and be a yes man) wouldnt make a diff vs in the summer. There are contracts to redo by the summer, who is staying? Who is going we dont know, but its up to MA and I think thats where some but not all where the problem lies. 

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We got the players that we got. Dont think it would be a better game from us today If we had another manager. DH is not Pep but Im sure he wants to play a better football than we play. Our team is not good enough, I accept that. When season started I told my mates we gonna have to fight avoid relegation. Then we started good and have some flow. Weimann out, thats very bad for us. Lately we are not moving the ball and players quickly. Its easy to blame DH but he dont have the right tools to make us top six.    Individual mistakes have cost us lots of points. Odowda, pen Barnsley, Moore, Bakinson etc. At the moment top six is unrealistic with DH or another manager. Things are better then we were bottom in leauge one, thinking of that Im not feeling so depressed. COYR!!!

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22 minutes ago, BetterRedthenBlue said:

Keep him until the end of the season we should be safe but in the summer bye bye Dean Holden and then show some actual intent and go out and get a decent manager like Howe, Bilic, Wagner, Carvalhal or go all out and try to get avb. 

Here we go with the ridiculous suggestions thread  Howe.... really surely he will wait til the summer when he could be in with a shout of a Prem job ( Palace). Bilic no chance he would come here. Wagner another lovely bloke... totally bombed in Germany ( s’cuse the pun). Carvahal and decent manager don’t belong in the same sentence (ask Wednesday or Swansea fans). We all know when change comes it will beAppleton or Robins.

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1 hour ago, Sir Geoff said:

Here we go with the ridiculous suggestions thread  Howe.... really surely he will wait til the summer when he could be in with a shout of a Prem job ( Palace). Bilic no chance he would come here. Wagner another lovely bloke... totally bombed in Germany ( s’cuse the pun). Carvahal and decent manager don’t belong in the same sentence (ask Wednesday or Swansea fans). We all know when change comes it will beAppleton or Robins.

I do respect your opinion but I feel we need to go for a ridiculous suggestion to take us to the next step. How do you know Bilic won't come here if you don't ask? Wagner went to Schalke when they introduced a new self imposed €2.5m per year salary cap and lost a few of their better players without being able to adequately replace them. Carvalhal I'll give you Swansea but Sheffield Wednesday isn't exactly a well run club and I'm going by his performances at Braga. 

I'm just getting a bit sick and tired of always being linked with the same people like Robins and Appleton I just want the club to show some ambition. 

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3 hours ago, BetterRedthenBlue said:

I do respect your opinion but I feel we need to go for a ridiculous suggestion to take us to the next step. How do you know Bilic won't come here if you don't ask? Wagner went to Schalke when they introduced a new self imposed €2.5m per year salary cap and lost a few of their better players without being able to adequately replace them. Carvalhal I'll give you Swansea but Sheffield Wednesday isn't exactly a well run club and I'm going by his performances at Braga. 

I'm just getting a bit sick and tired of always being linked with the same people like Robins and Appleton I just want the club to show some ambition. 

Not having a go I too am sick of hearing Robins and Appleton mentioned but they have been linked before via MA. I may be wrong but I think Bilic is already employed at a club. Would love to see the club go all out and sell the project to Howe but would he really go for it when he could still get a Prem job.

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