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Reply | "By far the most challenging season of my career!”
at 16:13 18 Mar 2025
Russell Martin only had one top half finish in his managerial career before getting the Southampton job. And that only came about at Swansea because of a late winning streak against teams already on the beach.
And there's a lot of talk about Danny Rohl probably being the next Saints manager, even though they're currently 12th in the Championship.
I hear a lot of talk about "player profiles" in the modern game. Presumably there are similar analytics techniques for managers too.
Obviously it's a results business. But if the analysts like your style then that seems to carry a lot of weight as well these days. |
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Reply | (No subject)
at 11:55 18 Mar 2025
That all seems balanced and reasonable.
I would pick up on the point you made about the relationship between Belk and Nourry:
"I don’t blame Nourry per se for the recruitment - ultimately Belk and his team provide the list of targets and Nourry just does the best deal possible for the club."
We should remember that Nourry's background is in data analysis and recruitment. And Lee Hoos praised him for this when Nourry was announced as the new CEO:
“I would like to wish Christian the very best of luck in the position. He is extremely competent and bridges a number of gaps that need to be bridged.”
“He has a proven track record of achieving success for football clubs he has worked with around the world and his expertise has already enabled us to identify and recruit two outstanding professionals."
https://www.qpr.co.uk/news/2024/january/12/christian-nourry-replaces-lee-hoos-as
Hoos by his own admission didn't really get the data analytics side of the game.
Nourry would appear to be far more savvy than that.
My point here is that Belk is surely still doing all the legwork, but Nourry is better able to guide him in what he wants and presumably can crunch the numbers himself to check what Belk serves up to him rather than taking it all at face value like Hoos and Les Ferdinand had to.
Mistakes have been made with Santos and Madsen the most obvious howlers. But that might perhaps be because we are now becoming too reliant on data and not giving enough weight to scouting. But that seems to be the modern trend in the game. Mark Warburton talked about it when he spoke to Hoopsa a while back. [Post edited 18 Mar 12:53]
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Reply | "By far the most challenging season of my career!”
at 11:17 17 Mar 2025
"I was told around the end of the Girona training camp he would likely sign the new contract"
Now you're shifting your position. First you say he signed the contract at the back end of July, and now you say you were told that he would "likely sign".
Hmm. There's a big difference in those two positions.
But either way the club didn't announce anything until the Fans Forum.
Now we're all sceptical about the timing of the announcement. Clive himself alluded to this in his write-up of the forum:
https://www.fansnetwork.co.uk/football/queensparkrangers/news/63074/and-for-my-n
"Three pieces of, ostensibly, excellent news in quick succession: a new contract for Cifuentes and his assistant Xavi Calm putting to bed for now any lingering rumours about his future; confirmation Karamoko Dembele will be signing permanently at the end of the season; and a contract extension for Jake Clarke-Salter as well.
These clearly weren’t all signed on Monday morning, they’d saved up for the occasion and you can make your own mind up on where that fits Nourry’s assertion he'll tell you everything he can as soon as he can."
But you're the one saying you know different about when Marti signed whilst offering nothing concrete to support your claims.
At the very least you should understand why others might be just as sceptical about your claims.
As for your claim that the new contract didn't need much negotiating. Well you can't have had much dealings with lawyers. They'll find problems just to justify their fees. And I doubt agents are any different. |
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Reply | "By far the most challenging season of my career!”
at 10:12 17 Mar 2025
There's a lot of rhetoric in there but no detail.
You say the new contract was signed at the "back end of July". So when did you become aware of this?
And Marti has been in the game for a while. He would know that his stock was high in the summer and that in turn increased his bargaining power. So why rush to sign the contract in July when he could wait until the transfer window closed and try to exert some influence over recruitment? |
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Reply | "By far the most challenging season of my career!”
at 08:57 17 Mar 2025
"The ‘new contract’ was signed back end of July."
The question was how did they negotiate a new contract when you say they weren't talking to each other over the summer.
It would be truly remarkable if the CEO and manager weren't talking at a time when the club were trying to tie down the manager to a new deal.
I didn't ask when the contract was signed. Although that is a remarkable level of detail for your wife's mate at Hammarby to know about our internal workings when the rest of us don't even get told how long players have signed up for!
And why would Marti be so indiscreet with this Swedish connection? Does he share confidential club information with all his former clubs? |
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Reply | "By far the most challenging season of my career!”
at 22:15 16 Mar 2025
"An owner saying "we've been too open, we're going to tell you less in future" is not a good thing. It's Bernard Matthews taking the calendars out of the turkey sheds."
100%
And it wouldn't work if we had a Warnock or a Redknapp in charge because they'd still be getting their message out through their army of tame media chums.
Maybe that was a factor in recruiting someone like Marti who had never previously worked in this country and didn't have a network of local media contacts. |
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Reply | "By far the most challenging season of my career!”
at 21:47 16 Mar 2025
The Ledesma and Saito stuff is just shrewd marketing and suggests someone at the club has their eye on the ball and isn't embarrassed by a bit of blatant opportunism.
IIRC Ruben said at the Fans Forum last season that they had been too open in the past and would be keeping a tighter grip on things in future.
At the time I thought that was a dig at Tony Fernandes and his incontinent tweeting. And maybe not such a bad idea. (Anyone checked Ruben's LinkedIn recently!)
it seems there was more to it than that.
But you're right, it doesn't make sense to big-up little Koki after one goal but not take advantage of the popularity and respect that Marti gets from most QPR fans and from most of the Championship pundits and fans of rival clubs. |
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Reply | 24 Hours in A&E - Preview
at 11:18 11 Mar 2025
"You can talk xG, xA, progressive ball movements, completed dribbles, midblock, high block, whatever you like. When you’re operating a slim squad on a limited budget, one of the key abilities you need in your players is availability."
Amen to that, brother. |
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Reply | Football Governance Bill
at 17:20 8 Mar 2025
My point about American sports is that they try to keep their sports competitive. So yes they have the draft system. They also have salary caps, or a "luxury tax" in the case of baseball:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Major_League_Baseball_luxury_tax
The aim is to keep the playing field as level as possible.
Over here we have FFP and P&S which really only serve to ringfence the power of the big clubs and make it harder for a new challenger to disrupt their elite group. |
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Reply | Football Governance Bill
at 15:12 8 Mar 2025
Well you asked for an example :-)
OK, hands up, it was a teensy overreaction, but not bad going for a Saturday morning.
On the whole I agree with this from Kensalriser:
"Regulators are fine when they’re given the tools and powers to do the job properly.
They’re not fine when they’re undermined and hobbled by governments and officials that have been compromised by the industries under regulation, ie hiring MPs as consultants etc. Then when people say regulation doesn’t work the practitioners of corruption can sit back in the satisfied knowledge that the mugs have been suckered again for just a little chump change."
As I see it the real problem is that the game seems to be run for the benefit of an elite few plus a handful of clubs fortunate enough to share the Premier League with them and whose sole purpose isn't about winning things but ensuring that they stay at the top table with the big boys, because that's where all the money is.
Since the Premier League started in 1993 the two major trophies in English football have been the property of five clubs: Arsenal; Chelsea; Liverpool; Man City; Man Utd.
Only two other clubs have won the PL (Blackburn and Leicester), and only three other clubs have won the FA Cup (Leicester, Portsmouth, and Wigan)
https://www.skysports.com/football/news/11661/13136017/premier-league-winners-fu
https://www.topendsports.com/events/soccer/fa-cup/winners.htm
In the meantime nine football clubs have gone bust since the Premier League started:
https://thefootballfreak.com/english-football-league-clubs-that-went-bust/
And lets not get started on the way big clubs hoover up young talent from the likes of us, whilst paying peanuts in compensation.
In America major sports are self-regulated. But in America they have deeply entrenched rules to ensure their sports remain competitive, and they require potential owners of clubs to stump up a huge sum of money in advance.
OK, American sports are structured differently from ours and what works there wouldn't necessarily work here. But at least their sports are genuinely competitive. They don't have dodgy owners and clubs don't go out of business.
The reason I think there is interest in an independent football regulator is because so many of the traditional fans of the game in this country have lost faith in the game's regulators to properly govern the game and want someone independent to do it. |
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Reply | Millwall keepers sending off
at 20:22 7 Mar 2025
I know it shouldn't be a factor but the one-eyed reaction from the Wawll fans might have played into the ban being extended.
Maybe the ban wouldn't have been extended if it hadn't been on TV.
And maybe the Wawll fans would have reacted differently if it hadn't been on TV and they hadn't been away to the Nigels.
But defending a keeper who charges out of his area and takes a wild head-high kick at the ball with no regard for the safety of other players is the sort of blind devotion you expect from a religious cult rather than a football fanbase.
FWIW I thought the red card was fair but a three game ban was also fair. Extending the ban is OTT. |
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Reply | Time to play our own
at 00:41 3 Mar 2025
It's getting on for two years since Tyler Roberts left us and he hasn't scored for anyone in that time
https://uk.soccerway.com/players/tyler-roberts/386239/
Pedigree, or Pedigree Chum?
Maybe it's too early to judge Nourry and perhaps he has been lucky so far. But Les Ferdinand and Chris Ramsey had strong links to Spurs and I don't recall them bringing in anyone of the quality of Morgan or Hyeok. Not even under Warburton when we were playing the sort of look after the ball football that would have suited a few bright academy prospects looking to cut their teeth in grown-up football.
Maybe there are good reasons for that. Nourry did have the good fortune of having some money to spend this season. |
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Reply | Time to play our own
at 21:58 2 Mar 2025
One thing you can say for Nourry is that the quality of player we are bringing in on loan seems to have gone up. |
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