Spurs have dispensed with the man once thought Europe’s hottest guru manager (don’t believe in guru managers). Villas Boas was a failure as manager but he was a mere symptom of their problems. Splurging circa £100m on vagrant misfits should be enough to disguise the fact that you don’t have a sustainable strategy. For a while. But primary responsibility lies with whoever authorised the budget in the first place.
Selling that chap with the funny hair to Madrid went some way towards offsetting the cost of this summer’s acquisitions, but Spurs wage bill for the new arrivals will dwarf the money paid to those who departed. This is the more serious problem.
They are left with players on long and expensive contracts who look like they auditioning for a West End show. Forget about Spurs recouping their ‘investment’, the chances of players attracting contract offers which match the cash the Cockerel coughs up each month is zero.
The Bale money is gone and those new contracts written in the summer will inhibit the club for years. What next: downsizing, or another visit to the roulette table, gambling with even bigger stakes next time?
Here’s what happens when you sell your star player: everyone and their grannie wants the money spent. “The [Insert club name] board need to show their ambition”. This comes from fans, the media, the manager, scouts, family members and every taxi driver in a 30 mile radius. And why wouldn’t they spend an apparent windfall, that’s what the money’s there for, after all.
It’s at this point clubs lose all self-awareness. Reinforced by the success which led to the development and profitable sale of a prime asset in the first place, the organisation’s view of its reach, not to mention competency, is obliterated. “We have spent money well in the past, look, here is the evidence, therefore we can spend this even larger amount of money well now”.
With this belief now orthodoxy, every pore in the organisation secretes an intoxicating scent attracting the club to market. Unfortunately, the rewards for spending big are heady and instant, though they seldom last as long as the hangover.
Directors are celebrated, ticket and merchandise sales get a short-term kick. The manager and coaches get to play with more expensive toys; quite literally, everyone is happy. This is narco-football, only accommodated by ever-bigger hits. For some, this narco-football offers proof that management share wider stakeholder aspirations. I contend otherwise.
The heresy to this orthodoxy reads differently:
Clubs should mistrust their successes, they are evidentially more random than most are prepared to accept.
Windfall transfer income is more likely to draw clubs away from the part of the market they are most competent in. It is an acknowledged fact that sellers and agents literally see them coming.
Don’t go searching for the instant hit, you’re more likely to miss. If necessary, take some short-term pain while using resources to enhance recruitment infrastructure.
Heresy in any area of life is seldom met with quiet contemplation. Narco-football heresy is more likely to be met with a rationalisation that the heretics don’t share orthodoxy’s core values – sustainable success of the football club – no matter how many references to “sustainable success of the football club” they make. It’s Salem-esque.
The orthodox-heretic analogy is evident where three or more are gathered in any club’s name. The first club who manage to unite everyone behind the heretic’s charter will clean up/reach nirvana/find salvation/achieve ultimate enlightenment/do lunch with Tom Cruise.
CQteN St Patrick’s Day Dinner is now FULLY BOOKED. Many thanks for everyone who responded so quickly. We are well on the way to raising the money to build a kitchen and shelter at the Kholoni Primary School in Malawi (for details check here).
Just a few posting days left to order your CQN Annual before Christmas, £5 from every sale goes to the Malawi appeal:
Sean Fallon: Celtic’s Iron Man:
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Twitter.
Ally’s shares where given away knowing what was coming,there is no doubt about that,this was done to sell Season Tickets.
White_italy
Craig Whyte, Charlie Green, Rafat Rizvi & Brian Stockbridge in a hotel room jumping about. Sandy & James Easdale on the way with a Cargo!!
Jobo-his brother seemingly……
Jobo Baldie
19:39
A mhan in your position and of your talent is entitled to some degree of licentia poetica.
You can play what you like and say it’s an alternative to the usual air. I heard a version of While Shepherds Watched on the radio today that was to the tune of Ilkley Moor. I’m struggling to stop singing it in my head.
the exiled tim-free the dam 5
19:40 on 17 December, 2013
Unfortunately, Football Clubs also need to make money, that is, if they want to survive…
jobo baldie
19:37 on 17 December, 2013
One last random question if I may.
Is the Limmy guy that was recently found guilty of sectarian bile via his website (or online radio show?) a completely different guy from the Scottish comedian (of ‘Limmy’s Show’ fame)? I do hope so.
_________________________________________________________________________
They’re brothers apparently!
I dont think Sally The Snowman is meltproof now………
Vmhan
I will check with the mailing house what has happened to the other copy. They may have sent as two individual packages.
Will get back to you in the morning.
CF
The war is over the Spivs have won…
Is no one asking the most important ?
Paul Murray can’t be on the board if he was on previously if club was liquidated.
THM 17.36
Too true .
1-1 after 6 matches is pathetic .
(:-)
TT
Breaking Syk news:
RIFC AGM – Board supports MAXIMUM living wage.
SFA applauds interesting innovative initiative!
Cambell Oglivie:
“What can you say? I am overwhelmed…
Scottish football is indebted to these custodians of the fabric of Scotland.”
Alistair McOist:
“Absolutely, I am in favour 100%.
My EK supporters club are right behind me, real Ran*ers men, 100%.
Getting the club, erm, the company, no – I mean the team – back to where we belong.”
“Eh, any idear whit the share cost is the day?”.
hen1rik
It’s Scotland Henrik..
Was Ally hedging his bets, get it:-)
I understand Murray had left the sinking ship before it actually sunk, ergo, he’s not disqualified. Apparently.
CQN annual just arrived and I must say it’s a superb production, so many interesting articles and terrific photos that you would not know where to start. Probably the best sports annual I’ve seen in many a long day. Well done.
From TheTribute Act
Police are investigating a betting scandal involving @ChrisGraham76? Impossible that 1 man can call everything wrong every time.
Class tweet from Graham there, “I wonder if all those happy about Stockbridge’s re-election have noticed all the Tims celebrating!!” Damn straight Chris, woo hoo!
The Battered Bunnet
16:34 on
17 December, 2013
It’s a little known fact outside of his native Japan, but Hiroki Yamada’s surname is pronounced Yamada, rather than the westernised Yamada.
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so dry it might self combust……..very good :)
!!Bad Bing!! and Jonny The Tim –
Thank you for the reassuance. Means it’s safe to watch the (ahem) sensible Limmy’s stuff then? Such as…
http://youtu.be/qammSSEwhiE
Jobo
Bada Bing
Forgot the Millennium was the hotel my son and his friends stayed in a few years ago :o(
He said it was excellent ..try and get a room on higher floor as views are stunning….
……..Manhattan..no a bad looking skyline.
Are ticketpuss and the octobus going to make an appearance soon alongside the Whi(y)tes n Greens or are they still in the incubator.
Meanwhile on a lighter note, have you ever tried to put a bowler hat on an octopus while they are driving a cheap bus?
No more drinking for me on a school night.
St Stivs 19:33
No really a big follower of the fitba o’wer the hills. However, did see that O’Higgins managed to beat some mob called (the oldest existing ?) “Rangers” in the semi’s 4-3 and then marched onto their first ever title win last Weds
http://santiagotimes.cl/bruised-bloodied-triumphant-ohiggins-claims-first-title-history/
Worst ever Crimbo present – going into Boots and buying (what I thought) was “Perfume” for Ma ‘skorrie. All credit to her for keeping a straight face when I presented her with a carefully wrapped can of Femfresh Vaginal Deoderant.
All I can say in my defence is you don’t really understand these things when your 11yrs old………
.
StarryPlough..
You have Mail (PM)..
001Bhoy
Celtic, Let The People Sing, aye right, see when the song gets to “lullabies” it doesn’t skip a beat to “songs of hope and joy” there’s a bit in the middle, mean it, or stop playing it.
Political expression isn’t restricted to overtly political songs.
We’ll sing it without the music.
Laters.
DJBEE,
” have you ever tried to put a bowler hat on an octopus while they are driving a cheap bus?”
Them old Uillean pipers can do that, have a smoke, and make a fine batch of poteen all at the same time… with one hand…. and the middle one at that
As expected, more cases of extremely questionable-looking deals with football clubs in Spain are coming to light in the wake of the complaint from European Commission. Sad to report, the latest involves our friends from Villarreal.
Villarreal is in the province of Castellón, where the authorities made the decision in the boom years in the middle of the last decade to build a new airport. It’s now listed as a private airport, but is run by a public company. The total cost of the project was €150 million, starting from about 2006. Construction was completed in March 2011, and there was an official inauguration ceremony. But no plane has ever taken off or landed there and no one holds a licence to use it for flights. It’s a white elephant, but a very expensive one.
Two local MPs are now describing as “subsidies” sponsorship money that the airport project ploughed into Villarreal, estimated at €20 million over the years. One of them has said the airport ‘operating’ company disguised payments to Villarreal as support for anti-drugs and AIDS awareness campaigns. She said this was “pure cynicism”.
Saint Stivs 19:45
In fairness to my ma we did live in a flat so hiding places for two bikes was limited to say the least .
I can understand the lion but what was my mother in law doing behind yer couch
HH
VP- Ta,great location and they doing a great rate at the time i’m thinking of going.mncelt goes every year and recommends it too.HH
On Sports Personality of the Year the other night,when it was Coach of the Year,couldn’t believe the BBC didn’t have the Sevco Superbus as a contender…..
For the punters amongst us BetVictor have both Ryan Gauld and Stevie May 33/1 to sign for Celtic as their next club.
Indeed,
it’s well known that them Uilleans reserve the left one for gently caressing their muse, and the right one for makin soup in the ole banjo… a fine pot of lentil as I recall , if a bit light on the pepper.
Davy Spillane, to his eternal embarrassment, was found face down it one morning – luckily, he wasn’t a man for the beard, and therefore could have it licked of by Sinead O’Connor, who couldn’t play the banjo either.
I once broke my g-string stressing for her.
Vmhan – YNWA Wee Oscar
Celtfish has replied above so has all details. We’ll sort this for you in the morning.
Remember bhoys and ghirls a fiver from all Annuals sold is now going to the fund to build the CQN kitchen and shelter at the Kholoni Primary School in Malawi. As someone said yesterday we are going to need a bigger kitchen!
You can be disqualified from being a director of a company if an insolvency practitioner or a member of the public reports your conduct as being ‘unfit’.
‘Unfit conduct’ includes:
allowing a company to continue trading when it can’t pay its debts
not keeping proper company accounting records
not sending accounts and returns to Companies House
not paying tax owed by the company
using company money or assets for personal benefit
I wonder if any new directors of Sevco fall under this.
Jobo Baldie
18:50 on
17 December, 2013
Good evening all.
Big confession time. Until about 5 minutes ago I couldn’t have told you a single line from ‘Roll Of Honour’. So, after reading of the handful of folk arrested for singing it I turned to Google in an effort to see what all the fuss is about.
Can anyone point me to what the issue is with this particular song? Let me make it quite clear that I am neither in favour nor against the song I simply want to be clear WHY it leads to arrest. My daughter is going to ‘Charlie and The Bhoys’ later this week. I don’t know whether they sing this song but if they did is there any reason why my daughter should be wary of singing along?
Jobo
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Ditto me too………its about about Irish Nationalists starving themselves to death as a protest and no mention of any IRA variant.
Plod keeps prosecuting in the hope that they will eventually set a legal precedent and then be able to prosecute ever more……ever more easily.
Defence argues that prior prosecutions continually fail because there is no evidence or mention of terrorism or terrorist organisations……..hence it keeps failing.
This is the politics……..
QUESTION:
Has it ever occurred to anyone that perhaps the board may not actually sing from the same “hymn sheet” as the common support?
Or put another way……do any of them actually own a pair of brown brogues???
Paul67 – Your analogy loses its front wheels when you factor in that Spurs have historically been a big spending club with little to no proportional return, so it should come as no surprise and pre-dates your ‘narco-football’ model. Indeed they were long known to have the most expensive season tickets for years until only recently. The Russian money to Chelsea and the Arabian money to Manchester, in line with some awful spends throughout the EPL for the likes of Newcastle/West Ham/Liverpool – From Boumsongs to Carroll to Torres not forgetting the Bents and the Euells.
What I believe this refined was the need for clubs to buy out of fear, not addiction. Not how much a player is worth (Pin a tail?) but how much he is worth to stop someone else getting him.
Ashley Young?????
You sign a manager because of trust – you have to trust that their signings will deliver the seeds from the initial interview.
Spurs had the makings of being amongst the big boys a couple of months ago and they bought late.
And only 5 weeks ago I heard Radio 5 journos tell the listening public that players had told them they did not like or trust what AVB was doing. Then he came out and jarred the press. And the rest was just a car on a hill with the brakes off.
Not all ‘get it, spend it’.
U
Breakng Syk news:
In a prepared statement, Cambell Ogilvy has commented on the forthcoming RIFC AGM:
The SFA’s compliance officer has reviewed comments to be made by the Ran*ers chief executive at the Company/Club/Team’s annual general meeting (aka AGM).
The compliance officer wants to stress that there is absolutely, 100%, for sure, no breach of any rules, anywhere.
Au contraire, I am compelled to convey my extreme satisfaction that we find ourselves in this position: rest assured, all things are hunky dory down Govan way.
At a time when Scottish football faces challenges on many fronts, it is incumbent on the SFA to embellish and support the fabric of Scotland and its sporting establishment, and by that I mean – of course – Ran*ers Football Club.
In this regard, the time, effort and resources devoted by our compliance officer to help out at the AGM is totally worthwhile.
I thank you, Walter Smith thanks you, Jack Irvine thanks you, Margarita at Blue Pitch thanks you, Alistair and the EK supporters club thank you, Monsieur Charlès Vert from Chateau du Lait thanks you, … ad nauseam…
I share an office with an older Celtic Supporter and another guy my age who claims not to like football but whom is a suspected closet Hun. Towards the end of the day I played ”white Christmas on piano’ from spotify on my phone and was singing ‘I’m dreaming of a Green and White Christmas’… to which my Celtic supporting colleague said – ‘Aye Craig Whyte and Charles Green Christmas’.. we both just laughed as stoney face closet Hun stared intently at his laptop….Green and Whyte – still so funny
“The highest court in the land can never, ever silence a song .
The people will decide, and only the people can silence a song ,
for if no one wants to hear it , the song itself will fall silent .”
Christy Moore