The College Dropout

Point is - their owners stole and cheated despite the favourable conditions. Dont make me bring the picture back

To get to the top, in a far more favourable environment, Chelsea and City lied and cheated to get there. We won't even leverage "bendy" rules (so far).

My core hypothesis is that the success of the club is down to the competence, ambition and drive of the Owners or at least some type of equity Owner. Not hired CEOs or DOFs. Everyone we've hired as you say, has a strong CV - nobody is a total fool or fraud. Even Mitchell. Daniel Levy will have more skin in the game than anyone we hire. That hired suit needs to catch and surpass Spurs on Levy's watch and dime. That hired suit needs to kill Levy in a business sense.

I'm talking about their strategy to PSR. They've adopted hacks fairly fast. They got talented youngsters in their dodgy deals and have sold their womens team to ensure they didn't have to sell a star player. It's aggressive. After qualifying for the CL, they missed out on back-to-back qualification by a point. Our first CL campaign was way too early and in hindsight, we were never going to be able to build a squad that could compete on multiple fronts. Villa however - decided to build a side that could compete on multiple fronts in January but left themselves too much work to do to catchup. Had they been aggressive earlier, they would've comfortably finished top 4. Yes, they ultimately fell short, but they gambled, did all they could to compete, and leveraged PSR hacks. 1 game away from back-to-back qualification. They genuinely tried to consolidate their position. This summer was our chance to be aggressive - we "only" needed to keep our best players and add 4 or 5 (not the 6 or 7 needed the last time we qualified). This summer was an opportunity to kick on, and at this very moment, we look like we are going to regress. The whole project is in turmoil. Today, the results of last season look like the peak of the project built 2-3 years ago. And by regress, not just next season but as a whole. The rudderless position isn't just down to Eales sickness and lack of replacement imo and not something that has emerged recently.

I don’t disagree totally. I just don’t think it’s possible to slow crawl to dominance. It at least it’s slow progression then suddenly all at once. You need some type of revenue hack. Even if that’s the youth system. And that youth system has to be Chelsea/City good, not Villa good. Eg top 5 in Europe. I think Villa’s strategy will a the best. Strike while they irons hot. They tried and came up short. Let’s see where we end up. And how the next 12-18 months pan out. This window can only be a success if we pack the squad imo. I don’t think the Wissa/Elanga/Ramsdale route is right. But could work if we double down with Paqueta and similar level players for our gaps and have a proper strong squad.

We've not progresssed meaningfully off the field for 18 months imo. Even on the pitch - the gains are from work done 18 months - 3 years ago.

I'm always going to take PIF at their word unless there's unequivocal evidence to the contrary. The window isn't that point for me. We'll see over the next 12-18 months as go beyond 5 years with them as owners. For now progress towards becoming a "European dominant force" is what i'm judging them against.

Because people keep saying "I don't want us to act like *". We aren't going to get to the top by being 100% clean or by playing fair and nice. This is multi-billion pound industry, it's a lions' den. Apex capitalists. Gone are the days of the local business-tycoon leading a team to glory. As fans, we need to realise what it's going to take to succeed. Really succeed. Did we think "the cartel" would just roll over and let us eat their dinner? What's it going to take to beat some of them and then join them? Because that will happen to some degree if we are successful.

Cartel was always going to intervene. At the moment, I don't think PIF have the stomach for the fight. Staveley did. Miss her. I maintain that with enough will and power it's possible. With less might Villa were 1 result away from back-to-back CL qualifications. We got in their way. I wonder what Villa would do with that additional £50m for CL. Had they had that squad at the beginning of the season they qualify for the CL. I think there's 2 strategies for PSR that can work. One is higher risk on paper. I don't think we are pursuing either viable route.

Name the elite football club that you think behaves well. I said in the other thread - clubs act in their best interest. That's their job. Don Florentino has consistently tried to act in his clubs best interest. He's got them 7 of their 15 CL titles. Madrid should build a statue for that man. He's delivered 2 maybe 3 different golden eras. All the midtable clubs in the PL benefit from PSR. It keeps them on the gravy train and stops an increase in the number of clubs that can't get relegated and increases the likelihood they can bounce straight back if they do. Our unfair advantage is being owned by PIF. PIF have stated ambitions that require their unfair advantage, but more or less are refusing to deploy them en masse or are slow to do so. We made such fantastic progress quickly because of the ambitious and aggressive work from Staveley and Mehrdad. Reflected in the calibre of players (and staff) we attracted and the fees paid (at the time). And also running into PSR difficulties - but that's all justified now imo. It worked. We needed to do that again to try and take us to the next level.

The article references Yasir as a "wildcard". Acknowledging his influence but lack of involvement. That's wrong imo. That's Manchester United like. A detached big boss. I understand there's Underbosses at Real for example but the Mbappe call is a Don Florentino decisions. What happens with Vini Jr will be a Don Florentino decision etc. And this is a club operating from a position of ultimate power.

I know people don't like Waugh and Caulkin but I thought this was a good summation of what a lot of us have been discussing these last few weeks and months: https://archive.ph/F72BJ#selection-401.0-404.0 The results have been brilliant this past season. But the wheels on the wider project have gone-off track ever since the June 2024 PSR debacle. The debacle itself was bad but the fall out has been worse. It also points to why I don't think a hired DOF + CEO is the optimal route in terms of leadership. Or doesn't get at the heart of the problem. We need someone who can talk to PIF as a partner, not as an overlord. In isolation, Mitchell thinking that we can't give Isak a new contract is rational. But we need someone that can sweet talk PIF and sweet talk players (and fans). Mitchell not appeasing Isak and settling the numbers created a gap in expectations and communication of both player and board/Yasir. We can say that's a combination of DOF/CEO but having one person across both provides synergy. I keep referencing Spurs because I saw their doc. Rose went to Daniel Levy to discuss his transfer. Daniel Levy is the Chairman, Daniel Levy is a significant shareholder, Daniel Levy is THE boss. A hired suit will never have that power imo, at least not from our disadvantaged position.

We need to stop complaining about other clubs acting in their best interest. We need to act in ours, the best way we can.

Someone on Twitter said something like "£80m for 13 Bundes is crazy" it's funny because it's true. We've seen players score double that in Bundesliga and still flop

I think he's meant to be retiring

He’s not the first player to try and force a move. Get told to stay and carry on. I keep using Kane. He went on strike. Everyone has forgotten. He eventually carried on and had a solid season. I think Mbappe had similar issues at PSG. He’s our best player. He’ll apologise. We’ll give him some more money and a written agreement and he’ll be back.

I’m steadfast that we are not forced to sell him. We literally are not. If the move doesn’t happen he’ll dry his tears and play.

I know Liverpool have money but £80m for a player to sit on the bench? even for Liverpool I thought that would be a £50m player max. Ramos, Wissa. We are just speculating but we need to live in the real world. If my bosses in the real world tell me something critical to my career verbally which they then renege. It’s a massive problem. 90% of business is agreed verbally. My speculation is that we were not clear to him and have been telling the world he’s not for sale.

This is a fanbase that loved Ben Arfa

I definitely think there been some communication gaps. Like with Kane. There was a gentleman’s agreement that was reneged on. Then made clear he wouldn’t leave unless a certain value was hit and more likely from abroad. Communication was there but basically lies were told and contracts stuck too. We’ve no idea what’s happened here. It seems like Isak said he wanted to leave early on and perhaps due to a lack of leadership we never came back with a solid reply. I don’t know obviously.

I agree with this. I don’t condone Isaks actions and I’m disappointed in his conduct. It’s not right. But ultimately he’s acting in his best interests like every human does. It’s been in the clubs best interests to ensure we don’t get in this situation with Isak and that’s failed. So I’m more upset with those meant to look after the clubs best interests than a single player with a short career. Also for me - I think it is now likely we were always shopping for an Isak replacement. Whether that was to play with Isak this season or not - we won’t know. Liverpool signing Etikite is the part that doesn’t make sense to me at the moment.

That was hilarious. This last week has been pretty bleak (relatively speaking - it's just football but the vibes have downshifted) on this forum but that made me laugh.

On pitch success has been driven by the aggressive and ambitious time Amanda was here. It’s literally the same players and management. Since July 2024 we’ve been the opposite of aggressive. On the pitch sure and off the pitch no hard evidence of transformative progress.

This logic is so backwards. Most PL clubs have PSR headroom. None of them want another Forest coming up from the Champ.

I’m not that concerned about comms. A lot of the recent comms has proven inaccurate, yet to come to fruition or caused more questions than answers. Just want decisive action.