Soriano and Bergiristain had nothing to do with the 2012/13 summer transfer window.
Are we the worst run elite club in the world? If not us then who?
- Thread starter Red Ryan
- Start date
I expect them to act consistently, follow a plan. I don't want them to hire three different managers for completely different reasons in three years. I want them to actually identify what they want in a manager, what they think is going to bring success.
in answer to the question posed; No.
How can we be the worst run? Record sales, new advertisers signing up all the time, breaking sponsorship deals. We're making more money now than ever before.
Are we the worst managed? No
Football doesn't go on and on and on with the same winners infinity. It happens in cycles. Look at Liverpool, AC Milan etc.
Could we have done better when Fergie left? Yes. I said it then and I say it again, the planning to allow Fergie and Gill to go at the same time was bonkers. It should have been staggered.
Our time will come again, we have a good CEO and a proven manager, I believe that some kind of success is just around the corner again.
Yeah ofcourse but the state in which he was sacked at both Bayern and Barcelona was quite embarassing, and not qualifying with a very strong Dutch generation was as well. Sometimes his philosophy works and everything is fantastic, sometimes it's just horrible. His United stint was also terrible at times, luckily he got us a trophy though.
Well obviously they did that, but what if the manager you identify is not available?
No, maybe they did that but that's far from obvious. And you identify a profile, not a person.
@Gentleman Jim has already covered a part of the argument.
Soriano was appointed on: http://edition.cnn.com/2012/08/17/sport/football/manchester-city-soriano-ceo/
And Begiristain was appointed on: http://www.bbc.com/sport/football/20114517
So they didn't have a major part to play in the summer window. As for the sponsorships, they had to boost their revenues, via some (but not all) deals in the Middle East (facilitated by the owner) or outside of it - before starting to build in a more organic way, once they're established as a genuinely big club with more widespread appeal. So again, I'm not sure how much blame is to be leveled against Soriano, and what his remit is (wrt corporate sponsorships in particular). But on the surface, City have done a good job of maintaining a very healthy growth rate (considering where they were starting from in comparison with the immediate competition):
Yeah we didn't really have loads of options to replace LVG with
Guardiola
Klopp
Simeone
Ancelotti
Pochettino
All seemed to be unavailable when it was time to replace LVG. We were fortunate that we got Mourinho. To pick someone else not in that list would be picking a lesser manager than Mourinho imo and that wouldn't make a lot of sense
No. We've had a couple of shit seasons. Other than that the club is in a strong position to succeed on and off the pitch.
Yeah but in fairness, we signed Fellaini for £4m OVER his buyout clause, because our manager, David Moyes, told us to. There's really no defending any aspect of that...and it wasn't an isolated stupidity incident
In insight it looks easy now to conclude that we should have gone for Posh but around the time we went for Lvg none here (probably including yourself ) would have wanted him especially after the first gamble of hiring a manager with no experience at a top club backfired spectacularly.
Sounds nice in theory, but in practice it doesnt work like that.
I was talking more about Moyes TBH, I dont think LvG was even a bad choice at the time and BTW Pochettino was not really on the horizon when we hired LvG. Now he is after doing a good job at Spurs.
But under SAF, we were winning trophies, regardless of the good/bad signings?
Disagree. Firstly because the problems brought up in this thread started when SAF was here. No other elite clubs buys the type of players we started to under Fergie's last few years. The team he was building to take over has all but disappeared. It didn't work. Only Smalling and De Gea can be called a success. So it's not just since Fergie left.
Also since Fergie left I feel we've improved in terms of throwing our weight around, participating for bigger names, for bigger money. We've just picked the wrong one's.
Here is the thing, it's not about Mourinho and whether he is the "best" manager we could have, from a reputational standpoint, he was the best available manager from a techincal standpoint, a manager like Lucien Favre is pretty good. Is he better or worse than Mourinho? I don't know, he has been less successful though.
The problem is, if Mourinho wasn't available which manager the club would have targetted? Which profile?
Big clubs change coaches all their time. Their upper management structure is usually more stable
City have been run pretty poorly in all honesty.
When you compare the ideology from the top dogs its a little bizarre. Hear me out.
1) They take over and buy a decent sized team with not much of a name for themselves beyond some plucky results, but they choose to buy the club in the same city as United and take on what is already considered "Manchester" in most of the world, not only that the club they are taking on isnt just founded on money, there is a deep and royal history of winning and rags to riches stories, a questionable decision to start with some would argue they were on a hiding to nothing to begin with.
2) They played a ridiculously long game to get a manager in who only ever does 3 year stints at clubs and has no proven success in terms of taking lower placed teams into world beaters and this point is still to be proven.
3) The Barcelona blueprint they are aiming for isnt just a case of hiring top level coaches and throwing them in a room together and seeing what happens, its a lifestyle and passion project that cant really be emulated otherwise wed have several teams of the same ilk and background.
4) City were bought in 2008, they are now a year away from 10 years owning City, compare that to what Abramovic did for Chelsea and its a poor indictment.
Chelsea from 2003-2013: Premier Leagues 3, F.A Cup 4, League Cup 3, 1 Champions League and 1 Europa League
Man City from 2008-2017: Premier League 2, F.A Cup 1 and 2 League Cups.
Pretty poor with spending significantly more.
5) City boast some of the best facilities in the world for Youth prospects, yet there is one sole youth player amongst their ranks who by all accounts was actually brought in from another club, "oh but the academy has just opened", so they didnt have one before the shiny new one opened? rubbish, the fact is they don't blood any of their youth prospects in the first team that have been home grown. Weve never had a spangly academy, weve always used grass roots football and local connections to get our prospects and we dominated for at least 10 years with one set of them. You dont need state of the art facilities to harbour and make the best players a point seemingly missed by the club.
I know its not one of the worst run clubs, but I wouldnt say its a stand out beacon of football process.
When you compare the ideology from the top dogs its a little bizarre. Hear me out.
1) They take over and buy a decent sized team with not much of a name for themselves beyond some plucky results, but they choose to buy the club in the same city as United and take on what is already considered "Manchester" in most of the world, not only that the club they are taking on isnt just founded on money, there is a deep and royal history of winning and rags to riches stories, a questionable decision to start with some would argue they were on a hiding to nothing to begin with.
2) They played a ridiculously long game to get a manager in who only ever does 3 year stints at clubs and has no proven success in terms of taking lower placed teams into world beaters and this point is still to be proven.
3) The Barcelona blueprint they are aiming for isnt just a case of hiring top level coaches and throwing them in a room together and seeing what happens, its a lifestyle and passion project that cant really be emulated otherwise wed have several teams of the same ilk and background.
4) City were bought in 2008, they are now a year away from 10 years owning City, compare that to what Abramovic did for Chelsea and its a poor indictment.
Chelsea from 2003-2013: Premier Leagues 3, F.A Cup 4, League Cup 3, 1 Champions League and 1 Europa League
Man City from 2008-2017: Premier League 2, F.A Cup 1 and 2 League Cups.
Pretty poor with spending significantly more.
5) City boast some of the best facilities in the world for Youth prospects, yet there is one sole youth player amongst their ranks who by all accounts was actually brought in from another club, "oh but the academy has just opened", so they didnt have one before the shiny new one opened? rubbish, the fact is they don't blood any of their youth prospects in the first team that have been home grown. Weve never had a spangly academy, weve always used grass roots football and local connections to get our prospects and we dominated for at least 10 years with one set of them. You dont need state of the art facilities to harbour and make the best players a point seemingly missed by the club.
I know its not one of the worst run clubs, but I wouldnt say its a stand out beacon of football process.
This is hilarious. I bet 90% of the club owners would offer their own son in sacrifice to Odin just to see their club make as much profit as we do.
the club itself is actually fine, its just the players and the managers have been terrible, Moyes was a catastrophe, VG? cannot really disagree with the appointment, Jose Mourinho the same, its just the players are not doing their job
The directors, Tixi, said it was always his vision to have Pep at City and a deal to get him was in place at least a year before he joined. Pep has never taken a lower placed team into world beaters, City finished above us in 4th on goal difference.
They have no competition because they are this good. Back when they were ran poorly, see Bayern circa 2008 or Real Madrid during same period, or Barcelona pre-2005, they weren't the best.
Milan and Inter would have something to say about that. With the turnover of players at these clubs in recent times, their success ratio has been abysmal. To Milan's excuse they have been largely shopping in the bargain bin due to the lack of funds, Inter have no excuse as they have been spending considerable money.
He sort of took 3rd placed Barcelona who finished further from top than City last season to the best team in the world.
And he took Barcelona when they were third at 10 points of the second and 18 points from the champions. The situations are comparable.
Which ties in with a new CEO finding his way. Wouldn't have happened with Gill I dare say
Does anybody think for one minute that any other top club would have handed the reigns over to that twerp Moist?
This kind of stupidity is costing us dear. Moist, manager of Manchester United Football Club. You couldn't make it up!
This kind of stupidity is costing us dear. Moist, manager of Manchester United Football Club. You couldn't make it up!
Valencia sacked a manager who was in the top half and gave the job to Gary Neville. Real Madrid fired Ancelotti and gave the job to Benitez, Chelsea hired Di Matteo.
Genuinely think we overplay these things at times. I mean, Real Madrid have an upcoming transfer ban but they had a poor summer imo. Place would go crazy if we missed out on a transfer the way they did with De Gea. They got knocked out of the cup for playing an inelligble player. Their transfer activity/squad management has been questionable for many years and same with their managers.
They tend to always have good enough players to win or compete but I don't think they're well run.
They tend to always have good enough players to win or compete but I don't think they're well run.
The profit made is living off the past, and so is the elite in elite club and that started before SAF retired. The last title was squeezed out at the expense of leaving a squad that needed renewal in a lot of positions. To be fair the decline of Van Persie and Rooney was a bit unlucky, but at the age Van Persie was signed it wasn't a signing that reflects a long term vision and the fact that SAF needed Giggs and Scholes who were nearing 40 should have been worrying anyway.
So there were going to be a few not very successful years in which the squad had to be rebuild, that's nothing an elite club can't cope with, but it has to be done within a few years, and his to be done well. That's were the more fundamental problems appear:
- There is no United way in the style of football and the way players are chosen and signed. Every elite club needs it's own way of doing things, that can't just change radically with the sacking of a manager. An elite club picks a manager that suits more or less the way the club wants to play, and an elite club has a steady policy in signings, what kind of age, what kind of prices, how many academy players etc.. United's way was SAF's way, and after he retired there's no way, no direction, nothing to hold on to, it's fully up the manager, who is almost by definition someone who will leave in a few years.
- After so many years of success, the fans are spoiled. They don't have the stomach for a rebuild, even if there was a direction the club was heading in, they can't take a transition, they don't have the patience, can't endure a difficult season and then you need a very strong chairman and a very strong manager and even mentally very strong players to perform well during the rebuild with a complaining crowd. Filling a big part of the stadium with well paying tourists doesn't help either, but the pressure doesn't come from the stands only.
The second fundamental problem will resolve itself eventually with even more disappointing seasons, and the first fundamental problem will probably get adressed with more urgeny when things keep going bad. The issue is that the longer it takes to solve both fundamental problems, the longer the way back to a real elite club will turn out to be. And if United keeps lingering around 5th place for too long, the elite money will become less elite quite quickly. So the future doesn't look very bright at all, unless Mourinho starts performing well very soon. He's not the rebuilding kind and will not define a Manchester United way, but if his spending and his style pay off than it stabilizes the situation and the club can postpone defining a United way and preparing for the rebuild until he's in his last season.
So there were going to be a few not very successful years in which the squad had to be rebuild, that's nothing an elite club can't cope with, but it has to be done within a few years, and his to be done well. That's were the more fundamental problems appear:
- There is no United way in the style of football and the way players are chosen and signed. Every elite club needs it's own way of doing things, that can't just change radically with the sacking of a manager. An elite club picks a manager that suits more or less the way the club wants to play, and an elite club has a steady policy in signings, what kind of age, what kind of prices, how many academy players etc.. United's way was SAF's way, and after he retired there's no way, no direction, nothing to hold on to, it's fully up the manager, who is almost by definition someone who will leave in a few years.
- After so many years of success, the fans are spoiled. They don't have the stomach for a rebuild, even if there was a direction the club was heading in, they can't take a transition, they don't have the patience, can't endure a difficult season and then you need a very strong chairman and a very strong manager and even mentally very strong players to perform well during the rebuild with a complaining crowd. Filling a big part of the stadium with well paying tourists doesn't help either, but the pressure doesn't come from the stands only.
The second fundamental problem will resolve itself eventually with even more disappointing seasons, and the first fundamental problem will probably get adressed with more urgeny when things keep going bad. The issue is that the longer it takes to solve both fundamental problems, the longer the way back to a real elite club will turn out to be. And if United keeps lingering around 5th place for too long, the elite money will become less elite quite quickly. So the future doesn't look very bright at all, unless Mourinho starts performing well very soon. He's not the rebuilding kind and will not define a Manchester United way, but if his spending and his style pay off than it stabilizes the situation and the club can postpone defining a United way and preparing for the rebuild until he's in his last season.
You're comparing United to clubs that have been the top teams in the country since their inception. Only 9 different clubs have won La Liga in it's and only 5 have won it more than twice. In Germany since they changed their format to the Bundesliga Bayern has won more league titles than the rest combined. Bayern are however different than Real or Barca since the Bundesliga is 50 years old and German football was a lot different before that and obviously heavily affected by the wars.
United's and Liverpool's historical success in the league is on the back of very few managers. If we look now at Bayern and go back as long as SAF was in charge than they have won more than he did but under 13 different managers (plus 2 caretakers). Every manager that has managed them for more than a year has won a major title.
The theme that I see here is that for the most successful clubs ever the manager hasn't been in charge of everything. Historically that's been the norm in England, the manager does everything. When you get someone special like SAF that formula works brilliantly but when you don't have someone brilliant it doesn't seem that great. Even with that in mind I wouldn't say that United are worse run than Barcelona or Real Madrid, especially not Real. Bayern are basically a model football club, a blueprint for how your club should be run. Real have simply been bigger than every single club bar 1 in their entire history and have used that strength to remain on top. The competition in La Liga, although fierce often between 2 or 3 clubs, has always contained Real and very rarely and outside joins the race. Despite clubs like Sevilla being very strong when competing against clubs elsewhere in Europe they simply don't have a chance at home and I don't need to go into reasons why because that's been done do death.
Regarding the United, the club is in a much touted rebuilding phase. We weren't really rebuilding with Moyes. The club was run the same way but we exchanged SAF for Moyes and everything obviously collapsed. The rebuilding started with LvG and will continue for some years because a lot of people high up are getting new responsibilities. After a few years we should be back to compete every season with the occasional single season where we don't.
United's and Liverpool's historical success in the league is on the back of very few managers. If we look now at Bayern and go back as long as SAF was in charge than they have won more than he did but under 13 different managers (plus 2 caretakers). Every manager that has managed them for more than a year has won a major title.
The theme that I see here is that for the most successful clubs ever the manager hasn't been in charge of everything. Historically that's been the norm in England, the manager does everything. When you get someone special like SAF that formula works brilliantly but when you don't have someone brilliant it doesn't seem that great. Even with that in mind I wouldn't say that United are worse run than Barcelona or Real Madrid, especially not Real. Bayern are basically a model football club, a blueprint for how your club should be run. Real have simply been bigger than every single club bar 1 in their entire history and have used that strength to remain on top. The competition in La Liga, although fierce often between 2 or 3 clubs, has always contained Real and very rarely and outside joins the race. Despite clubs like Sevilla being very strong when competing against clubs elsewhere in Europe they simply don't have a chance at home and I don't need to go into reasons why because that's been done do death.
Regarding the United, the club is in a much touted rebuilding phase. We weren't really rebuilding with Moyes. The club was run the same way but we exchanged SAF for Moyes and everything obviously collapsed. The rebuilding started with LvG and will continue for some years because a lot of people high up are getting new responsibilities. After a few years we should be back to compete every season with the occasional single season where we don't.
You never see any of Real Madrid, Barcelona, Bayern Munich going through transitional phases which we have done for 3 years and counting. Although this you could attribute to the strength of their leagues. The amount of money now in the premier league has made it more competitive but that's still not enough of an excuse for United to continue to struggle. On a brighter note I'm fully expecting the scousers to either be totally knackered or to suffer a lot of injuries come January.
Not sure what your point is. We changed the chief exec, apart from that first summer I think Woodward has done great. Probably overseen more transfers in three years than Gill did in seven.
When was the last time we started a season thinking we could realistically win the ECL?
We've been on a downward trajectory since about 2009. That brilliant back five we had sustained us for a couple more years but the football got worse and worse. Warning signs like ECL group stage elimination and Europa League embarrassment should have woken everybody up.
Anderson, Cleverley, Jones, Rafael, Fabio, Evans, Nani, Welbeck, Young.These were supposed to be our next team but none of them really worked out.
Then we got rid of those and replaced with Darmian, Rojo, Schweinsteiger, Falcao, Schneiderlin and a Di Maria who didn't want to be here.
You can't look at these names and be surprised as to why we've been a mile off the other elite clubs.
Talk of anything else just overcomplicates a simple problem.
Is this the same Barcelona that had Xavi, Messi, Iniesta, Valdes and Puyol to name a few? Just saying its seems a bit short sighted to assume the same thing will happen for City as it did Bayern and Barca with lesser players and more competition in the league. When they arent one of the dominant teams YET. Especially when your clubs history doesnt dictate a mentality of winning nor a blueprint for success.
Agreed. 3 years removed from winning the PL title, I'd say we are just fine. We play in the toughest top to bottom league in the world. Barca, RM, Bayern, Juve play in very top heavy leagues. Playing week in and week out against Clubs that have a legitimate chance to beat you takes it's toll.
In that "bad period" they dominated us at Camp Nou in the CL semi-final against possibly our best team since 1999.
What we would give to just be in the CL
Bayern struggled for years in the 2000s and made the turnaround with a couple of good decisions towards the end of that decade. Real Madrid had a lengthy mediocre spell in almost the same timeframe. United is in a roughly similar position now and - importantly - also in regard to the huge amount of money that continues to flow in nevertheless.
I think the way things are going, the worst should be over and if no big mistakes are made, it's they are in a good position to work themselves back to the top again. The competition in the PL is tough, of course.
----------------------------
Edit
Okay, after seeing tonight's game: There is certainly a lot of work to do.
Last edited:
Yes.
The way we handled the Rooney situation twice and let him win. If this happened at Madrid, Bayern or Barca he would've been shown the door ages ago.
Overpaying for players in the transfer window and selling good players for peanuts.
The way we handled the Rooney situation twice and let him win. If this happened at Madrid, Bayern or Barca he would've been shown the door ages ago.
Overpaying for players in the transfer window and selling good players for peanuts.
Agree on Bayern, but Real Madrid and Barcelona are dealing with arguably the best defensive team of the past decade and arguably the best motivator in world football.
Altetico are better than any PL team.
Besides the clubs in Italy, probably.
We have no plan nor blueprint.
We just throw darts and hope it hits at the right spot. No wonder we fail to progress.
We have no plan nor blueprint.
We just throw darts and hope it hits at the right spot. No wonder we fail to progress.
Actually they have no competition because they have far more cash to spend than any of their rivals - the financial disparity between Bayern and the rest is ridiculous, likewise Barca/Real. Apart from a few years of sugardaddy craziness you dont get that in the PL.
Plus I think you misunderstood my post - I was saying that Serie A is similar to PL in that there is a lot of competition for CL places and big teams missing out, unlike Spain and Germany.
Ye but that is still only 3 teams and there are 4 CL places so it is still easy for them to qualify every year unlike us.