Chesterfield game - stay or sack for manager

[thnhouse]

I love that a “relatively successful” period in a 100 years worth of nothingness is seen as more of a example of how to do things than the actual most successful time in the clubs history. Isn’t nostalgia fun. Maybe we should stick with the WM formation that got us to the cup Semi Final in the 1800’s ?

[MikeSB]

I love that a “relatively successful” period in a 100 years worth of nothingness is seen as more of a example of how to do things than the actual most successful time in the clubs history. Isn’t nostalgia fun. Maybe we should stick with the WM formation that got us to the cup Semi Final in the 1800’s ?

Yes it is and you may wish to check the gates we had over that period too....

The club was NOT founded when Gradi arrived no matter how many say we would have folded without him or indeed the academy comes first before the first team. That shows real ignorance about what REAL fans think of that rubbish statement. AlexMick has shown there were some successful times in that previous period. 20,000 fans in Gresty Road. Beat that if you can mate! We beat Chelsea away in the FA cup that has never been achieved under the Dario era.

Football was more enjoyable back then before the prima donnas arrived..

Oh, who was the clubs MOST successful Centre Forward we had that scored the most hat tricks and not a coaching lesson in his life! Frank Lord, take a bow from heaven son! If anyone saw him they would not be so coy with their comments about the history of this club..

BTW, can you try and persuade some of our academy graduates to sign contracts to repay all that coaching they had? Or are they too big for this club?

[out0lunch]

Frank was one of our best forwards but Mick are you telling me he wasted his time when he stopped playing and was a coach at Crystal Palace and Preston?

[MikeSB]

Frank was one of our best forwards but Mick are you telling me he wasted his time when he stopped playing and was a coach at Crystal Palace and Preston?

I bow to your knowledge as what happened to Frank Lord when he left us....

Was there such a thing as 'coaches' back then? Even assistant managers seemed a rarity and think again from memory we only had a manager and a trainer and that was it and so unlike all the massive backroom teams they have now and its a matter of opinion if you think the football as improved? I ask myself if our academy costs over one million pounds a season then where is the money going if the academy lads are getting nothing apart from when they are offered contracts at 17 which again is reported to be quite low? I still think that is far too much for a club our size and probably less than our income from the gates? OK do the maths, average 4K gate and 23 home games that is 92K attendance multiplied by the cost per fan at the gate and season tickets and concessions so can we say average 15 pounds per fan? Probably less but that would be about 1.4 million and that has to pay for the players wages, the shop, ground staff and maintenance, heating and electricity, national insurance and stewards and bar staff plus takings there and of course the FA top all that up but its probable that the gate money alone does not pay its way if we have to contribute 760 grand to the academy as well? So we can't afford a Cat 2 academy without biggish sales and the board obviously knows all that and why the playing budget is so tight.

I may have missed something there and so add on or delete as appropriate.

Of course it's all about or should be whether fans enjoy the football over the various decades and now and whether its value for money? I suspect we enjoy it more when young and not so much when we get older but others can add to that if they wish?

[alexmick]

I love that a “relatively successful” period in a 100 years worth of nothingness is seen as more of a example of how to do things than the actual most successful time in the clubs history. Isn’t nostalgia fun. Maybe we should stick with the WM formation that got us to the cup Semi Final in the 1800’s ?

I don't really understand what your point is here, thnhouse. I was merely correcting Welsh _ Cup in my initial statement, to say that we spent more than just one season outside the bottom tier, prior to the arrival of Dario. I also went on to say that that decade was a "reasonably" successful period in the club's history. That fact is true and I did witness those exciting times. I am not saying at all that the period of time from the late 1980's until about 2005, under Dario was not also successful. It was a fantastic achievement and put the club on the football map. Nothing wrong in nostalgia surely? Part of living through history I would say. Just a thought. Did you actually witness those good times during the 1960s and the awful seasons we all endured from 1970-1983?

[AstonAlex]

I suspect we all tend to remember things as better when we were younger, and not just football. The bad and the indifferent are things we prefer to forget, whilst we recall the best. He finest footballer I ever watched regularly was Martin Peters in his days at Norwich City - he was so far ahead of his teammates that you could almost see him thinking about whether they would read his passes, something that only changed when Peter Osgood was signed up.

I’ve only lived in Cheshire for just over 30 years so can’t comment on the pre Dario era, but I do know that the best players I’ve seen play for the Alex came through the youth system (or Academy if you will), ie Ashton, Powell, Danny Murphy and the often forgotten Rob Jones. Would those players have bern sold to Premiership high rollers for the same money these days? I suspect not all of them for the reasons given above about the number of overseas players at all levels of football these days. Even we’ve had Nigerians, Trinidadians, Algerians and, one of my favourites, a St Vincent international at the club - and that list is far from exhaustive. And who is to say they didn’t improve the team or provide great entertainment.

The game is very different now from even Dario’s most successful period, never mind the 1960s. We may not like it, but it ain’t gonna revert so we might as well get used to it. I’m rubbish at football and no amount of coaching would ever change that. But I do know that in the sport I play regularly, Kids from as young as 7 or 8 with ability benefit hugely from coaching. And those with less ability will also know how to play the game better, so coaching is a great thing for enthusiastic young people for all sorts of reasons. Maybe it isn’t the Alex’s responsibility to provide what is essentially a social service, but I think it’s great that the club provides chances for younger people in the area and would like to think that we could do a whole lot more.

[out0lunch]

I bow to your knowledge as what happened to Frank Lord when he left us....

Was there such a thing as 'coaches' back then? Even assistant managers seemed a rarity and think again from memory we only had a manager and a trainer and that was it and so unlike all the massive backroom teams they have now and its a matter of opinion if you think the football as improved? I ask myself if our academy costs over one million pounds a season then where is the money going if the academy lads are getting nothing apart from when they are offered contracts at 17 which again is reported to be quite low? I still think that is far too much for a club our size and probably less than our income from the gates? OK do the maths, average 4K gate and 23 home games that is 92K attendance multiplied by the cost per fan at the gate and season tickets and concessions so can we say average 15 pounds per fan? Probably less but that would be about 1.4 million and that has to pay for the players wages, the shop, ground staff and maintenance, heating and electricity, national insurance and stewards and bar staff plus takings there and of course the FA top all that up but its probable that the gate money alone does not pay its way if we have to contribute 760 grand to the academy as well? So we can't afford a Cat 2 academy without biggish sales and the board obviously knows all that and why the playing budget is so tight.

I may have missed something there and so add on or delete as appropriate.

Of course it's all about or should be whether fans enjoy the football over the various decades and now and whether its value for money? I suspect we enjoy it more when young and not so much when we get older but others can add to that if they wish?

You missed a big factor the £500,000 we are given to run the academy !!!

[MikeSB]

You missed a big factor the £500,000 we are given to run the academy !!!

No, not at all...

The total expenditure on the academy is well over a million and our contribution is £760,000 that has been reported. So its even worse that we can't seem to get L2 standard players on that sort of money. To me it's obvious that we downgrade to Cat3 and save at least 500,000 or more and the FA still contribute quite a large amount on top of that. Its a matter of opinion as whether Cat2 or Cat3 will make lads think whether to go elsewhere but nobody has given us names of local kids that have gone to Cat1 academies if they are right that more coaching results in better players that is...

[MikeSB]

I suspect we all tend to remember things as better when we were younger, and not just football. The bad and the indifferent are things we prefer to forget, whilst we recall the best. He finest footballer I ever watched regularly was Martin Peters in his days at Norwich City - he was so far ahead of his teammates that you could almost see him thinking about whether they would read his passes, something that only changed when Peter Osgood was signed up.

I’ve only lived in Cheshire for just over 30 years so can’t comment on the pre Dario era, but I do know that the best players I’ve seen play for the Alex came through the youth system (or Academy if you will), ie Ashton, Powell, Danny Murphy and the often forgotten Rob Jones. Would those players have bern sold to Premiership high rollers for the same money these days? I suspect not all of them for the reasons given above about the number of overseas players at all levels of football these days. Even we’ve had Nigerians, Trinidadians, Algerians and, one of my favourites, a St Vincent international at the club - and that list is far from exhaustive. And who is to say they didn’t improve the team or provide great entertainment.

The game is very different now from even Dario’s most successful period, never mind the 1960s. We may not like it, but it ain’t gonna revert so we might as well get used to it. I’m rubbish at football and no amount of coaching would ever change that. But I do know that in the sport I play regularly, Kids from as young as 7 or 8 with ability benefit hugely from coaching. And those with less ability will also know how to play the game better, so coaching is a great thing for enthusiastic young people for all sorts of reasons. Maybe it isn’t the Alex’s responsibility to provide what is essentially a social service, but I think it’s great that the club provides chances for younger people in the area and would like to think that we could do a whole lot more.

May I ask what sport that is? The purpose of the Alex is to provide a successful professional football club that fans will support and pay to watch them. For them to say the academy is more important than that basic concept, tells me they have lost their marbles.

I think football is different than most other sports though that coaching is NOT essential as it wasn't for 100 years before and we had more success before it became the bees knees. The most important is aptitude and natural ability and I don't see how any amount of coaching could really make a difference as nobody needs teaching how to pass a ball, dribble, take free kicks, head a ball, score from 25 yards which we rarely see in modern football even with a lighter ball and better boots etc. I'm arguing that someone like Dario and an one assistant can do wonders not by teaching the basics but just being there and encouraging the lads and far more important getting them playing against others. You don't need coaching to get fit either...A sandbag running up mow cop was one idea...

No, coaching is a cottage industry that is only there to employ people that are far less talented than most of the kids with that natural ability I spoke of. BTW Dean Ashton was NOT a product of the academy as he was what 16 when he joined us? The sort of age that I say we should concentrate all our efforts on and leave the 5 year olds to the schools and other bodies...

What I am saying is if these kids have the natural ability like they always had before academies and got to play in their local leagues then if they are really good and stand out then they will get noticed and be offered a trial in fact that is how it used to be...and no amount of people arguing for million pound academies whereby the FACTS speak louder than words when less than 1% make the grade from them and so that surely cannot be much different than in the old days...Coaches will defend them to their dying day, naturally!

[jimmyboldon]

May I ask what sport that is? The purpose of the Alex is to provide a successful professional football club that fans will support and pay to watch them. For them to say the academy is more important than that basic concept, tells me they have lost their marbles.

I think football is different than most other sports though that coaching is NOT essential as it wasn't for 100 years before and we had more success before it became the bees knees. The most important is aptitude and natural ability and I don't see how any amount of coaching could really make a difference as nobody needs teaching how to pass a ball, dribble, take free kicks, head a ball, score from 25 yards which we rarely see in modern football even with a lighter ball and better boots etc. I'm arguing that someone like Dario and an one assistant can do wonders not by teaching the basics but just being there and encouraging the lads and far more important getting them playing against others. You don't need coaching to get fit either...A sandbag running up mow cop was one idea...

No, coaching is a cottage industry that is only there to employ people that are far less talented than most of the kids with that natural ability I spoke of. BTW Dean Ashton was NOT a product of the academy as he was what 16 when he joined us? The sort of age that I say we should concentrate all our efforts on and leave the 5 year olds to the schools and other bodies...

What I am saying is if these kids have the natural ability like they always had before academies and got to play in their local leagues then if they are really good and stand out then they will get noticed and be offered a trial in fact that is how it used to be...and no amount of people arguing for million pound academies whereby the FACTS speak louder than words when less than 1% make the grade from them and so that surely cannot be much different than in the old days...Coaches will defend them to their dying day, naturally!

Yawn......tin hat on order.