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Thread: Chesterfield game - stay or sack for manager

  1. #41
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    May 2009
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    Quote Originally Posted by jamesdad View Post
    Our league position tells a story and I hear fans saying we have good young players in the first team who have come from the academy. Well the proof will be in the pudding if another club wants to buy any of our players, then they are good players if not they are just average players in a team towards the bottom of the league. Football is a business and we must not wear rose tinted glasses re our club and players. We can debate all this to the cows come home but it is the board who will make / not make the correct decisions on the clubs future.
    I feel the most important thing to be sorted is the sale of the shares held by NH. Once this is sorted then the club can move forward . Can anyone please give an update on how this is progressing as it appears to have been dragging on for years since JB had to admit they were in negotiations.
    I heard at the time that you are talking about the club had an offer from a local business to buy the club but it was rejected by majority votes and that is why this has all gone quiet.

  2. #42
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    Jul 2012
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    I don't understand why certain posters continue to ignore the argument that the academy is not solely for million pound sales.

  3. #43
    I Imagine it's the same posters who think that we're going to go shooting up the leagues if we'd just minimise youth development.

    Yep, that's right: our poorly supported club, re-elected to the league 7 times between 1958 and 1986 (having spent just one season outside the bottom professional tier in its history prior to the Gradi era) is in fact a slumbering giant, held back only by the millstone of the Academy.

  4. #44
    Join Date
    Mar 2011
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    I’m ‘amused’ by those who demand that the Board should spend all their millions on making Crewe Alex a 1st Div or even Championship club. Apart from one director, I don’t think any of them are in the multi-millionaire class. Perhaps these fans would like to remortgage their house or max-out the credit card so the Alex can buy a new striker/midfielder?
    The Academy, it seems to me, is a way of developing talent without hawking the club off to a transient, self-interested sugar daddy with the concentration span of a goldfish. It is a business model that has seen us stay in the League despite relatively poor attendances.
    Of course there are things that could be done, of course mistakes will be made, of course the development of youngsters (especially since the imbalance of the Premier League has changed the game) will be cyclical and is not guaranteed. If the Board asked for £100 off every supporter, I wonder how many would invest that in ‘their’ club?

  5. #45
    Join Date
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    Excellent comments AL. I suspect the Academy would be there if the first team wasn't. Clearly in a different form. But existing, nonetheless.

  6. #46
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    Quote Originally Posted by Welsh_Cup_1937 View Post
    I Imagine it's the same posters who think that we're going to go shooting up the leagues if we'd just minimise youth development.

    Yep, that's right: our poorly supported club, re-elected to the league 7 times between 1958 and 1986 (having spent just one season outside the bottom professional tier in its history prior to the Gradi era) is in fact a slumbering giant, held back only by the millstone of the Academy.
    We actually spent two seasons outside the basement division prior to Gradi arriving in 1983. Promotion from Div. Four in both 1962-63 and 1967-68 seasons, saw us spend just two short spells in the Third Division. The 1960's, as I have said in the past, were reasonably successful times for the club. There were quite a number of lofty finishes in the table during that decade too. All that success arrived through a shoestring budget, with a couple of good managers who through wheeling and dealing in the transfer market, got the most out of the players available.
    Last edited by alexmick; 05-01-2018 at 06:00 PM.

  7. #47
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    Quote Originally Posted by alexmick View Post
    We actually spent two seasons outside the basement division prior to Gradi arriving in 1983. Promotion from Div. Four in both 1962-63 and 1967-68 seasons, saw us spend just two short spells in the Third Division. The 1960's, as I have said in the past, were reasonably successful times for the club. There were quite a number of lofty finishes in the table during that decade too. All that success arrived through a shoestring budget, with a couple of good managers who through wheeling and dealing in the transfer market, got the most out of the players available.
    Aye Mick, it's interesting how some posters distort the facts to suit their biased argument.

    Its my 'opinion' that a L2 Academy is ONLY in the hope it will deliver million pounds sales to cover the costs because then what IS the point when as I have said over and over again that parents will only take their kids to the local academy no matter what that level is and so if we were Cat 1 it would make no difference or even Cat 3 and that is where the Board are wrong to try and pursue an outdated model but it is their money so badly managed that soon it will dry up and then they will change it. IF some say its also for producing players for L2, then I then repeat, one million pounds per season for a team struggling at the foot of L2? We can buy in a full team of experienced players for that money and the Conference must be full of the same standard of players anyway. How come that 95% of all the L1 and L2 clubs refuse to have a Cat2 and yet we do? Should it at least produce decent L2 players? Or again what then is the point of one?

    OK you tell me since we have had the EEEP and Cat 2 with all these extra coaches and all that extra money, what difference has it made to the expected increase in quality players ie better coaching etc and what players have been sold for a million? Half a million then?

    The point is surely NOT what it produced ten years ago but what its producing now...

    Mick, some fans think this club only started when Dario arrived and you once again confirmed that was wrong. I would even say that most of the players back then were far better Pro's than most academy graduates from what I have seen anyway and Mick, tell them about the heavy pitches back then when our 'kids' wouldn't last ten minutes on those and yet they are supposed to be fitter now with all the facilities they get?

    Your money, your choice!

    But it cannot be long before the money runs out for the Cat2 and probably Dario and Bowler will leave the sinking ship and its finances to someone else! Probably coincides with a wholesale review and change of board members possibly sooner than we think?
    Last edited by MikeSB; 05-01-2018 at 06:40 PM.

  8. #48
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    Jul 2009
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    You are absolutely correct about the 1960's and the attitude of the players back then, Mike. Different times though. Welsh _ Cup was also correct about our dismal re-election years, which mainly ruined the 1970s for the club. However, it was Dario who came along and did save us from oblivion and certain relegation out of the Football League. As for the academy, I see it as an important part of the club in the way of player development, although I do think that it should be scaled down somewhat. Times have changed and with the wealth of those PL clubs, neither can we attract the same quality of youngster, nor can we keep them on board when they do fulfil their potential.

  9. #49
    Join Date
    May 2009
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    1,611
    Quote Originally Posted by AlexLeicester View Post
    I’m ‘amused’ by those who demand that the Board should spend all their millions on making Crewe Alex a 1st Div or even Championship club. Apart from one director, I don’t think any of them are in the multi-millionaire class. Perhaps these fans would like to remortgage their house or max-out the credit card so the Alex can buy a new striker/midfielder?
    The Academy, it seems to me, is a way of developing talent without hawking the club off to a transient, self-interested sugar daddy with the concentration span of a goldfish. It is a business model that has seen us stay in the League despite relatively poor attendances.
    Of course there are things that could be done, of course mistakes will be made, of course the development of youngsters (especially since the imbalance of the Premier League has changed the game) will be cyclical and is not guaranteed. If the Board asked for £100 off every supporter, I wonder how many would invest that in ‘their’ club?
    I would AL if the board would give me an interest free loan.

  10. #50
    Join Date
    Jun 2013
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    Quote Originally Posted by alexmick View Post
    You are absolutely correct about the 1960's and the attitude of the players back then, Mike. Different times though. Welsh _ Cup was also correct about our dismal re-election years, which mainly ruined the 1970s for the club. However, it was Dario who came along and did save us from oblivion and certain relegation out of the Football League. As for the academy, I see it as an important part of the club in the way of player development, although I do think that it should be scaled down somewhat. Times have changed and with the wealth of those PL clubs, neither can we attract the same quality of youngster, nor can we keep them on board when they do fulfil their potential.
    Yes Mick, times change and for many football fans, not for the better. I still don't think we faced oblivion though. Lots of clubs our size are in L1 and L2 and yes some in the National League where some of the gates are higher because they have more local derbies. So its just my opinion that non league is not the end of the world or the club. Every single club both league and non league have an academy of sorts where local kids get a chance to show any natural ability and so even the lowest tier of academy would be just fine. I am willing to be proved wrong when you say 'attracting' the same quality of youngster? But can ANYBODY advise of ANY 'local' kid where his parents have taken them to a PL academy and where another kid from OUTSIDE the local area has come here say from Macclesfield, Port Vale, Shrewsbury, Wrexham and some could argue they are even within our local area but the point and question still stands as I don't think there are many if any at all. But someone may know of one or two to prove your point Mick.

    I know personally of one local lad that was highly rated went to our academy for some years and his Father told me he or his wife couldn't have taken him further afield as they both had jobs and found it hard to take him even locally and so I just cannot see that being much different anywhere else UNLESS they are really something special and then they would be whisked off sooner rather than later. I know some late ****agers did go to Liverpool one time but that was some while ago and think they were not kids though and about to sign contracts.

    The other problem is as we are seeing is some players that have come through the academy refusing to sign extensions and that is disgusting to my mind anyway having had millions spent on them collectively...

    I do wonder if the board has been to swayed by Dario though and we really shouldn't have gone with Cat 2 but Cat 3 like most others did and some now have even abandoned that idea....Cat 3 about 150 grand, Cat2 three quarters of a million...Take your pick!

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