Can’t compete or won’t compete?

[caytonmiller]

Sorry don't do links.
Digital online Advertiser which you have to subscribe to. Possibly in this week's Tiser or at least it should be.

Don't subscribe and don't live in Rotherham so don't get the tizer. Will have to take your word for it

[Ronners]

All businesses are always at financial risk, it is about what level of risk the owners want to carry and then how they manage the risk. What would i want TS to do differently, well whatever I say is based on a limited knowledge same as everyone else on here, but my observations are:
1. Contract management poor, we seem to have a "run down" policy where we only offer new contracts late in the contract cycle and this means we get a high rejection ratio for key assets, net outcome is we are losing potential resale value for players.
2. Don't keep saying we have learned our lessons and promise investment in the team and then don't do it, sets expectations and the fans will always feel let down or mislead.
3. Academy, if we are not going to invest in the finished article we have to put more effort into finding gems for our first team and future sales. How many players have come through our youth system and gone on to be first team regulars or to make us some money?
4. Be visible when it gets tricky, he is the invisible man at the moment, quick to take the applause but where is he now? He should be standing up leading from the front providing visible support for the management and the team.

Now I am not saying 1 and 3 are easy, but 2 and 4 are. 1 and 2 are just areas that don't seem to be as optimum as they could be, there could be many reasons why they are not, but one of the reasons could be that the people doing the work aren't very good at it. saying TS is a successful businessman so he always knows best, isn't good enough, the people that owned Blockbuster video were very successful business people so much so they turned down the option of in netflix, where are the Blockbuster owners now.

The contract management is a tricky one, if we weren't a yoyo club then I think we could offer players we wanted to keep a really good deal, but I do take your point that maybe we could offer a new contract earlier, if a player is proving himself to be important.
The Academy i also think is a tricky one, as we have bigger clubs around us, one who's massive, who will all have contacts that will alert them when a Rotherham boy at school shows promise, and although we did manage to get Ben Wiles, we couldn't get Matt Hamshaw when he was a promising Rotherham schoolboy footballer and the Massives got him, but yes they are areas we could address.
The point I was trying to get across is that some want TS to put more money in to give us a better chance of staying in the championship, but these people don't, or wont, say what they would like TS to actually do? and if TS did decide to put more money in, there is no guarantee for a club our size at this level of football to stay up, or even if we did, we will always struggle at this level of football as it stands at the moment. UTM

[millersrus]

Agree with the contract management being the tricky one.
Simplistic but generally.. A club on an uptrend would indicate player assets improving in value so longer term contracts with eye to profit on sales. Money to invest in replacements. Consolidate the base.
A club on a downtrend would be the opposite, players not as saleable so shorter contracts.
However we are a a yo-yo club in the middle which way to go?
My take is that the chairman has erred on the side of caution but loses player assets and unable to afford replacements at championship level.
Can’t see any any other realistic long term home except for league 1 with this mindset.
Pretty much has been the case for the majority of time in our history.