I agree with those who say that Richard Murray's reputation is in tatters, but I think his main failing is that he has been too trusting of people (and probably a bad judge of character).
We all want a club owner who will let the coaching staff get on with their job, well I don't think there was ever a sense that RM interfered with playing matters. He appointed his managers, backed them as best he could with the situation of the time and left them to get on with it.
In Curbs he had someone he cold both trust to do the right thing by the club and one who had excellent judgement. I think Parky had a reasonable amount of integrity too - having him in charge probably stopped us going under completely when in League 1, even if we all had higher ambitions that that. In between that he appointed the chancers that were Dowie and Pardew and they shafted him. He's backed the wrong horse twice now with new owners too.
Wow, I haven't heard that in ten years. Great find.
I have it on my computer. I just uploaded it to Audioboo. In fact I saved quite a few audio interviews from the old official site. I've replaced my computer twice over the years but I've kept those audios.
Good job, JessieAddick. From recollection, Sky had a technical problem and didn't capture it.
Ten years ago today.... announced Curbs leaving .. and that was the start of an ever accelerating slide downhill .. apart from the odd stop in a lay by
Take Bent's goals out of the picture and it looks pretty weak. Some honest triers in there (& some not), but arguably past their peak (Perry, Powell, Holland, Kish), and our "successful youth policy" (copyright Peter Varney 1995-2007) wasn't delivering. We needed change. And when the time came, Murray mismanaged the change process completely. The problems did not start on this day, the rot was beginning to set in, and we failed to correct it.
Why did we need a change! Finishing 7th not good enough. Be careful what you wish for. This was the start of the slide and look where we are now!
Just to really cement the hatred the forum appears to have for me, I'm not sure I've ever read comments with more rose tinted glasses. Curbs had taken the club as far as he could, and removing him was an attempt (seen to be unsuccessful of course but an attempt) to take charlton to the next level. Curbs' football was as interesting as the proverbial paint drying. 10 men behind the ball, a back 6 played every game no matter home or away and any opposition. When rumoured for the England job I told a friend playing 6 at the back against San Marino at Wembley would go down well! But at least we'd win 1-0. Not that anyone will read this properly and just shout, but Curbs did, I agree, almost guarantee safety in the prem. At what cost? Boring boring football, that's what. All rose tinted glasses - the fans chanted for him to leave. And he left. We aimed higher than him - Europe and nice football. Yes it failed, but we tried. But remembering Curbs as this amazing fellow is just re-writing history. On top of all that clubs and fans have learnt that having 1 guy run the entire club is a mistake (see Ferguson) as the future is damned. You have to have continuity planning, you gave to be able to keep running a club when that 1 guy leaves. If he dominates everything it's impossible. Club mistake! So there we go, abuse to start no doubt. But that's the actual history of Cyrbs. I for one am proud charting tried to evolve, succeed, achieve more. Yes we got it wrong, but getting rid of curbs was in fact the right decision to try.
Just to really cement the hatred the forum appears to have for me, I'm not sure I've ever read comments with more rose tinted glasses. Curbs had taken the club as far as he could, and removing him was an attempt (seen to be unsuccessful of course but an attempt) to take charlton to the next level. Curbs' football was as interesting as the proverbial paint drying. 10 men behind the ball, a back 6 played every game no matter home or away and any opposition. When rumoured for the England job I told a friend playing 6 at the back against San Marino at Wembley would go down well! But at least we'd win 1-0. Not that anyone will read this properly and just shout, but Curbs did, I agree, almost guarantee safety in the prem. At what cost? Boring boring football, that's what. All rose tinted glasses - the fans chanted for him to leave. And he left. We aimed higher than him - Europe and nice football. Yes it failed, but we tried. But remembering Curbs as this amazing fellow is just re-writing history. On top of all that clubs and fans have learnt that having 1 guy run the entire club is a mistake (see Ferguson) as the future is damned. You have to have continuity planning, you gave to be able to keep running a club when that 1 guy leaves. If he dominates everything it's impossible. Club mistake! So there we go, abuse to start no doubt. But that's the actual history of Cyrbs. I for one am proud charting tried to evolve, succeed, achieve more. Yes we got it wrong, but getting rid of curbs was in fact the right decision to try.
Curbishley left of his own accord . You're, of course, entitled to your opinion, even if it is utter bile . I can only assume that you only attended games towards the end of his tenure
Listening to that audioboom is just heart breaking....
I fucking loved that bloke...
Utter utter disaster ever since, with a another knife in the guts when our genuine chance with CP was extinguished by these utter utter c**** ... All I want is them out could not care less if it leaves us in non league... these people, if we can even call them that, deserve nothing but a cursed life full of pain ...
Just to really cement the hatred the forum appears to have for me, I'm not sure I've ever read comments with more rose tinted glasses. Curbs had taken the club as far as he could, and removing him was an attempt (seen to be unsuccessful of course but an attempt) to take charlton to the next level. Curbs' football was as interesting as the proverbial paint drying. 10 men behind the ball, a back 6 played every game no matter home or away and any opposition. When rumoured for the England job I told a friend playing 6 at the back against San Marino at Wembley would go down well! But at least we'd win 1-0. Not that anyone will read this properly and just shout, but Curbs did, I agree, almost guarantee safety in the prem. At what cost? Boring boring football, that's what. All rose tinted glasses - the fans chanted for him to leave. And he left. We aimed higher than him - Europe and nice football. Yes it failed, but we tried. But remembering Curbs as this amazing fellow is just re-writing history. On top of all that clubs and fans have learnt that having 1 guy run the entire club is a mistake (see Ferguson) as the future is damned. You have to have continuity planning, you gave to be able to keep running a club when that 1 guy leaves. If he dominates everything it's impossible. Club mistake! So there we go, abuse to start no doubt. But that's the actual history of Cyrbs. I for one am proud charting tried to evolve, succeed, achieve more. Yes we got it wrong, but getting rid of curbs was in fact the right decision to try.
Firstly, I don't hate you, although I do believe you speak (some) eloquent nonsense.
Curbs was not removed. He left by mutual consent. He had one year left on his contract and refused to sign another one.
Murray wanted Curbs to sign another contract and Curbs refused.
Murray's view and I agree, was that it would be difficult to sign players and possibly get them playing to their maximum potential if the players knew he was leaving. On that basis they agreed they should look for a replacement.
I agree Curbs had taken the club as far as he could without further substantial funds. In his last season his central midfield were Bryan Hughes and a fading Matt Holland who were of mediocre Championship standard.
Yes, towards the end, Curbs teams were defensive and boring, but this was necessary to remain in The Premier League.
There was no way we could compete playing expansive football with a "Championship" squad. Any knowledgeable Charlton fan would recognise this.
It is weird to suggest Curbs would have had a far superior England team defending against San Marino.
I saw all bar one of Curbs home games as manager and never once did I hear fans chanting for him to leave.
Yes I heard fans like your self complaining, because they did not understand the game of football sufficiently.
I agree that we did not have adequate succession planning and believe once again all right minded Charlton fans would concur.
Looking back it's easy to be upset about the bad choices we made, especially given where we are now, but it did feel that this parting of the ways was inevitable at a certain point. I don't think the biggest issue is that Curbs reached an end point with us, but that the next step was so important and we cocked it up entirely. Two major things had to go right, and they both went horribly wrong; the new structure had to work, and the new manager had to be a good choice. Murray tried to put in a new structure that had to be abandoned almost immediately, and he hired a manager who wasn't any good, had managed to get into the PL but had immediately got relegated from it while reliant on one excellent striker's goals entirely, and only really got the job to spite a local rival. On top of that the finances were also wrecked completely in the process. You could feel the bitterness flowing out of Murray at this point for Curbs getting all the credit for Charlton's success instead of him, and it was no surprise when Murray gave Dowie more money in one window than he'd given Curbs in any preceding season, while Dowie also failed to bring any money in for players at all. We spent £10.7m that summer (on some absolute dreck) and brought in £300,000, which barely covered Hasselbaink's shorts bill. We later sold a player in January for £1m, but it was Traore and we'd signed him for £2m that summer. That's what really killed us, our net spend was £12.4m on unsaleable assets that season and we're only just recovering from the impact that had now, and we're still being held to ransom by Roland regarding the assets.
The big question is who could we have got instead of Dowie? I seem to remember that we'd offered it to Billy Davies and he changed his mind (quite a Charlton theme that with Howe and Wilder as well) but he went on to be a) not very good and b) insane so possibly a lucky miss there. Mick McCarthy was also available but not one to set pulses racing. Who else was even out there at the time? I think we were quite unfortunate that when Curbs did reach his endpoint there wasn't an obvious quality managerial replacement for him out there. Maybe if Murray had been a wizard he could have gone for Guardiola before he started at Barce B!
Wow how time flies! Even this thread is now five years old...
It's always going to be extremely difficult to replace someone who's in charge for such a long time. I do think though if Curbs had stayed on for another year and helped with a smoothier transition, things might have turned out differently. Shame Murray didn't want it that way.
Start of a downward spiral that we haven't recovered from. Perhaps now with TS as the owner is our first genuine chance to claw back to where Curbs left us.
Was never a case of Curbs had taken the club as far as he could, more the club had gone as far as it could. The “next level” would require investment the board at the time did not have the resources or desire to provide. Nothing wrong with that, it’s just how it was.
He was always going to leave at some point, and Murray’s logic for rushing it through a bit did hold some water, but staying up one more season was very significant as it would’ve earnt us a share of a much increased TV deal. It was a bad year to roll the dice.
All easy with hindsight, and we have subsequently had some highs we wouldn’t have done had it not all started to go tits up after he left so I’m not bitter about it. Just part of the life experience of being a football fan.
As stated above though, this idea he was forced out by impatient, unappreciative fans is and always has been utter bollocks. A few vocal idiots on football phone ins do not, and have never, spoken for the majority of fans.
Comments
Well it didn't, cheers Al
We all want a club owner who will let the coaching staff get on with their job, well I don't think there was ever a sense that RM interfered with playing matters. He appointed his managers, backed them as best he could with the situation of the time and left them to get on with it.
In Curbs he had someone he cold both trust to do the right thing by the club and one who had excellent judgement. I think Parky had a reasonable amount of integrity too - having him in charge probably stopped us going under completely when in League 1, even if we all had higher ambitions that that. In between that he appointed the chancers that were Dowie and Pardew and they shafted him. He's backed the wrong horse twice now with new owners too.
Literally fighting amongst ourselves in Greenwich park and the Plume of Feathers.
Didn't go to the game in the end.
Bad day.
So there we go, abuse to start no doubt. But that's the actual history of Cyrbs. I for one am proud charting tried to evolve, succeed, achieve more. Yes we got it wrong, but getting rid of curbs was in fact the right decision to try.
I fucking loved that bloke...
Utter utter disaster ever since, with a another knife in the guts when our genuine chance with CP was extinguished by these utter utter c**** ... All I want is them out could not care less if it leaves us in non league... these people, if we can even call them that, deserve nothing but a cursed life full of pain ...
Curbs was not removed. He left by mutual consent. He had one year left on his contract and refused to sign another one.
Murray wanted Curbs to sign another contract and Curbs refused.
Murray's view and I agree, was that it would be difficult to sign players and possibly get them playing to their maximum potential if the players knew he was leaving. On that basis they agreed they should look for a replacement.
I agree Curbs had taken the club as far as he could without further substantial funds.
In his last season his central midfield were Bryan Hughes and a fading Matt Holland who were of mediocre Championship standard.
Yes, towards the end, Curbs teams were defensive and boring, but this was necessary to remain in The Premier League.
There was no way we could compete playing expansive football with a "Championship" squad. Any knowledgeable Charlton fan would recognise this.
It is weird to suggest Curbs would have had a far superior England team defending against San Marino.
I saw all bar one of Curbs home games as manager and never once did I hear fans chanting for him to leave.
Yes I heard fans like your self complaining, because they did not understand the game of football sufficiently.
I agree that we did not have adequate succession planning and believe once again all right minded Charlton fans would concur.
*according to the press, Roy Hodgson and people who know nothing about Charlton Athletic
It's always going to be extremely difficult to replace someone who's in charge for such a long time. I do think though if Curbs had stayed on for another year and helped with a smoothier transition, things might have turned out differently. Shame Murray didn't want it that way.
He was always going to leave at some point, and Murray’s logic for rushing it through a bit did hold some water, but staying up one more season was very significant as it would’ve earnt us a share of a much increased TV deal. It was a bad year to roll the dice.
All easy with hindsight, and we have subsequently had some highs we wouldn’t have done had it not all started to go tits up after he left so I’m not bitter about it. Just part of the life experience of being a football fan.