Duchatelet is THE Problem

Chris_from_Sidcup

oohaahmortimer said:

If we signed all them players under the coaching of NJ we’d be midtable dross and half of them would have broken down with injuries 

Unfortunately that is highly accurate.

charltonkeston

There are so many problems with our club it would be like playing wacka mole to fix them. Defiantly Duchatet is one of them but then so is the current owners who are pretty much unknown apart from Charlie who stated on his podcast appearance that the academy is a important revenue stream. I wonder if its the plan to develop players at the expenspense of 1st team success. There are also the other problems, player recruitment, player retention, coaching, team tactics, the list could go on and on but I really think the biggest problem is the ownership. I'm not sure they've ever known what to do or whats needed.

Addick Addict

Chris_from_Sidcup said:

Addick Addict said:

It's rather embarrassing to see what the team at the top of the table and 16 points above us have spent on recruitment when compared to us. In all competitions they have won 9 on the bounce and lost just one game in their last 18 which was a 2-1 defeat to Aston Villa in the League Cup. This is their XI with the most League 1 games this season (appearances in brackets):

Franco Ravizolli (13) - free from MK Dons
Jack Grimmer (14) - free from Coventry
Joe Low (15) - undisclosed from Bristol City
Caleb Taylor (11) - on loan from WBA
Daniel Harvie (15) - undisclosed from MK Dons
Garath McLeary (13) - free from Reading
Aaron Morley (12) - on loan from Bolton
Josh Scowan (13) - free from Sunderland
Cameron Humphreys (12) - on loan from Ipswich
Daniel Udoh (14) - undisclosed from Shrewsbury
Richard Kone (15) - free following successful trial after playing for an Essex League club

All of the above have started at least 10 of their 15 matches and no other player has commenced more than 6 games for them this season. Three undisclosed payments which probably amount in total to less than we paid for Ahadme and the rest of them either frees or loans.  Virtually half of that XI joined this season too. 

It wouldn't matter if we owned the ground or not because we could have signed any number of those if we really wanted to.

That to me shows they've been very fortunate with injuries and are reaping the benefits of being able to field a settled side week in week out.

We are struggling and i'm not saying we'd be doing as well as them but i'm confident that if we'd had the likes of Leaburn, Jones, Ramsay, Edwards and Chuks fit all season we'd be doing much better than we are.

Absolutely Injury does play a part but there's at least one player there that they probably would not have signed knowing his history. Making your most expensive player someone that is only able to play 20 minutes when fit really does restrict your options in other areas. Wycombe can't afford, let alone gamble in that way, to do that. 

There's no way we would even consider a 37 year old player like Garath McLeary because he wouldn't fit into our long term strategy. Where are our loan equivalents of Taylor, Morley and Humpreys? We have Allan Campbell. Not exactly the same. They signed 21 year old Richard Kone for nothing and he's scored 9 League goals in 11 starts whereas we spent shedloads on Ahadme by comparison who has 1 in 8. When we lost three consecutive games to Blackpool, Stevenage and Bristol Rovers we hardly had anyone missing. Five of the XI above never kicked a ball for them prior to this season so it's not as if they haven't had to hit the road running either. 

Their success is as down to recruitment and a manager knowing how he wants them to play as it is their lack of injuries. We have 14 players that have made 10 or more appearances but have taken a scatter gun and signed anything that moves. Quantity rather than quality and in some respect too many of the same type i.e. every team needs one water carrier but they really do not need four of them. Sometimes less really is more. 

paulbaconsarnie

oohaahmortimer said:

If we signed all them players under the coaching of NJ we’d be midtable dross and half of them would have broken down with injuries ….

..on 6 year contracts

CAFCBill

Sorry if this has already been said I've not gone through and read every other post in here. My opinion is our main issue is that every single recent transfer window we have nothing to build off. Player recruitment and coaching staff recruitment has been so poor for so long that every Summer/ January has been a complete squad rebuild. Of the current squad based on current form the only players I think we can seriously build from are Jones, Leaburn, Ramsey & possibly Godden/ Berry (but Berry never plays). That's pretty much a whole new team and this summer we recruited heavily. It's so frustrating to hear every transfer window that this is a new era for the club and we only recruit players who give 100% into everything they do. If so, what brilliant scout saw that in Allan Campbell. I just want some stabillity but it's really hard to see that happening if this current group of players carry on with the performances they are giving. I'm normally really positive lol, I have lost a lot of interest this year and I think that's really sad as off the pitch I do actually genuinely think this set of owners are trying to do the right things. They've just recruited horribly on the football side of things. Which is pretty important when you run a football club. Rant over

CAFCBill

Also this summer why didn't we recruit an attacking minded central midfielder. That has been the greatest mistake of this season. There's literally no link between the strikers and midfield in the middle of the pitch. 

Nadou

CAFCBill said:

Also this summer why didn't we recruit an attacking minded central midfielder. That has been the greatest mistake of this season. There's literally no link between the strikers and midfield in the middle of the pitch. 

There's no link because Jones must have chosen to have the defence hoof a long ball as soon as they have stopped passing it from side to side between them. The ball sails over midfield in the hope that it might hit someone's bonce and bounce into the net.

carly burn

Jones had no interest in scoring many goals.
Clean sheets and 1-0's was his vision.
And I'm sure we'd have all been happy with regardless of it was turgid to watch.
But what he's ended up with is a leaky defence and tepid midfield....and not an iota of a plan B.
I really feel for Anderson. He's at an age where he should be learning the game alongside and experienced midfielder with a bit of class.
Parker had Stuart and Kinsella.
Poor Anderson has ended up with Docherty and Mitchell!

YTS1978

PWR much of the thread. I may be being naive, but if the owners are here "for the long term" as Charlie keeps suggesting, then why not negotiate a long term payment plan to get the assets back off Roland? I know it's more losses PA but it's surely beneficial. Say the lease is 15yrs then whack £1.5m on per season + the rent already in place and increase PA if we climb the pyramid. More like paying off a mortgage than renting, if that makes sense?! I'm literally spending someone else's money in my mind here, but am I missing something? Maybe FFP comes into it, but could the investment group set up another company to fund this? I dunno? I'm sure @Airman Brown Brown and others more clued up might be able to offer some insight.

Ducktapeshoerepairs

PeanutsMolloy said:

ElfsborgAddick said:

Any owners that we have who do not purchase The Valley will surely hinder our prospects on the pitch.
With the lease winding down rapidly I can see a bleak future unless someone comes in and buys everything.

Duchatelet may be an arse but the main problem is that it makes us vulnerable when ownership is being sold to shysters buying control cheaply.
We’ve had enough experience of that but the current owners are not shysters.
Their intentions are good, the plans sensible and the money is there. Whether Jones is a sound appointment to achieve their immediate objectives is another matter. 

What money ? The money to keep is alive (I can see that), the money to take us forward (no evidence of this as yet)

Billy_Mix

Airman Brown said:

It’s not an accident that we keep failing and it’s not enough to point at the players, the manager or any one individual behind the scenes. I have no confidence in the current management but I think they are a product of the bigger picture, just as their recent predecessors were. 

Equally it’s no coincidence that Charlton succeeded in the 1990s and early 2000s just because you can’t put it down directly to the ownership or redevelopment of The Valley. 

The club in that era was a crusade, with everyone committed to a common goal. The directors were clearly part of that. The management was passionate and engaged. This mission, as Curbs has often related, was transmitted to the players. It had an effect although in the Premier League it became increasingly marginal to the players.

My point is that we have no current narrative in which people can believe. The owners are remote and the management isn’t able to communicate sincerity of ambition or purpose. There is nothing positive for the players to take from that, even if they were collectively good enough. In short nobody believes in what is currently going on. They are all going through the motions, as are many of us, and even those doing their best on the pitch cannot overcome the situation on their own. No surprise we fail and I fear we will continue to do so, until something fundamental changes. It’s not acquiring the ground per se - although comparisons with publicly owned stadia are irrelevant - it’s what that would mean about the club.

I know you were much closer to events than most of us for an extended period but do you really believe that a significant majority of the playing squad would be significantly influenced by something as nebulous as a 'mission' or 'narrative' to the effect of achieving more than the sum of their parts?
A greater influence than say, simple game plans designed to maximise the utility of the players that are fit and available at any one time and communicated to them in terms they understand?  With maybe something like a plan B for when errors, luck and refereeing incompetence intervene? 
Each match is a discreet event, 100 odd minutes, utilising between 11 and 16 players, most of whom have relatively defined roles.
This is not high concept, theoretical or philosophy

These are professional athletes it's true but even during Curbs's squad's steepest improvements and attainments there was the eternal revolving door of players on relatively short contracts.  The cliché that there is no loyalty in football is a cliché for a reason.

Much is made of all that was involved in the return to the Valley (the "crusade") providing the momentum to reach the playoffs twice in a few years, successfully of course in 98, bouncing straight back to the top division in 2000 leading to years at the top table
Much less acknowledgement is made of Lennie Lawrence achieving promotion to the top flight during the exile and clinging on for a couple of years against all odds and the financial clout of all the opposition.  His squads turned over as rapidly as those we've seen much more recently. Lennie's better offer wasn't slow to arrive. 

Murray, Simons, Curbishley and Gritt initially found themselves together as a result of events more than because they created or designed their starting point.
Their synergy or bottled lightning could never have been predicted and could never be permanent.  None of them had much experience in the roles they undertook in the summer of 1991.
That sort of synergy can't be manufactured or downloaded

The Chris Powell/Peter Varney led promotion felt like everybody pulling in the same direction, but Lee Bowyer also pulled off a promotion at a time of maximum turmoil minimum cohesion.  (The reasons for the brevity of each resulting Championship stay being very similar)


Forest have gone from champions of Europe to the 3rd division and back to the top half of the premiership.
Fulham have gone from top division to 4th and back again
Luton went from top division to 5th and back to the top again
The trajectory of far more has been in the one direction - all the familiar former league clubs in the conference, let's not dwell on Bury.


The absence of an intangible additional force isn't the 'fault' of the current custodians.

fenlandaddick

Bloke is like a ball and chain. Needs to be paid off and sent away. What a blimmin nugget

PragueAddick

When discussing the idea of just extending the lease, a lot of people cite Citeh, but nobody mentions the excrescence just across the Thames. Which is funny, because people are also talking about  chipping in to buy the ground, well we are all chipping in each year to keep West Ham in subsidised clover there. 

That said, if you listen to Kieran Maguire, who firmly believes that English clubs should own their stadia, there are still some disadvantages to West Ham's situation starting to emerge. They managed to grab all the wedge from the prawn sandwich revenue while no-one was able to see what was going on, but otherwise they cannot "monetise" the stadium in the way Spurs can and do (and to a lesser extent Arsenal). So the revenue gap between West Ham and those two is growing wider. As for the Valley, negotiating a sensible lease which allows for development and use of the facilities with that nutjob may be almost as difficult as negotiating a sensible sale price. FWIW I think our owners have pretty much worked this out. I've concluded that Methven has a pretty good grasp of the modern business dynamics of the English game, and subscribes to the Kieran Maguire view re stadium ownership; and having explained some things to the Americans they've probably agreed on a strategy of slowly slowly catchee monkey re RD, and are concentrating on sorting out the football side first. Maybe what I hope more than anything else, and can be derailed by failure to sort the football side, but I think that's the most likely approach they are taking.

Ducktapeshoerepairs

PragueAddick said:

When discussing the idea of just extending the lease, a lot of people cite Citeh, but nobody mentions the excrescence just across the Thames. Which is funny, because people are also talking about  chipping in to buy the ground, well we are all chipping in each year to keep West Ham in subsidised clover there. 

That said, if you listen to Kieran Maguire, who firmly believes that English clubs should own their stadia, there are still some disadvantages to West Ham's situation starting to emerge. They managed to grab all the wedge from the prawn sandwich revenue while no-one was able to see what was going on, but otherwise they cannot "monetise" the stadium in the way Spurs can and do (and to a lesser extent Arsenal). So the revenue gap between West Ham and those two is growing wider. As for the Valley, negotiating a sensible lease which allows for development and use of the facilities with that nutjob may be almost as difficult as negotiating a sensible sale price. FWIW I think our owners have pretty much worked this out. I've concluded that Methven has a pretty good grasp of the modern business dynamics of the English game, and subscribes to the Kieran Maguire view re stadium ownership; and having explained some things to the Americans they've probably agreed on a strategy of slowly slowly catchee monkey re RD, and are concentrating on sorting out the football side first. Maybe what I hope more than anything else, and can be derailed by failure to sort the football side, but I think that's the most likely approach they are taking.

Has that changed now re West Ham ? 

PragueAddick

Ducktapeshoerepairs said:

PragueAddick said:

When discussing the idea of just extending the lease, a lot of people cite Citeh, but nobody mentions the excrescence just across the Thames. Which is funny, because people are also talking about  chipping in to buy the ground, well we are all chipping in each year to keep West Ham in subsidised clover there. 

That said, if you listen to Kieran Maguire, who firmly believes that English clubs should own their stadia, there are still some disadvantages to West Ham's situation starting to emerge. They managed to grab all the wedge from the prawn sandwich revenue while no-one was able to see what was going on, but otherwise they cannot "monetise" the stadium in the way Spurs can and do (and to a lesser extent Arsenal). So the revenue gap between West Ham and those two is growing wider. As for the Valley, negotiating a sensible lease which allows for development and use of the facilities with that nutjob may be almost as difficult as negotiating a sensible sale price. FWIW I think our owners have pretty much worked this out. I've concluded that Methven has a pretty good grasp of the modern business dynamics of the English game, and subscribes to the Kieran Maguire view re stadium ownership; and having explained some things to the Americans they've probably agreed on a strategy of slowly slowly catchee monkey re RD, and are concentrating on sorting out the football side first. Maybe what I hope more than anything else, and can be derailed by failure to sort the football side, but I think that's the most likely approach they are taking.

Has that changed now re West Ham ? 

No. They continue to coin it from that, because it's in the shoddy contract. What has changed is that Spurs now have a stadium which is just as big, demonstrably better, where they keep all revenue (WHU only get a bit of the regular catering money) and entirely their own to rent out, and monetise as they think fit. Daniel Kretinsky won't like that, and that's why I expect him to make an offer to London to buy the thing in the next few years. 

IanJRO

Heard rumblings a year ago that discussions were being had on a third party to purchase the stadium and SL from RD in return for what I assume was some sort of stake in the club and place on the board plus a new lease arrangement. Haven't heard anything since but thinking at the time was that whilst it wouldn't entirely reunite the ground and the club to start with, it would have been a step in the right direction.  The name given to me was one that would have made plenty nervous though!

MuttleyCAFC

Where I respectfully disagree with Airman's post is that it is a fait a complis that we will not be successful. Robins did a great job at Coventry despite similar conditions. Bowyer showed despite a terrible owner that a strong team can be produced. Where we have failed, in both cases under Duchatelet, under Powell and then Bowyer is due to a total unwillingnes to ride the wave. Powell had the rug pulled from underneath him despite just missing out on the play-offs the season before and we saw all the nonsense with Bowyer's contract and selling us to crooks after he got us promoted.

If, and of course it is a big if, Jones did something similar I wouldn't say with certainty that he wouldn't be backed further by this current lot. Then who knows. If Jones doesn't do it, which he isn't showing signs he will do at this moment, I would hope we find a Charlton man without loads of baggage or experience ( for an experienced manager to come to us this would have to include experience of failure) and we can hope to follow the model that has brought us success everytime we have tasted it in recent years. 

The key in getting the Valley back is getting back to the Premier League. I can't see any other scenario where this could happen.

Solidgone

Roland Out Forever screamed Alice Cooper!

bertpalmer

IanJRO said:

Heard rumblings a year ago that discussions were being had on a third party to purchase the stadium and SL from RD in return for what I assume was some sort of stake in the club and place on the board plus a new lease arrangement. Haven't heard anything since but thinking at the time was that whilst it wouldn't entirely reunite the ground and the club to start with, it would have been a step in the right direction.  The name given to me was one that would have made plenty nervous though!

who was it then?

Athletico Charlton

YTS1978 said:

PWR much of the thread. I may be being naive, but if the owners are here "for the long term" as Charlie keeps suggesting, then why not negotiate a long term payment plan to get the assets back off Roland? I know it's more losses PA but it's surely beneficial. Say the lease is 15yrs then whack £1.5m on per season + the rent already in place and increase PA if we climb the pyramid. More like paying off a mortgage than renting, if that makes sense?! I'm literally spending someone else's money in my mind here, but am I missing something? Maybe FFP comes into it, but could the investment group set up another company to fund this? I dunno? I'm sure @Airman Brown Brown and others more clued up might be able to offer some insight.

Why would RD accept that though?  The only reason I can imagine was an even bigger end sale price for him. It's a non starter.

YTS1978

Athletico Charlton said:

YTS1978 said:

PWR much of the thread. I may be being naive, but if the owners are here "for the long term" as Charlie keeps suggesting, then why not negotiate a long term payment plan to get the assets back off Roland? I know it's more losses PA but it's surely beneficial. Say the lease is 15yrs then whack £1.5m on per season + the rent already in place and increase PA if we climb the pyramid. More like paying off a mortgage than renting, if that makes sense?! I'm literally spending someone else's money in my mind here, but am I missing something? Maybe FFP comes into it, but could the investment group set up another company to fund this? I dunno? I'm sure @Airman Brown Brown and others more clued up might be able to offer some insight.

Why would RD accept that though?  The only reason I can imagine was an even bigger end sale price for him. It's a non starter.

 That's where the art of negotiation comes in I guess! Get me Andy Scott on the blower! 

fenaddick

bertpalmer said:

IanJRO said:

Heard rumblings a year ago that discussions were being had on a third party to purchase the stadium and SL from RD in return for what I assume was some sort of stake in the club and place on the board plus a new lease arrangement. Haven't heard anything since but thinking at the time was that whilst it wouldn't entirely reunite the ground and the club to start with, it would have been a step in the right direction.  The name given to me was one that would have made plenty nervous though!

who was it then?

Total guess but given his previous shenanigans and the fact his name was occasionally thrown about when we were being passed but could be Mike Ashley

red10

The actual problem is Southall putting a fucking stupid valuation on the assets with his original "promise". A valuation Duchats likes and is clinging on to with everybody knowing it's completely unrealistic. Why this twat can't wake up and understand it was Bullshit and accept a realistic offer I just don't get.

Chris_from_Sidcup

red10 said:

The actual problem is Southall putting a fucking stupid valuation on the assets with his original "promise". A valuation Duchats likes and is clinging on to with everybody knowing it's completely unrealistic. Why this twat can't wake up and understand it was Bullshit and accept a realistic offer I just don't get.

Has he even had a realistic offer?

swordfish

We might want it, but he's got it, and isn't selling it. He doesn't have to, and over time land tends to appreciate in value. I bet he's hacked off that we're in L1 as it limits our attractiveness to buyers who might come closer to his valuation, assuming it's a monetary return that motivates him above all else. 

And I know some will say he's vengeful and wants us to suffer, but that doesn't explain him entering lease agreements with owners in the past when he could have told us/ them where to go.