New CEO/Midfield 2for1 thread (Can we sign a Player-CEO fill both roles?)

[Orion]

brian was responsible for ditching the reading way, and subsequently getting rid of lots of useful players at this level, and replacing them with a load of weak identikit midfielders whoi couldnt fight their way out of a lettuce leaf
gourlay compounded that massively, by spending way more money on buying a load of even weaker identikit midfielders, but going back to tev is not the answer imo.
what experience does he have to become a CEO?

Spot on. He really won't be the right replacement.

Typical example of two steps forward and one step back by the owners, who clearly have no idea what they're doing.

[Norfolk Royal]

Get someone in who knows their way round a business deal like Phillip Green.

[muirinho]

brian was responsible for ditching the reading way, and subsequently getting rid of lots of useful players at this level, and replacing them with a load of weak identikit midfielders whoi couldnt fight their way out of a lettuce leaf
gourlay compounded that massively, by spending way more money on buying a load of even weaker identikit midfielders, but going back to tev is not the answer imo.
what experience does he have to become a CEO?

Spot on. He really won't be the right replacement.

Typical example of two steps forward and one step back by the owners, who clearly have no idea what they're doing.

When Gourlay came in, you could see the logic, they wanted somebody with loads of experience, and they got one. But he was the wrong personality for the club, which is a lot harder to identify and pin down.

They've acted on that mistake, but I can see why them made it, and also, as a result, why they might now be thinking - let's get somebody in who we get on with, and seems to get on well with people in the club, rather than, let's get in a bigwig with loads of experience elsewhere.

i.e., bring back people who've worked here before - Howe or Tevreden. Wouldn't Howe and Hammond between them have recommended promoting Tev the first time round? If REP is still going ahead, and Howe is looking after that, he may not want to move back

who do you think they should get in?

[Orion]

brian was responsible for ditching the reading way, and subsequently getting rid of lots of useful players at this level, and replacing them with a load of weak identikit midfielders whoi couldnt fight their way out of a lettuce leaf
gourlay compounded that massively, by spending way more money on buying a load of even weaker identikit midfielders, but going back to tev is not the answer imo.
what experience does he have to become a CEO?

Spot on. He really won't be the right replacement.

Typical example of two steps forward and one step back by the owners, who clearly have no idea what they're doing.

When Gourlay came in, you could see the logic, they wanted somebody with loads of experience, and they got one. But he was the wrong personality for the club, which is a lot harder to identify and pin down.

They've acted on that mistake, but I can see why them made it, and also, as a result, why they might now be thinking - let's get somebody in who we get on with, and seems to get on well with people in the club, rather than, let's get in a bigwig with loads of experience elsewhere.

i.e., bring back people who've worked here before - Howe or Tevreden. Wouldn't Howe and Hammond between them have recommended promoting Tev the first time round? If REP is still going ahead, and Howe is looking after that, he may not want to move back

who do you think they should get in?

People say never go back, but how can you ignore two people who clearly knew what they were doing, are low risk and know how to bring success.

Hammond and Howe.

[Victor Meldrew]

Not until summer 2017. We broke our transfer record on Ilori in Jan 17 and bought Popa in too along with the loan signings of Grabnan and Oxford.

And to be fair, Ilori has been a good signing, Popa showed he should have been good. Grabban was played out of position by Stam. Oxford was a waste who has now completely disappeared as a player.

Has he? He's shown glimpses of being a good player but wouldn't say he's been consistently good enough.

Hard to explain but he's one of those players who makes himself look better than he actually is.

We have another one like that, our multi-capped (so he must be good) right-back.

[WAZZOCK]

brian was responsible for ditching the reading way, and subsequently getting rid of lots of useful players at this level, and replacing them with a load of weak identikit midfielders whoi couldnt fight their way out of a lettuce leaf
gourlay compounded that massively, by spending way more money on buying a load of even weaker identikit midfielders, but going back to tev is not the answer imo.
what experience does he have to become a CEO?

Who are you referring to here out of interest?

[Orion]

brian was responsible for ditching the reading way, and subsequently getting rid of lots of useful players at this level, and replacing them with a load of weak identikit midfielders whoi couldnt fight their way out of a lettuce leaf
gourlay compounded that massively, by spending way more money on buying a load of even weaker identikit midfielders, but going back to tev is not the answer imo.
what experience does he have to become a CEO?

Who are you referring to here out of interest?

Tevereden

[WAZZOCK]

brian was responsible for ditching the reading way, and subsequently getting rid of lots of useful players at this level, and replacing them with a load of weak identikit midfielders whoi couldnt fight their way out of a lettuce leaf
gourlay compounded that massively, by spending way more money on buying a load of even weaker identikit midfielders, but going back to tev is not the answer imo.
what experience does he have to become a CEO?

Who are you referring to here out of interest?

Tevereden

Apologies, I meant ‘useful players that BT got rid of’. The biggest one I can think of is Norwood, with a special mention to Cooper. However the former was for a price we couldn’t turn down, and I have it on good authority that the latter’s attitude was inhibiting him.

[WAZZOCK]

brian was responsible for ditching the reading way, and subsequently getting rid of lots of useful players at this level, and replacing them with a load of weak identikit midfielders whoi couldnt fight their way out of a lettuce leaf
gourlay compounded that massively, by spending way more money on buying a load of even weaker identikit midfielders, but going back to tev is not the answer imo.
what experience does he have to become a CEO?

Spot on. He really won't be the right replacement.

Typical example of two steps forward and one step back by the owners, who clearly have no idea what they're doing.

When Gourlay came in, you could see the logic, they wanted somebody with loads of experience, and they got one. But he was the wrong personality for the club, which is a lot harder to identify and pin down.

They've acted on that mistake, but I can see why them made it, and also, as a result, why they might now be thinking - let's get somebody in who we get on with, and seems to get on well with people in the club, rather than, let's get in a bigwig with loads of experience elsewhere.

i.e., bring back people who've worked here before - Howe or Tevreden. Wouldn't Howe and Hammond between them have recommended promoting Tev the first time round? If REP is still going ahead, and Howe is looking after that, he may not want to move back

who do you think they should get in?

I think the owners have their hearts in the right place, but I will wholeheartedly refute your first paragraph above.

Gourlay had absolutely no experience of the player side of football prior to joining Reading.

This is an obvious statement, by commercially running a Chelsea compared to a Reading is really very different, and you can see by the current situation just how poorly he performed.

It’s bizarre to think given the difference in stature between the two clubs, but he was very much out of his depth at Reading.

[Maneki Neko]

brian was responsible for ditching the reading way, and subsequently getting rid of lots of useful players at this level, and replacing them with a load of weak identikit midfielders whoi couldnt fight their way out of a lettuce leaf
gourlay compounded that massively, by spending way more money on buying a load of even weaker identikit midfielders, but going back to tev is not the answer imo.
what experience does he have to become a CEO?

Who are you referring to here out of interest?

the people who could work hard, run loads, put a tackle or a cross in,defend and help out the defence,
but who werent able to dribble it out from the back/tip and tap the ball around in our own half for days.
becasue as we have seen, an english championship "football team" is not entirely functional if all of the players come from the same ball playing technical mould.

[muirinho]

Spot on. He really won't be the right replacement.

Typical example of two steps forward and one step back by the owners, who clearly have no idea what they're doing.

When Gourlay came in, you could see the logic, they wanted somebody with loads of experience, and they got one. But he was the wrong personality for the club, which is a lot harder to identify and pin down.

They've acted on that mistake, but I can see why them made it, and also, as a result, why they might now be thinking - let's get somebody in who we get on with, and seems to get on well with people in the club, rather than, let's get in a bigwig with loads of experience elsewhere.

i.e., bring back people who've worked here before - Howe or Tevreden. Wouldn't Howe and Hammond between them have recommended promoting Tev the first time round? If REP is still going ahead, and Howe is looking after that, he may not want to move back

who do you think they should get in?

I think the owners have their hearts in the right place, but I will wholeheartedly refute your first paragraph above.

Gourlay had absolutely no experience of the player side of football prior to joining Reading.

This is an obvious statement, by commercially running a Chelsea compared to a Reading is really very different, and you can see by the current situation just how poorly he performed.

It’s bizarre to think given the difference in stature between the two clubs, but he was very much out of his depth at Reading.

The thing is, he wasn't brought in for the player side of football, was he? He was brought in for the commercial side. Tevreden was meant to handle the player side. That they couldn't work together isn't the owners' fault.

I'm not saying he wasn't out of his depth in Reading, he clearly was. I'm just pointing out that it's harsh on the owners to blame them for that - on paper it probably looked like he'd be great.

[Orion]

When Gourlay came in, you could see the logic, they wanted somebody with loads of experience, and they got one. But he was the wrong personality for the club, which is a lot harder to identify and pin down.

They've acted on that mistake, but I can see why them made it, and also, as a result, why they might now be thinking - let's get somebody in who we get on with, and seems to get on well with people in the club, rather than, let's get in a bigwig with loads of experience elsewhere.

i.e., bring back people who've worked here before - Howe or Tevreden. Wouldn't Howe and Hammond between them have recommended promoting Tev the first time round? If REP is still going ahead, and Howe is looking after that, he may not want to move back

who do you think they should get in?

I think the owners have their hearts in the right place, but I will wholeheartedly refute your first paragraph above.

Gourlay had absolutely no experience of the player side of football prior to joining Reading.

This is an obvious statement, by commercially running a Chelsea compared to a Reading is really very different, and you can see by the current situation just how poorly he performed.

It’s bizarre to think given the difference in stature between the two clubs, but he was very much out of his depth at Reading.

The thing is, he wasn't brought in for the player side of football, was he? He was brought in for the commercial side. Tevreden was meant to handle the player side. That they couldn't work together isn't the owners' fault.

I'm not saying he wasn't out of his depth in Reading, he clearly was. I'm just pointing out that it's harsh on the owners to blame them for that - on paper it probably looked like he'd be great.

When he first came in, I thought it was a good appointment TBF, it only came to light later that if was going to be a disaster.

Tevs record in the market was more fail than succeed imo.

[WAZZOCK]

brian was responsible for ditching the reading way, and subsequently getting rid of lots of useful players at this level, and replacing them with a load of weak identikit midfielders whoi couldnt fight their way out of a lettuce leaf
gourlay compounded that massively, by spending way more money on buying a load of even weaker identikit midfielders, but going back to tev is not the answer imo.
what experience does he have to become a CEO?

Who are you referring to here out of interest?

the people who could work hard, run loads, put a tackle or a cross in,defend and help out the defence,
but who werent able to dribble it out from the back/tip and tap the ball around in our own half for days

Names?

I’ve mentioned Norwood and Cooper, anyone else?

[WAZZOCK]

When Gourlay came in, you could see the logic, they wanted somebody with loads of experience, and they got one. But he was the wrong personality for the club, which is a lot harder to identify and pin down.

They've acted on that mistake, but I can see why them made it, and also, as a result, why they might now be thinking - let's get somebody in who we get on with, and seems to get on well with people in the club, rather than, let's get in a bigwig with loads of experience elsewhere.

i.e., bring back people who've worked here before - Howe or Tevreden. Wouldn't Howe and Hammond between them have recommended promoting Tev the first time round? If REP is still going ahead, and Howe is looking after that, he may not want to move back

who do you think they should get in?

I think the owners have their hearts in the right place, but I will wholeheartedly refute your first paragraph above.

Gourlay had absolutely no experience of the player side of football prior to joining Reading.

This is an obvious statement, by commercially running a Chelsea compared to a Reading is really very different, and you can see by the current situation just how poorly he performed.

It’s bizarre to think given the difference in stature between the two clubs, but he was very much out of his depth at Reading.

The thing is, he wasn't brought in for the player side of football, was he? He was brought in for the commercial side. Tevreden was meant to handle the player side. That they couldn't work together isn't the owners' fault.

I'm not saying he wasn't out of his depth in Reading, he clearly was. I'm just pointing out that it's harsh on the owners to blame them for that - on paper it probably looked like he'd be great.

A CEO role at Reading would involve the final say on everything (including signings, sales and contracts), unlike the work he undertook at Chelsea. BT publicly came out and said RG was obstructing his work, which must have been hard to take given he was completely new to such working situations. When Howe was in charge, ultimately he oversaw everything the club did, RG didn’t have this experience.

Sorry, I’m not trying to be difficult, and fundamentally I agree with your point on the owners.

[muirinho]

Sorry, I’m not trying to be difficult, and fundamentally I agree with your point on the owners.

Yeah, fundamentally I don't think we're too far apart on that. And FWIW I'm not keen on Tevreden coming back in as CEO.
However, I can see a line of thinking where the owners are going - hang on, we paid megabucks for a guy who worked for a big club, and talked himself up to the nth degree, and he was flipping useless. Maybe we'll just go for somebody who doesn't have the experience, but isn't going to make everyone hate him, and Nigel Howe can act as a mentor for him as well as doing REP stuff.

[WAZZOCK]

Sorry, I’m not trying to be difficult, and fundamentally I agree with your point on the owners.

Yeah, fundamentally I don't think we're too far apart on that. And FWIW I'm not keen on Tevreden coming back in as CEO.
However, I can see a line of thinking where the owners are going - hang on, we paid megabucks for a guy who worked for a big club, and talked himself up to the nth degree, and he was flipping useless. Maybe we'll just go for somebody who doesn't have the experience, but isn't going to make everyone hate him, and Nigel Howe can act as a mentor for him as well as doing REP stuff.

You hit the nail in the head with your last sentence there. Whoever comes into the role will almost certainly have Howe as a mentor imo

[Sutekh]

Wouldn't be a surprise to see Nigel Howe quietly return in the short term to be the guy to find a long term replacement and take care of any pressing business in the interim.

[Maneki Neko]

Who are you referring to here out of interest?

the people who could work hard, run loads, put a tackle or a cross in,defend and help out the defence,
but who werent able to dribble it out from the back/tip and tap the ball around in our own half for days

Names?

I’ve mentioned Norwood and Cooper, anyone else?

off the top of my head....

cooper
tish
hector
williams
mcanuff
cummings
ledge
long
even lower quality players like blackman, Sa, pearce, karacan,NHunt tabb, morrison, ferdinand who knew how to do their jobs.
players with a bit of grit about them, who could put themselves about, with some strength, and who did the dirty work/hard yards

i realise these werent all kicked out, some went as natural wastage due to age/fitness, some had to be sold for financial reasons etc
but the point is they werent replaced like for like, and we ended up with a team of lightweight clones.

i realise we wanted to go more towards keeping the ball/passing (not something i agree with, or enjoy watching) but you have to maitain some balance. and imo thats what we lost in that time.

[WAZZOCK]

the people who could work hard, run loads, put a tackle or a cross in,defend and help out the defence,
but who werent able to dribble it out from the back/tip and tap the ball around in our own half for days

Names?

I’ve mentioned Norwood and Cooper, anyone else?

off the top of my head....

cooper
tish
hector
williams
mcanuff
cummings
ledge
long
even lower quality players like blackman, Sa, pearce, karacan,NHunt tabb, morrison, ferdinand who knew how to do their jobs.
players with a bit of grit about them, who could put themselves about, with some strength, and who did the dirty work/hard yards

i realise these werent all kicked out, some went as natural wastage due to age/fitness, some had to be sold for financial reasons etc
but the point is they werent replaced like for like, and we ended up with a team of lightweight clones.

i realise we wanted to go more towards keeping the ball/passing (not something i agree with, or enjoy watching) but you have to maitain some balance. and imo thats what we lost in that time.

You know Brian had nothing to do with the sale of all but two of those players?

[Maneki Neko]

bah!

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