What will Stuart Webbers legacy at NCFC be?

[alex_ncfc 666]

1 hour ago, Channon’s Windmill said:

Soccerbot. Is it even used now? If it is I guess we didn’t pay for any program updates

I predict the Soccerbot will be torn down within a year of Webber leaving. What a farce it was. 

[Yobocop 1,105]

2 hours ago, Sufyellow said:

But she is on the board and has been running the club which is way over 33 million in debt. I would still give her time if that's what the Americans want.  Definitely no bonus though on shares or anything, no one should be rewarded for failure. 

Who else is on the board out of interest? 

[Kingston Yellow 224]

4 hours ago, STAN said:

The notion amongst some fans that Webber came in and transformed the club drives me insane. He has stunk the place out, the club currently feels rotten from top to bottom, and it will probably take many years to recover from his “legacy”.

Webber struck gold with Farke, Buendia and Pukki and I will probably cherish those promotion seasons forever. Ultimately though it was Farke who delivered that free-flowing football and feel good factor, not Stuart Webber.

When he arrived he was extremely critical of his predecessors, but if you compare all aspects of his and McNally’s time at the club McNally’s achievements far outweigh anything achieved by Webber. 

Going back to the 2016-2017 season. We had just been relegated from the Premier League, Alex Neil was sacked in March 2017 with us sitting 8th in the Championship. Alan Irvine was appointed caretaker manager, followed by Webber arriving at the start of April 2017. Irvine finished the season reasonably strong guiding us to 8th place finish (10 points off the playoffs).

Despite his predecessors apparently dashing our lottery winnings up the wall, Webber still inherited a number of players with a high resale value and/or high potential.

In the season he arrived we had already sold Redmond, Brady, and Olsson in multi-million pound deals. In his first full season Howson, Pritchard and Jacob Murphy all departed in multi-million pound deals. Second season Maddison and Josh Murphy. Fourth season Godfrey and Lewis.

As of today I’m struggling to see much resale value in the squad at all. Potentially Jonny Rowe (who was also at the club pre-Webber funnily enough) and possibly Gabriel Sara.

In his first interview after arriving at Norwich Webber said: “The job in a nutshell will be judged on how good the recruitment is and how good the head coach is, it’s no use the medical department looking fantastic if you recruit the wrong players”.

You can blow the shiny new training ground building trumpet all you like, but it’s currently delivering relegation form Championship football. Yes it needed improvement, but it didn’t take a rocket scientist/footballing guru to realise that. 

Ultimately he’s leaving us with a cr*p manager, a squad full of ageing journeymen, a disjointed fan base, uncertainty from top to bottom, and we look a million miles from the Premier League.

I’d give him a solid 1/10, the sooner he departs the better. 

 

 

A great post and I agree with most of this.  Whilst I can’t stand Webber and have never liked him, I do credit him with brining in Farke and Kieran Scott, who were the architects of our success in the Championship.  

However, the whole thing fell apart as soon as Scott left.  Our recruitment strategy has been a complete failure, Farke was made the fall guy and yet, Webber’s remained.   

[Segura 84]

As one poster states, human nature dictates that we will look back on Webber's time here as a rum'un, as it is likely to end in a low ebb for the club.

However, to add some balance, I would state he's achieved close to the maximum that can be achieved in the current footballing climate for a medium sized club with little resources. Two championship trophies is not something to be sniffed at and shouldn't be forgotten or diminished.

There are several similar-sized clubs who have dropped out of the Prem in recent times and become marooned - Stoke, Swansea, WBA, Watford, Boro, QPR, Cardiff, Hull, further down there's Bolton and Portsmouth. So what is happening right now clearly isn't unique for a club of our stature.

Yet I can't deny we're in a rathole and I understand the frustrations - he's failed to establish us in the Prem, he has worse PR skills than Gerald Ratner and I'm personally concerned by the 'brain drain' of staff who have left NCFC recently - this doesn't look good for him at all.

Clearly we've long since reached the point where it would be best for both parties to say farewell and adieu and I wish Mr Knapper the very best, he may well need it!

 

[slaphead 17]

Good crop of early potatoes last year in the allotment down at Colney.

[Bradwell canary 109]

Got dead lucky with Farke!!

Thats it!

 

[Kingston Yellow 224]

2 hours ago, Segura said:

he's failed to establish us in the Prem

If you’re going for balance, he’s failed to establish in the Championship without Scott and Farke.

[S_81 872]

9 hours ago, STAN said:

The notion amongst some fans that Webber came in and transformed the club drives me insane. He has stunk the place out, the club currently feels rotten from top to bottom, and it will probably take many years to recover from his “legacy”.

Webber struck gold with Farke, Buendia and Pukki and I will probably cherish those promotion seasons forever. Ultimately though it was Farke who delivered that free-flowing football and feel good factor, not Stuart Webber.

When he arrived he was extremely critical of his predecessors, but if you compare all aspects of his and McNally’s time at the club McNally’s achievements far outweigh anything achieved by Webber. 

Going back to the 2016-2017 season. We had just been relegated from the Premier League, Alex Neil was sacked in March 2017 with us sitting 8th in the Championship. Alan Irvine was appointed caretaker manager, followed by Webber arriving at the start of April 2017. Irvine finished the season reasonably strong guiding us to 8th place finish (10 points off the playoffs).

Despite his predecessors apparently dashing our lottery winnings up the wall, Webber still inherited a number of players with a high resale value and/or high potential.

In the season he arrived we had already sold Redmond, Brady, and Olsson in multi-million pound deals. In his first full season Howson, Pritchard and Jacob Murphy all departed in multi-million pound deals. Second season Maddison and Josh Murphy. Fourth season Godfrey and Lewis.

As of today I’m struggling to see much resale value in the squad at all. Potentially Jonny Rowe (who was also at the club pre-Webber funnily enough) and possibly Gabriel Sara.

In his first interview after arriving at Norwich Webber said: “The job in a nutshell will be judged on how good the recruitment is and how good the head coach is, it’s no use the medical department looking fantastic if you recruit the wrong players”.

You can blow the shiny new training ground building trumpet all you like, but it’s currently delivering relegation form Championship football. Yes it needed improvement, but it didn’t take a rocket scientist/footballing guru to realise that. 

Ultimately he’s leaving us with a cr*p manager, a squad full of ageing journeymen, a disjointed fan base, uncertainty from top to bottom, and we look a million miles from the Premier League.

I’d give him a solid 1/10, the sooner he departs the better. 

 

 

This this this. *clap*

Edited October 29, 2023 by S_81

[shefcanary 2,466]

On 29/10/2023 at 10:24, Barbe bleu said:

How much involvement did he have in the training ground?  Sure its good, very good maybe, and the funding was a masterstroke but was he involved in the design or the money raising, or just there at the time?

My recollection is that the planning application went on just after he started and to get it to the stage of putting the papers in isn't done in the course of a couple of weeks or months.

Am I misremembering?

You are not. Zoe came in as a consultant a long time before Stu arrived and one of the "successes" of her consultancy was indeed the planning and design of the new improved Colney. I've been castigated on here before for saying this, but when she tipped Stu the wink about the job here, do you think she also held back on the background knowledge she had gained of the clubs future plans?  When he went into the interview he effectively fed back the vision the Board were working to. Instead of being sceptical unfortunately Delia and Michael (both already well bitten by strong media types) ate it up and appointed him almost on the spot. 

Just why did he leave Huddersfield again?

And yes, initial recruitment success under Kieran Scott dried up as soon as Scott left. That was his biggest mistake, not holding on to him or finding an equal replacement. Its' been downhill since, so much so he panicked after listening to that Talk****e noise and threw away the philosophy he said would be key to the future of the club. And now, what future? Well there might be one but that's at least 3 seasons away.

[pete 320]

His legacy is leaving the club financially and player wise in a complete mess.