10 years of Chase vs. 10 years of Smith

[Syteanric 1]

Martin O''Neil would of left at the first sniff of a big club coming in. He wouldnt of shown any loyalty to us. He''d of gone to where the big Payout was... Leicester were big payers, Celtic were big Payers and Randys Villa are big payers.

jas :)

[Temp the Revelator 0]

[quote user="FramCanary"]

[quote user="Say Hello To The Angels"]I understand peoples dislike of our current board even if i don''t 100% agree with it but Robert Chase was never liked (can''t remember much before 1990) and by the end the level of hatred towards the man was immense. I will never forget going to all the protests as a kid and remembering the elation felt by all when he finally left. I just don''t see or hear that level of feeling towards our current board when i speak to people and go to games.

Robert Chase lost us Martin O''Neil for that i will never forgive him, our current board are clearly better for the club than chase was although obviously the 10 years under chase were far more entertaining. If he''d have been allowed to continue though there would be no NCFC.
[/quote]

Yes, it is quite unbelievable that there is not the same level of protest aimed at the fools running the club. However, a tide of unrest and anger is gathering momentum & similar scenes may return.

O''Neill threw his toys out of the pram when Chase refused to sanction his proposed £1.3m acquisition of an unproven Dean Windass. Three months later the player moved from Hull to Aberdeen for 625k!. When O''Neill was tempted to Carrow Road by Chase & his board, he stated that the level of transfer budget was of no interest to him. However, he soon got through a significant amount of non-existant finance when purchasing a past-it Fleck (650k) & Rush (375k).

If Chase had stuck it out we would almost certainly be in much better shape than now - could it be any worse?

FramCanary.

[/quote]

Are you serious?  If Chase had stuck it out there would be no club left to support - Geoffrey Watling bailed the club out on the condition that Chase stood down as Chariman and from the Board.  We were very, very close to going under.

[nutty nigel 7,533]

[quote user="jas the barclay king"]

Martin O''Neil would of left at the first sniff of a big club coming in. He wouldnt of shown any loyalty to us. He''d of gone to where the big Payout was... Leicester were big payers, Celtic were big Payers and Randys Villa are big payers.

jas :)

[/quote]

I agree completely with that jas.

I posted last week about his times here as a player, he was a great player and he had a big impact here twice, but his transfers were always controversial.

Loved watching him though!

 

 

[Green and Yellow 0]

I would like to reply to canary 02 comment ''we are not 24hrs from closure'' unlike during the Chase era. That may be factually correct AT the moment but it is my opinion that if relgated we will be in a large pile of  brown s***. With the banks banging on the door.    

[norfolkbroadslim 223]

There can only be one winner in this discussion.  It has to be Chase.  That said I wouldn''t want him as chairman, but would pick him every time over the current bunch of monkeys.

Chase sold our best players and didn;t endear himself to the fans but.....

- He bought land around the ground.

- He developed the stadium long before it legally had to be (seating).

- League positions under chase are a million times better than they have been since he left.  To think we were disappointed with a third place finish in the Premiership.  We would love to be third in the Premiership now.

- Despite selling good players we always seemed to manage to find replacements of a good quality, and also a lot of bargains.  There was a much better quality of players coming throught the youth setup than we have now.

When we wanted Chase out, we thought the grass could only be greener, how wrong we were.

[nutty nigel 7,533]

So now looking back in time Chase''s front lawn looks greener but that depends what part you look back at. The lawn has some dodgy brown bits too like appointing Megson twice!

 

[FramCanary 0]

How can people just bury their heads in the sand and not allow themselves to realise what a laughing stock our beloved football club has become.

Time for complete change.

[Time to go Delia 0]

Chase every time , we had a team to be proud of in those days , Delia Smith has turned us into a laughing stock .

[FramCanary 0]

It is clear that those with one or more brain cells hail the Chase era as one of achievement and realise that the Smith tenure has been a failure.

What now?.

[JuanVelasco 27]

Are you being serious? be banished to suffolk I say........ For all the clubs/Chase''s mistakes during this period which resulted in relegation (such as the sutton sale, where did the money go? etc etc), the single biggest mistake that this idiot made was this:

First season back in the championship, Martin O''Neill as manager, top of the league at christmas, depleted squad..... Mr O''Neill requested 900K to buy Dean Windass, in return he promised promotion, he didn''t get it and he quit, we slipped down the league and spent 9 years in the championship.

That 900K could have been the start of the most successful era in the clubs history, when you consider the success of Leicester in the domestic cup competitions in the three or four years that followed.... Leicester (who O''Neill got Leicester promoted from the championship and are of a very similar size to our club) had not one but TWO cracks at European competition... as well as some shiny medals around their necks.

Shove that up your chase loving A***s and smoke it, everything that the chase regime achieved during their era was undone by that stupid mistake..... the flour mill investment, yeh it made us money.... but 900K on windass would have got us straight back up with a talented manager, 1m on a flour mill has only recouped a tiny fraction of the cost of such a prolonged period in the championship.

Oh yeh, and if you chase fans would like to meet Robert Chase and tell him personally of your admiration for his ''achievements'' then he can regularly be seen walking down dereham road or st benedicts to visit his cheque conversion company opposite Majestic Wine........

Sorry for the anger but you need to get real.

 

[John Boubepo 0]

The truth is when you add it all up it''s actually quite a difficult one to call, mind you I think many of us are far more forgiving of Delia because she''s Delia, many of us have a soft spot for her, including me to a certain extent, because she''s female, she''s a character, she''s a bit mumsy and she taught us how to boil our first egg.If she had been a balding, fat, ugly, 60 yr old man in a baggy grey suit, it would have all been over for her at least 12 months ago.If I''m honest the biggest part of me wants to see her turn this around and make a success of things despite all the mistakes  i.e. -  employing 3 [consecutive] very poor managers, failing to invest at a crucial moment while in the prem [did somebody shout Chase?] and playing a part in the building of a God awful hotel!After all this, I still want to see her make it but having said that, the fact that I can''t decide if she''s any better than Chase, pretty much says it all!  

[The poster formerly known as ? 0]

[quote user="Canary02"]

 Chase was a nightmare. He was exceptionally lucky to have Dave Stringer and then Mike Walker bale him out. Without successful managers investing in youth we would be no more thanks to that ****.

 

[/quote]

 

And under Smith just exactly how many succesful Managers investing in youth have we had? Oh dear.

 

[The Third Earl of WimBim 0]

This is a very interesting debate and having had some inside knowledge of our past four majority shareholders/Chairmen I will avoid my usual pathetic attempts at humour.

Geoffrey Watling was a real gent and I don''t think that I need to expand on his relationship with the Club - my main memory of him, apart from getting a lift to the ground with him when he spotted me waiting at a bus stop with my City scarf on - was the light in his eyes as he wandered round the centre of Milan prior to the Inter game - you could tell how proud he was. 

Sir Arthur lived and died NCFC and my most memorable vision of him was him being nearly in tears at the Civic Reception after we won the League Cup (totally refuse to call it by any other name).

There is no doubt that Robert Chase was a shrewd business man but you cannot give him total credit for the way the footballing side developed (and then failed) under his regime.  By the time he became Chairman we had been in the top flight of football for 12 of the previous 15 years.  We had a well established youth policy and an almost hereditary way of bringing through new managers when required.  By then our style of football was already established and recognsed for what it was -  a style which probablty started back in the days of when John Bond managed to secure the talents of players like Martin Peters. Chase''s biggest fault was not recognising when we needed to push things even further i.e. not releasing funds for Mike Walker to keep up the strength of the team after our defeat in Milan and losing Martin O''Neill to Leicester City for the same reasons.  He made some good land deals but almost got carried away by his own success and his desire to be a leading light in the higher echelons of football.  To say that he listened to fans is a strange take on events - I remember him many times giving speeches to fans groups and you always came away with the feeling that you had heard what you wanted to hear - only to find a few days later that the opposite was happening.  A clever politician no doubt but I dont think he paid much attention to fans viewpoints.

Delia is a strange one - born in Surrey, not naturally a Norwich fan, came here by a roundabout route.  There''s no doubting that she is a very passionate ''fan'' but sometimes you feel that she wears her heart on her sleeve too much - will we ever live down the ''Letsby Avenue'' incident?  Hung on to Nigel for much too long and replaced him with someone who has (as yet) not been given the resources to turn the slide around.  My biggest question over the current era (like many of you on here) is what the hell has happened to our youth team policy and our wonderful academy.  For years we could be relied upon to bring through a succession of players but this has all but disappeared.  Combined with no decent reserve team football the ability to come up through the ranks has almost disappeared.

However, unless we have a buyer who can sweep in and purchase the major shareholding, I can''t see things changing and to be honest I can''t see that happening, even if the current board were to be hounded into isolation.

No idea what the remedy is but hope that something happens soon either on or off the pitch or both!

[ZLF 274]

The success of the teams in teh two periods means its a no contest,  chases time is easily the winner. 

However someone else asked previously what delias legacy was/would be - too early to tell is the honest answer so far.  But the cost of Chases success was to ensure that any successful years HAD to be followed by a period of failure.   Chases legacy is still being felt and for me that is an unacceptable cost.     

[FramCanary 0]

[quote user="ZippersLeftFoot"]

The success of the teams in teh two periods means its a no contest,  chases time is easily the winner. 

However someone else asked previously what delias legacy was/would be - too early to tell is the honest answer so far.  But the cost of Chases success was to ensure that any successful years HAD to be followed by a period of failure.   Chases legacy is still being felt and for me that is an unacceptable cost.     

[/quote]

Nonsense.

How can you comment that the Chase years HAD to be followed by failure?. As it happens Smith''s tenure does add up to failure both on and off the pitch. However, Smith & her board took on a half decent squad of players and decided to run with net debt of £6.9m rather than clear it and start again - this was a decision made by the new board. A Chase approach would have been to cash in on the £11m combination of offers from Bolton & Spurs for Eadie & O''Neill, clear part/all of the net debt and provide a new manager with substantial funds to get us back into the Premiership.

To suggest that this past 10 years of under-achievement has anything to do with what was inherited is a nonsense. Smith & her board have failed due to their own catalogue of mistakes. This has become obvious to the vast majority of the supporters.

FramCanary.

[Jerzy Krukowski 5]

perhaps the lack of a succesful youth policy over the last few years

has been down to the changes in rules that mean we can only get

youngsters in the acedemy within 1.5 hrs travelling time. Not sure when

that came in, but it must have had a huge impact.

[FramCanary 0]

A great debate with many interesting points made by all.

One further point - Why does Smith hide when things get tough?.

Despite years of abuse from an element of our fan base, Chase never did hide & he departed with immense dignity.

Smith - WHERE ARE YOU?.

[In Dubious Battle 0]

It is very difficult in reality to compare the two periods, football has changed beyond all recognition in the last 10 years. I don''t think anyone could disagree that success is much harder to acheive in 2007 than it was in the early to mid 90''s, getting to the premiership and staying there has become increasingly difficult as vast sums of money have flooded the game and the gap between rich & poor has grown. It is all very well to go on about us acheiving 3rd, 4th & 5th placed finishes in the top flight under chase but the reality is without lots of money to spend we will never finish that high again even if we had the greatest board/owners in football.In chase''s era there were still bigger teams who had an advantage (man utd, liverpoool etc) but it was not such a huge gap and the rest of the teams were all on a fairly even playing field. We now have the situation where a team like wigan are in the premiership with only 15,000 supporters by virtue of the fact they have a rich backer. The way things are going in another 10 years time unless you have a sugar daddy it will be impossible to get into the premiership.  I''m not making excuses for delia at the end of the day 17th in the championship is not acceptable but i do feel making a straight comparison between her and chase without considering these external factors is a bit unfair. The era of £30 million transfers, £100,000 a week wages and clubs ending up £30-£40 million in debt had only just started when chase left it was a different game back then.

[The Third Earl of WimBim 0]

[quote user="FramCanary"]

A great debate with many interesting points made by all.

One further point - Why does Smith hide when things get tough?.

Despite years of abuse from an element of our fan base, Chase never did hide & he departed with immense dignity.

Smith - WHERE ARE YOU?.

[/quote]

 

Although I agree that she seems to have gone a bit quiet, the only time I think she''s gone AWOL was at Tamworth.  Seen her at most if not all home games this season.

[FramCanary 0]

[quote user="Say Hello To The Angels"]It is very difficult in reality to compare the two periods, football has changed beyond all recognition in the last 10 years. I don''t think anyone could disagree that success is much harder to acheive in 2007 than it was in the early to mid 90''s, getting to the premiership and staying there has become increasingly difficult as vast sums of money have flooded the game and the gap between rich & poor has grown. It is all very well to go on about us acheiving 3rd, 4th & 5th placed finishes in the top flight under chase but the reality is without lots of money to spend we will never finish that high again even if we had the greatest board/owners in football.

In chase''s era there were still bigger teams who had an advantage (man utd, liverpoool etc) but it was not such a huge gap and the rest of the teams were all on a fairly even playing field. We now have the situation where a team like wigan are in the premiership with only 15,000 supporters by virtue of the fact they have a rich backer. The way things are going in another 10 years time unless you have a sugar daddy it will be impossible to get into the premiership.

 I''m not making excuses for delia at the end of the day 17th in the championship is not acceptable but i do feel making a straight comparison between her and chase without considering these external factors is a bit unfair. The era of £30 million transfers, £100,000 a week wages and clubs ending up £30-£40 million in debt had only just started when chase left it was a different game back then.
[/quote]

Yes - valid points & very well put accross. However, during the Chase tenure we had a very modest income with gates averaging around 15,000 & ticket prices of £10ish. There was the extensive cost of change to all-seater & the building of the Barclay. This project was undertaken without the luxury of an inherited ''legacy'' of land with high value to cover over half the cost. There were no share issues (bringing in close on £5m) and the club Balance Sheets were not ''window dressed'' by capitalisation of the player contract values. In addition, the Chase board did not benefit from a £1.5m Whatling loan write-off, nor did it enjoy the high level of ''Parachute'' monies after relegation!.

[ZLF 274]

[quote user="FramCanary"][quote user="ZippersLeftFoot"]

The success of the teams in teh two periods means its a no contest,  chases time is easily the winner. 

However someone else asked previously what delias legacy was/would be - too early to tell is the honest answer so far.  But the cost of Chases success was to ensure that any successful years HAD to be followed by a period of failure.   Chases legacy is still being felt and for me that is an unacceptable cost.     

[/quote]

Nonsense.

How can you comment that the Chase years HAD to be followed by failure?. As it happens Smith''s tenure does add up to failure both on and off the pitch. However, Smith & her board took on a half decent squad of players and decided to run with net debt of £6.9m rather than clear it and start again - this was a decision made by the new board. A Chase approach would have been to cash in on the £11m combination of offers from Bolton & Spurs for Eadie & O''Neill, clear part/all of the net debt and provide a new manager with substantial funds to get us back into the Premiership.

To suggest that this past 10 years of under-achievement has anything to do with what was inherited is a nonsense. Smith & her board have failed due to their own catalogue of mistakes. This has become obvious to the vast majority of the supporters.

FramCanary.

[/quote]

The financial mismanagement meant that the success was never sustainable - so its far from nonsense.    Chase made a horrendous number of mistakes and maljudgements that haunted this club for years - just because we are having a rough time now does not mean that everything was rosy back in the 90s. 

 

[In Dubious Battle 0]

[quote user="FramCanary"]

[quote user="Say Hello To The Angels"]It is very difficult in reality to compare the two periods, football has changed beyond all recognition in the last 10 years. I don''t think anyone could disagree that success is much harder to acheive in 2007 than it was in the early to mid 90''s, getting to the premiership and staying there has become increasingly difficult as vast sums of money have flooded the game and the gap between rich & poor has grown. It is all very well to go on about us acheiving 3rd, 4th & 5th placed finishes in the top flight under chase but the reality is without lots of money to spend we will never finish that high again even if we had the greatest board/owners in football.In chase''s era there were still bigger teams who had an advantage (man utd, liverpoool etc) but it was not such a huge gap and the rest of the teams were all on a fairly even playing field. We now have the situation where a team like wigan are in the premiership with only 15,000 supporters by virtue of the fact they have a rich backer. The way things are going in another 10 years time unless you have a sugar daddy it will be impossible to get into the premiership.  I''m not making excuses for delia at the end of the day 17th in the championship is not acceptable but i do feel making a straight comparison between her and chase without considering these external factors is a bit unfair. The era of £30 million transfers, £100,000 a week wages and clubs ending up £30-£40 million in debt had only just started when chase left it was a different game back then. [/quote]

Yes - valid points & very well put accross. However, during the Chase tenure we had a very modest income with gates averaging around 15,000 & ticket prices of £10ish. There was the extensive cost of change to all-seater & the building of the Barclay. This project was undertaken without the luxury of an inherited ''legacy'' of land with high value to cover over half the cost. There were no share issues (bringing in close on £5m) and the club Balance Sheets were not ''window dressed'' by capitalisation of the player contract values. In addition, the Chase board did not benefit from a £1.5m Whatling loan write-off, nor did it enjoy the high level of ''Parachute'' monies after relegation!.

[/quote]I agree with what your saying and would add the cash made from transfers in the last year that has not been reinvested in the team fully, however next season being in the premiership is going to worth £40 million more than being in the championship you just cannot compete with that. There is no excuse for our posistion in the championship there is absolutely no reason why we shouldn''t in the very least be challenging for the play offs but i do believe that there is a pretty cast iron defence for the failure of this board to sustain premiership football.

[Mokey76 0]

To jog your memory a bit, a little story!

In 1992 after Dave Stringer had ''left by mutual consent'', we came very close to getting Phil Neal as our new manager.  As i remember, Mr Chase was a fan of how he managed Bolton for a long time and not spent much money.  After Neal decided a trip to Norwich was far too far to travel every day, Mr Chase went for the cheaper & easier option of promoting our reserve team manager, Mike Walker. I''m sure Mr Chase, along with rest of us, would never of dreamed of the exciting 18 months to follow - so I wouldn''t really credit him with any part of out footballing sucess in that period.  After one very successful season in charge, Mike Walker wanted an extension to his contract as it was only for 2 years, Mr Chase said he''d discuss it later.  After we had our Uefa cup run, Mike Walker asked again and got the same reply, so he went for a bit of job secrurity and probable a lot extra cash and went to Everton.  We got John Deehan & Gary Megson and relegated and haven''t come anywhere close to that success since.

I''m not saying we could''ve had it all if Walker had never gone, but I''m guessing it would have been a hell of a lot better than it is now!!

[BBFF 0]

Chase was far more successful on the football pitch where this lots ambition is far more centred off the pitch as we can now see by our present football waste land.

I support a football club its a pity some those in charge at Carrow Rd don''t think the same way.

[Syteanric 1]

[quote user="ryan85k"]

 

First season back in the championship, Martin O''Neill as manager, top of the league at christmas, depleted squad..... Mr O''Neill requested 900K to buy Dean Windass, in return he promised promotion, he didn''t get it and he quit, we slipped down the league and spent 9 years in the championship.

 

[/quote]

and the fact the current Regime got through 4 managers in that 9 years has nothing to do with it?

 Had they of Given Mike walker the time and the money worthington had got we wouldnt of spent 9 years at the bottom of the division getting T**tted by Port Vale would we?

jas :)

[Syteanric 1]

I fully believe Katie that if Walker ahd stayed, got the deal he wanted and had some fund we could of been a dominanant force in english football today.

Jose who? they''d of been small time compared to us.

jas :)

[FramCanary 0]

Good point, but I feel as though we should have avoided the drop. In many matches we performed to the required standard, but were not quite strong enough in the vital area''s of central defence & midfield. Had Fleming & Holt been replaced by younger players of a similar/better standard & if we had dropped Green (when it was patently obvious that his performances were becoming sub-standard), then I think Premiership football would have been sustained. However, you correctly point out that the gap is now huge between the have & have not''s.

Our approach was ''Prudence with ambition'' & resulted in very modest team strengthening, despite premiership income of an estimated £36m. For us to now be lumbered with £20m of debt is astonishing. With our neighbours - their debt level is fully understandable, our''s isn''t!

Clearly, we have been paying an average squad of players very very much more than their performances deserve, whilst other monies have been flooding out of (what is now) a sinking ship.

We could be on the verge of total disaster!.

[In Dubious Battle 0]

[quote user="FramCanary"]

Good point, but I feel as though we should have avoided the drop. In many matches we performed to the required standard, but were not quite strong enough in the vital area''s of central defence & midfield. Had Fleming & Holt been replaced by younger players of a similar/better standard & if we had dropped Green (when it was patently obvious that his performances were becoming sub-standard), then I think Premiership football would have been sustained. However, you correctly point out that the gap is now huge between the have & have not''s.

Our approach was ''Prudence with ambition'' & resulted in very modest team strengthening, despite premiership income of an estimated £36m. For us to now be lumbered with £20m of debt is astonishing. With our neighbours - their debt level is fully understandable, our''s isn''t!

Clearly, we have been paying an average squad of players very very much more than their performances deserve, whilst other monies have been flooding out of (what is now) a sinking ship.

We could be on the verge of total disaster!.

[/quote]This is of course true we had an amazing opportunity when we were promoted and we failed to make the most of it, i agree with ''prudence with ambition'' to a point, i don''t want to see this club spending silly money on players and ending up like Leeds. It''s a fine balance but upon promotion to the premiership we should have been more ambitious and signed a few more big players, for a start Dean Ashton should have been signed in August. If we ever get up there again the only way we will stay there is by spending money i think watford have proven once again what happens if you don''t .Remember a large chunk of our debt was for the building of the south stand, i would like to have a look at the accounts and see where all the money actually does go, i understand our wage bill was £9 Million last year? i shudder to think how much Peter Thorne, Paul McVeigh, Matteiu Louis Jean, Andy Hughes etc are costing the club every week. I''m no supporter of the current regime they need to sort things out asap, i just thought that some people were being a bit too simplistic in their comparisons between them and Chase.

[mbncfc 1]

[quote user="Say Hello To The Angels"]

This is of course true we had an amazing opportunity when we were promoted and we failed to make the most of it, i agree with ''prudence with ambition'' to a point, i don''t want to see this club spending silly money on players and ending up like Leeds. It''s a fine balance but upon promotion to the premiership we should have been more ambitious and signed a few more big players, for a start Dean Ashton should have been signed in August. If we ever get up there again the only way we will stay there is by spending money i think watford have proven once again what happens if you don''t .

Remember a large chunk of our debt was for the building of the south stand, i would like to have a look at the accounts and see where all the money actually does go, i understand our wage bill was £9 Million last year? i shudder to think how much Peter Thorne, Paul McVeigh, Matteiu Louis Jean, Andy Hughes etc are costing the club every week.

I''m no supporter of the current regime they need to sort things out asap, i just thought that some people were being a bit too simplistic in their comparisons between them and Chase.


[/quote]

This post completely sums up how I feel too, both on the thread and on our club [Y]

I guess the only annoyance is Reading. They didn''t really spend much at all... [:(]

[BlyBlyBabes 0]

I think that what worries me most about the Smith regime is the underlying philosophy & psychology that are persistently and perniciously at work. 3 examples:

1.  ''Prudence with ambition'' as a philosophy is miles away from ''Ambition with prudence''.

2.  Doncaster''s unashamed assertion that our most recent promotion  to the premier league was an ''over-achievement''.

3.  Smith''s deliberate characterisation of our club as ''little old Norwich''.

An industrial psycholgist would likely define this approach to fundamentals as a recipe for bankruptcy. 

OTBC