CHASE ????

[pitch fork 0]

ok now i know the name upsets many norwich fans

but with the recent situation with the club bringing in players:- isnt it about time we praised robert chase-he layed the foundations for the future-colney is a fantastic training ground and  thats the reason we are getting these players

and it all goes back to chase

i honestly believe that the board need to wake up and smell the coffee,can u honestly say that the club with the board we have can get back in the premiership

under chase we came third and went on an amazing european run

thank u chase please bring him back 

[Marigold 0]

I have been a regular viewer of this message board for the last two years and have thought about signing in on many occasions but this thread has really turned my head and is something I really believe in! Chase done more for the club than anyone i can remember.

Had he not have invested money in land and Colney we would be in the same position as Leeds if not worse (MK Dons!) The top class facilities seem to be a main pull for all of our major signings since we started using it. Let''s face it, would Huckerby, Helveg, Safri, Ashton, Earnie etc have been happy training at Trowse every day?! That place had more bumps than Titus Bramble''s BMW!

He is also a really top bloke. I met him in Asda once......

I also think Hucks will be here till he retires so don''t fret fellow fans, I saw it when I was playing with my crystal balls last nite but that''s a different story.

Que Binner remarks as it''s my first post and god forbid anyone to have a different opinon on this board.

[Herb 0]

Do not feed the troll....

[canaryjock 0]

I''m assuming you''re taking the p*ss...

[Jerzy Krukowski 5]

Why do you think he upset so many fans then and still does today then?

Perhaps because of not investing in the team when we were doing well,

allowing more than one superb manager to leave, selling off our prize

assets and not replacing them, promising to leave if Sutton was sold

and then not following through? Not to mention some of the dubious

building deals that went on during his reign. All the kinds of things

some on here (you?) constantly complain about the current board doing.

Anyway, why bring it up? he''ll never come back and we all should be pleased about that.

[Show Me What You Gooot! 0]

Mr Chase, is that you?

[Bury Green 0]

Here we go, somebody comes on the message board who actually offers some very relevant thoughts on Chairman Bob and he is immediately presumed to be a Troll. Predictable in the extreme and symptomatic of our current predicament.

Chase did indeed create the foundations that have underpinned the club through the Smith & Jones regime investing into property at the bottom of the market. Given the massive growth of land values since the mid nineties and indeed the exponential growth in the local property market as a result of the Riverside redevelopment it is surely impossible to ague that the club four have been five star -----d without these significant property assets.

There again this doesn’t conform with what we have been told, namely ‘Chase bad, Delia good’ which to this day simply does not bear close scrutiny. Chase’s greatest mistakes are two fold, firstly under his stewardship the club tasted unparallel success and a result of not backing his manager to push on after the Milan defeat he turned back and it all slipped away again. For those of us who remember and enjoyed those heady days it is surely better to have lost in love than to whenever loved at all?

When Smith & Jones regime finally got itself back to where we belong, Doomcaster was thrust in front of us to inform us that we could have signed Dean Ashton in August but it had to wait until the full extent of the TV revenues were known so it was done at Christmas, oh and the late great Geoffrey Watling estate cancelling his loan to the club. So the infinitely superior Smith & Jones regime were happy to start their first season back in the Premiership with no replacement for Iwan Roberts other than Gary ‘you can call me Muffin’ Doherty, would Chase have done this? Nope.

Secondly, as I mentioned many times in the past at the time the club were relegated in the mid nineties what really did for Chase was his inability to back his new manager Martin O’Neil in the manner he had hoped to, O’Neil threw his toys out of the pram and the rot had truly set in but what has never really been mentioned is why.

At the time the clubs borrowings were almost exclusively by way of an overdraft, quite normal at the time and unlike the term loans that form most of the clubs borrowings today. When the clubs bankers who themselves were all but insolvent at the time called in this overdraft it brought about the fire sales of Ashley Ward, John Newsome etc to keep the club afloat but which ultimately set the club back a decade.

So the main question is whether or not this was entirely Chase’s fault? Possibly so but this was quite normal business practice at the time and of course he had told us some great big porkpies and not dissimilar to one or two we have heard recently.

“If Chris Sutton isn’t here then neither will I” or words to that affect, not unlike “we will not be forced to sells players with the £2m loan from Mike & Sharon” we were fed just a couple of months ago.

The return of Chairman Bob is certainly not an option as of course there were many other skeletons in the closet such as the club trip to the 94 World Cup but by no means was his tenure the farce so many posters seem to think.

Troll away

[pitch fork 0]

oh dear i know some people would be narrow minded,

in the 80s and  early 90s under chase i saw the best football

this days we see poor football-

why do u lot not understand that

chase was the man who made things happen-

glad someone agrees with me(marigold)

there must be more of u out there

[ricardo 8,034]

[quote user="Bury Green"]

Here we go, somebody comes on the message board who actually offers some very relevant thoughts on Chairman Bob and he is immediately presumed to be a Troll. Predictable in the extreme and symptomatic of our current predicament.

Chase did indeed create the foundations that have underpinned the club through the Smith & Jones regime investing into property at the bottom of the market. Given the massive growth of land values since the mid nineties and indeed the exponential growth in the local property market as a result of the Riverside redevelopment it is surely impossible to ague that the club four have been five star -----d without these significant property assets.

There again this doesn’t conform with what we have been told, namely ‘Chase bad, Delia good’ which to this day simply does not bear close scrutiny. Chase’s greatest mistakes are two fold, firstly under his stewardship the club tasted unparallel success and a result of not backing his manager to push on after the Milan defeat he turned back and it all slipped away again. For those of us who remember and enjoyed those heady days it is surely better to have lost in love than to whenever loved at all?

When Smith & Jones regime finally got itself back to where we belong, Doomcaster was thrust in front of us to inform us that we could have signed Dean Ashton in August but it had to wait until the full extent of the TV revenues were known so it was done at Christmas, oh and the late great Geoffrey Watling estate cancelling his loan to the club. So the infinitely superior Smith & Jones regime were happy to start their first season back in the Premiership with no replacement for Iwan Roberts other than Gary ‘you can call me Muffin’ Doherty, would Chase have done this? Nope.

Secondly, as I mentioned many times in the past at the time the club were relegated in the mid nineties what really did for Chase was his inability to back his new manager Martin O’Neil in the manner he had hoped to, O’Neil threw his toys out of the pram and the rot had truly set in but what has never really been mentioned is why.

At the time the clubs borrowings were almost exclusively by way of an overdraft, quite normal at the time and unlike the term loans that form most of the clubs borrowings today. When the clubs bankers who themselves were all but insolvent at the time called in this overdraft it brought about the fire sales of Ashley Ward, John Newsome etc to keep the club afloat but which ultimately set the club back a decade.

So the main question is whether or not this was entirely Chase’s fault? Possibly so but this was quite normal business practice at the time and of course he had told us some great big porkpies and not dissimilar to one or two we have heard recently.

“If Chris Sutton isn’t here then neither will I” or words to that affect, not unlike “we will not be forced to sells players with the £2m loan from Mike & Sharon” we were fed just a couple of months ago.

The return of Chairman Bob is certainly not an option as of course there were many other skeletons in the closet such as the club trip to the 94 World Cup but by no means was his tenure the farce so many posters seem to think.

Troll away

[/quote]

That''s got to be the fairest appraisal of the Chase Era that I have ever read Bury.

I wonder how different things might look now if he had only backed O''Neil''s judgement.

[Jerzy Krukowski 5]

What is your point?

[Bury Green 0]

[quote user="ricardo"]

That''s got to be the fairest appraisal of the Chase Era that I have ever read Bury.

I wonder how different things might look now if he had only backed O''Neil''s judgement.

[/quote]

The real issue is he couldn’t back him and the Dean Windass saga was symptomatic of the problem. This has been mentioned previously but at the time corporate recovery at clubs bankers was handled by somebody well known to me, a Binner of the very worst kind who took much relish in bragging about he was going to be the man who would break our club.

Such is the fine line between success and failure, a different bank and chase may well have been able to bring Dean Windass to the club and lets face we would have backed O’Neil to have got the club back to the Premiership at the first attempt and to have ended up back in Europe just as he did with Leicester.

Just think, Delia would have been nothing more than a celebrity supporter and Doomcaster would have never darkened our doors, one can  but dream

[Marigold 0]

Just because some people don''t appreciate what Chase has done for the club doesn''t mean that your feelings should be shared by everyone (coughspatcough)

Bury green is the type of fan who sees the sense in pitchfork''s post. He understands that despite some shocking errors of judgment and speaking when he should have said nothing NCFC is still reaping the benefits of the plans Chase laid.

I think it is just a shame that he had no clue about football, if he had then we could have been an established Premier League team...... or were we just over achieving?

[Smeg 0]

Chase - Good busineess man and builder

            BUT worlds worst chairman and totally football clueless

 

he may have given us a future, but he ruined the whole 1990`s for us

[Temp the Revelator 0]

All very valid points about the foundations of our current club, however, had Fat Bob spent the money on the team rather than the land in the first place, I would bet we would have retained our Premiership status for many more years than we did and benefitted from the influx of Sky millions - this therefore becomes a moot point, IMHO, because the club would then have not needed to cash in on assets to keep afloat.  With hindsight it was a good decision to invest in land, but a better balance between that and the team would have been a much better decision.  All a matter of timing, I guess.

However, for me, the point was more the arrogance and pig-headedness of the man - he held the Norwich fans in the same kind of regard that Freddie Shepherd had for the Newcastel fans, in my experience.

[ricardo 8,034]

[quote user="Bury Green"][quote user="ricardo"]

That''s got to be the fairest appraisal of the Chase Era that I have ever read Bury.

I wonder how different things might look now if he had only backed O''Neil''s judgement.

[/quote]

The real issue is he couldn’t back him and the Dean Windass saga was symptomatic of the problem. This has been mentioned previously but at the time corporate recovery at clubs bankers was handled by somebody well known to me, a Binner of the very worst kind who took much relish in bragging about he was going to be the man who would break our club.

Such is the fine line between success and failure, a different bank and chase may well have been able to bring Dean Windass to the club and lets face we would have backed O’Neil to have got the club back to the Premiership at the first attempt and to have ended up back in Europe just as he did with Leicester.

Just think, Delia would have been nothing more than a celebrity supporter and Doomcaster would have never darkened our doors, one can  but dream

[/quote]

Thats very interesting Bury.

It shows that what goes around comes around. Hopefully Norwich Union will have a similar lack of sympathy now that our southern neighbours find themselves in the same boat.

[Bury Green 0]

[quote user="Temp the Revelator"]

All very valid points about the foundations of our current club, however, had Fat Bob spent the money on the team rather than the land in the first place, I would bet we would have retained our Premiership status for many more years than we did and benefitted from the influx of Sky millions - this therefore becomes a moot point, IMHO, because the club would then have not needed to cash in on assets to keep afloat.  With hindsight it was a good decision to invest in land, but a better balance between that and the team would have been a much better decision.  All a matter of timing, I guess.

However, for me, the point was more the arrogance and pig-headedness of the man - he held the Norwich fans in the same kind of regard that Freddie Shepherd had for the Newcastel fans, in my experience.

[/quote]

Good post, during the glory days at Carrow Road the only thing missing was a big sign over Carrow Bridge telling us all to Foxtrot Oscar.

Of course Honest Bob seriously compromises the clubs liquidity with his land acquisitions but I’m not so sure he could have seen the forthcoming banking crisis that really did for him, after all bank lending had been done that way for a very long time.

The line about ‘dubious building deals’ makes me chuckle, lets cast our minds back to the first share issue when a well know building contractor bunged £200k (or thereabouts) into the share issue shall we? Was this the same contactor who after a long and lengthy tendering process became delighted to renew their long standing acquaintance with the club with the new South Stand? Could this be the same contractor who amazingly got the job of building ‘That hotel’? Surely not, that type of thing only went on under Robert Chase as we all know ‘Chase bad, Delia good’

Give me strength

 

[Carlos Valderrama 0]

Totally agree that the football under Chase during the so called ''Glory Years'' was fantastic, also the best I have ever seen at the club.  Yes Chase did a lot of good things for the club, he also did a lot of bad.  The shrewd land deals are paying dividends now agreed, but do not forget that there were some deals that were not so clever (the old boulton & paul site for example).

But, the relegation season was abysmal.  It hurt to watch the very club you love get ripped apart at the seams.  So, although responsible for good, he was also to blame for very bad, very very bad.  That is why everyman and his dog protested so vociferously to oust him, me included.

I reckon Chase would have built us one of the best stadiums in the country had his tenure lasted a little longer.  As for everything else, who knows.......Personally I am quite happy with the current regime.  At least everything is a little more solid with them at the helm.  And also, lets not forget that football is a totally different game now.

[ricky knight 0]

 I was on the front line against chase, but now i remember the saying, careful what you wish for, i would take chase over this current lot anytime.

[Syteanric 1]

[quote user="Bury Green"][quote user="ricardo"]

That''s got to be the fairest appraisal of the Chase Era that I have ever read Bury.

I wonder how different things might look now if he had only backed O''Neil''s judgement.

[/quote]

The real issue is he couldn’t back him and the Dean Windass saga was symptomatic of the problem. This has been mentioned previously but at the time corporate recovery at clubs bankers was handled by somebody well known to me, a Binner of the very worst kind who took much relish in bragging about he was going to be the man who would break our club.

Such is the fine line between success and failure, a different bank and chase may well have been able to bring Dean Windass to the club and lets face we would have backed O’Neil to have got the club back to the Premiership at the first attempt and to have ended up back in Europe just as he did with Leicester.

Just think, Delia would have been nothing more than a celebrity supporter and Doomcaster would have never darkened our doors, one can  but dream

[/quote]

haha, all i can say to the person u know Bury Green is "whos Laughing now Bin man!" I bet he has kept his little trap shut for quite some time now huh? wouldnt it be hilarious if the Scums Bankers wound them up. then u could rub it in his face forever and a day.

if he is reading this.. "those that laugh last..." you might want to think about that Fella eh?

jas :) 

[YankeeCanary 0]

[quote user="ricky knight"] I was on the front line against chase, but now i remember the saying, careful what you wish for, i would take chase over this current lot anytime.[/quote]

So Ricky, you admit you were wrong last time. What makes you so sure you would not be wrong again?

[ricky knight 0]

[quote user="YankeeCanary"]

[quote user="ricky knight"] I was on the front line against chase, but now i remember the saying, careful what you wish for, i would take chase over this current lot anytime.[/quote]

So Ricky, you admit you were wrong last time. What makes you so sure you would not be wrong again?

[/quote]

 

Did i say i was wrong, Chase had run his course, i said, read again," I would take Chase over this current lot anytime." this lot are the pits more pork pies than a pie shop.

[Branston Pickle 4,150]

This is rather raking over old ground.  Of course we had our best spell as a football club whilst Chase was in control, but I''m not so sure that the football side of things had that much at all to do with the Chairman - indeed, at the time I was always of the opinion that the on-pitch success was in spite of rather than because of him, and nothing has changed that opinion.  The fact was at the end of the 80s we had a great team behind the scenes in Stringer et al, getting players in for next to nothing and bringing them on (Walker very much got the benefit of this); the problem was that as soon as we brought them on, Chase cashed them in but released next to nothing for replacements.  This is and was a policy that will always, eventually, fail - as of course it did - when we were unable to replace with anything like the same quality that we were losing.  Had we only invested a little bit more into the side, we would have quite possibly been in the Prem for the entire time from ''95 until now, reaping the financial benefits that are there for all to see.  Ok, Chase couldn''t see that this was going to happen, but it did, and his policies led to us missing out on the Premiership gravy train: that is 100% certain.

[Cluck 0]

Good to see the much maligned Robert Chase getting a bit of credit. He didn''t get everything right by a long chalk...but neither did he get everything wrong. He brought City fans years of great football and only failed because he tried too hard to reach for the stars. If that is so wrong then it explains why turgid mediocrity under the present Board is apparently so laudible.

The O''Neill debate is pointless...because even if we had signed Windass, O''Neill would have been off to the first big club that came along...such was his ambition. The Chase/O''Neill debacle is just a smokescreen to burden Chase with yet another reason to hate him. This "propaganda" has been Smith''s escape clause...and I''m just astounded the myth lives on 10 years later.

I agree that under Chase this club was something to be proud of......and far from being it''s "Saviour" Smith has done little more than take it backwards 30 years.

[norfolkbroadslim 225]

Yes I agree it was such a disastorous fall from grace, the way we were relegated, after those heady days in Europe, Martin O''Neill, money apparently disappearing, conspiracy theories etc etc.

However, with hindsight would we be any worse off now with Chase?  And believe me I wanted Chase to go, I made my own ''Chase out mug''. 

If relegation and subsequent failure to bounce straight back was not good enough under Chase.  Can all the pro board people please explain to me how it is acceptable under the current board?

Furthermore, if you plotted the clubs performance on a graph since say the original relegation season in the 90''s to now, including both on field performances, and off field, including finances, you''ll probably find the club is at its lowest ebb NOW.

Yes I know football has changed etc etc.

But if losing top flight status and European football was so unthinkable that we protested for the Chairman to pack his bags, why do we now appear to be content with where we are now?  And if we are not, how many more years do we give this board to achieve this?

I beleive Norwich City FC as a football club are capable of getting into the top flight and staying there for a few years, yes getting relegated again at some point in the future, but then going back etc.  Under the current board I don''t honestly believe this is possible, we may by some stroke of good fortune get promoted, but we would come straight back down again.

Have people lowered their expectations of Norwich City and if so why?  Is it like a self fulfilling prophecy?  We are constantly told about little old Norwich, small, friendly club, don''t expect too much in so many words, that we have come to believe it and that a top half Championship finish would be a good season?

I would really appreciate a reply from some of the people who ''back the board'' so to speak.

Cheers[:D]

[Jerzy Krukowski 5]

[quote user="ricky knight"] I was on the front line against chase, but now i remember the saying, careful what you wish for, i would take chase over this current lot anytime.[/quote]I reckon you''ve been hit one too many times by a granny with a chair if you think that [;)]

[BBFF 0]

I keep reading "FOOTBALL has changed".......changed to what? There are still 11 men a side, kicking a round ball with thousands of fans wanting their side to win...that''s FOOTBALL. At the moment this lot in charge at Corrow Rd have forgotten we are a FOOTBALL club with their minds firmly set on their "off the pitch" ambitions.

Chase got many things wrong, under him we were in debt, we were a selling club, we spent money on concrete and land instead of on players and we were never told the whole truth about what ever the club was doing!!!!! So what''s so different now? Nothing. The debt is bigger, we sell the best players when ever we can, we buy lots new pots and pans when we already had some and as for the whole truth..I now never believe a word put out from Carrow Rd, not even the size of the crowd. And after all that the FOOTBALLS far far worse.

Maybe its the time to rethink the Chase years, look at the good not just the bad but I would not want to see Chase back but I hope this lot don''t hang around much longer or they will have to drop the word FOOTBALL from the clubs name.

 

FOOTBALL MUST COME FIRST

[Mr.Carrow 394]

[quote user="norfolkbroadslim"]

Yes I agree it was such a disastorous fall from grace, the way we were relegated, after those heady days in Europe, Martin O''Neill, money apparently disappearing, conspiracy theories etc etc.

However, with hindsight would we be any worse off now with Chase?  And believe me I wanted Chase to go, I made my own ''Chase out mug''. 

If relegation and subsequent failure to bounce straight back was not good enough under Chase.  Can all the pro board people please explain to me how it is acceptable under the current board?

Furthermore, if you plotted the clubs performance on a graph since say the original relegation season in the 90''s to now, including both on field performances, and off field, including finances, you''ll probably find the club is at its lowest ebb NOW.

Yes I know football has changed etc etc.

But if losing top flight status and European football was so unthinkable that we protested for the Chairman to pack his bags, why do we now appear to be content with where we are now?  And if we are not, how many more years do we give this board to achieve this?

I beleive Norwich City FC as a football club are capable of getting into the top flight and staying there for a few years, yes getting relegated again at some point in the future, but then going back etc.  Under the current board I don''t honestly believe this is possible, we may by some stroke of good fortune get promoted, but we would come straight back down again.

Have people lowered their expectations of Norwich City and if so why?  Is it like a self fulfilling prophecy?  We are constantly told about little old Norwich, small, friendly club, don''t expect too much in so many words, that we have come to believe it and that a top half Championship finish would be a good season?

I would really appreciate a reply from some of the people who ''back the board'' so to speak.

Cheers[:D]

[/quote]

Very good post IMO. The stock response of "football has changed, look at all the foreign investment etc." just doesn`t hold water. Only a handful of clubs in our league have had anything like the finance through parachute payments, big crowds and player sales that we have had in the past two seasons and yet we havent even troubled the play-offs. Munby stated a few months after relegation that "if success on the pitch were dictated by current finance the club would settle somewhere in the middle of the Championship" and implied that anything higher was "punching above our weight". Absolute rubbish and yet it seems the majority still go along with it and mediocrity is acceptable.

Chase`s downfall came about by the costs of the constant off-pitch developments (which we have reaped some benefit from) eventually crippling the team through lack of funds (remember the lack of a replacement for Gunn?). The current board have done exactly the same thing yet, with the help of carefully worded spin and a "nicer" image, are hardly ever brought up on it.

I think that off-pitch projects will always come first until the supporters wake up and say "enough".

 

[Bury Green 0]

Thinking about things again last night one thing that has been omitted so far was the demise of the academy at the end of the Chase regime. As part of the stringent cost cutting measures there was a disastrous period when the club had to let go of its most valuable asset, the clubs Academy. Even today we suffer greatly as a result of it never finding its feet again and producing true quality in the same way it did in in quite the eighties and early nineties.

By the end of Dave Stringers reign and of course under Mike Walker we benefited from some of the best young talent in the country, Chris Sutton, Ruel Fox, Dale Gordon, Darren Eadie, Andy Johnson, hell it was even good enough to attract David Beckham for a trial. Of course the geographic limitations in place today tell against us but had the crisis that ripped the very fabric out of the club been avoided our critical supply line of the very best youngsters could still be in place, but was this Chase’s fault?

As mentioned previously, he couldn’t have seen the banking crisis that really did for him but of course over investment in freehold significantly compromised the clubs cash position as well but in all honesty we haven’t produced anything other than Robert Green for a very very long time, lets hope Chris Martin might reverse that trend.

To conclude, Honest Robert understood the value of the academy very well and for that we can be thankful a sit gave us some of the best players to ever put on the Green n’ Yella and my all time top ten includes any number of them, Bellers, Fash, Disco, and the list goes on…..

Still this is an interesting thread and fractionally more interesting than a Wrath topic such as what they are going to have for dinner or internet porn

OTBC

[nutty nigel 7,902]

[quote user="Cluck "]

The O''Neill debate is pointless...because even if we had signed Windass, O''Neill would have been off to the first big club that came along...such was his ambition.

[/quote]

Just like Bond and Walker before him. Nothing changes!

 

[BlyBlyBabes 0]

[quote user="nutty nigel"][quote user="Cluck "]

The O''Neill debate is pointless...because even if we had signed Windass, O''Neill would have been off to the first big club that came along...such was his ambition.

[/quote]

Just like Bond and Walker before him. Nothing changes!

[/quote]

Yes, it does.

Nobody offered to take Worthington off our hands.[:''(]

OTBC