Finance versus the manager

PurpleCanary · November 12, 2014

Deep Thought: "An Answer for you? Yes, I have. Though I

don''t think that you''re going to like it. You’re really not going to like it.”

A recurring question in

football is how to assess the respective influences of finance and the

manager on a club’s

performance. I decided to look at

Norwich City over our three seasons in the Premier League to see if

that provided answers to the general question, but also to our

relegation.The

latter may be in the past, but a fact-based analysis might help clarify

a debate that still (as this week shows) surfaces here, and in any

event the general question will always be relevant for a club like us.

Although the analysis refers to the struggle to stay in the Premier

League it is applicable to clubs trying to get there. The basic factors

of finance and the manager are the same. What happened last season may

have parallels now and in the future. Of. necessity this is a long

post for a complicated subject. Those understandably not interested should look away now. I strongly suggest anyone who wants to quote

from it should do so selectively. I have

double-checked all the figures but given the statistic-based nature of the piece it

is almost inevitable that some errors have crept in. I am greatly indebted

to Stephen Morrow, Senior Lecturer in Sport Finance

at the University of Stirling, and author of ''The People''s Game?

Football, Finance and Society'', and his colleague, Dr Nicholas Scelles,

for taking the time to read a late draft and making some very helpful

suggestions. Of course, the arguments and conclusions are entirely my own, as are

any errors.

1) GENERAL RATIOThat finance is the largest single influence on performance, with the manager

second, is a given. There is less agreement on the ratio between the two, and

on whether it is different over a season as against several, and if so by how

much. It is also widely accepted

that the best financial indicator of performance is wages rather than income,

or profit, or debt, or the transfer bill or subsidiary advantages or even the

owner’s place in the Rich List. It doesn’t matter what they have in the bank or

in shares but (as with Evans and Ipswich Town) how much of it they are able and

willing to spend on wages. Because, the argument goes, the higher the wages the

better the players.But there are serious problems with relying on wage spending. It will take a

season or two for the wage bill at a club up from the Championship to get in

line with its PL rivals, though the players may be as good. There is the Finidi

George Syndrome, where a club stuffed with thirtysomethings looking for a last

pay day will have a massive wage bill compared with a tight-knit group of

hungry young thrusters from the lower leagues and overseas anxious to make

their mark. A battle-hardened squad that has survived may well do better than a

collection of expensive newcomers.Clubs can simply buy the wrong players, and/or dump the manager and give the

new man scope for more spending in January. There may be regional and

historical differences, with London clubs and those with famous names having

to pay more than provincial rivals.In short wages are not anything like an absolute guide, but will have to serve,

as the best indicator. The book, The Numbers Game, provided research for the PL

(to which all references from now on are, unless stated) over 10 seasons which put

that financial factor’s influence over a club’s position at 81 per cent. Even

with a few per cent for luck and so on (which The Numbers Game does not even

mention as a factor) that leaves the manager responsible for at least 15 per

cent. But, the book’s research showed, over a single season the financial

element fell to 59 per cent. Again factor in a few per cent for luck, and you

have managerial influence at a highly significant one-third of the total.2) PROBABILITYWhatever the ratio or ratios, a club frequently

in the bottom three in the Wage League Table (WLT) is more likely to be

relegated than a team placed 10^th or 3^rd. A frequent example to explain probability

theory is coin-tossing. That is irrelevant here since there is no skill in

coin-tossing; the results are the same no matter who spins the coin. A relevant

analogy would be a yacht race with several equally matched boats and crews, but

with some of the skippers more talented than the rest. As with yachting, so

with football. There is skill in managing a football club. Some do it better

than others.However the false coin-tossing analogy has an instructive oddity. The odds of

100 tails in a row are astronomical. But if the coin has landed tails 99 times

the odds of a hundredth are then just 50/50. So to an extent in football. The

chances of a pauper club (defined as one permanently low in the WLT) getting

relegated within, say, ten seasons are high. But if they survive nine seasons

the odds of doing so once more are not only theoretically much better than at

the start of the decade but in practice probably better still. This is a club

that knows how to stay up. Especially if the man in charge is a survivor, such

as Tony Pulis, who has never been relegated as a manager. Crystal Palace,

almost certainly bottom of the wage table and deep in the relegation zone when

he took over, finished 11^th.WAGESTurning to our three seasons in the PL, and the wages paid by ourselves and our

rivals, I have taken the WLTs provided by David Conn in The Guardian. They are

for a club’s total staff costs and so include many employees whose contribution

to how the team plays is marginal at best and non-existent at worst. That said,

they seem roughly to tally with the Sporting Intelligence list, which purports

to be only for first-team wages. I looked at the bottom eight WLT clubs, as our rivals. For simplicity’s, sake

where clubs have spent the same on wages, I have crudely differentiated by the

alphabet. It avoids the absurdity of clubs finishing 3.5 places or whatever

above or below their station, and doesn’t unfairly skew the results. Note that

the Norwich City figure for 2012-13 is a 12-month calculation, to make a fair

comparison, because we had a 13-month financial year.The tables show the position in the WLT, the amount spent on wages, the

finishing league position, and the variation between WLT and league positions:2011-12:13^th. Bolton. £55m. 18^th. -5

14^th. Stoke. £53m. 14^th. =

15^th. Blackburn. £50m. 19^th. -4

16^th. WBA. £50m. 10^th. +6

17^th. Wigan. £38m. 15^th. +2

18^th. Wolves. £38m. 20^th. -2

19^th. Norwich. £37m. 12^th. +7

20^th. Swansea. £35m. 11^th. +92012-13:13^th. Sunderland. £58m. 17^th. -4

14^th. West Ham. £56m. 10^th. +4

15^th. WBA. £54m. 8^th. +7

16^th. Swansea. £49m. 9^th. +7

17^th. Norwich. £47m. 11^th. +6

18^th. Southampton. £47m. 14^th. +4

19^th. Reading. £46m. 19^th. =

20^th. Wigan. £44m. 18^th. +2Various points stand out sharply. Only Stoke in 2011-12 and then Reading finish

where a strict correlation with wages says they should. Norwich City are a

combined 13 places above their supposed spot in the universe. No club is only

one place out, and the variations go from two places to nine, with the average

“error” of 4.3 places. Indeed, the biggest disparity isn’t shown there, with

QPR, seventh in wages in 2012-13, finishing 13 places lower in the real world.

Of the six teams that went down in those two seasons, five were in the bottom

eight in wages, so the WLTs are a reasonable guide to those who will be in the

relegation dogfight but as a precise guide to placings of much less use.In addition, 2012-13 reveals how close together teams’ wages can be. From the

£44m for Wigan the amounts go up in small jumps, with only £5m separating them

from Swansea in 16^th, and £14m from 20^th to 13th. That is less true of

the year before, with the bottom four rather adrift and a £20m gap from 20^th to 13^th. I would not over-emphasise

this point, but when a few more million may only mean Squad X has a couple of

extra high-waged but misfiring players than Squad Y then the practical

differences on the field shrink further.In 2011-12 Wolves were the only team in the bottom three wage-wise to be

relegated (bearing in mind they were strictly speaking 17^th= with Wigan and only

downgraded because of the alphabet), with two (Reading and Wigan) the season

after.There is as yet no WLT for

2013-14, and any estimate is complicated by it being the first year of the new

mega-TV deal, from which we received £18.6m more than the year before (that

being pretty much the basic rise) while Swansea, for example, scooped £26.6m

extra. But Swansea will not have known when structuring wages that they would

end up receiving so much extra. We increased our wage bill – by £7m to £54m but

what all clubs did to their wage structure in anticipation of this largesse is

unknown.A reasonable assumption would be that Crystal Palace were bottom of the 2013-14

WLT, and Cardiff and Hull towards the bottom. They may have rich owners

(bearing in mind that it is willingness to spend rather than theoretical wealth

that matters here) but in 2012-13 Southampton, despite being wealthier than us,

were only level on wages. Promoted clubs do take a while to catch up. We had a only

year’s start on Southampton but two years’ start on Hull and Cardiff. Cardiff’s

wage bill in their 2012-13 Championship season was £32.8m and Hull’s was only

£25.9m. Given that, with our 2013-14 wage bill of £54m, I would, with modest

conviction, expect us to have been above Hull and probably Cardiff as well.

Perhaps now a bit behind Swansea, who had to bulk up their squad for the Europa

League, and Southampton, so 17^th or perhaps 18^th.On that modest conviction, of

the three teams relegated, Fulham were not in the relegation WLT, while we

and/or Cardiff may have been. Taking the three seasons as a whole, of the nine

relegated teams only four or five were scheduled by finance to go down. Indeed,

Swansea, who came up with us and still with limited wage resources, have

finished consecutively 11^th, 9^th and 12^th, with the three-place drop

probably explained by the upheaval of a managerial change and that European

campaign.Interestingly, in each of those three seasons Swansea have had

different managerial teams – Rodgers, then Laudrup, then Laudrup/Monk. Yet they

have more than comfortably survived. Those generally good choices have helped

Swansea markedly outperform their finances in the first two seasons and probably

again last year.This is a highly relevant

point for medium-sized clubs. The shelf-life of a PL manager is around two

years. We and those like us get to pick from the third tier of managers. Not

surefire successes or proven successes but those who are a bit of a gamble. So

over ten years, with several managers, at least one is likely to be an outright

failure and another merely or barely competent, and then the (negative) finance

factor will reassert itself.So the figures quoted by The Numbers Game make general sense. Over several

seasons the financial factor is more dominant than in any particular year, when

the managerial factor rises significantly in importance. But that

managerial factor (if beneficial) can mean that even the probability odds over

a run of seasons can be if not beaten completely then at least favourably

altered. And when the financial differences are as small as in 2012-13, for

example, then the managerial factor (positive or negative) takes on even more

relevance. As The Numbers Game says: “Football is decided by fine margins. It

is here that the manager comes into his own.”NCFC FINANCES OVER THE PL SEASONSA period of real success and growth. Turnover - £23.3m in the Championship

in 2010-11 – has gone from £74.3m in 2011-12, to £74.7m (for 13 months) in

2012-13 to £94.3m in 2013-14, while the external debt has been reduced from

around £14m to zero, and internal debt cut from small to smaller. Operating profits (excluding player trading) have been £1.72m,

£21.7m, £14.2m and now £26.1m.The key point is that those healthy figures have translated in ever-increasing

summer spending on players. And spending money we had rather than money we

didn’t have.For the summer of 2011-12 the accounts have us spending £6.1m on Elliott

Bennett, Morison, Johnson, Pilkington and Ayala (plus de Laet and Naughton on

loan), and that list excludes Vaughan, for whom we paid money, and the

expensive winter acquisitions of Howson and Ryan Bennett. Only McDonald was let

go.In 2012-13 in came Butterfield, Whittaker, Snodgrass, Turner, Bassong, Tettey

and Bunn (plus Garrido on loan) at a cost of £9.9m plus a potential £3.4m. Camp,

Becchio and Kamara arrived in the winter. Only Crofts left.In 2013-14 we bought van Wolfswinkel, Nash, Redmond, Olsson, Fer, Hooper and

Elmander at a cost of £20.1m plus a potential £8m. Yobo and Gutierrez came on

loan in the winter. We offloaded Steer, Vaughan, Holt, Barnett and Butterfield.From £6.1m to £13.3m to £28.1m. A more than doubling followed by a more than

doubling. Supposedly our net spending last summer was the 9^th largest in the whole of

Europe. Spurs, for example, spent more, but they were paying out what they’d

received for Gareth Bale. And through our three seasons there was no-one sold

we wanted to keep. All the players let go were deemed to have outlived their

usefulness. It hardly matters not knowing

where we were in the WLT for 2013-14. The point about wages is that they

tend to indicate the quality and quantity of players a club attracts. And we

must have been paying good wages last season to attract those players, and if

we weren’t we attracted the players anyway.According to chairman Alan

Bowkett the summer spending was a record: “I think it’s unprecedented in the

history of the football club, both relatively and absolutely in real terms.” On

top of that fact I doubt many would quarrel with the view that the squad was

significantly improved in successive years and particularly – on paper at least

– last summer.Everybody spent lots of extra

TV money last summer, so I looked at Swansea as the obvious comparison. Why the

obvious choice, given that Swansea might look like the exception that proves

the finance rule? It had to be one of the two teams with whom we were promoted, to get an exact

comparison, in terms of the opposition teams and the unique financial circumstanes. With those three

seasons coming at the end of the old TV deal and the first year of the new goldrush

mega-deal studying a club from a different set of three years would have been

invalid.QPR ruled themselves out, by way of their absurd wage policy and by the small

matter of being relegated in the second season. Swansea, by contrast were not

only at the same stage of Premier League development but were financially

similar – like us not benefitting from recent parachute payments, for example,

and not having any major subsidiary advantages.As proof of that, in the first two seasons Swansea were next to us in

the WLTs and very close in the real league tables. Equal wage spending

of £35m and

£49m with our £37m and £47m and finishes of 11^th and 9^th as against our 12^th and 11^th.Secondly, Swansea are certainly not the only exception. West Brom, in the three

seasons since their promotion for which figures are available, outperformed

their wage bill by a massive 21 places. Higher up the table Everton, under

Moyes, frequently outperformed. I lack all the necessary figures on Wigan, but

they stayed up reasonably comfortably under Bruce and then Martinez for seven

seasons and certainly outperformed their wage bill in most of them, and even

outperformed by two places the season they went down. A survey from the

Henley Business School at the University of Reading makes the point that some managers, such as Allardyce, McClaren

and O''Neill, have a history of outperformance, and Pulis and those others named above could probably be added

to that list. If Swansea and those

other clubs and managers prove a rule it is that with good managers the finance factor

can be held at bay, and that the under-recognised

probability factor that ends up doing for clubs is that sooner or later a bad

managerial choice will be made.Finally, every mention of Swansea could be excised from this piece and that

would not affect in the slightest the hard facts about Norwich City’s

performance and the conclusions to be drawn from that. The comparisons with

Swansea are useful, by putting various aspects in perspective, but ultimately

the story of last season is how we did, for good or ill.That dealt with, Swansea seemingly brought in no fewer than 17 players (that

Europa League bulking up) but, going on appearances, only four – Abat, Canas,

Shelvey and Bony - were significant PL acquisitions, at a reported cost of

£19.5m. Although Shelvey and Bony in particular did very well, that quartet

doesn’t seem – on paper – to be markedly better that the seven we brought in, with two fringe Dutch internationals,

two regular members of the Sweden squad, a highly-rated youngster, a proven

goalscorer and a back-up keeper.COMPARATIVE PERFORMANCEYet while Swansea, despite the

managerial switch and the exhausting European campaign (they played 54 games

against our 43), dropped only three places and four points from the previous

season to finish 12^th on 42 points, we fell seven

places to 18^th and 11 points to 33.(There is an argument that if we had stayed with Hughton we would have been

relegated but with more points. When he was sacked we were racking up 0.96

points per game. If that had continued we would have finished on a rounded up

37 points or a rounded down 36. Given the extreme difficulty of the last five

games (three of which were away) it is hard to imagine we would have anything

like carried on at 0.96 ppg. In the earlier reverse fixtures, with Hughton as

manager and with the advantage of three at home, we lost all five with a goal

difference of -11. In those last five under Adams we gained a point and the GD

was -8, so he actually outperformed Hughton. Given all that, it seems generous to suppose

Hughton at best might have gained one point more than Adams did. So I am

assuming that keeping Hughton to the end would have seen us still finish in 18^th, but with no more than 34

points. To avoid confusion (I hope) I will generally now refer to a double-digit

fall in points. There is also the argument that places matter more than points,

even though they are inextricably linked. In any one season places decide where

you finish, determining safety or otherwise, and financial rewards. But places

can be illusory. As with us finishing a place higher in 2012-13 than the year

before but with three fewer points - a small drop that could now be seen as

foreshadowing our double-digit collapse last season. Over the long run points

per game are a generally better guide to how a manager is doing).The other three teams whose

total fall was in double figures were Man Utd, who mislaid no fewer than 25

points , West Brom, down 13 and Fulham, 11 lower. As far as I am aware there

was no collapse in the finances of those clubs to explain such massive falls.

The common factor was management failure, particularly with the post-Ferguson

Moyes debacle at Man Utd and the Jol/Meulensteen/Magath fiasco at Fulham, and

to a slightly lesser extent at West Brom, who barely survived and sacked the

manager immediately thereafter.HUGHTON’S PERFORMANCESince it is a given that

there is always a managerial factor in how a team performs, Hughton’s 2013-14

record has to be scrutinised, and two aspects in particular.i) Tactics. Here there were two main criticisms of Hughton. That his

tactical approach was overly defensive and ultra-cautious. Secondly, that he

didn’t change that approach during games when circumstances seemed to

demand it. Either when we were on top but not leading (at West Ham, for

example) or when we went behind. That there was no Plan B.As to the former accusation, I have found it

impossible (others may be successful) to come to a conclusion. There are too

many incalculables; for example a more attacking approach might have won us

more games but also cost us some wins we achieved, since five of our eight were

by 1-0.More susceptible to analysis is the second,

strikingly summed up by Alan Bowkett in May: “We want [next season] to play a

passing game. There will be times and it will be appropriate, when you’re under

the cosh against Chelsea, you want 10 men behind the ball. But there will be

other times when, for example in the Premier League, you go to Hull and play

for 64 minutes against 10 men, and you wouldn’t know how to open a can of tuna,

let alone their defence. And that is not tolerable.”Bowkett’s reference to

Hull and opening up defences is more instructive and generally applicable than

he perhaps knew. We were one of only two teams in the bottom half of the table (West Ham the other, and they finished comfortably in 13th) to go through the season away from home without coming

from behind to get a result. Unlike our main relegation rivals not once

did we fight back even for a draw, let alone a win (or even at least equalise

before conceding again). If we went behind we lost.That has to have been the result of the set in stone policy. We did it five

times (two wins and three draws) away under Lambert and even four times (all

draws) under Hughton in 2012-13, although none after that November, which

suggests the policy was being worked on then and finalised last season. Overall

under Lambert, home and away, we notched up 15 come-from-behind points, eight

under Hughton Season One and only five (a win and two draws also early on) last season.So the statistics show up a basic flaw in the idea that the best way to get

back into a game was not to have a Plan B but to keep on playing

ultra-cautiously. It wasn’t, because it hardly worked at home and not once away

from home. ii) Transfers Since Norwich

City did not have a director of football, I assume that while all

transfers were authorised by the directors, within their spending

limits, the ultimate recommendation on whom to buy came from the

manager. I have seen no evidence that any of the players acquired during

the Hughton years were not his recommendations, or at least did not come

with

his approval, and no evidence that any were bought against his wishes. Bear in mind the post-season comment from chief executive David McNally

about not wanting to continue a system in which the manager was solely responsible for

all key footballing decisions. Given what McNally said (see below) about last

summer’s acquisitions it is very hard not to see that as in part a reference to

making the recommendations on transfers a more collegiate affair.

So, based on the players acquired by Hughton being his choices, it is simplest

to quote what McNally said in that post-season Radio Norfolk interview when

asked if the manager had bought badly:“If you look at the reason why we have struggled this year, in the five years

we have worked together every summer transfer trading has improved the football

club. That cannot be said about last summer with the seven players coming in. If you go back to the year before with some of the players he [Hughton]

brought in, in his first summer, despite the lack of time he had in joining us

in June he did well with the money available then, and he was clearly

restricted by the amount of cash he had that summer. Ironically last summer we had more money to spend and you look back with

the benefit of hindsight and say the summer signings haven’t worked. And they

haven’t.” That is a "yes" to the question from McNally -

despite record spending, while our rivals were improving their squads,

ours got no better. Especially upfront, and particularly

with van Wolfswinkel, with whom Hughton was linked when he was manager

at

Newcastle and bought once he was in position to at Carrow Road. A

Swansea

contrast is again instructive. Van Wolfswinkel’s solitary goal cost

£8.5m. The

£12.5m for Bony yielded 16 PL goals and 25 in all. There are two views

on van

Wolfswinkel, but Hughton is damned either way. He bought a bad player or

turned

a good player into a bad one. (As it happens van Wolfswinkel’s meagre

record so

far on loan at St-Etienne suggests the former, as would the sizeable

player write-down

in the latest accounts if that is partly related to a now much lower

assessment

of the Dutchman’s resale value).

You have the chairman and the chief executive, as hard-nosed business

professionals, saying Hughton seriously erred in 2013-14 in a manager’s two

most vital areas of influence. And these were unforced errors. Active decisions

that turned out to be wrong. The money was there, in record amounts (remember

Bowkett’s “...unprecedented in the history of the football club...”) and there

was enough quantity and quality in the squad for different tactical systems. A caveat needs to be stressed here. Although those attacks from Bowkett and

McNally are fact-based, and so undeniable, one needs to allow for some potential

blame-laying by the directors. Allied to that is the point that much of what a

manager does is highly public while most of the work of the directors is hidden

and less capable of being subjected to fact-based criticism. On the face of it

the provable errors last season were Hughton’s. That does not mean there were

none from the directors.CONCLUSIONThere is no iron law that says

finance (save for administration) will relegate a club irrespective of the

managerial factor. There is always a managerial factor. Given the frequent

financial closeness of clubs in the lower end of the table, in any one season

the managerial factor not only can be the difference between survival and

relegation but is often going to be the difference, and has been in those three

years for other clubs. Last season Palace finished where Fulham should have

done and vice versa because of that factor.So was it the difference for us? If we were around 17^th or 18^th in the WLT, the superficial

answer would seem to be no. That we performed roughly to our financial level. That

would be to miss the point. There was no financial reason for the fatal

double-digit drop. On the contrary, our finances were at their zenith, and this

had translated into record transfer spending comparable to that of rivals.As Alan Bowkett said last October: “I think we probably have the best football team we

have had for probably 20 years, the best financial position we’ve had certainly

for the past 20 years and probably the best back office team this football club

has seen for many a year. We will be there [still in the PL] next year.” Yet

not so. In short we performed worst in the season in which we should have done best. Hence

the comment from Michael Wynn Jones in the Radio Norfolk

interview that Hughton would have been sacked no matter what. The

directors,

taking the context into account, plainly didn''t buy the argument that a

serious slump, even if we just stayed up, was acceptable,

let alone financially inevitable.The statistics (using the actual ones for last season) entirely support that

(not to mention backing the notion that over seasons points are a better guide

than placings):2011-12: 12^th; points 47; goal difference -14.2012-13: 11^th; points 44; goal difference -17.2013-14: 18^th; points 33; goal difference -34.Everything, on-field and off,

was set up to enable Hughton to equal those previous levels of achievement.

Instead we double-digit plummeted. With the three clubs that did the same the

main reason was managerial failure. Whoever was in the job performed

significantly less well either than their predecessor or than they had done previously.So with us. The danger posed

by finance can be held at bay, as proved by other clubs, but it needs continual

good decision-making. From the directors and the manager. Any mistake, and

finance takes over (as it has done with others and probably will at Swansea

eventually). It is possible there were contributory errors in the NCFC

boardroom. But what is certain is that while Lambert and Hughton Season One

managed very competently, Hughton Season Two managed crucially less

competently, with avoidable mistakes.That NCFC fans believed that to be so can possibly be ignored, although it is

hard to justify doing so when there was such a consensus. Harder to ignore that

view from rival fans and harder still with professional pundits and experts.

And then our chairman and the chief executive said it was so. And the absolute

and comparative statistics show it was so. There was no Calvinist

predestination about our relegation. It was human error. To which, because of

finance, we will always be in danger of falling victim. The lesson for the

future is that for Norwich City to survive in the Premier League, or to get back there, everybody has

to be at the top of their game.

The Butler · November 12, 2014

What an excellent post

Well constructed and a sound argument

My thanks at least PC

Just wait until T reads it![:D]

Dubai Mark · November 12, 2014

A terrific post and thank you for taking the time and trouble.

My worry right now, and I personally think our current Board have done a decent job overall, is.......that I feel we are now seeing THEIR BIGGEST MISTAKE so far unravel in front of our eyes.

What happened with CH was the type of scenario that happens at many football clubs particularly of our size, it just ended in tears a little quicker than they and many of us surely expected. CH at the time was an excellent choice for the job in hand, sustaining the performance as his second season progressed was his downfall......its not easy in the EPL when you are one of the smaller clubs.

BUT, the latest decision to appoint Neil Adams has, I believe unfortunately, now already proven to be a mistake. Particularly when considering the basic fact that we do have an excellent squad......a squad that will undoubtedly be earning more than the overall majority of clubs in the league we are currently in...but a squad that is clearly now severely under performing.

The next two or three months are now crucial.....thankfully you do get time in this league to turn things round.

Bury Green · November 12, 2014

An excellent and very worthwhile contribution and a big ''bravo'' for what must have a lot of hard work.

It''d make for an interesting discussion topic in an open forum type gathering.

nutty nigel · November 12, 2014

Fantastic post Purple. It will take this simple bog cleaner a while to digest it so I''ve got no other comment apart from to thank you and to celebrate another reason why this messageboard is the best online community of Norwich City supporters.

Bury Green · November 12, 2014

Every village has its idiot

lake district canary · November 12, 2014

Correct me if I am wrong, but I gather from this fine piece of work that finances are the key indicator of expectations and that as long as everyone is on the ball, we can do well, but as soon errors by board or manager creep in, the balance can tip things downwards. What always bothers me with statistical analysis though, is that the things that can''t be measured are not taken into account. A negative vibe amongst fans - a player having too much influence in the dressing room in a bad way - a piece of pure bad luck - the way the fixtures fall - etc etc. These things can''t be measured easily and do affect boards and managers'' performances.

Regarding this season I''m with Dubai Mark on this. Last season everything seemed to be against us and we had a very negative feel to things most of the season. This season though, we appeared to have everything going for us - fans positive, good finances, good squad, we even had a good start to the season which should have boosted confidence. So why has it deteriorated? It is of course down to the players and the management combined. But the manager is the one who carries the can and has to rise to the challenge to get us on a good path. The worrying thing for me is that there is no evidence that things are improving or are likely to improve.

Statistically what matters this season is the final points tally and whether we get promoted. The trend at the moment is downwards - we''ve gone from a positive "we can do anything" to a "we can''t do anything" feel to things, in the space of a few weeks. That is quite a turn round. It may not be a statistical analysis, but it represents what I feel - and plenty of others by the looks of things. We have to make sure that is switched back to an upward curve as soon as possible - the only way for that to happen is for Adams to sort it out. A big ask and imo one that may be beyond him. I hope I''m wrong - if we win the next two or three matches and get back up the table, there will be hope again. Finances versus the manager? Then the manager has it all to do.

Bury Green · November 12, 2014

I''m sure the OP will be significantly more on the ball than me as its twenty one years since I last had to deal with quantitative analysis and suchlike but I think what LDC''s alluding to is a p-value.

A very low value gives you a very low presumption against the hypothesis.

Positivity rather ranks along side faith in these types of discussion, a belief not based on proof or thereabouts and whilst yes it could play a part it remains unquantifiable.

Right at the moment all this is actually doing is making me feel old and decidedly rusty, interesting though.

GPs Beard · November 12, 2014

An excellent collection of thoughts. If I may (well I''m going to anyway) I will offer some musings..

This season we will be considerably higher in the WLT among our peers in the Championship. It could be the first time for several seasons where we have, what many would call, a competitive advantage.

We appear to be able to attract players to us, that other teams among us might want. Despite Norwich being a wonderful place to be, I suspect that is as much about wages than anything else. I also imagine that some of our players (Ruddy) who had a relegation clause in their contract haven’t actually seen their money drop quite so dramatically.

I would offer the argument that we are not supporting the investment being made in the playing staff, in similar fashion with our manager and our coaches. As Purple says

“That finance is the largest single influence on performance, with the manager second, is a given”

I don’t believe that it is safe to ignore the CV of the manager (and the coaches) . I think the board are missing a trick if they feel that simply backing the playing staff is enough. There are managers (probably expensive) that have proven achievement skills that would attract a premium in other corporate environs. We must understand that the key objective this season is promotion. Plain and simple. Stated by the board. Not consolidation. It is unthinkable that in other walks of life you would spend in critical areas of the resource needed to achive your objective, but take a chance on leaving another area so open to risk. No F1 team would stick an unproven driver in where you have a competitive advantage over your peers.

Of course if you are skint, like we were when we appointed Gunny, you can make a case for it.

Swansea is a good example for how the manager has changed and the position of the Club has improved. Monk had little experience BUT ignoring all else but Monks position in comparison with Adams I would say it was quite different. Swansea lost their manager in positive circumstances, as indeed did Southampton. The team was doing well, Monk came in and carried on good practice. You could say the same about Hughton who followed a successful mid table finish under Lambert . Hughton did well in the first quarter of his tenure. Adams was faced with a very different proposition.

In addition as Purple says

“The shelf-life of a PL manager is around two years. We and those like us get to pick from the third tier of managers”

In fact we haven’t even picked from the third tier. We picked a guy that wasn’t in any tier. .

And now a word on the post season dinner speech which is a point of reference.

I was present and heard this . AB put on his glasses and read from a pre planned speech “because he wanted to get it right” . I took this as a group position, "I speak for us all". And there were a few themes running through the address.

Most importantly relegation was avoidable, and by default, Hughtons fault. The reference to opening a can of tuna and it being “not tolerable” . It wasn''t us guv.

There was also the slightly jingoistic reference to playing the “Norwich way” . I’m not sure what this is, but it gave the address some real grit and determination. However I fear the tuna had become more of a red herring. Were the board trying to soften us up for the appointment of our youth Team Coach with no wins out of five? Who knows. Are we playing the Norwich Way?

Then David M introduced the concept that the manager had spent too much time on matters that were not necessary for his involvement. I think he mentioned being called late at night about a young loan player going to Luton or Southend. Through this the Football Committee and the Technical Director was introduced. That the board deemed it necessary to have experience on the committee (Joe Royle) and then go into the season with no such experience is odd. Royle obviously let them down, but have they tried to replace him? Having decided that the committee needed this skill set, what has happened since?

Purples caveat is very well made “ one needs to allow for some potential blame-laying by the directors. Allied to that is the point that much of what a manager does is highly public while most of the work of the directors is hidden and less capable of being subjected to fact-based criticism. On the face of it the provable errors last season were Hughton’s. That does not mean there were none from the directors.”

To conclude and steal part of Purples summary,

“Everything, on-field and off, was set up to enable Hughton to equal those previous levels of achievement. Instead we double-digit plummeted. With the three clubs that did the same the main reason was managerial failure. Whoever was in the job performed significantly less well either than their predecessor or than they had done previously.

The lesson for the future is that for Norwich City to survive in the Premier League, or to get back there, everybody has to be at the top of their game”

But I would add where you can afford to take a further statistical advantage, that of employing resource that has proven achievement given your current objective, you should.

So long and thanks for all the fish.

ca · November 12, 2014

That''s a brilliant post Purple Canary, must have taken you hours to gather all the facts and type it all out for the benefit of others.

You''re a star [:)]

Parma Ham's gone mouldy · November 12, 2014

A fine piece of work PC.

Parma

Mutley · November 12, 2014

Many thanks PC for such an excellent piece of work, it is very much appreciated.

At this very moment it feels like we are punching under our weight and our neighbours are punching over theirs on the pitch. With the finances that we have at our disposal that should not be the case.

The difference is surely the manger that each club currently possesses. Why has the board taken such a gamble on an inexperienced boss? They laid the blame clearly at the door of the previous boss for our relegation and if this appointment fails to gain us promotion they are the ones that should clearly take the blame.

I would love NA to succeed but has the job come too early for him? And why have awe not appointed anyone to replace JR?

Highland Canary · November 12, 2014

Very enjoyable read providing a credible explanation for our failure. This is why, of course, there is some concern with our current managerial appointment.

R Mellie · November 13, 2014

One of the best posts I think I''ve ever had the pleasure of reading, most thought provoking, cheers Purple

PurpleCanary · November 13, 2014

Thanks for the various comments. To reply to a few:1) From ldc:What always bothers me with statistical analysis though, is that the

things that can''t be measured are not taken into account. A negative

vibe amongst fans - a player having too much influence in the dressing

room in a bad way - a piece of pure bad luck - the way the fixtures fall

- etc etc. These things can''t be measured easily and do affect boards

and managers'' performances.I think that is true up to a point.

There are any number of statistical surveys on football finance versus

the manager and on whether sacking the manager improves results. But by

definition any sensible survey has to include dozens of examples. Yet

the truth is that no two clubs are the same and no two sets of

circumstances around, say, the sacking of a manager are the same.A

few days ago I instanced West Brom ditching Steve Clarke quite early in

his worrying second season after a very successful first. It seemed a

crazy decison, until you wondered if the directors had decided that all

he had been doing was living off Roy Hodgson''s good work, plus

benefitting from Lukaku on loan (and coincidentally or not Clarke has

not found a manager''s job since). But you could not factor that into a

survey, because you would not be able to find enough other clubs where

that had happened. Nor would you find enough clubs with similar

circumstances to those that evidently persuaded our directors to sack

Hughton even if he kept us up for the second year running.This

is why I went into such statistical detail on our particular record over

the three years, because it was more illuminating than the crude kind

of comparison you get with more broadly-based surveys.But I

agree there are imponderables that cannot be measured, although I wonder

how important some, such as a negative vibe, are. A Guardian

journalist did a very unscientific survey of the views of fans in

cyberspace and decided there were currently only five PL clubs where the

fans were happy - Chelsea, Southampton, West Ham, Swansea and Burnley.

All the rest were pretty miserable. Which tells you more about the way

cyberspace distorts reality than anything else. But also raises the

question - is supporter dissension really a bad thing or does it bring a

team together? The fans at Newcastle have been revolting all season and

yet the team has just won five games in a row...2) To GPB:

Thanks for the comments about that end-of-season dinner. They confirm

the impression I had gathered from simply reading the quotes, that there

was an element of blame-laying going on.3) As to the parallels

being drawn with the here and now and Adams, I think they are

inevitable, although I would be cautious about taking them too far.

Granted the the basics are the same in the Championship ad the PL, in

that the

richer clubs have bigger

wage bills and so can afford better players. But Adams is not Hughton,

and whether that is a good or a bad thing I for one have as yet no idea.4)

Finally one subject I didn''t get into at all is financial fair play,

and whether that might affect the balance of power between finance and

the manager in the latter''s favour. The early signs are that Uefa is

taking its FFP seriously and that the Football League is similarly doing

so, although the recent decision to alter its rules on losses looks

like a bow to pressure from the Premier League. But whether the PL is

also serious about FFP seems to be entirely unclear.

ricardo · November 13, 2014

[quote user="PurpleCanary"]The lesson for the

future is that for Norwich City to survive in the Premier League, or to get back there, everybody has

to be at the top of their game.

[/quote]An interesting read and some superb statistical data. As Nutty Nigel remarks, it will take some time to digest.The only thing I will say it present is that your lesson for the future is the same as the lesson all long term supporters have learned from the past. The way the Premier League is structured means that a team of NCFC''s stature will always struggle to survive long term in that division.

PurpleCanary · November 14, 2014

[quote user="ricardo"][quote user="PurpleCanary"]The lesson for the

future is that for Norwich City to survive in the Premier League, or to get back there, everybody has

to be at the top of their game.

[/quote]An interesting read and some superb statistical data. As Nutty Nigel remarks, it will take some time to digest.The only thing I will say it present is that your lesson for the future is the same as the lesson all long term supporters have learned from the past. The way the Premier League is structured means that a team of NCFC''s stature will always struggle to survive long term in that division.[/quote]Ricardo, I think it depends a bit what you mean by long-term. Just to expand a bit on my conclusion, as I said in the preamble, I decided to study this question, because it kept coming up, in general and in relation to our relegation. And the debate here was not entirely monolithic - in other words some posters blaming Hughton for relegation acknowledged the significance of finance, and some who defended him accepted he may have made mistakes.I approached the subject with an open mind, because I don''t have an agenda. That said, my suspicion was that I would find there was no iron law of finance that meant relegation was inevitable very soon or just slightly less soon. What I would discover, I thought, was that to survive everyone involved had to keep on making the right choices. But that it would always be a struggle.My research led me to a rather different conclusion. That if you can survive for a season or two, and carry on making those good decisions, then it is possible to keep on surviving with a bit to spare. It doesn''t always have to be the last kick of the last game of the season that ensures safety. Broadly, it is possible to become established as a club that hits the 40-point mark or a touch above.. But how long that can last depends on continued good decision-making. The moment a bad choice is made the chances of survival nose-dive.

YankeeCanary · November 14, 2014

[quote user="PurpleCanary"][quote user="ricardo"][quote user="PurpleCanary"]

The lesson for the future is that for Norwich City to survive in the Premier League, or to get back there, everybody has to be at the top of their game.

[/quote]

An interesting read and some superb statistical data. As Nutty Nigel remarks, it will take some time to digest.

The only thing I will say it present is that your lesson for the future is the same as the lesson all long term supporters have learned from the past. The way the Premier League is structured means that a team of NCFC''s stature will always struggle to survive long term in that division.
[/quote]

Ricardo, I think it depends a bit what you mean by long-term. Just to expand a bit on my conclusion, as I said in the preamble, I decided to study this question, because it kept coming up, in general and in relation to our relegation. And the debate here was not entirely monolithic - in other words some posters blaming Hughton for relegation acknowledged the significance of finance, and some who defended him accepted he may have made mistakes.

I approached the subject with an open mind, because I don''t have an agenda. That said, my suspicion was that I would find there was no iron law of finance that meant relegation was inevitable very soon or just slightly less soon. What I would discover, I thought, was that to survive everyone involved had to keep on making the right choices. But that it would always be a struggle.

My research led me to a rather different conclusion. That if you can survive for a season or two, and carry on making those good decisions, then it is possible to keep on surviving with a bit to spare. It doesn''t always have to be the last kick of the last game of the season that ensures safety. Broadly, it is possible to become established as a club that hits the 40-point mark or a touch above.. But how long that can last depends on continued good decision-making. The moment a bad choice is made the chances of survival nose-dive.
[/quote]

A great read Purple. However, on this last piece of input ( where you are reacting to Ricardo ) it''s my opinion that you are putting a little too much dependence upon good decision making and not quite enough on fortune or luck. I suspect there is very little difference between Ricardo''s ( and others ) statement and yours when the number of points gained, and survival, can adversely be affected by bad luck rather than poor play by clubs such as Norwich in one or two games.

Parma Ham's gone mouldy · November 14, 2014

I felt - both on the training ground, pitch and boardroom - that there was an elephant in the room with Hughton. One that I believe Paul Lambert instinctively felt and saw.

The existing players were not good enough to make the jump you are talking about to a +40 side.

The elephant in the room for Norwich fans under Hughton, was that his method was autistic and calculated and took account of the disparity in playing resources, ability, financial disparity and the inevitable evaporation of the high of promotion, survival and wide-eyes newness of it all. It was a logical approach that focused on our weaknesses and a strategy that could glean points against better sides (in the absence of cup final naïveté). This is inevitably replaced - on the training ground, pitch, boardroom, message board - with a weltschmerzen, an ennui, a weariness as the reality dawns that trudging, grudging point-gathering is the medium term future. No real hope of silverware, success is survival and that''s all.

Hughton''s failure was at the top end of the failure chart, in that it was his big gambles, his cherries on the cake that failed. The forward line was not embellished - though in reality our investment in his area was comparatively limited (extraordinarily) in context - nor cherished. Nevertheless, as Ricardo stresses, we were performing above our station historically, in WLT terms and in a fundamental structural sense, given our rapid rise.

Parma

PurpleCanary · November 14, 2014

[quote user="Parma Hams gone mouldy"]I felt - both on the training ground, pitch and boardroom - that there was an elephant in the room with Hughton. One that I believe Paul Lambert instinctively felt and saw.

The existing players were not good enough to make the jump you are talking about to a +40 side.

The elephant in the room for Norwich fans under Hughton, was that his method was autistic and calculated and took account of the disparity in playing resources, ability, financial disparity and the inevitable evaporation of the high of promotion, survival and wide-eyes newness of it all. It was a logical approach that focused on our weaknesses and a strategy that could glean points against better sides (in the absence of cup final naïveté). This is inevitably replaced - on the training ground, pitch, boardroom, message board - with a weltschmerzen, an ennui, a weariness as the reality dawns that trudging, grudging point-gathering is the medium term future. No real hope of silverware, success is survival and that''s all.

Hughton''s failure was at the top end of the failure chart, in that it was his big gambles, his cherries on the cake that failed. The forward line was not embellished - though in reality our investment in his area was comparatively limited (extraordinarily) in context - nor cherished. Nevertheless, as Ricardo stresses, we were performing above our station historically, in WLT terms and in a fundamental structural sense, given our rapid rise.

Parma[/quote]But we didn''t need to jump to 40+ points, parma - we had reached 47 and 44 the two seasons before!I

understand your view that Hughton believed there needed to be a basic

switch to - in crude terms - a more defensive and supposedly utilitarian

style of play. Whether that was well-founded in logic is a question I

didn''t examine (as opposed to the lack of a Plan B, the failure of which

is certainly supported by the evidence).But the hard facts are

that we did drop 11 points in his second season for no good reason.

What may at the outset have seemed logical to Hughton turned out to be

anything but utilitarian.

Parma Ham's gone mouldy · November 14, 2014

Clarification:

"Established +40 side" as Ricardo and Yankee identified.

I endeavoured to establish further reasons why the initial 2 seasons did not face the same problems of season 3.

The inference of Ricardo''s point - plus the relative comparative lack of finance - could be that season 2 was an excellent, against-the-odds success (without the year 1 bravado).

Parma

Number 9 · November 16, 2014

All well and good, however, that is a history lesson which stops short of our current plight.

Are we now experiencing mistakes from our manager (bearing in mind that the directors have not put their heads above the parapet to identify any for us)?

What actions could / should be taken now at this point in the season?

Also, do the lessons from the Premier League apply directly to the Championship, or is the case study too different?

PC, I''m not trying to be critical of your hard work, which must have taken some time & thought, just nudging you to extend the logical reasoning to this season.

PurpleCanary · November 16, 2014

[quote user="Number 9"]All well and good, however, that is a history lesson which stops short of our current plight.

Are we now experiencing mistakes from our manager (bearing in mind that the directors have not put their heads above the parapet to identify any for us)?

What actions could / should be taken now at this point in the season?

Also, do the lessons from the Premier League apply directly to the Championship, or is the case study too different?

PC, I''m not trying to be critical of your hard work, which must have taken some time & thought, just nudging you to extend the logical reasoning to this season.[/quote]Answers to various questions. Bear in mind my aim in part was to look at the general question and not

just how it affected Norwich City. And, based on my limited research, I

came to a very slightly more optimistic conclusion that the one I had

expected.There are massive particular differences between the

finances in the Premier League and the Championship, and even - because

of parachute payments - within the Championship. And the finances of the

Championship seem to have attracted much less attention. But I am sure

the basic point applies to both - crudely, the more you spend on wages

the better the team is likely to perform.Any financial

assessment of this season is premature. We won''t find out our financial

details until October 2015 and how they compare with those of other

clubs (by way of wages, for example) until the spring of 2016.I

cannot draw any conclusions on possible managerial mistakes from Adams.

Statistics enabled me to reach two conclusions on Hughton - that he

misspent a record amount of transfer money, and that his lack of a

tactical Plan B cost us crucial points. It is not yet possible to

produce a statistic-based verdict on Adams.

YankeeCanary · November 16, 2014

[quote user="PurpleCanary"][quote user="Number 9"]All well and good, however, that is a history lesson which stops short of our current plight. Are we now experiencing mistakes from our manager (bearing in mind that the directors have not put their heads above the parapet to identify any for us)? What actions could / should be taken now at this point in the season? Also, do the lessons from the Premier League apply directly to the Championship, or is the case study too different? PC, I''m not trying to be critical of your hard work, which must have taken some time & thought, just nudging you to extend the logical reasoning to this season.[/quote]

Answers to various questions. Bear in mind my aim in part was to look at the general question and not just how it affected Norwich City. And, based on my limited research, I came to a very slightly more optimistic conclusion that the one I had expected.

There are massive particular differences between the finances in the Premier League and the Championship, and even - because of parachute payments - within the Championship. And the finances of the Championship seem to have attracted much less attention. But I am sure the basic point applies to both - crudely, the more you spend on wages the better the team is likely to perform.

Any financial assessment of this season is premature. We won''t find out our financial details until October 2015 and how they compare with those of other clubs (by way of wages, for example) until the spring of 2016.

I cannot draw any conclusions on possible managerial mistakes from Adams. Statistics enabled me to reach two conclusions on Hughton - that he misspent a record amount of transfer money, and that his lack of a tactical Plan B cost us crucial points. It is not yet possible to produce a statistic-based verdict on Adams.
[/quote]

Purple, the point you made was that a clubs ability to remain in the Premiership for a good, long period is dependent upon continued good decision making by the directors and managers. Number 9 asks, among other things, is our manager making mistakes. Putting that to one side for the moment and focusing on whether the directors are making continued good decisions and, in particular to pick up on your self-admitted crude point of "the more you spend on wages the better the team is likely to perform", if one is not able to ascertain financial details of how this season is impacted until October/2015 both for Norwich and other clubs, then how are directors to know if they are making "continued good decisions" except in hindsight, at which point it is too late. Is this where my "luck" element kicks in?

YankeeCanary · November 16, 2014

I should have said "until the spring of 2016" but the question asked really remains the same.

PurpleCanary · November 16, 2014

[quote user="YankeeCanary"]

[quote user="PurpleCanary"][quote user="Number 9"]All well and good, however, that is a history lesson which stops short of our current plight. Are we now experiencing mistakes from our manager (bearing in mind that the directors have not put their heads above the parapet to identify any for us)? What actions could / should be taken now at this point in the season? Also, do the lessons from the Premier League apply directly to the Championship, or is the case study too different? PC, I''m not trying to be critical of your hard work, which must have taken some time & thought, just nudging you to extend the logical reasoning to this season.[/quote]Answers to various questions. Bear in mind my aim in part was to look at the general question and not just how it affected Norwich City. And, based on my limited research, I came to a very slightly more optimistic conclusion that the one I had expected.There are massive particular differences between the finances in the Premier League and the Championship, and even - because of parachute payments - within the Championship. And the finances of the Championship seem to have attracted much less attention. But I am sure the basic point applies to both - crudely, the more you spend on wages the better the team is likely to perform.Any financial assessment of this season is premature. We won''t find out our financial details until October 2015 and how they compare with those of other clubs (by way of wages, for example) until the spring of 2016.I cannot draw any conclusions on possible managerial mistakes from Adams. Statistics enabled me to reach two conclusions on Hughton - that he misspent a record amount of transfer money, and that his lack of a tactical Plan B cost us crucial points. It is not yet possible to produce a statistic-based verdict on Adams.[/quote]

Purple, the point you made was that a clubs ability to remain in the Premiership for a good, long period is dependent upon continued good decision making by the directors and managers. Number 9 asks, among other things, is our manager making mistakes. Putting that to one side for the moment and focusing on whether the directors are making continued good decisions and, in particular to pick up on your self-admitted crude point of "the more you spend on wages the better the team is likely to perform", if one is not able to ascertain financial details of how this season is impacted until October/2015 both for Norwich and other clubs, then how are directors to know if they are making "continued good decisions" except in hindsight, at which point it is too late. Is this where my "luck" element kicks in?

[/quote]Yankee, I take your point about luck. I don''t doubt it can play a part, and often a significant part, but is as far as I can see entirely unquantifiable! And I was anxious to avoid subjective judgments. For example I have a strong view on Hughton''s basic tactical philosphy (as opposed to the question of a lack of a Plan B) but kept it to myself.As to financial information, the directors, as opposed to we unwashed masses, will already have a great deal of that. The amount we spent in the summer is already publicly known (it was around £13m) but the directors will also know, which we can only guess at, what we received for players. And they will know our crucial wage spending, and have a decent idea how it compares with our rivals, and a pretty good idea on income for the season.In addition I doubt that finance, in the sense of the misspending thereof, would be the only criterion. If I was a director factors such as the manager''s ability (or not) to learn from mistakes and whether they had the squad performing to its potential would come strongly into play, and it might well be possible to have formed a view on those aspects by now.I will send you a supplementary PM.

Number 9 · November 16, 2014

I''ve been considering where we sit with the players wages / managers influence in the Championship.

I have no research other than my own musings, but surely the managers influence must be at least the same as with the Prem, probably somewhat more.

That said, management mistakes would be more of a problem.

Have we had had management mistakes?

Hindsight perhaps will answer that fully, however, there have been some strange decisions made in my opinion.

PurpleCanary · November 23, 2014

[quote user="Number 9"]I''ve been considering where we sit with the players wages / managers influence in the Championship.

I have no research other than my own usings, but surely the managers influence must be at least the same as with the Prem, probably somewhat more.

That said, management mistakes would be more of a problem.

Have we had had management mistakes?

Hindsight perhaps will answer that fully, however, there have been some strange decisions made in my opinion.[/quote]I am a bit researched out now, so I can''t answer that question. For what it is worth, taking the 2012-13 season, in the Premier League the highest wage bill was £233m (Manchester City) and the lowest was £44m (Wigan). In the Championship it was £37.4m (Bolton Wanderers) and £6.2m (Peterborough).Plainly in absolute terms there is vastly greater difference in the Premier League, but as it happens the Man City bill is only 5.295 times that of Wigan, while the Bolton bill (boosted by parachute payments) is 6.03 times higher than Peterborough''s. Whether that suggests a Championship manager has more influence, or less, or the same, I couldn''t say.At a tangent, a friend sent me a link to some contrasting comments on my OP on Wrath of the Barclay. One pithily described it as "coma-inducing" while another said it was "really interesting". Mind you, that poster apparently regards me as "one of the few sane voices" here...

PurpleCanary · March 11, 2015

[quote user="PurpleCanary"]

There is as yet no WLT for