Too Much Too Soon

“Our goal is to make this club one of the best, not just in England, but the world. To reach that goal, there is no limit....” Dr Sulaiman Al-Fahim September 1st 2008.

Money talks. Especially in football, and these days...especially in English football. The transfer of Brazilian star Robinho from Real Madrid to Manchester City, as opposed to Champions League runners up Chelsea is just one example of how money holds sway.

Chances are, before September 1, you will never have heard of Dr. Sulaiman Al-Fahim or Sheikh Mansour Bin Zayed Al Nahyan. Early that morning, City majority shareholder Thaksin Shinawatra signed a memorandum of understanding with the Abu Dhabi United group (ADUG). This would see the Arab company taking a majority stake in the football club and in doing so, shaking up European football.

Al-Fahim, the front man of the group, has promised to turn City into a top four club within three years, as well as promising to bring in a number of ‘galactico’ signings. They are dreaming of instant success, “A place in the Champions League is quite a jump from last season, but we will sit down with the manager, identify the players he would like, and bring the right players to the club. This season we would like to be better than last season, and we are eager for trophies next season”. Realistic goals???

ADUG join Roman Abramovich (Chelsea), Aston Villa’s Randy Lerner and the Glazer family at Manchester United among other foreign investors in the premier league. To date, the most successful transformation of a clubs footballing fortunes has come at Chelsea, where since acquiring the club in 2003, Abramovich has invested over £550m in an attempt to turn the Blues into one of the world’s best known clubs. They’ve won two domestic titles, an FA Cup, a League Cup and were the width of a post from lifting the prize the Russian billionaire so covets, the UEFA Champions League. Purely judged on Chelsea’s exploits over the past five years, one can understand the optimism among the blue half of Manchester.

But it’s not always rosy in the garden. When a super rich owner buys a football club he has extremely high expectations, and he’d like a return on his investment post haste. As if managing a football club isn’t hard enough. Owners have their own ideas on how to play the beautiful game, and have been known to interfere in player selection and the team’s tactics. This is evident at Chelsea. For all of the success, there have been four different managers during the Abramovich era, and this managerial merry go round is down to issues highlighted above...expectations too high, impatience, and above interference. Even The Special One only survived a month into his third season!!!

In fairness to such owners, it’s not all doom and gloom. At Aston Villa, there seems an understanding between the manager and the clubs hierarchy, which is similar to the situation at Manchester United. Neither Randy Lerner at Villa, nor the Glazers at United seem to meddle in team affairs, or attempt to sign their own players without consultation with the manager. These owners have identified that the manager they employ can be trusted with their club and can develop, progress and deliver success.

Reverting momentarily back to Man City, those with a propensity for gambling surely wouldn’t offer large odds on Mark Hughes remaining in a job come the end of next season (2010). This is a club trophy-less since 1976 (and haven’t been close since), they finished a mediocre 9th last season, and the new boss wants trophies next year!!! Hughes has already proven himself an above average manager at club and international level, but with Al-Fahim bandying about possible transfer targets such as Ronaldo (perma-tanned and Portuguese, not fat and Brazilian), Torres and Fabregas. How long will it be before they start seeking out a marquee name as manager?

This leads to another worrying and rather irksome development in modern football...the Director of Football. In recent days, Newcastle United has become a club in turmoil. Now up for sale, they are managerless, and the squad mediocre. Their delusional fan base has become incandescent with rage over the fact that billionaire owner Mike Ashley has ‘brought shame and ridicule on the club’. Now when I say delusional, I refer to the fact that said fans maintain that they are a ‘big club’. Statistics show this just isn’t the case. Newcastle haven’t won a major honour since 1955 and were last champions in 1927!

The shame the fans speak of was brought on by Dennis Wise’s appointment as the club’s Director of Football. Manager Kevin Keegan left the club blaming the management structure for his resignation stating that it left him with little or no influence over the clubs transfer policy. Keegan enjoys God-like status on Tyneside and news of his exit led to revolution against the board. Demonstrations in the city applied pressure on Ashley and banners labelling himself and Wise ‘Fattyboy’ and ‘Ratface’ were paraded around the stadium.

The problem is that top managers feel undermined by such Directors of Football. Martin O Neill turned an offer down from Spurs while he was at Celtic, and he insists he will never work under a Director of Football, “some directors of football have power without responsibility”. This is a view seemingly shared by Arsene Wenger, who has come out in support of Kevin Keegan.The silly thing about all of this Newcastle nonsense is, in his impassioned statement on the sale of Newcastle, embattled Ashley claimed he wanted to build like Arsenal, “Arsenal is the shining example in England of a sustainable business model”. Hmmm...Arsenal don’t have a Director of Football Mike!!!

Long term, what does the future hold for English football? Is it possible that big money takeovers, an overreliance on foreign imports and huge debts are in danger of destroying the game? It is the ordinary fans that clubs cannot afford to neglect. Watching a live game must remain an affordable prospect for supporters, and it would be an awful shame if an average family could not afford to attend games.

If the Abu Dhabi group are serious when they say they will stop at nothing in a bid to make City the biggest club in the world, and if the ‘shameless’ Mike Ashley can find a buyer for Newcastle, one who “can lavish the amount of money on the club the fans want”, and if the influx of foreign investment continues in the premier league (there are a number of investors hovering). Maybe, just maybe, one or two could gate crash the “Big Four’s” party. As football fans we can expect exciting times ahead...but at what cost?