buctootim

That's basically it imo. ML and he went into it as a joint fun project and with ML now dead Cortese has seen it as his own personal project. Not surprisingly the people now writing the cheques don't agree.

Not coping too well with idea that someone can have performed well at some aspects of his job and poorly at other others thereby performing averagely overall I see. Keep at it. They aren't difficult concepts to grasp

Odd post. Cortese is the subject of this thread, the one you have also commented on, and Cortese's job is managing the organisation behind the scenes. Go on on the football threads and you'll find my and other people's comments are more about football. Yours too probably. Yes of course the Staplewood development is important and welcome - but its a no brainer. Lowe saw we needed a top academy in order to produce talent we couldn't afford on the open market, that really was visionary at the time. Upgrading facilities to current mid prem standards again after their decline during admin using money gifted by the owner, not so much. I think you are making the mistake of confusing genuine ability to add value (rare and difficult) with the kudos extracted from spending lots of other peoples money (easier and more common). On a lot of the important performance metrics for his job - running the organisation well - he has performed poorly.

I give him credit for making two good manager appointments and also made some good signings. He also made a reckless manager sacking, signed players for £20m who have made little impact, alienated the press, oversaw the complete shambles that is hospitality / catering / box office, lost numerous staff who couldn't work with him and got the club sued by suppliers. Overall, about average.

Course it does. These are all things you know for a fact.

Im not diminishing them. The fact is that there are clueless loons who are easily parted from their money and some genuinely very able chairman who are able to make their clubs successful with very limited resources. I agree with Bucks Saint - out of the Liebbherrs, Adkins/Pardew and Cortese I would put Cortese as having the least direct responsibility for our rise.

We did well that year - but we got promoted in second with the second or third highest budget in the championship. Reading were actually the real over performers.

Fair comment, both are reasonable points of view to take from looking at the facts. I stick by my view that the greatest driver of our success has been the Liebherr's amazing financial backing and a good manager, not Cortese's 'amazing' skills.

Pity. As ever its not wise to step outside the sheep like orthodoxy on here. People have a pretty simplistic view - the team has done well so the man in charge must be doing well. Cortese has some good attributes, chiefly a drive to succeed and an ambitious vision. He's not a great Executive Chairman / CEO though, his people management and customer relations skills are too poor for that. Yes of the course the team have done fantastically well the past few years. Good managers being given a playing and transfer budget three times the average in Lg1 and double the average in the championship helped a bit. Buying the best players in the division tends to give you an edge. The measure of a really good chairman is - can you get your club to over perform? Swansea, Norwich, Wigan and Cardiff are the real examples of that. Cortese would have achieved very little on an average Lg1 budget without the Liebherr's money and support. The Liebherrs however would have likely achieved just as much with any other CEO who is of average or better than average competence. I don't necessarily want him to go, but he definitely needs to be reined in by an older, people savvier influence on the board.

Considering his position? Hasn't he made his mind up yet? I thought he was supposed to be dynamic but he's been dithering all day.

£28 million payoff! Its in his contract so he should get it, but what a crazy system its become.

I said its nearly technically possible, which it is. Remotely operated unmanned drones take off, carry out spy missions, launch weapons and then land again routinely in Afghanisatian and elsewhere. I didnt say commercial operations are about to start, which is a whole different ball game.

Trials are going on to see if unmanned commercial flights are technically feasible - which its seems very likely they will be, if not right now then very soon. Would you pay to fly BA to New York in what would effectively be an unmanned drone? Personally I wouldn't have a problem with it, although only after a few accident free years when any bugs had been ironed out. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-22511395

Or Ambitious Chairman required. Previous incumbent left because he fell out with almost everybody. Must be able but not socially autistic.

Because the original deal which gave him absolute control was agreed with ML. ML is now sadly dead and the deal expires next year. Its perfectly natural that the family who are now funding the club want more say over how their club is carried forward, particularly if they are being asked for another huge injection of funds. Would you give total control of your investment to a man you don't really know and don't necessarily trust?

98% of fans are worried that we need him as he is supposedly the gatekeeper to the Liebherr's money and support. Im not sure that's true, his current unbridled control of Saints may actually be a block to it.

And Adkins mishandling, and Benali, and the media spats and all the unnecessary and avoidable crap. Remember ML was a bit of a philanthropist, in part drawn to Saints by the history, community links in St Mary's etc. He wanted to revitalise the whole area as well as the club - not stitch up local suppliers and fall out with ex players.

A box of random Super 8 films in an antique shop in Stockholm. Turned out to be fascinating, including film of a National Socialist march in the 1930s.

That's a bizarre comment. Saints are in almost exactly the same position now as they were when Adkins was sacked and Reading were already unsaveable by the time Adkins arrived. Slightly more relevant is that fact that on current form (past 4 games) Saints are 17th whilst Reading are 10th.

We're not any better, and not really any worse either. Its striking how similar results and performances under Adkins and Pochettino have been. Good performances against the top teams, lacklustre and sometimes dreadful against the weaker ones. Similar per game points tally, frustratingly inconsistent. So far the manager change hasn't been justified. Pochettino may be 'okay' but 'okay' doesn't justify the stiffing of our most successful manager in recent decades and in the process taking a huge risk mid season.

Saints 1 goal in five matches. Reading 10th on current form. Hm.

Not as many tits as I might have expected from the OP

Im sorry you feel so powerless to change anything, maybe you have a victim mentality. One of the senior buyers at Sainsbury's told me a couple of years ago that if the CEO gets five letters from customers on the same subject in the space of a year then he requires a full report from his senior managers on what the problem is and what they have done about it because he knows that if 5 people can be bothered to write at least another 495 will have the same view but wont have bothered - and 500 people spending or not spending £100pw is worth £2.6m pa to his company . I got some very good and interesting info from making a small effort to be proactive. You should try it.

Actually it was personal email expressing some candid views but stating she had nothing to do with the running of the club. Nice of her to take the time i thought.