Sport Republic

[Willo of Whiteley]

I posted the below on April 10th in the SR new leaf thread:

I’m sure this’ll be merged in the ST thread soon, but let’s not gloss over this - Sport Republic have been a disaster.

The headlines a simple:
- 14th when they took over and a sustainable and desirable Premier League team.
- Two relegations within three of their four full seasons.
- The second worst Premier League finish in history, and the worst for us.

But they’ve invested money!
Let’s analyse that.

- They spent recklessly in their first full season, Romeo Lavia was the only success.
- They changed how they scout players from effectively scouts to a digital database that analyses them. This crop of intelligence scouted us gems such as Sekou Mara and Armel Bella-Kotchap.
- The wastefulness of their spending has seen a squad change more times, almost as much as Watford change managers.

Ah, the managers, there’s been some success there.
Bollocks…

Ralph Hassenhutl - excellent with Martin Semmens and his coaching team and not much money, good getting the best out of players. Probably not given any real say in transfers in SR first summer. Sacked, fail.
Nathan Jones - clown from a Welsh mining village who married a nice girl, made more enemies in as short a space of time as a dictator would. Sacked, the first of the glorious “Black Box Data Driven Appointments”. Sacked, fail.
Ruben Selles - damage limitation, appointed after a fluke win and subsequently led us downwards at the same time as Unai Emery was appointed by Villa. Sacked, fail.
Russell Martin - good appointment, promotion, but boring football at times, stubbornness cost him, naivety in the transfer window, and  should’ve done a lot better with the squad at his disposal. Sacked, but a pass.
Ivan Juric - heavy metal football? Heavy metal bullshit. Who’d have thought bringing in a defensive manager when you’re bottom of the league would keep you up? SR did. Sacked. Fail.
Will Still - Football Manager enthusiast, first big gig but stubbornness, lack of direction and leadership cost him massively. Big, big mistake from SR that will now potentially cost us promotion in what is a very weak Championship. Sacked, fail.
Now Tonda Eckhart - we all had low expectations, but let’s not beat around the bush, he was brought in for the U21’s, not the first team, and fair play to him for working wonders with the resources he’s got.

But surely SR have done well in other avenues?
Ah, ffs…

Goztepe, promotion holding their own and seemingly the only team benefitting from the glorious “multi-club model”. Albeit in the Turkish league they’ve done ok.

Valenciennes, “baby are you down” as the song goes, because that’s the way they’re heading too, and have been since the takeover. Chopping and changing of managers.

The ONLY positives I’ll give SR is the commercial side, so Level One, The Dell Bar, the matchday atmosphere outside the ground, all excellent. But that’s it.

Let’s not gloss over all this, SR get little backing from me until we’re at least back where we started when they took over.

Now to add:
Spying - and seemingly we’re shit at that too.
Another fantastic notch to add to their list of accomplishments during their time here.

String boycotts need to happen.

Demands of refunds.

Dont buy any more merchandise, season tickets etc.

Another humiliation. It’s like watching a live example of how not to run a business.

Regardless of whether the higher ups knew or not, this is on their watch.