Rudkin

[CosbehFox]

5 minutes ago, Babylon said:

And the problems aren't all Rudkin, without wanting to go over the whole thing again... 

 

We accepted bids on players (Sourmare and Vesty) that the players turned down. That's using sources you used to state we'd turned other bids down. 

The FFP rules were changed and it became clear we needed to cut back at least 20% on wages, it's very hard to negotiate new contracts based on that. 

It's also hard to sell players or give them away if you don't have the budget to buy someone of equal ability, because it's better to keep them. 

Loans can be more lucrative that sales if the deals are right, or you are only getting seriously low offers. 

The wider world has changed; players have started running down contracts to take back power. 

 

Things aren't going to change until we've got a grip of the finances, which i'd like to think happens in the summer if we get promoted. Because we lose a lot of dead wood, we have increased revenue, and we should be able to get the wages right down in terms of % of revenue. There was no giant issue back when we were getting money for Musa, Iborra, Zieler, Lawrence, Moore, De Laet, Schlupp, Hernandez etc. So what's changed, circumstances as listed? Chairman? Or do you seriously think it's all down to Rudkin?

But then we go back to why? Wages. Handed out by Teflon. 

 

 

Edited 2 February by CosbehFox

[The_77]

34 minutes ago, Babylon said:

No, it probably means (if it's true) that we couldn't afford to cover his wages or whatever other fees were involved... for all we know, the agent was demanding a large signing-on fee, considering he's going to be on a free in the summer.  

Or it means we banked on fluking a sale of another player that would suit us and help with FFP but that never happened. Personal terms with the player would have already been sorted. 

[Babylon]

14 minutes ago, Chocolate Teapot said:

Rudkin is culpable for signing the players we can't sell because we overpaid for them. He negotiates the contracts, it's very simple in this sense.

John Rudkin doesn't value the players, he's not a scout or head of recruitment. If you go back to a time when our scouts were signing diamonds and they loved to chat to all and sundry about the process. They identified the players and passed up the chain a value of said player... otherwise, how would Rudkijn know what the hell he's meant to start bidding at. 

 

Now, of course as you go up the chain of decisions he's CLEARLY got stuff wrong. Like allowing Rodgers to install his mate who had nothing but an utterly atrocious record, we all knew it at the time and everyone screamed NOOOOOO. I feel like people focus on all the small stuff, that he's basically not responsible for day to day. There was a lack of due diligence there and it's things like that which piss me off, more than blaming him for paying x, y, or z, when it's not his wheelhouse. 

[Viva]

2 minutes ago, Chocolate Teapot said:

Yunus? Not sure.

Casadei? Not sure.

Cannon? Too early to say.

 

It was good but when your budget is double everyone else's its not that hard 

Mads - great

Mavididi - great

Winks - great

Fatawu - great

 

Cannon - looks a decent prospect for a value fee. 

[Ric Flair]

5 minutes ago, Babylon said:

And the problems aren't all Rudkin, without wanting to go over the whole thing again... 

 

We accepted bids on players (Sourmare and Vesty) that the players turned down. That's using sources you used to state we'd turned other bids down. 

The FFP rules were changed and it became clear we needed to cut back at least 20% on wages, it's very hard to negotiate new contracts based on that. 

It's also hard to sell players or give them away if you don't have the budget to buy someone of equal ability, because it's better to keep them. 

Loans can be more lucrative that sales if the deals are right, or you are only getting seriously low offers. 

The wider world has changed; players have started running down contracts to take back power. 

 

Things aren't going to change until we've got a grip of the finances, which i'd like to think happens in the summer if we get promoted. Because we lose a lot of dead wood, we have increased revenue, and we should be able to get the wages right down in terms of % of revenue. There was no giant issue back when we were getting money for Musa, Iborra, Zieler, Lawrence, Moore, De Laet, Schlupp, Hernandez etc. So what's changed, circumstances as listed? Chairman? Or do you seriously think it's all down to Rudkin?

It's down to the astronomical wages we put them on in recent years and the mind boggling transfer fees we've started paying for players. All signed off by Heir Rudkin. It's not all on him, he's been given carte blanche by Top who trusts him unequivocally. 

 

Whilst that trust remains, we will not see the seismic change we need. I hope we get it, the points you raise above are relevant and we have to learn quickly and act quickly. To do this we need a stark change in strategy on recruitment, but again I don't think we'll learn.

 

The whole place needs freshening up.

[HankMarvin]

What was the logic in turning down bids for Iversen last summer. He wasn’t even making the bench. 

keep him for another 12 months at least, paying his wages in that time. Then take a lower bid (if any) because of his lack of activity over the last 12 months.

 

 

 

 

[CosbehFox]

Just now, Babylon said:

John Rudkin doesn't value the players, he's not a scout or head of recruitment. If you go back to a time when our scouts were signing diamonds and they loved to chat to all and sundry about the process. They identified the players and passed up the chain a value of said player... otherwise, how would Rudkijn know what the hell he's meant to start bidding at. 

 

Now, of course as you go up the chain of decisions he's CLEARLY got stuff wrong. Like allowing Rodgers to install his mate who had nothing but an utterly atrocious record, we all knew it at the time and everyone screamed NOOOOOO. I feel like people focus on all the small stuff, that he's basically not responsible for day to day. There was a lack of due diligence there and it's things like that which piss me off, more than blaming him for paying x, y, or z, when it's not his wheelhouse. 

Disagree. That's exactly what his role should be. He's the quality control filter to the ownership. He should be knowledgable to know the worth of a player. When to say to a manager or a scout, that deal isn't worth it. That's the remit of a DoF or a technical director. 

 

If he isn't doing that role, then simply he's a waste of a title, waste of a wage - because exactly what would do he do outside of that? 

 

Someone has to shape how the club is going to look in the future. You can't be the head of it and not at least make sure that everything links up. 

[lcfcbluearmy]

4 minutes ago, Babylon said:

John Rudkin doesn't value the players, he's not a scout or head of recruitment. If you go back to a time when our scouts were signing diamonds and they loved to chat to all and sundry about the process. They identified the players and passed up the chain a value of said player... otherwise, how would Rudkijn know what the hell he's meant to start bidding at. 

 

Now, of course as you go up the chain of decisions he's CLEARLY got stuff wrong. Like allowing Rodgers to install his mate who had nothing but an utterly atrocious record, we all knew it at the time and everyone screamed NOOOOOO. I feel like people focus on all the small stuff, that he's basically not responsible for day to day. There was a lack of due diligence there and it's things like that which piss me off, more than blaming him for paying x, y, or z, when it's not his wheelhouse. 

At the time our scouts were signing diamonds Rudkin was not director of football

[Claudio Fannieri]

I understand that Rudkin has to navigate through FFP and that is not easy, however he is responsible for signing off the following contract negotiations to players who have ended up remunerated well above there ability and probably at a significant increase to where they came from, including - 

 

Soumare

Bertrand 

Vestergaard

Praet

Daka

Perez

Ward - contract renewal 

Hamza - contract renewal 

 

I would beg the question do we even negotiate in relation to personal terms or do we just accept the first request from the agent, when in reality that is there cheeky request and would be prepared to drop £20k - 30k below the first ask, wouldn’t shock me if we could have saved £6-8m a year on the above by negotiating harder. 

[HankMarvin]

6 minutes ago, CosbehFox said:

Disagree. That's exactly what his role should be. He's the quality control filter to the ownership. He should be knowledgable to know the worth of a player. When to say to a manager or a scout, that deal isn't worth it. That's the remit of a DoF or a technical director. 

 

If he isn't doing that role, then simply he's a waste of a title, waste of a wage - because exactly what would do he do outside of that? 

 

Someone has to shape how the club is going to look in the future. You can't be the head of it and not at least make sure that everything links up. 

Agreed, your average fan has a good grasp of transfer fees and player worth based on history, age, injury etc, if you spend your working life within that industry you feel like that person should be an asset in that role. 
It would appear we overpay and overrate the lesser skilled players when selling.

Obviously no teams get it right all the time, but history has shown us with the amount of deadweight we carry that most of the time we get it wrong.

Edited 2 February by HankMarvin

[MPH]

I do get the impression that Rudkin is a yes man. He will be given a remit and will be told to make it happen. I really dont think all financial and therefore all footballing decisions are down to him. 

 

I mean, Maresca's first interview was done without Rudkin's knowledge wasn't it?

[An Away Move]

1 hour ago, Sol thewall Bamba said:

"Running the club properly" is not letting it get to the stage where we can't afford a £500K loan fee because of all the money we pissed up the wall and all the talent that left on frees. 

 

I think it was Ric that made the analogy on the BSLB Pod where he said "Rudkin has come round to your house and set in on fire. Then he's put it out, and claimed to have done you a favour". 

 

Every issue that the club is facing is self inflicted. We're not victims of anything.

I think some empathy is needed re: how tough it actually is pragmatically to run an ambitious club. In some ways we have been a victim - of our own success. If you qualify for Europe you need to have enough players of enough quality to qualify again the next year with an increase to the fixture list. To do better the next year to do better you need to offer more money to attract better players. It’s great if you qualify again. The problem is when you don’t. You are then left with a bloated squad of players on good money who don’t want to take a pay cut when other clubs want to buy them. You cannot help but lose them on a free once they’ve decided to run their contracts down. Performance levels drop off and financial restrictions for clubs like Leicester mean you cannot refresh and add quality. 
Add relegation into the factor and you are potentially facing financial armageddon. We should be counting our lucky stars we are top of the league and looking good for promotion because not going up is going to be catastrophic with the all the staff costs and overheads from Seagrave. I don’t see how we could ever balance those sort of costs being outside the Prem. 

Main point is that getting into Europe and not staying there is an absolute killer and not much you can do if fat cat players then don’t want to be sold. 

[Sol thewall Bamba]

6 minutes ago, An Away Move said:

I think some empathy is needed re: how tough it actually is pragmatically to run an ambitious club. In some ways we have been a victim - of our own success. If you qualify for Europe you need to have enough players of enough quality to qualify again the next year with an increase to the fixture list. To do better the next year to do better you need to offer more money to attract better players. It’s great if you qualify again. The problem is when you don’t. You are then left with a bloated squad of players on good money who don’t want to take a pay cut when other clubs want to buy them. You cannot help but lose them on a free once they’ve decided to run their contracts down. Performance levels drop off and financial restrictions for clubs like Leicester mean you cannot refresh and add quality. 
Add relegation into the factor and you are potentially facing financial armageddon. We should be counting our lucky stars we are top of the league and looking good for promotion because not going up is going to be catastrophic with the all the staff costs and overheads from Seagrave. I don’t see how we could ever balance those sort of costs being outside the Prem. 

Main point is that getting into Europe and not staying there is an absolute killer and not much you can do if fat cat players then don’t want to be sold. 

Contracts were sanctioned for players who were never worth them, which snookered us and got us relegated, and we're meant to feel sorry for them?

[Babylon]

25 minutes ago, lcfcbluearmy said:

At the time our scouts were signing diamonds Rudkin was not director of football

Who was DOF when we signed Kante.... 

[Sol thewall Bamba]

Just now, Babylon said:

Who was DOF when we signed Kante.... 

How do you KNOW he was involved in the deal though? You don't know that FOR SURE.

[lcfcbluearmy]

Just now, Babylon said:

Who was DOF when we signed Kante.... 

Yes he was but also Walsh was still there. I think part of Rudkins failings is not properly replacing him

[Babylon]

28 minutes ago, CosbehFox said:

Disagree. That's exactly what his role should be. He's the quality control filter to the ownership. He should be knowledgable to know the worth of a player. When to say to a manager or a scout, that deal isn't worth it. That's the remit of a DoF or a technical director. 

 

If he isn't doing that role, then simply he's a waste of a title, waste of a wage - because exactly what would do he do outside of that? 

 

Someone has to shape how the club is going to look in the future. You can't be the head of it and not at least make sure that everything links up. 

No, that's the role of the head of recruitment. Rudkin isn't there to get involved in scouting players and determining players. 

[Babylon]

1 minute ago, lcfcbluearmy said:

Yes he was but also Walsh was still there. I think part of Rudkins failings is not properly replacing him

And that's a fair criticism. 

[lcfcbluearmy]

Just now, Babylon said:

No, that's the role of the head of recruitment. Rudkin isn't there to get involved in scouting players and determining players. 

He is in charge of recruiting the Head of recruitment and working with them to get deals over the line though

[Hinckleyfox]

38 minutes ago, CosbehFox said:

But it's under his umbrella - his role is effectively quality control. He should be the individual setting the agenda, the ideology and the personality. If it's not his failure, it should be pretty who clear who has failed. The fact his role is so fudged - which includes interests in Leuven and Horse Racing creates this void of leadership. Fundamentally alongside the errors, that's what is badly missing. 

Yeah I do get that, and I dont disagree. All I'm saying as this as with everything in this world it always seems like the blame has to be pointed at one person, generally in a senior position, with very little attention going towards the people that are actually making the recommendations all the wy up the chain - who lets be honest, will also be being rewarded handsomly.

 

[Babylon]

1 minute ago, Sol thewall Bamba said:

How do you KNOW he was involved in the deal though? You don't know that FOR SURE.

YAAAAAAWN... he was Director of Football when we signed Kante, that's a fact. And those scouts there at the time told the world what our system was in determining players and how it worked in terms of valuations, from their mouths. 

[Babylon]

1 minute ago, lcfcbluearmy said:

He is in charge of recruiting the Head of recruitment and working with them to get deals over the line though

Indeed, I don't think I've said he isn't, have I. But it's not him just sat there on his own deciding what a player is or isn't worth.

[Ric Flair]

3 minutes ago, Babylon said:

YAAAAAAWN... he was Director of Football when we signed Kante, that's a fact. And those scouts there at the time told the world what our system was in determining players and how it worked in terms of valuations, from their mouths. 

He was Director of Football for the whole time we've failed to sell players, that's a fact. 

[Sol thewall Bamba]

3 minutes ago, Babylon said:

YAAAAAAWN... he was Director of Football when we signed Kante, that's a fact. And those scouts there at the time told the world what our system was in determining players and how it worked in terms of valuations, from their mouths. 

So when it's going good he's in charge and you know that for sure, and when it goes badly you ask for concrete proof of his involvement. Got it.

[Ric Flair]

If Rudkin has no involvement in the value of signings, he certainly has involvement in the parameters in which we sell players and also the wage structure. That is as big a problem as the signings have been that have failed.

 

Also we've been through 4 different head of recruitment's since Rudkin was here and the common denominator is him.