It’s guest blog time again, and back for another visit it ‘Trev Demo’, who responds to the article I wrote on Sunday in which I attempted to explain why our plan – not always successful – is for MFW to offer a range and balance of views.
All yours, Trev.
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I completely understood why Gary felt the need to explain all things MFW in a recent article.
I felt for him really. Does he pander to complaints, that bring about complaints from others? Does he bury his head in the sand, or does, as I believe he has, stay true to his opinions and try to achieve balance?
As someone that would be termed a ‘Happy Clapper’ by many (kudos to the comment that suggested we drop such name-calling), I wrote one list of reasons to be positive.
I see now people that defended Gary asking why we haven’t written more (positive articles). I believe the answer to this is the same as to why people are fed up with the allegedly negative contributions. In short, it’s already been said.
Some of us, myself included, would rather chance our arm with self-funding and local owners. Some wouldn’t. Each view is fine and rational. Surely, we do not need to play it out day after day with possibly a fresh micro-view in one direction or the other.
I don’t want a faceless owner or investment group running our club. I don’t want to spend millions of pounds on footballers.
I hope that is a fair view.
Others disagree, and believe our current owners have squandered too much (opportunities, money etc) for too long and need to be relieved of their duties.
I believe that is a fair view also.
But there seems to be an appetite by some to play out this disagreement day after day. It’s been said, again and again.
This makes me sad.
It’s a waste of all of our time, once everything has been said. For every anti-owner article, do the likes of myself and Stewart Lewis, Mick Dennis, and others, need to trot out our ‘reasons for the current incumbents’ to continue?
I love reading Mick D’s defences of the club, though even as a loyalist I find some of it is a stretch.
I also enjoy reading Gary’s disappointment of things lately, always well written, but plenty of it I disagree with, some of it is impossible to argue against and causes me to reconsider my position.
It’s why I’m here.
I have no interest in a repetitive CAPS LOCK heavy battle whereby a so-called ‘MOG’ or whatever points out our record number of relegations, only to be met by a ‘Happy Clapper’, such as I, to point out every club that’s sold out and gone south. I could find a hundred of these websites within minutes.
It is the open-minded nature of MFW that keeps me coming back.
Can we please, try to preserve that for the rest of pre-season, so we can get back to the delicious main course of disputing performances, subs, tactics (to be identified admittedly)?
Debates over our best signing? Or our worst? etc.
For now, let’s please keep it together, so we can harmoniously disagree when the real action starts.
Please?
One area we could follow the club is by treating opinions like Academy goalkeepers – the more we have the better our options.
But if you’ve only got goalkeepers in the academy something’s gone wrong, going wrong, or is going wrong.
It’s like aiming for 17th in the prem one error and you go down , aim higher make the error you have a chance.
Pukki and Ricki the Wolf
Hi Trev
I’m in the opposite camp as your good self.
Enough is Enough and for a long time I’ve watched from afar as city have struggled to survive, since 1983 I’ve lived in Blackpool and watch a club with a great history nearly go out of the league, the owners taken to court by a Latvian business for money owed and finally forced to sell by the courts to pay the m9ney he owed.
Supporters that demonstrate just like in the Chase era at city butno one listened especially the owner.
In some ways our present owners are similar(Sorry if that up sets anyone) but they don’t listen, make statements ie we get no offers yet the financial director says they have turned down numerous offers.
We get told as a PLC documentation takes longer to clear the legality of things yet other clubs that are PLC’s are sold in weeks.
We are told by an employee yes a senior one that the share issue is proceeding and that the Attanasio are all on board yet not a squeak from any board member.
I agree the negative comments have far outweighted the positive ones but putting a new twist on it the Happy Clappers Brigade like the status quo to continue while the Unhappy Clappers Brigade wants changes.
Is it positive to continue along a well trodden path with no light at the end of a tunnel ?
Or is it a negative to want changes to improve the financial status, stadium and team rebuild.
No one wants a Saudi Princes to bank roll us but a fair crack at progressing and if that means a change of ownership so be it, first things first let the owners open up to one and all the status of the share issue without breaking any legalities as we’re told is hold them up.
Maybe some information on a h9w the search for new Sporting Director is progressing.
No news is Good News so we’re told but it also implies there’s no progress, we have Webber overseeing our rebuild yet when he leaves his replacement who’s had no hand in this rebuild will be responsible for team results even recruiting a new head coach.
City is in a mess and the blame sits in Stowmarket
I think someone missed the point of this article.
Before I get shot in the morning let me say when I refer to city owners being similar to previous Blackpool owners it’s ment in the demeanour towards the supporters, in running the club and intransigence to change.
Hi Trev
I don’t know what I was hoping for in the comments, but the initial responses are pretty depressing – it’s as if they didn’t read your article.
Discussions about players, tactics and results (good and bad) are so much more interesting at this time of the season, than rehashing entrenched opinions about ownership. We are all football fans of the same club, after all.
MFW is not going to change the minds of either camp, so could we set that particular argument aside until at least Christmas, perhaps?
Maybe Alex and Bernard might read your article again, instead of latching on to the small part about ownership. There were some really good points about remembering what we have in common and accepting that other views can also have merit, despite disagreeing with them.
We shouldn’t need flak jackets to talk about our club – this is a time before the real action begins, for speculation and anticipation surely?
I think your last sentence pretty much sums up where we are, Chris. Until the action begins for real, all we have is speculation, both on-pitch and off.
Without that, I’m not sure what we’d fill the pages of MFW with over the summer months 😀
Oh I dunno so much about that Gary.
Close season provided us the opportunity to offer the platform to Trev and four fellow like-minded supporters to give us their views on why they reckon it is important to remain positive.
Trev obviously enjoyed writing his first article enough to back it up with this second one and while I don’t really agree with the sentiments expressed in either, I have thoroughly enjoyed reading both – thanks again, Trev.
Not every supporters’ website would have offered that opportunity, particularly *in public* as you made sure we did and let’s be honest, I was glad that Trev and the others took you up on the offer.
And but for close season I’d never have got the opportunity to disclose my late grandmother’s love of wrestling’s Royal Bros 🙂
Every cloud…
Cheers Chris, Cheers Gary. Agree with you both, very well summed up at the end Chris.
To be fair to Bernard the context of my final comment wasn’t clear (sarcasm was intended), I find the number of Academy keepers comical, whilst feeling sorry for Barden/Mair/McCracken et al when we signed another this summer.
One thing I believe we all agree on, on the pitch last season was pretty poor, in a very average division.
How do people feel about a likely 4-4-2 with one of our target men (Barnes?) dropping deeper, with one of our 2 CM’s dropping deeper (McClean?) while our full-backs attack with gay abandon. I think that seems like Wagner’s plan. I’m no expert, but I’m not sure about it tactically, could we be overrun in midfield where many teams employ 2 or 3 dog like workmen?
Transfer wise, If I were equipped like Richard III (prob got that reference wrong) I’d be offering my kingdom for a holding midfielder.
Sorry Chris latching on to the ownership, it’s the subject on every supporters mind.
I’m nearly 73 in October and since 1959 I’ve started every season with a positive attitude that this will be a better season than the last one and under Arthur South it progressed very well.
Chase had somersault good years then it turned sour but the thrill of a 3rd place league finish and a glorious run in Europe remains.
Our present owner in my opinion have never given us positive vibes but as before each season I’m hoping for the best out come.
Positivity come from the top and when that is replaced with negative comments over the years like supporter funding not self funding the club does make enough to survive on transfers and gate money alone.
Cooking lessons to generate money sadly any positives coming out of the club in the last year on investment, shares issues have turned negative due to the clubs lack of keeping its paying public informed on its progress.
City say they do things differently to other clubs yet owners have said they admire Charlton and they have nearly gone out of business numerous times now that is an ambition
I see that Gary (quite reasonably) picked up your last sentence.
I was more struck by your first one – how true!
Hi Stewart,
Positivity, as I’ve said, comes from the top and sadly with our Club I can’t remember the last positive comments that have come from the owners.
New investment and share issues got people hoping that a slow but sure new beginning was on the horizon, and that has slowly been allowed to sink into a negative state.
You’ve said it’s for legal reasons and that being a PLC slows it down and I, like many others, can accept that but as in any business the paying public or the supporters need to hear from the owners – not a senior, well-paid member of staff whose husband is working out his notice.
People read the articles and makes comments on how they interpret that article, and Chris saying that those comments are depressing as we have read then means he hasn’t read those comments either.
I am a positive person and at the start of each season my friends laugh and ask “promotion or relegation?” and even in our last terrible seasons in the Premier League I didn’t agree that relegation was inevitable until it was mathematical certain.
So please don’t knock others who comment – we all have opinions and they might differ from yours and mine, but they are all relevant.
Positivity, as I say, comes from the top. It would just be nice to hear some good news directly from the owners, not piecemeal comments from people not in the know or employees towing the company line.
Well said – a problem of social media is the way in which all opinions become personalised. A label is attached, names are called – the substance of debate or nuance of opinion become simplified on reception and buried under abuse. Personally, I think the are positives and negatives about our club at the moment. It really doesn’t have to either/or
This time of the year is like the time we were leaving school and preparing for what was to come next, a wide range of emotions gets tangled up. Still lots of things to do and undo but it‘s not going to be the same again, already Wagner is putting his stamp on things, I‘m more encouraged than discouraged, ups and downs aplenty can be counted on and arguing will take place, that‘s football. Oh and the mysterious disappearance of the new shares needs to be resolved.
On tactics there was an attempt to go 442 when out of possession against Darmstadt ,early doors , at least it gives 2 upfield for the longer out ball when the pass through the lines is failing due to the other sides pressing.
On ethos , the club structure is set by the owners and it is what it is, and unlike a government that we can change if we don’t like them , we can’t do a thing about our doomed to fail self funding model.
Again like Martin Trev I don’t agree with everything you say but I certainly think you make valid points.
Especially the 3 man midfield to over run us. Shades of Project Crapstart.
Kenny Mclean as our holding midfielder ? I am not convinced. Against the better Championship sides it didn’t work for my money. But say what you will about Norfolk’s honorary Pointer he was badly missed at the end of last season.
I asked a very good friend and fellow supporter how he would feel if we were 5th come the middle of October, as long as we haven’t played all the lesser teams, “very happy” he replied.
That is what one mediocre season in the Championship does to our mindset. I too would be happy with 5th, in fact ecstatic but none of us were last season as mentioned once or twice by dear Old Smudger Smith at the time.
And this new perspective Trev I do blame on the owners. They oversaw the biggest financial hole (borrowing the parachute payment money while at the same time insisting we are a still a self-funding club) since the Chase days. No wonder we are shopping in the free market.
A different friend of mine is more supportive of your stance, he in particular is fed up with the lack of atmosphere at Carrow Road. Even I have to admit it did a good job of resembling the Highbury Library last season.
But can you truly blame the fans? Rubbish football is one thing but being blamed for the said rubbish is for many the final straw where Delia and Michael are concerned.
I just think it is hard to give up something I have no doubt Delia and Michael both love, but the words “in the best interests of Norwich City FC” keep coming into my head.
I really feel for Mick Dennis, he is an excellent journalist that always made ” Hold the back Page” so much better. But he is in a unenviable position as he is very friendly with Delia and Michael, so I think it is wrong of us to expect him to criticize the shareholders. I have said before if my mate Marty won £200 million and bought the club (which he would😂) I would find it difficult to disagree in public with his decisions.
And your wish to be a self-funding club owned by local people is a very fair viewpoint and if Farkeball had worked it would have been fantastic. But it didn’t. To play it you need much better skilled, physical and athletic players for the EPL.
The truth is if we want to go back to being what we were back in the mid-eighties to the mid-nineties, a regular top EPL club, we will definitely need wealthier owners.
Just look at Fulham, Brighton and Brentford, so much wealthier owners, I am afraid those old days of competing as we did have gone, probably forever.
For everyone struggling to understand Herr Wagner’s style, and why we don’t need a DM like Skipp or Tettey. Have a look at the very good article in the PinkUn https://app.pinkun.com/23645887/content.html.. It certainly helped me 👍
Any idea if that article is available elsewhere? I’m done with paying for the Pink’Un app and can’t access via your link. Cheers if you can help!