Mladen speaks.....

I agree with them, there's actually zero football knowledge on our board

 

I agree. It's very odd for non football people to think they had a better tactical plan to beat Peterborough or Bolton than the guy who got us to 5th in the table across 45 matches. It leaves a bit of a sour taste hearing that.

Plus using the phrase "we knew Martin internally"... please don't make me have that image

 

If you’ve been in around a successful football club, is that not experience enough?

 

I don't think so for that position, we needed a footballing person in there, this was their chance of getting someone in there to help them out and we've gone with an analyst. I generally thought this was a separate position and we were also recruiting a director of football.

 

Tell that to Luton, their chairman is from gas and energy, Ipswich chairman is a chemist. All those saudi world cup winners running man city.

 

Sporting director or director of football role across football is filled by non footballing people that have found success, Phil Giles at Brentford came into the job with no previous experience and is a mathematician. The role is primarily about recruitment and finding players that hit the targets that analytics highlights, being able to run through all the scouting reports to see if a target fits those stats consistently. He's got a head coach that he's hand picked with known success, he said part of the process involved seeing what types of players they'd want to be recruited, essentially saying he seems to want to play with the same process we've set out to aim for. The proof will be in the pudding this season and the transfer window will be the beginning.

 

You're naming chairman, who's helping the chairman behind the scenes? Citys DOF is an ex footballer. Were run completely different to those clubs has well, their coaches/managers have a lot more input into the signings.

 

I went on to name Brentford's director of football, back to Ipswich, Gary probert a non playing academy foundation level coach, Mark Thomas at derby was a chief scout, Richard Hughes at Pompey was head of recruitment from FGR. All found success moving up to director of football roles.

 

As mad as it sounds, I don’t think the sporting director needs to be an ex-footballer. Ex-footballers tend to have an agenda and a preconceived idea of how they want a team to work. I’m glad to have an independent.

 

Luton's Chief Recruitment Officer is Mick Harford.

You don't get much more football than that.

 

And does he sit on the board at Luton? The reply was because Gordon said:
"there's actually zero football knowledge on our board"

And like I said in subsequent replies, Derby, Portsmouth, Ipswich and Brentford are examples of clubs who've had promotions whilst employing a director of football that hasn't kicked a ball at any competitive level.

 

But do you think the boards of those clubs have better football knowledge than ours? A fashionista from NY, a guy from India with no involvement in football whatsoever before us and the Crynes?

 

Portsmouth board is stacked with the Eisner family and 2 lads who made Topps sticker albums.

 

I can see both sides on this but only if management knew Collins wasn't going to change anything for the playoffs, did they talk to him, were there full and frank discussions? Did they know Devaney would do things differently? I think all the negativity against Collins had an effect, even if subconsciously.
I don't think it made any difference sacking Collins. He should have had the chance to continue, the players needed to step up and show some conviction to go for it. Instead of praising Collins for a difficult job, well done we ended up looking disrespectful and, I think, somewhat foolish. I haven't seen that Collins has been slagging us off and I think he's being dignified. He should have been moved on with thanks and respect from the club for a tremendous achievement in the circumstances.

 

Mlinton, Mlinton; who the ****'s Mlinton?

 

Let’s not forget the deplorable treatment that he got from our ‘fans’ during away games toward the end of the season, my son and grandson were at one such game and they said it was absolutely disgusting and that they were embarrassed. Perhaps the board were ‘listening to the fans’ like some of the loons on Facebook kept asking for

 

I picked up on that too. To be honest it explains why we have problems recruiting managers if we insist on giving coaching staff colonoscopies

 

Bet he has Oakwell in his favourites on his Sat nav settings

 

perhaps during conversations Collins told them the best way to beat them was to press but he didn’t feel he had the personnel to do it?