Firstly, can I call you Mosh? It sounds too cosy because I hate to be foreign to anyone I meet. Sure, I'm a recluse, but I'm not antisocial. Anyway, I digress, and I should perhaps start with my dream.
Like any fan, especially one who has been supporting the club for so decades (and no I'm not that old), I dream of my team winning the UCL, perhaps quintuple or six-tuple, or whatever insane number of cups a team can win in a year. A team of such stature who plays in quality stadium with an academy that churns out players that can challenge the best in Europe if not the world. Well, that is the dream of a fan.
It is this dream that sharply contrasts, if not contradicts, reality. At the risk of unsettling people, (e.g. manager and players, however much I doubt nor want it), the downtrend has gone on far too long.
First, our finances, being kept in the dark for so long, and despite your investment, shed little light towards where we're going. While we need to keep grandeur plans secret from being foiled by our opponents, this is a club that has been rudderless for at least 2 seasons now, after many more years limping along as clubs embraced the golden era of TV revenue.
To my knowledge, we don't own Goodison Park, nor Finch Farm. Yet we're building a stadium at Finch and tinkering with upgrading Goodison or move to an eternal new home. I'm for the new stadium idea by the way, and appreciate the community service we're doing by upgrading Finch.
But we need a plan, a plan that puts us on the map and not tenants that can be kicked out if we don't pay rent, not especially when TV revenues are through the roof. A plan where we know how much goes into the stadium and how much we can put into our team. Hopefully, when we have that plan, we can think about what we can do to improve our commercial value. (If you check, it is abysmal for a team that ranks top 10 for a good part of the past decade) Yes, run this team like a well run company, one that has good community links and works, but also efficient in the financial aspects.
Second, our team, to be exact, our manager. I'm going on a limp here and say, we're likely to score 60 and concede 55, perhaps ranking around 14th with 47 points. I will avoid talking about statistics (unless you requests for it) even though that's my day job and just say, that is abysmal. We've been top 10 for most years under Moyes and we're at least 5 positions off Martinez' best year 2 years in a row and still falling. While I don't want Moyes back, he scored less than 50 points just once, in his sophomore slump year in 2004. Sure, I can ignore the standings sometimes, but surely, being that close to relegation must be a concern. I can't imagine paying millions to buy 49.9% of a club that is trending downwards in the league.
I believe we need an overhaul on the playing side of things. Many of Martinez' fans will say, he bought well, attacked well, but success (as prescribed by the media and the business world) is a numbers game. Where we rank and how many titles we win matter.
We need to win titles to mark how far we've come, yes, but that should not be done by sacrificing our league performance. Money wise, losing 5 positions (assuming 9th to my predicted 14th) means 6 millions pounds. The FA Cup, from the mighty Google search, is about 2 million. And if I can be frank, a big IF we win. So there you have it, bad business sense in opting for cup over league.
I don't have many names to throw up, and if some optimistic fans are correct, you might already have your target. Sadly, I work with numbers which prevents me from being overly optimistic, however positive I truly am. Hence I'll throw 3 names to highlight the caliber of managers that we should be looking at that is worthy of your investment. Diego Simeone, Unai Emery and Thomas Tuchel. There are some local coaches you can go after, but someone could knock them due to their less than stellar performance with a club (e.g. Enrique Flores, Ronald Koeman). Older heads (e.g. Wenger, LVG, Hiidink) can help but personally, I think the next manager should be one that can lead your team for many years to come (at least a decade) so that you can set your mind on better things, like a new stadium or generating more marketing revenue. Ideally with a fiery passion for football and success.
Last but not least, the youth academy. This is listed last because it is the least of our problems. We have a good youth setup, and if history to go by, our scouting network is pretty good also. That should be enhanced by nailing down similar tenant issues like Finch Farm and having a great coach as our next manager. My dream setup would be one that both improves our youngsters on the field and off the field, like education to improve their lives regardless of their football career (e.g. Ajax, Santos from what I've read). Sure, I want us to have produce a player of Messi's level, but that is a lottery. Still, a good academy will produce good players and personality around the club, and score more social points with the global community.
That's my wishlist. I understand that it is your money and I hope my wishlist provides can generate ideas with great ROI for the club. I am currently not putting much effort into watching the mess under Martinez outside of the FA Cup (e.g. I switched off after West Ham scored their first in our 3-2 loss to them). You may find me more related to trending #EFC #FireMartinez than anything else.
The team needs you, an element of change, metaphorically and literally, since the board have not improved our financial odds even through this golden era of TV revenue. We survived, sure, but financially, we're not improved much beyond our stabilization years. I hope you're not another false dawn but I don't believe we need you to "give all you have". You saw a project, hopefully a long term one, one that I hope will bring glory days to the blue half of Merseyside.
In that, if you actually read all this to the end, thank you and good luck.
Dennis
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