SITTING IN JUDGEMENT

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Three days enforced absence from work have given me chance to reflect on a number of matters football wise.  Kilner’s departure; Palmer’s advent; the players strike; the greed of the Premiership; the Phoenix League …. that seems no end to it all.   It’s very seductive to sit and write about why I believe that English football will have changed out of all recognition over the next five years, and I might add certainly not for the better, but for the valedictory issue of TTP it’s far better and more relevant, to concentrate on issues dear to our heart in the short term anyway.

A good number of years ago, (well, 40 editions ago in TTP 60), I wrote a piece about the malaise affecting the English game, namely the irresistible urge amongst chairman of the big clubs to forget all about sound business principles and appoint untried and untested, (and in the main proven to be incompetent) managers purely on the basis of a good playing career. The list is almost endless … Banks, Stiles, Ball, Charlton (R), Hurst and Peters from the World Cup team …. Robson, Dalglish, Keegan, Bruce from recent times and even as I sit here our old chum Francis is due to be taken on yet again by another gullible chairman.  The common theme of that last group is their ability to shift shed loads of other peoples cash, mainly on totally mediocre foreigners, and a proven inability to achieve any kind of lasting success.  There may be the odd Cup to show for the mis-investment but no evidence whatsoever that they have managed to develop the infrastructure any of the clubs they have been asked to “MANAGE”.

Which brings me to the crux of this piece. What is management about, what is needed to make it effective, and within the context of that how will posterity judge Kilner and what can we really expect from Palmer?

I start from the basis of being a manager in my own profession for over 20 years now.  20 years of having to deal with people; having to juggle resources and organise things so that the business succeeds, and succeed it has done over that period. On that basis I reckon that I’ve got a fair idea of what makes for good management. Equally over those 20 years I’ve seen any number of textbooks carefully scripted by management gurus who put down their thoughts, and incidentally judging from the cover price make an absolute fortune from doing so.  But I reckon that they can all be synthesised into 3 points.

Know what your objectives are and what are you being asked to achieve.

Know what resources you have and invest them as wisely as possible in people to do the job and give them the tools to do it.

Ensure that those resources are organised so that objectives are achieved and remember that the unwritten law is to apply common sense.

So to Kilner.  I’ve got to start by declaring my total distaste at the witch hunt which preceded his departure. In the ground and on the various mailing lists there was a body of opinion which was ill-informed, frankly ignorant, (and was probably constituted at the same characters who pilloried Megson who ofcourse is now showing what he can do). This was of course finally capped by the demo outside the ground to which Elwood finally bowed and should be eternally ashamed of.

Before the apoplexy kicks in let’s consider the facts.

Kilner’s Objectives.

It doesn’t take a fool to know that his job was to maintain First Division status – nothing more nothing less. Any aspiration to anything better is but fools gold. We cannot compete with the majority of clubs in this division. Cash flow prevents it and crowds won’t allow it. On this basis having kept us in Division One for two seasons he did achieve the objective. Yes it looks as though it would have taken us down this year I still believe that to maintain the status we have for that period was an achievement.  Richer clubs have gone down during that period.

Kilner’s Resources

We all know that these have been fairly limited especially during the last 12 months and have certainly not been assisted by the sell to survive policy.

It is a matter of fact for a Club like County saleable assets will indeed move on. So Moore, Dinning, Cooper and Nash did have to go.  I just found it depressing that during this time he was getting so little of the proceeds for reinvestment  – but more of that later. One of the resources little mentioned is a direct credit to Kilner and that is the growing product of the youth set up. Let’s remember that he came to the job from the post of Head of the Centre of Excellence –  I suspect that the infrastructure he put in place there it’s going to benefit the club in the long run. We’ve already seen the likes of Wilbraham;  Briggs and Clare come through and with Welsh, Daly and Williams on the verge there is definite promise ahead.

Kilner’s Use of Resources.

The art of a good manager is to use the resources available in the best possible way, and that’s got to be seen in two ways. How was the cash available used and how did he manage the players he eventually gathered together?  It’s got to be said that his record on the transfer front was somewhat less than sensational. The cash he was allowed to spend doesn’t seem to have been well invested. Wiss,  Nergersen,  Bryngellson, Lawson and D’Jaffo are all names that failed to deliver and in some ways I believe that the writing was on the wall in the summer when he was allowed the paltry sum of £15,000 for building. It looked to me that the Elwood had decided that he couldn’t be trusted with money. Kuqi was the one who did seem to have potential it now looks that will never find out – with Hurst we might see in forthcoming months. So on this score he can be said to have failed. But if cash had been made available in order to compete with at least the middle section of division who knows?  What was depressing was the extent to which he had to rely on journeymen when team strengthening was required and for this I put the blame fairly and squarely at Elwood’s door. First Division survival should not depend on bringing in the likes of Allen, Bailey, Elliott, Maxwell and Sandford amongst others –  there is a time when it’s right to speculate to accumulate.

Having put the players in place how did he manage them. Tales seem to seep out Edgeley which suggest that his man management left a lot to be desired. Alleged bust ups with Hurst mainly but Wiss amongst others suggests he may not have grasped the basic tenet of effective management which is to recognise that each and every person is motivated differently. The best way of dealing with people is to identify whether the carrot or stick is the most appropriate tool – the direct way to ineffective management is to apply a straitjacket policy across the board and I suspect that Kilner fell into this trap

Once on the field I’m sure that we all have differences of opinion about tactics, formations and the like and I suppose the arguments about this could fill the whole of TTP.  In summary I believe that Kilner did at times have a good grasp of tactics but purely on the negative side. Look at the way he always seemed to squeeze the life out of supposed quality opposition. The results at Maine Road and generally getting something at Wolves and Bolton. He seemed to know how to frustrate the opposition but rarely if ever managed to convert this into a positive approach which could take the game to the opposition.

Kilner – a summary.

It’s sad when somebody who was revered from the terraces, albeit a decade ago, gets pilloried and then gets fired. I’m sure we’ll all remember him more for his contribution to the first promotion than for his managerial endeavours, but whatever you think about the latter he did indeed keep us in Division One for two seasons and given the constraints that he operated under that was a very positive achievement.  In judging him as a manager there will undoubtedly be a variety of opinion and everyone is entitled to that. From my own, and particularly subjective, perspective I don’t actually believe that a proper judgement can be formed. A manager must be given the tools to do the job and Elwood certainly gave him nothing like the latitude he extended to Megson in the transfer market either in terms of cash to invest nor in allowing him to keep the backbone of the team which had been reasonably successful during his first six month tenure. He had plenty of faults but  there again let him who is without sin cast the first stone….  I actually appreciate the fact that he gave us another two seasons in this League which given the lack of proper support at Board level is something we have no right to expect.  In hindsight I suppose history and Kilner’s future employment record will be the proper judge but at present the jury must be out.

Turning to Palmer. When I first heard about his arrival it came without the knowledge that it was a package with the Messiah and Richardson. Therefore I felt a sense of foreboding. When I heard Murphy was back I felt relieved. For those longer term readers a piece contributed to TTP 23, (In Defence of Murphy), summarised my feelings about him which haven’t changed with the passage of time. Let’s recall without him back in 1986/87 we would have disappeared into oblivion. So the Trinity brought in by Elwood certainly has potential but only if they are allowed to do the job. Given the resources, while they may not preserve First Division status this time round, the probably will build a platform to make a decent fist of returning next year. Let’s not pretend it will be easy –  there’s plenty over the last few years who thought that an immediate return was preordained and have had a rude awakening. Which is why I feel slightly uneasy about the market Palmer appears to have operated in already –  bits and pieces players under the £100k mark such as Lescott and Ellison. I’d love to be proved wrong and see them come through but I believe that the future for County iis investment to reasonable level allied to further development of the youth set up.  In this context I want no more than to see Palmer succeed – I suspect that with Murphy at his right hand he’ll have adequate guidance on the management aspects of the job but it really is up to Elwood to give him the tools to do the job.

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Sadly we won’t again have the opportunity to discuss these kind of issues in the pages of TTP. So it’s probably right at the end of all of this to reflect on the last 10 years during which I have been a fairly regular contributor. I welcomed the arrival of TTP all those years ago as a platform for opinion, humour and debate away from the sterile offerings of the club programme. It has definitely fulfilled its purpose, but I think was of its time. The advent of the age of e-communication has overtaken it as a means of informing and opining. Equally I definitely believe that there has been a change of mood amongst the EP fans – at the start TTP was celebrating the birth of success. Gave the opportunity to recollect hard times, (which were fairly recent at that point), and to put in context the rise. It reflected on issues like the Bergara sacking; the Wembley trips; the annus mirablilis of 1996/97 and other Cup triumphs. It pursued matters such as the clubs pricing policy; the freedom to sell around the streets; and the contretemps with Stoke and Burnley. From a personal perspective, until work commitments over the last two years led to my own contributions becoming infrequent, it gave me the opportunity to air my opinions. But there has definitely been a change of mood – no longer is there an expectation at EP, more a sense that the great strides made over the last decade have been forgotten.  I think recent pages in TTP have reflected this. The time has come to move on and maybe it’s an appropriate time to call it a day. TTP started with plenty of stuff about the Messiah – maybe it’s right to end it with his return.  I wrote nearly ten years ago,  “Murphy arrived … the tide turned”, let’s pray for a repetition.

December 2001