Graham Potter’s new regime has gotten off to a good start at London stadium. Gone is the Lopetegui gloom, along with the departure of technical director Tim Steidten. In six short weeks the club has been reset and reprogrammed on, and off the pitch.
Potter’s head of recruitment Kyle Macaulay was probably part of the ‘Potter package deal’ when he signed. Steidten had fallen from grace at London Stadium after some questionable transfer deals at shall we say less – than value for money outcomes and held fallen out with two successive head coaches who banned him from the dressing room.
Who is to say now that the third and final piece of the Potter jigsaw is not about to fall into place? Dan Ashworth has been a free agent since December and would fill the new ‘situation vacant’ at West Ham – that of Director of Football.
The man responsible for closing deals to recruit Antony Gordon, Alexander Isak, Alexis Mac Allister, Moses Caicedo, Marc Cucurella and current Hammers loanee Evan Ferguson certainly has the track record to lead negotiations as West Hams new Director of Football role, wheres Macaulay is more of the stats man and less effective in closing deals.
Potter and Ashworth worked well at Brighton
Whilst David Sullivan professes there is no urgency to act on the Director of Football role, we can but hope that behind the scenes West Ham are already planning for the next transfer window with the trio of Potter, Macaulay and Ashworth in situ.
To fund the next phase of West Hams’ squad rebuild will require some very difficult planning – player sales will be required and the Hammers have lost a fortune in recent years by offloading players at huge losses.
If, as is rumoured, West Ham are going to splurge again on the marquee striker signing in the summer, we can but hope that Ashworth is running transfers by then. Nobody wants a repeat of the Duran, Ings or Fullkrug debacles.
The best way to change for the future would be to put tried and tested Premier League professionals in charge and let them do their job unfettered by board interference. At West Ham – that’ll be the day.
Regarding the ownership of football clubs by foreign billionaires (see Comments’ section below), let’s not kid ourselves. Most investors buy a club for the tax and revenue implications. They don’t give a rat’s ass about the club, the supporters or football in general. There are still a few clubs in Europe owned by the fans, but their number is shrinking. Football is becoming a playground for the rich.
Does the average fan want to be just someone who buys tickets, shirts, and makes noise every other Saturday? Or do they want to have a say in how their club is managed? They are two very different models of football. There was a time when small clubs like Forest could win the old Europen Cup. Now only about 5 or 6 clubs in the whole continent have a realistic chance of winning the Champions’ League. Is that what we want? Is that healthy?
UEFA and FIFA are becoming money operations trying to squeeze every penny/cent out of the fans. Is football a business or a way of life? We get to choose via our behaviour.
Sullivan may say there is no rush but it’s only 3 months until the end of the season and it will take time to put the machinery in place and get it running. Genuinely hope we can start looking at using data like Brighton and Brentford do to identify a pipeline of talent.
I’ll be amazed if Potter, Macaulay and whoever else were just allowed to get on with it as that nullifies Sullivans reason for being in football.
Our problem is that we have two polar opposite owners, Kretinsky who has tuppence ha’penny invested in the club with comparison to his other investments so he takes virtually no personal interest, and Sullivan who is 100% there for the personal involvement.
Football has moved on though from the days where someone not particularly good at it can call all the shots. Other clubs are thoroughly professional now and intrinsically smaller revenue clubs are readily able to outperform us by simply being extremely efficient.
The money we waste through poor decisions, and the money we don’t come into due to poor decisions is crucifying us. While rivals rake it in. I’m just watching Villa v Tottenham. Villa appointed Emery and seem to get their transfer business 99% right, accordingly they’re streets ahead of us.
I think it also depends on the seismic change there has been in club ownership and multi-club ownership models over the last 10 years John.Villa are owned by billionaires, Egypt’s richest man Nassef Sawiris and American Wesley Edens who own the club via the holding company V Sports. They have partnerships with clubs in Spain, Egypt, Japan and a 29% stake in Portuguese club Vitoria de Guimaraes. Naseef Sawiris’ net worth is a staggering $9 billion, and Wesley Edens $3.8 billion. Villa reported a £119 million loss for the 2022/23 season after significant investment from the owners, since then Villa have gone from strength to strength, and now competing in the Champions League. Recruitment has been brilliant – Morgan Rogers from Middlesborough for only £8 million plus £7 million add ons, and now valued at £40 million. Ollie Watkins brought for £28 million and Arsenal just failed with a bid for £60 million. Jhon Duran brought for £15 million 2 years ago, and sold to Al Nassr for £64 million.
In contrast West Ham had Daniel Kretinsky purchase 27% of shares paying in the region of £180 million with £155 million spent on players last Summer. Graham talked in the excellent Ironclad podcast about we have not yet seen the best of these players. IF he is given the full backing by the Directors and major investment in replacing players without interference I believe we can make similar progress over the next 5 years, but we may well need to look closely at the multi club ownership model to match progress made by other clubs. Man City, Liverpool, Man U, Newcastle, Arsenal, Brighton, Villa, Brentford, Chelsea, Palace and Bournemouth show how successful this can be. Potter, Macaulay and Ashworth, If he is brought in, could shape our destiny but they need the buy in and support from the board and fans, and hopefully an eventual full takeover by Daniel Kretinsky.