There goes Julen!

[The Dude]

Turning against the cunts who employed him is fucking open season though.

Regarding O’Neil I reserve the right to harrumph at the telly in the wee small hours!

Agreed. I hope GON is a success, I doubt he will be though. Regardless of how he does, the decision maker Shi is getting the brunt of it.

 

[MARKakaJIM]

Fosun Exec Board. They'll set the corporate strategy across all of their investments, Shi has to enact that. The issue is the football club don't seem to be exempt from that overarching decision making, eg cutting expenditure back completely. You can't run a football club like a plc without acknowledgement of the unique operating model, therein lies the issue

Wonder how heavily Wolves feature on the radar of that level of Fosun, a more public face than most of their other investments but financially it must be pretty small time compared to a fair chunk of their portfolio. Be interesting to know how much actually goes up above Shi for consideration or sign off rather than just letting him get on with it.

 

[pavlosmacwolf]

Blimey, makes Bill McGarry sound like a pussycat. (One for the old codgers).

Mcgarry would have eaten the whole lot for breakfast.

 

[AndyWolves]

Hobbs has probably got an incredibly limited budget to work with in terms of a new manager.

 

[Tony Towner]

Wonder how heavily Wolves feature on the radar of that level of Fosun, a more public face than most of their other investments but financially it must be pretty small time compared to a fair chunk of their portfolio. Be interesting to know how much actually goes up above Shi for consideration or sign off rather than just letting him get on with it.

It's more that in my experience that style of business -investment/holding companies, no idea on Fosun specifically obviously, tend to create top down strategies which they cascade throughout the organisation - Inventory targets, head count reductions, systems simplification, spend targets etc. Shi then has to translate that to a football context.
You wouldn't think a business that size would have a one size fits all approach, but from what I've seen that's often the case.

 

[HanDoJin]

A few 5-0 reverses and things are going to get pretty toxic.

How many times did GON’s Bournemouth lose by that scoreline last season? Genuine question -I didn’t file them at all closely.

More JL?

 

[Lycan]

Having slept on it I think Fosun are going to get incredibly lucky here. I'm absolutely certain that Sheffield United will go down and I'm 99% sure that Luton will follow them, that leaves a group from 18th to 10th of ourselves, Everton, Burnley, Fulham, Forest, West Ham, Brentford & Palace. Not all of those teams will have bad seasons and be involved in the relegation fight but every single one of them has serious issues to contend with.

Now personally, I think we've got the best squad out of those 8 teams. People might disagree with that but it's certainly not the worst. If our aim for the season is to finish in the top 7 of that 8 team league... Expectations are so low that anything better than 18th is going to be perceived as O'Neil doing a good job.

One thing we know about O'Neil is that he can grind out results. That style of football will suit Kilman & Dawson and we've got enough pace on the counter and height from set pieces to shit house our way to safety pretty comfortably.

It's just depressing. It didn't have to be this way.

 

[Johnny75]

No.
It's the adoption of a position than a Wolves fan wants the team to lose as many games as possible as fast as they can... (so that a hopefully more competent option can be sought) that I find so abhorrent.
And given the absolute maelstrom of disdain about Fosun and Shi, you then presuppose we'll break the mould and be different in our search for a successor.
I think I'll have some of what you're having.

There are two glimmers of hope.

1) Bournemouth sold within 6 months of appointing GoN. Hopefully Fosun are doing the same.

2) Fosun have appointed both Nuno and Lop following the appointments of two disasters. Could be they get lucky a third time.

The fact you don't agree with me and find something so abhorrent says more about your fixed view than it does me.

 

[Johnny75]

'Admirable' of me?!

Come on mate, you don't need to be that condescending - I'm as underwhelmed by this appointment as anyone but actively hoping he fucks up is really silly.

Best case scenario? He keeps us up, we are able to spend a bit in the next transfer window. The first part is maybe 50/50, the second part just wishful thinking.

Worst case scenario? He manages a similar PPG as Lage did last season, and we're looking for a replacement. Before Christmas. Who will probably be told there's no money to spend. Yeah, good luck attracting a high calibre pool of candidates for that, then. With the track record Fosun have of appointments, it really doesn't bode well.

So yes - if it's okay with you, I'm hoping GoN proves me, you and 99% of this forum wrong and somehow manages to keep us in this league. The more likely alternative is disastrous for this club and if that happens, it'll be self inflicted.

I didn't mean to be condescending to you so apologies.

If GoN is the second coming of Pep then yes I'm all for him proving me wrong. The fact he wasn't even on anybody's list and couldn't get a championship managers job in the close season suggests that he's pretty shit.

So I'm hoping he fails fast rather than death by a thousand cuts.

I don't see why that's so abhorrent but there you go.

 

[Elephant Pyjamas]

"Antibiotics list?"

What was autocorrected there!?

 

[Tony Towner]

Having slept on it I think Fosun are going to get incredibly lucky here. I'm absolutely certain that Sheffield United will go down and I'm 99% sure that Luton will follow them, that leaves a group from 18th to 10th of ourselves, Everton, Burnley, Fulham, Forest, West Ham, Brentford & Palace. Not all of those teams will have bad seasons and be involved in the relegation fight but every single one of them has serious issues to contend with.

Now personally, I think we've got the best squad out of those 8 teams. People might disagree with that but it's certainly not the worst. If our aim for the season is to finish in the top 7 of that 8 team league... Expectations are so low that anything better than 18th is going to be perceived as O'Neil doing a good job.

One thing we know about O'Neil is that he can grind out results. That style of football will suit Kilman & Dawson and we've got enough pace on the counter and height from set pieces to shit house our way to safety pretty comfortably.

It's just depressing. It didn't have to be this way.

The same approach as 2011/2 then, the promoted teams are shit so we'll be OK. Now I do think the gap between established PL clubs and the Championship is bigger now than then but under Lopetegui I only had us finishing about 15th. I think it's a complacent attitude - the club not you.

 

[Johnny75]

It's Hobbs I'm disappointed in, my view of Shi couldn't really sink much lower anyway. He was put in charge of the recruitment, granted probably with a very narrow brief, Shi isn't even in the country and that's the best he came up with. As someone that's supposed to have a football knowledge he should be able to see deeper than just the Bournemouth headline. Be interesting to see if he sticks around, if he doesn't then I'll retract the criticism

Depends what he's told he can do. Maybe that his list was 100 names and GoN was 97th.

 

[Paddingtonwolf]

Local journos who are clearly terrified of being shut out are now writing one eyed bullshit to get the fanbase back sucking on the Fosun tit. Sorry, that won’t work in this country. Lopetegui was no Angel in this shitstain but Fosun are the masters of it. They are lying to everyone while emptying their wallets by a few percent more every season.

 

[Elephant Pyjamas]

Local journos who are clearly terrified of being shut out are now writing one eyed bullshit to get the fanbase back sucking on the Fosun tit. Sorry, that won’t work in this country. Lopetegui was no Angel in this shitstain but Fosun are the masters of it. They are lying to everyone while emptying their wallets by a few percent more every season.

Well, that's a bit extreme. The Atheltic article pointed to a couple of oddities from Lop that may have hindered his relationship with Shi/Fosun, not that he was shagging Wendy under the Billy Wright statue.

 

[Langers]

I didn't mean to be condescending to you so apologies.

If GoN is the second coming of Pep then yes I'm all for him proving me wrong. The fact he wasn't even on anybody's list and couldn't get a championship managers job in the course season suggests that he's pretty shit.

So I'm hoping he fails fast rather than death by a thousand cuts.

I don't see why that's so abhorrent but there you go.

I think we're agreeing with each other..... Just about!

I hate the fact that the football season starts for us in half a week and I'm actually dreading it. Another year in the Premier League and I'm not looking forward to it - we shouldn't be in this position.

 

[GLASGOWOLF]

There's a lot in there that make Lopetegui sound genuinely unhinged.

'His inner circle was tight and he could be paranoid to the extent that other long-serving club staff had to email for permission to watch training.'

Jesus Christ hahahaha

Find it funny about staff having to email to watch training.

We turned up last season, not only did he allow us to watch with no issue, he did something Nuno never did in 4 years of Marbella trips.

He came over, thanked us for turning up (it was Raining, My Best friend over here another Wolves fan had died on the way to meeting me ) he stood their in the rain and chatted for a good 15 minutes really approachable, pleasent and gave an impression of someone who knew what he was doing.

Allowed Photos with him.
Nuno now he was aloof, you could not even get his Autograph let alone talk to him.

Paul used to warn us not to speak to him.

 

[Lycan]

The same approach as 2011/2 then, the promoted teams are shit so we'll be OK. Now I do think the gap between established PL clubs and the Championship is bigger now than then but under Lopetegui I only had us finishing about 15th. I think it's a complacent attitude - the club not you.

Of course it's complacent and it opens up the possibility of relegation which I wasn't even considering last week.

I had us finishing comfortably at the top of that little mini league under Lopetegui, maybe even higher if he got a centre back and a midfielder in. I suppose to Fosun, apart from a bit of a financial hit, it won't matter to them if we finish in 17th or 10th. Depressing to us 'Legacy fans' but we already know they don't give a shit about us.

Long term it'll fail. Keep going down this road and we'll be relegated in 2-3 seasons. I think we'll just about be okay this year though.

 

[jd1981]

The most qualified managers we’ve had of the last 5 years have both been forced out or wanted out for speaking their mind and warning the board of the consequences of standing still. Have a feeling any manager of any quality will keep hitting the same brick wall.

 

[WsWolf]

Find it funny about staff having to email to watch training.

We turned up last season, not only did he allow us to watch with no issue, he did something Nuno never did in 4 years of Marbella trips.

He came over, thanked us for turning up (it was Raining, My Best friend over here another Wolves fan had died on the way to meeting me ) he stood their in the rain and chatted for a good 15 minutes really approachable, pleasent and gave an impression of someone who knew what he was doing.

Allowed Photos with him.
Nuno now he was aloof, you could not even get his Autograph let alone talk to him.

Paul used to warn us not to speak to him.

That's interesting re Nuno. Not my experience of him, I saw him in Tettenhall he stopped and had a chat. Took a pic and he went on his way. He couldn't have been more of a gent, I miss him.

 

[Johnny75]

That's interesting re Nuno. Not my experience of him, I saw him in Tettenhall he stopped and had a chat. Took a pic and he went on his way. He couldn't have been more of a gent, I miss him.

So it seems Lop and Nuno are decent principled men and the club are putting out character assassinations to local reporters who blithely put it in the public domain.

Client reporters really are scum.