Wednesday 9 May 2012

What I would do if I was Chief Executive of Ipswich Town to try and protect the future of the club?

This blog is an attempt to write from a neutral view-point. Personally I don’t think Paul Jewell is the man to lead Ipswich forward – but this isn’t a ‘Jewell out’ moan or anything of the sort.
I am attempting to write with regards to what I know about how football clubs are run, because I have a fear that the way ours is being run is not the greatest model currently – as too much power is given to the manager. At any point the manager is only 6 defeats away from the sack and over the last 3 years we have seen that when this model is the approach taken, the new manager comes in and changes everything.
We need to ensure that there is consistency in the squad, and there is some overall direction given from board level, so the First Team Manager comes in merely as a custodian and not as dictator.
I think, now that we have committed to a Category 2 academy, it is vitally important that we fully embrace all parts of it. This means a fully functioning Under 21 team should be at the club, with their own manager. Obviously it makes no sense to bring players in to be in the U21 squad currently but I think the decisions made on the academy players need to be completely taken away from the First Team Manager.
The academy players, which the new rulings dictate are those “who are U21 and in the reasonable opinion of the Club would not benefit from participating or continuing to participate in its Academy’s Coaching and Games Programme”, would be looked after by a dedicated youth team coach.
Coaching youth players is very different to coaching adult players and during an academy stint, something as silly as an August birthday as opposed to September may mean that they end up being released as have not physically and mentally developed as much as their peers.
And, there is a huge caveat to this, but Paul Jewell has been relatively successful in the transfer market. The caveat is that I am discounting the over 30’s he has signed (which is a huge leap for me as a PJ critic) and focusing on the young hungry players the club need to sign. Aaron Cresswell, Jay Emmanuel-Thomas and Andy Drury have all proven to be astute signings, and have no doubt increased their value in their time at the club. The same can be said for players who were previously bit part players with the likes of Tommy Smith and Lee Martin all having been improved under Paul Jewell.
Again excluding the Over 30’s in this, my biggest disappointment with Jewell has been his inability to ingratiate academy players into the first team squad. Josh Carson has gone backwards this year, Luke Hyam was dropped after a good spell and Joe Whight hasn’t had a look in. While Jewell is the one who see’s these players more often than I do, it is still disappointing that they haven’t been eased into first team football.
There is also a disappointment with players that have been released and from Phil’s recent news story, have been offered terms that are derisory at £250pw. The most glaring error at the moment seems to be Tom Eastman, who was picked up by 2 ex-ITFC academy coaches (and top flight centre backs!) at Colchester, subsequently loaned out to League 2 and now has been an integral part of their season in League 1.
I think a number of these problems could be avoided if the U21 coach had the final say in offering players coming out of the academy contracts. The First Team Manager would always be able to veto a player leaving who he rates, but currently it seems as though it’s the other way round. From watching a number of U18 games you often here comments from those in the know of ‘if Jewell doesn’t fancy them they don’t have a hope’, ‘the academy is disconnected from the club’ etc……….And in a way, who can really blame Jewell? He is given a budget to work with and if it is a case of paying 4 academy graduates £750pw or getting in a first team player who could impact the team £3k a week – in an industry as short sighted as football it isn’t difficult to understand his thought process! This is where the Chief Executive needs to look at the long term plan.
But this is where the separate budgets need to come in, the academy budget for U21s needs to be managed as a separate squad and the budget totally separate. They are in the best position to develop the players – they know when it is right to sort out a loan move, they will be able to build links with local clubs for their U21s – whether this be with teams in the Ryman league like Leiston up to teams in Conference like Braintree. The academy can be funded outside Financial Fair Play budgeting and it is so important for the future of the club that we allow the players to fully develop, and the academy staff are making decisions on players – rather than the current model where it seems that if players aren’t deemed good enough for first team squad at 18, they are released – again this must be related to Jewell’s budget and short termism of football in general.
This will allow for a finishing school to be at the club, between the academy and first team, this is important for a number of reasons.
  • Players in certain positions aren’t generally ready for first team at a young age (Goalkeeper, centre back and central midfield spring to mind) so they need to be developed further, and with more care from youth coaches.
  • Not all people develop mentally and physically at the same speed so it is important that the more immature members are given the opportunity to shine
  • Paul Jewell, for all his criticism, has shown that he can develop players from around age 20-21 when they have already developed from boy into man. The likes of Cresswell, JET, Smith and Martin are good examples of this
  • The 4 players mentioned above have been signed for a total of around £2.5m and once Smith has signed his contract I’d guess this can nearly be doubled AC - £1m, JET - £1.5m, TS - £750k, LM - £1.5m. In the new world of Financial Fair Play, it is vitally important that the norm becomes to develop players and increase value if you wish to progress. If we can give Jewell better players at 20, more hardened, more developed, more ready for 1st team football – then his track record has shown that he can begin to get the best out of them.
I think if we were to adapt this structure at the football club, then there would be a genuine long term plan. As I alluded to earlier, if we lose our first 6 games of next season then it is highly likely Jewell will be sacked. This would be disastrous as a new manager will come in, want his own men, and it will be hugely costly and unsustainable with FFP. FFP dictates that this approach to managers can’t happen, and with the man in charge so easily expendable, it is vital that the Chief Exec takes responsibility for the shaping of the overall squad, from first team to development to academy. This may mean the first team budget is cut slightly, but in every business budgets can be cut annually so Jewell will have to work with what he is given to protect the long term interests of the club.
I really think that a number of peoples main criticisms with regards to Jewell will be solved by this structure, as he has shown he can attract players and get them through the door, and shown that he can improve players. I hope he has learnt from his ‘old heads’ approach last year and we can build a competitive squad, while also improving players to sell at the right time to finance a promotion push. Names may be wrong here but we sold Dyer and used money to bring in McGreal, Jermaine Wright and Stewart to push us to promotion.
This can be done again if there is joined up thinking between the academy, the under 21 development squad and the first team.

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