From Despair to Where - Relegation Unpacked | Season 2: Episode 3

Well. Here we are.

In what is easily their least enjoyable recording session to date, Andrew and Max sit down to make sense of the unthinkable - West Ham United's relegation to the Championship after a season that was, in truth, a long time coming.

Taking inspiration from A Christmas Carol (the Muppets version, naturally), the lads split this one into three acts. The Ghost of West Ham Past takes us back to January 2010, when David Sullivan and David Gold walked through the door with the proceeds of a Birmingham City sale and a plan that always had more to do with profit than passion. From the stadium deal that lined their pockets while breaking fans' hearts, to the criminal mishandling of David Moyes and the Declan Rice windfall - Andrew and Max unpick exactly how the seeds of this relegation were planted long before a ball was kicked this season.

The Ghost of West Ham Present surveys the wreckage: £350 million spent since the Rice sale, a revolving door of managers, a squad built by committee (if that committee was one man on his phone), and a boardroom that has haemorrhaged its senior leadership faster than the team haemorrhaged points. 

And the Ghost of West Ham Future? Sullivan won't sell cheap. Kretinsky lurks. The finances are brutal. 

Scrooge, in the end, changes his ways. Whether David Sullivan will do the same is, frankly, less certain.

COYI. Whatever league we're in.

Transcript

SPEAKER_04 0:00

You're listening to the West Ham Syndrome Podcast, the show where we look at West Ham United beyond the match day, with your hosts, Andrew Jenkin and Max Portman.

SPEAKER_03 0:12

Hello and welcome to the West Ham Syndrome, the podcast that takes a look at West Ham United Beyond the Match Day. I'm your host, Andrew Jenkin, and joining me as always is my co-host and good mate. He's the Tatty to my Pablo. It's Mr. Max Portman. How are you, mate?

SPEAKER_02 0:26

I mean, how good can one be after Sunday, for example, you know, but trying to be optimistic, honestly.

unknown 0:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 0:34

Trying to be optimistic. Funny enough, as I was telling you beforehand and I was on the radio this morning. So it's not. I know I'm surprised you had time for the podcast now that you're uh, you know, global superstar. Mate, like hard to ever forget you. I gave you a shout out this morning. I said, you know, you're probably out walking a dog, listen to this live. And where were you? Writing the script for this episode. At least one of us is dedicated to this. No, no, I'm trying to be optimistic. I'm trying to see that the championship's a fun experience rather than being pessimistic and being one of those that, oh, it's fucking shit, we're still a fucking shit, everything's good to fucking shit. Yeah. Because there's a lot of people that are going to be out there doing that, and it's it doesn't help anybody, you know. You've kind of got a it's shit, it's horrible, we all hate it, but you've got to make the best of a bad situation, ain't ya? How are you feeling? What's your opinion on it? Because you were at the game on Sunday.

SPEAKER_03 1:20

I was. I was very sad. I I thought the atmosphere was actually better than I thought it was gonna be. I mean, I think, yeah, I've I I I just really felt for Jared Bowen as much as anything. You know, someone that's I'd be really interested to see what happens with him this summer. Whether whether I know you said he would like to see West he'd like to stick with West Ham and and help him in the championship, get promoted again back to the Premier League. I suspect there's an element of you you say stuff in the heat of the moment in a press conference that perhaps you don't you don't necessarily mean. There's also an element, of course, that he is one of the few sellable assets they have. I'm sure we'll get to the finances later. Whether they could actually afford to keep him would be another question. But you know, as someone that probably has had offers to go elsewhere and watching teammates like Declan Rice go and now lift the Premier League, whether he's got a kind of slight element of I think he's 29 now, isn't he? So generally I was just very sad, but you know, it's not it's not our first radio, is it? I think I've been I've been alive for at least two relegations and sort of an active fan for for definitely two. I mean, record not record high points total, but a high points total I think doesn't sort of shadows the fact that it's been a pretty awful campaign, regardless. And it it's it's been coming. I think we're we can say safely it's this isn't kind of a surprise, really, is it? I think quite a lot of people had us pinned for for relegation at the start of the season, and I think the writing's been on the wall, and it's just the lack of proactivity that's led us to this position. But we'll we will we will unpick all of that over the next however long it it takes. Obviously, this isn't a an episode we wanted to record. The kind of the whole purpose of this podcast was perhaps to think about happier days and get into the you know the West Ham syndrome, so be it, of of supporting the club. But here we are, and I think we we can't really avoid not talking about it. So the format for today is we're gonna have a little look at the club since 2010, which is when David Sullivan and David Gold bought the club, and we're gonna get into perhaps the weeds of of how we've ended up here with a look at the the past, the present being this this season and the future. So let's get into it. I think we will try and be uh, you know, I've got a little section called Reasons to be cheerful later on, which we could uh have a look at. That is part three, yeah. Nice and injury reference for those injury. Yeah. So, you know, some silver linings perhaps to think about. Maybe it's not all Demon Gloom, but okay, so here we go. Sullivan and Gold walk through the door, having just sold Birmingham City to Carson Young for around 82 million pounds, and with that money, they they walk in and buy West Ham United.

SPEAKER_02 3:59

We should state for the record that they don't buy the whole club out, right? They only buy 50%. Yes, absolutely.

SPEAKER_03 4:04

That's a good point, isn't it? And I think probably the other thing is they they'd made a lot of money on the Birmingham City till, hadn't they? So this wasn't necessarily money. Well, I mean, it is their money in in some respects, but it's also you know money that they've made off the back of another club, which I guess tells you something a little bit about the financial model that they would go on to uh implement at West Ham in terms of how it's financed.

SPEAKER_02 4:25

Yeah, I'm not sure if you remember this, but funnily enough, with the season going to put like it has, I've been chatting to my dad a lot about this, and he reminded me about this actually, which was in that press conference in January 2010. They both say, you know, we're in our 60s or in gold's case, in the 70s, we do not want to be doing this forever. This is the money we've got on, we want to retire, so we're not gonna, you know, throw every last penny at this club, and fundamentally that's what they've proven. I mean, there's been a lot of stuff said about you know them loaning the the club money with interest costs so they get money back from the club. It's there's a lot of things going wrong from the beginning, but even before that, you know, they come in and buy the club on the cheap. You know, I mean, it gets bought four years before that by the Icelandic owners for 85, and that's for the whole club. So there's definitely something going on here. I mean, I know the Icelandics lost their money because of the recession in 2008, but there's yeah, it just feels off from the start, in my opinion, and I think that's kind of a theme that kind of we're gonna pick on up here. It's all done kind of piecemeal that they want the club to succeed, but they want to do it with minimal outlay.

SPEAKER_03 5:36

So, as you say, they they come in, they buy the club around 50% of it, reportedly around £50 million. And I think we could probably, and as you say, Max, you're sort of quite reluctant to put much of their own money into the club. Now, I think to be fair, they have done that over the years and and lent them money, but with interest rates attached, right, and higher than standard interest rates, they have profited from the club certainly in interest payments. And I think we could probably look at various types of football owners and and the kind of broad types of of club owners. And we probably have something what you'd call custodian owners, owners, sorry, people that see themselves as stewards as something bigger than themselves and bigger than the balance sheet, you know, a club that exists within a community with its heritage, and the owner's job is really to protect that. And then you've probably got investor owners who are people who, whatever they say publicly, ultimately view the club as a vehicle for a financial return. And I think we can kind of put gold and sullivan into that second camp, although with elements of of the of the former. I mean, I think it would be wrong to completely dismiss them as crude, you know, well, maybe not. Maybe gold. Yes, yes, absolutely. And and you know, they it's not like they've not done anything positive for the community. And I know when we've spoken about iron supporting food banks, some of the work that they've they've done towards that perhaps doesn't get quite as much attention. So I think there's a complex ownership here where they they talk about being fans of the club, but ultimately they are they're businessmen, right? And they are looking to profit personally from from the deal and perhaps come to some of those other things in in down the road. But if we compare that to someone like Roman Abramovich, who didn't want any financial return from a club, and I'm not saying that's how a football club should be run, absolutely not. That goes kind of against my principles as well. It needs to be self-sustainable, but almost like a non-profit, in a way, where the money is reinvested back into the club rather than people extracting the dividends or interest repayments for their own personal benefit.

SPEAKER_02 7:38

I have to say, first of all, you can really see your sports management job coming into play here. Yeah, for those of you who it's maybe your first episode, Andrew is uh teaches sports management up at the University of Sterling. And as you've just gained from that, can you can we call that a soliloquy, basically? Because you just basically just ruled it off without even breaking the sweat.

SPEAKER_03 7:57

Oh, maybe I don't know. I think that's that's maybe a bit generous.

SPEAKER_02 8:00

I don't actually know what that word meant, so uh I think you might be uh it's like would you know in Shakespeare where they do the big they do the big speech, they call that soliloquies. That's that's my English litig, as my English micro coming into play.

SPEAKER_03 8:11

Expertise coming to the full. Thank you.

SPEAKER_02 8:13

But no, I think you're right there. I think there is elements of these two are fundamentally businessmen, you know, they have made a lot of money, potentially not in a particularly glamorous business. You know, I mean pornography and entertainment is not a glamorous business, and you know, there are people who will say that it's not great, and there's definitely a lot of proof to prove that they weren't exactly, you know, nice people in business. But I think you're right. I think gold, especially, definitely has a lot of sentiment towards the club. I mean, the famous thing he grew up at 442 Green Street, so he grew up with him literally spitting distance of the club. Sullivan, when he comes to university, moves to is it Upminster or Hornchurch? He moves into that area of the world, didn't he? Yeah, but originally he's a Cardiff lad and just kind of falls in love with the club while he's out that way of the world, and then he tried to buy the club. That's what a lot of people try to forget. In the early 90s, they were actually one of the bigger shareholders in the club. Yeah, in the beginning of the 90s, it was when the curtains still had the uh the lion's share of the uh shares, and they were the family in charge at that time. I think Golden Talk and brought about 29% of the club and then got rejected for taking more because you know of their background. So there's this kind of bad kind of vibe around them, around the especially from the hierarchy, don't trust them. And then it's the case of, as you say, coming in 2010, they buy the club and they're almost they paint themselves as their saviours, knowing that they're doing us a favour. So I think it's the case of it's the path of police resistance and they've got in and they're gonna run it like a business like they did Birmingham. They did w well with Birmingham in Birmingham were what a middling second division, third division club when they took over. And they made them into Premier League mainstays for most of the noughties, you know, prior a couple of seasons in and out. They were, you know, you could imagine them showing up in mid-table and normal. And I mean Christ, they were you know, they were always causing trouble in Shamship reform. Always used to beat us for something, didn't they? Without fail, I remember that. Yeah, yeah. So, you know, there is something, yeah, you know, them coming in was uh interesting at that point. And as you say, we were close to administration, you know.

SPEAKER_03 10:23

So uh they did us a favour and yeah, I don't really I I I sort of I don't I think I had a sense of optimism at the time, and they sort of said a lot of the right stuff, didn't they, uh about what they wanted to do, the plans for the future of the club. I think if you were being quite cynical, you could you could suggest that they sensed there was an opportunity to get the London Stadium, which would really catapult the value of the club and ultimately how much they could then make from the ownership of the club, either through selling the bowling or kind of any deals around around the stadium in the future. But yeah, I mean I think ultimately they are hard-nosed businessmen, as you say, made their made their money in uh in interest. Hard-nosed business. Yeah, in a hard-nosed business. And I think you know, Brady as well. Uh they they're tough, tough negotiators, certainly, and tough operators and informal conversations with people that have worked with them or or operated with them or dealt with them, you know, not not fun to work for or or or to deal with. And I think probably if we think about their kind of business acumen, the stadium's probably the most visible, uh tangible aspect of that, right? I mean, and I know that's something we've spoken a lot about on the podcast. You can make a lot of kind of arguments for why it was the right thing to do at the time to sort of press on. And in theory, it should have been a foundation to solidify their position as a kind of elite club in the UK, right? Moving from what was what was a 36,000 capacity stadium to a 60, what is it now, 62,500 capacity stadium with the travel links that it has.

SPEAKER_02 12:06

Quite fine. I looked at this yesterday actually about all the clubs are going to be in the championship next season, and we're the biggest stadium by a solid 25,000 to 27,000. I think the closest that comes to us is the riverside, and that's uh just shy of 35,000, and we're on 62 and a half. So, yeah, but the one thing you have to remember at this point is as you say, it's a really great point you make about the stadium being a tangible asset because Upton Park we own there is uh place to space to grow it, maybe to about a 42, half and a thousand seat with the capacity to go up to a fifty thousand. Because the idea was is that do you know they used the bus garage around the back of the north stand the idea was is that they were going to build a tunnel that went underneath it, so buses, ambulances, everything there was actually a way to go through road, but then you could build the stadium up and over that bit.

SPEAKER_03 12:53

Yeah, yeah. But and they had a planning permission, I think they were looking into planning permission, weren't they?

SPEAKER_02 12:57

Yeah, and I think and I think they may have got planning permission to get up to 42 and a half with the i propensity to go on to 50. But you know, at that point the Olympic Stadium wasn't a lease, it was a tendency, you know. If you've got that stadium, you owned that stadium.

SPEAKER_03 13:10

So they've they've they've obviously still got this, I got uh they'll be 89 years into their 99 lease, which is being largely funded by the taxpayer, it cost 272 million pounds of public money, and you can see the appeal. And I think to be honest, it's only really that Late in Orient weren't a viable option due to the sort of fan size of the fan base and the fact that that Tottenham wanted to knock it down completely and rebuild it from scratch as a football stadium that West Ham got it, and I kind of they kind of forced the government's hand, didn't it, to uh to to sign into an agreement, which is not I I don't know who it's really serving. I mean, you know, fans don't enjoy it, taxpayers are now going to be paying more money for it.

SPEAKER_02 13:54

Fundamentally, mate, it's the government's failing. That's the thing, you know. West Ham got the deal of the century, as Arson Wenger called it. Where we pay fuck all on the stadium, and you know, we call it easy. The government tech is used instead of taking all the costs, the taxpayers take in even more costs for the stadium, they pay for most of the conversion for it. And Tottenham's idea, they proved later on, was actually the better idea. Knock it down, build it as a football stadium, and then do up Crystal Palace in South London, the athletic stadium down to Crystal Palace, not the actual Stelhurst Park, although that blessed it could do with a little bit of a revamp of after many years. But no, you know, rebuild Crystal Palace as a proper athletic stadium, and that was the idea that Spurs had. And Sadiq Khan, when he did his independent review when he came in, proved that. And fundamentally, he proved it was you know Boris Johnson's failing because they didn't want the stadium to become a white elephant. Yeah, yeah. And we benefited from it. Oh, it must have been so Brady and Sullivan.

unknown 14:51

Yes.

SPEAKER_02 14:52

Brady has definitely benefited from it.

SPEAKER_03 14:54

Yes. Well, I think you know, you're right. If you and if you look at the terms of it, I remember when it sort of came out, BBC published the contract in 2016, and the details are pretty extraordinary, aren't they? So two and a half million a year in rent initially. So things like the goalposts and the corner flags are included, pest control covered, policing obviously covered, stewarding in Barry Hearn, who was chairman of Leighton Orient at the time, said this was I think my dog could have negotiated a better deal on behalf of the taxpayer. And you know, Boris Johnson had his eyes on on the on the Prime Minister role, didn't he? I think he just kind of wanted to get rid of it, and he I think uh there's obviously some political connections between Sullivan and in terms of money that he's donated to the to the Tory party previously. West Ham contributed about £15 million, I think, towards the conversion. But you're right, I mean, yeah, uh it'd be really interesting to look at how much, and maybe that's something that we could crunch, how much they've made additional revenue from the stadium move. Quite hard to sort of extrapolate how some some of the successes they've had, but how much extra they're now making per annum through through the stadium, which they're paying two and a half million, you know, annually towards.

SPEAKER_02 16:05

I know we're doing that later in the season, we're actually going to do it ten years at the London Slash Olympics Stadium, so that's definitely when we can pick up do our research beforehand and really give our listeners the numbers. Yeah, we'll be like be like Kieran McGuire, but just for West Ham.

SPEAKER_03 16:21

And I think the other thing that's really important to say about all of this is and this this kind of breaks on me, and I don't think this perhaps gets some of the attention it it should do, is that when Golden Sullivan sold Optum Park, the Bolin, they sold it to a developer called the Gilead Group in 2014, and then within a few years the site was flipped for around a £20 million profit, and the owners benefited from that sale. So there was a there was there was something going on within the trading of that site and who owned the the Gilead group and how much extra that you know were they able to benefit from. And I think that's worth perhaps listeners doing a bit of a investigation as to uh some additional monies that they made perhaps on that. But yeah, they've essentially got the the stadium for next to Nuffy and they sold the old one for for a profit. And I think as as the fans on Sunday were singing, you know, there's no soul in in the in the London stadium. The chant that was was ringing out towards the end.

SPEAKER_02 17:19

Mate, mate, what the nice part about not being tied into any universities or anything like this is that we can't swear on this podcast, so you can say the actual chant.

SPEAKER_03 17:28

Sold our oh I make sure I have to get it right though. I was there and I sort of sold our soul for this shithole, I believe, was the uh was the chance that uh you know, and and noticeable that they uh oh sorry, Sullivan left before the end of the match as well, I think.

SPEAKER_02 17:43

Yes, yeah, we may get into what was said about him later, although uh from what we've heard, and we're only the messages who do not shoot us on this one. We've heard potentially a panorama episode this Friday at half past seven may expose something about Mr. Sullivan, but I will say no more.

SPEAKER_03 18:02

Yes, I think yeah, it's probably sensible for our own uh reputation. Uh yeah, for right, yeah, right. I'm gonna get hit with a libel suit, mate. So that's what I'm saying. Absolutely, yeah. No, I think that all of this is the the perhaps not the biggest concern of his right now. No, but I certainly will be tuning into that. And I think um Phil Parks, uh, there's a good there's a good book, Bolin's Farewell about last season, and Phil Parks, the the great goalkeeper, said, I think Sullivan and Gold have screwed everybody over to go to this new stadium, which is totally useless for football. So one of the greatest players in the club's history, you know, that's not really a fringe of you. And I think as well, I mean I it'd be disingenuous to say that I I've not enjoyed matches there in the past. There have been good matches, haven't there? And they have been able to. I mean, the atmosphere on Sunday was was pretty good. I suppose the concern is that they are for exceptional circumstances. So the semi-final against Eintracht Frankfurt. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Uh sorry, uh sorry, semi-final against Eintrak Frankfurt was a great atmosphere. You know, Sevilla, some of the some of the European matches, some of the night games have been really good, but I suppose the concern is that when they're paying at 12 o'clock on a Saturday against Cardiff at home, is is it gonna be quite the same? It's not the sort of standard atmosphere, is it?

SPEAKER_02 19:20

No, no, and I think that's gonna be a big thing they're gonna have to address next season. To it to his credit, and there's a lot of people who, you know, I know Alan Padre is very much a marmite as a manager, but they will give him his credit that when he came in, the first thing he did was try and rebuild a relationship between the club and the fans, and he tried, you know, he was the one who introduced the bubble machine. He's the one who tried to make it more for the kids, make it more as a family thing, you know, made sure the hammerets were performing. Christ, I'm going back a bit here to talk about the hammerets then like but the fact is, you know, he tried to make sure there was a feel-good factor around the club, so you know that you enjoyed even if the football was shit, you enjoyed going for the matchday experience. And I think that's the thing he tapped into and did well to his credit. And him and Brown backed him on that to Brown's credit. So you know, I know they're both Marmite characters, but I will give him credit for that. The club have done nothing in that respect, you know. Our friend Martin blessed him, you know, he was doing all the on-pitch stuff, but he can only do so much, you know. There's so many people above Martin, you know, and they want to put out a commercialised corporate products, and as much as football has become that, football's fans still want a little bit of you know what they know. It's a bit like New Coke, in it, back in the 80s. You can't change the formula and expect everyone to like it. People are gonna go, now fuck this, I ain't drinking that, or fuck this, I ain't having this. You know, people are well, people don't want it, and I think that's well, we're gonna pick up on that in the current situation because we've kind of got off track here and kind of forgot about the original the ghost of West Ham Past, because I as I'm sure I'll tell listeners I when Andrew pitched the idea to me yesterday about how to format this, I said, Christ, it sounds like a Christmas carrot, you know, you've got the ghost of West Ham past, the ghost of West Ham present, and the ghost of West Ham future.

SPEAKER_03 21:04

And who's Michael Cain in all of this? Um presumably you're talking about the Muppets Christmas Carol. Oh, I haven't. That's the only question I know.

SPEAKER_02 21:11

Oh, fair enough. I was thinking Scrooge, you know, of Alvin Finney. And don't worry, I'm not gonna start singing thank you very much, like I said I was gonna sing yesterday.

SPEAKER_03 21:20

That that reference went over my head.

SPEAKER_02 21:23

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 21:24

Sorry, I can't just just to get an insight into me about this.

SPEAKER_02 21:34

Yeah, and funnily enough, as I said to you, you know, it's all about in this in the film, it's all about Scrooge dying, and they're all singing thank god you're dead, almost. So it's almost that's why I said to you, if Sullivan leaves, we'll be singing thank you very much, because it's like cheery open. See ya.

SPEAKER_03 21:51

See, see, you've got a very kind of cultural sort of understanding of it, whereas my understanding of Christmas Carol comes from a Muppet's Christmas carol with uh you know God.

SPEAKER_02 22:01

Okay. We are going off track here. But who would the Michael Kane beat you? I think they could sign the Vince, obviously.

SPEAKER_03 22:06

Uh yeah, I think it would be, wouldn't it? Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 22:08

Yeah. Okay, yeah. But who but who then is Kermit the Frog? Ooh. Okay, is this a bonus episode that we've got to do?

SPEAKER_03 22:16

It could be, but it's a great question. I don't mind getting sort of sidetracked by this kind of chat. Any chat involving the markets is good, isn't it? Yeah. Who would Kermit the Crog Frog be? I don't know. Maybe we'll come back to that. I think that's maybe maybe listeners could write in and let us know what they who they think Kermit the Frog should be. I don't think it would be Gold or or Gabriel.

SPEAKER_02 22:33

Is this the part you know during post-hitty and where we start sneaking in the da da da da da da da da Just just I know we'll get back to the West Ham stuff, but who's your favourite Muppets character?

SPEAKER_03 22:48

Big fan of the Fuzzy Bear. Fuzzy Bear's great. Yeah. Yeah. I like Rizzo the rat. Yeah. I like the dog. I can't remember the dog's name, but he looks like my dog Toby. And my favourite character is the Swedish guy that keeps trying to like you know, the sh the shrimps, yeah, the chef. I can't remember his name either, which is not good. I think they literally he is literally just a Swedish chef. Right, the Swedish chef, yeah. And who would be who would be the two old guys? I can't remember their names now. Tatler and Maldor. That's it. Who would they be? They might they might be the fans that sit behind uh my dad. Yeah, they're just moaning all game. Yeah, it could be worse.

SPEAKER_02 23:26

You're right, it could be worse. We could be Millwall. Ha ha ha ha Sorry. Right, right. Yeah, we're actually doing here. Sorry.

SPEAKER_03 23:36

I think this is why people tune in. So spoken about the stadium. I mean, the promise the world class stadium. I think we can all understand the reasons for going, the compromise on the athletics track and all the other bits and pieces. I mean, actually, just walking back on Sunday was a real pain in the arse. I forgot what a pain in the arse. And there was sat there's there's some Leeds fans, you know, the all the kind of away fans mixing with the home fans on the way back to the on the on the stadium. And they were like, Do you have to do this every game? And one of them was like, I'd be in the pub right now, I'd probably be on my second pint by the time you get actually get to the the you know, it is it's not a good setup, really, is it?

SPEAKER_02 24:15

Look, I think, yeah, I think talking about the current situation of the club, I think that's one of the big things that a lot of people are angry about when it comes to it, and this is what creates this huge disconnect between the fans and the club is that they left the community behind at the bowling, you know. You know, they made, I'm sure you remember this, they made all these grandiose promises, we'll support you, we'll bring you along, we'll do this, we'll do that. And as soon as we went, we just dropped them without even a second thought. You know, like the bowling now, thankfully, you know, it's that had a really great revamp, it's got some really great people in there who are making sure it's great. But it's so much of a struggle, you know, that Nathan shut down, Urkin shut down all these places you'd go on a match day, you'd see on a match day, they're gone. You know, all because they left the abandoned the community all in the all in pursuit of profit, you know. And I'm sure from a sports management degree there's been so much written on that, right? You know, about how destruction of community and chasing a power note has been, you know, it's not just the destruction of a football club, but of a community in society, you know, as a breakdown result in that respect.

SPEAKER_03 25:20

Yeah, absolutely. And I uh yeah, and I think what's really sad, uh I that I went with my dad a couple of years ago back to the the old site, and you wouldn't know there was a football stadium there. You know, there's a very, very small monument to to where the center circle was, I think, and they've named some of the flats after managers and they and key players. But and and I think the other thing to say about that, and we spoke to to Levi about this as well, wasn't it? It was around the kind of promise of a museum or some sort of monument to the history of the club, which just hasn't been fulfilled, which is really disappointing, just seems to have been thrown by the wayside and forgotten about. So, in terms of like the history and the heritage, there's very, very little to to really point to, and it almost seems to be traded in it. And you're right, I think you you said earlier about it's gone very corporate that you do wonder who all these things are actually for, and do they do they really care if if season tickets drop off? Probably not because there's enough sort of tourist fans that can come and and sort of see the see the match, and they're easier to cater to because they're going spend more money behind the bar or they'll go spend more in the club shop. So which is the way football's gone. Yeah, and this is yeah, you're right. That's not unique to to top.

SPEAKER_02 26:31

That's not unique to us, that's the way football's gone. You know, that football does cater to the middle classes in this day and age because they've got more to spend income.

SPEAKER_03 26:38

Absolutely. I think I think the the kind of thing that kind of grates on me is this pretense that you know they're sub well they they were supporters or Sullivan's supporter in some way, and he understands it, and they were going to protect some of those aspects which they clearly haven't done and forgotten about kind of the community, as you say, in the process of doing it. Anyway, I think that's probably we could spend we could spend you know hours talking about the stadium move, couldn't we? And we and we we have done already.

SPEAKER_02 27:02

But a final thing, just to pick up on something you said there about the history and the heritage, you know, that's the one thing that this is the whole thing is that when you think about football as a business, what fundamentally does football produce uh it doesn't produce anything as a business in the business model, and that's the great thing, is that the idea of a football culture that's been built up over hundreds of years, you know, West Ham's 131 years old this year, you know, you've got a history there that comes from about it comes from Dockers, comes all the way through, you've got so much great stuff that works better. You've got great players, you've got the White Horse Final, you've got the World Cup winners, you've got Johnny Lyle, you've got all that history that's there, up you know, all the way up until 2016, and then you're just disregarding it. You know, that's the thing is that you've got a gener generations of supporters before that who are still engaged with a club and remember that history, remember that mythology, and remember the reasons they fell in love, West Ham, and why you know you can walk into a pub on a you walk into the pub on a Saturday afternoon going, yeah, we're fucking done this time, ain't we? You know, going to work on a Monday morning and have that real pride about supporting a football club. And I think that's the thing that has been dismantled, it's the heart has been taken out of it, you know. And that's the thing we all fall in love with. I mean, that Christ, that's the reason we started this, you know. I know we're getting quite deeply philosophical in this episode talking about stuff, but there is a fundamental issue here that kind of comes out when you know you reflect and you kind of wonder where it all went wrong. And I think there's this great point here that the history and heritage makes the culture, and the culture bleeds through, and that's the thing that brings people back. You know, the football could be turgid, but you like the people who sit next to you, you like the club because they mean something to you in a way that another club doesn't, right? You know. And I think that's the big thing here, and I think that's the problem that's going on here. Now we're probably going to talk about the current situation at the club, is that yeah, that's the thing. You know, there has been a dismantlement of epic proportions that has now come bite us in the arse.

SPEAKER_03 28:59

You can also look at why, why is you know, sorry to go back to my academic sort of thinking here, but why is sports management different why do we teach sports management and not you know, not just business management, I could keep on the same? Because sports organizations and particularly football in the UK are social and community institutions, right? And we're hoping that the owners, the ones that ultimately have the decision-making power, are going to be custodians of that history and heritage that they they come into, not dismantle it and not kind of portray the fans that that are ultimately helping line their pockets, essentially. And we kind of, I think if you look at the way the club has been managed, it's been managed as a business and not a sports organization with that fan base in mind. So yeah, I think there's there's we can we we'll we'll obviously get onto some of the other decisions that have been made. I think the stadium is the one that perhaps sticks in the throat of most supporters. That's before we perhaps get into the lack of competence that comes with some of the other decisions made. But let's quickly talk about David Moyes because there's almost like if we think about the past, there's probably, yes, there was a bit of a disaster under Avram Grant and some of the appointments that were made previously. I think Allardyce probably was a sensible, one of the few sensible appointments. I know he wasn't popular, but it was one of the few sensible appointments that they made in terms of just getting back into the Premier League and stabilizing. But McMoy's is probably another sensible appointment that they made, and again, this might be controversial amongst some fans. I don't think they ever should have sacked him. I listened to a lot of stuff where people have said that you know the form in the league was really dropping off and there was sort of diminishing returns from Moyes, and the football was pretty turgid. I personally think a lot of that comes from he probably didn't believe in the ownership, he probably didn't believe that he was going to be given the resources or the power to be able to take the club to the next level. There's kind of a list of players that have sort of come out that he wanted to sign that would have been good recruitments for the club, that he wasn't given the resource to sign. Obviously, there was the appointment of Tim Steiden that came in that really kind of made that relationship quite fractious. And ultimately, I think the the way they sort of screwed him with the contract offer, and then with Drew it a couple of weeks later, after the results dropped a wee bit, he was right to want to walk away, and the results were probably reflected in the fact that he knew he was gonna leave, and you know, a lot of the players probably thought they were gonna leave as well. So I think a lot of that comes from Sullivan. I don't think he can point a finger at Moyes.

SPEAKER_02 31:26

I was gonna 100% agree with everything you just said there. You're right, the football wasn't great, but we were winning, and when we went on the counter-attack, we were scoring some good goals. You know, we had some good players, it was enjoyable. You know, you as I said just a minute ago, you could walk into work on Monday morning with your head held high because we'd gone and have a win. You know, it may have been against skin if your pants, but that's the whole point of supporting West Ham. You don't support them because you win well, you win because you win by the skin of your pants, and you score a great goal in the process. That's the fun of it. Otherwise, we'd also go and support Arsenal, play shit football, win the league, and everyone will be like, Yeah, it's great, but everyone else will go, Yeah, but your football shit lads, so does it really count? So here's that's the thing, I totally agree with you. There was a lack of support from higher up. You know, Sullivan didn't support him, Sullivan didn't get the players he wanted in. I mean, Christ, if you had told me three years ago we got Scott McTominay compared to Scott McTominay now, yeah. I you know, I think if we West End came out and said we're going to Scott McTominay, I think I'd wet my pants a little bit because what a player he's become, you know. I mean, you live in Scotland, you know, he he's a he's a hero. He's almost a god in your country. It's a whole thing going on here, you know, that you could have got Maguire, who yeah, he's he's a bit hit and miss Maguire, but when it counts, he does show up.

SPEAKER_03 32:42

He would have been solid, yeah. He would have been solid.

SPEAKER_02 32:45

And that's I mean, Dawson, Christ, remember when we all go, Fucking Craig Dawson, what'd you fucking mean? And now we you know, there's probably a lot of us going, you know, I'd be really good in the championship, don't you? Craig Dawson.

SPEAKER_03 32:55

Yeah, absolutely. And I and I think um he he you're right, he sort of identified players that were perhaps undervalued and got the best out of them. Yeah, so converting Antonio to a striker, you know, became the premier our Premier League record goal scorer. Uh but not a bitch to a striker, striker.

SPEAKER_02 33:12

He loves turning a winger into a striker.

SPEAKER_03 33:16

And and I think look, I think we can both agree they wouldn't have been relegated if they'd stuck with Moise, they wouldn't be in this mess if they'd they stuck with him. Again, I know that some fans would say there's got to be more to to life than some of the sort of Moysian football, but he was he was pragmatic and he got results, and as you say, some of the footballs were really good and he delivered us a trophy. And I I felt really sorry for him the way things ended. I think if he'd been spoiled, I think actually, if you read a lot of the stuff, he was incredibly shocked by the lack of infrastructure within the club when he joined, and things like scouting was basically all still on paper, you know, filing cabinets and things like this. They hadn't sort of digitalized some of the things that you know, clubs like Brighton and Brentford being leap years ahead of them in terms of recruitment. So I I think that was another turning point, and then you could criticize some of the managerial appointments, which we can discuss with Lopateggy and then Potter. Now, both on paper for me, and people will say they got those appointments wrong and they're bad managers. I don't know. I I don't know if they are. I just wonder if they are just working in such chaos and such an unsophisticated environment with a lack of structure and a lack of vision that it's really hard to um to make progress. I don't know how do you feel. I mean, obviously the results weren't good, but again, I wonder I say I wonder if they start with like Edgie, whether they would be they would whether they would have got relegated this season. Well, I do think we would have got relegated.

SPEAKER_02 34:43

I think Yeah, I think do you know what I think the problem is here? I think Antonio said it brilliantly in an interview the other day, is that I understand Potter wanted to start a new culture at the club, but the fact of the matter is you knew this during sports management, and just understanding management from your perspective in that respect is that if you go in and you remove any leader in the team and you were popular leaders at that, naturally, as we said earlier, people are gonna rebel. So naturally the players are gonna rebel, it creates a bad atmosphere. You've got bad characters in the squad, right? That's to be picked up as well. But I think Lopategi and Potter both wanted to go away from Moise, which is understandable. You want to be a manager, you want to stamp your own thing on the club. But the problem is, you know, you have to do it gradually because if you come in and say no, broom sweeps clean, it's a case of as it's proven here, either a nine times one time out of ten, it works. The other nine times it's gonna blow up in your face because what you're doing, as you say, there's a lack of infrastructure in there anyway, you know, even around the squad. And the fact is, you take the infrastructure that exists within the squad, it's gonna completely fall apart. It's just gonna never it's gonna resemble what else is going on. So maybe this squad this season just reflects what's going on internally.

SPEAKER_03 35:58

I totally agree with that. I I also think I was listening to must have been the football ramble. Apologies, if I was listening to, but they were sort of talking about if there's a lack of leadership at the top or there's chaos at the top, eventually, over time, that is gonna seep into results on the pitch and and a kind of lack of structure around the playing squad. You know, those things inevitably do trickle down. And yeah, and I think I I think Potter, you're right, he did there were a lot of leaders that left, and his kind of approach to it was kind of creating culture, and he almost wanted to start with a clean slate, didn't he, and kind of mould a culture from from the ground up. But in doing so, there came a bit of a leadership vacuum. And you're right, with with Kufault leaving, Cresswell leading, leaving, sorry, Antonio leaving sort of midseason last year. There was three kind of key characters there, weren't there? And they were apparently reading Antonio's sort of some of the things that are coming out about his book and his sort of memoir, I guess, about his experiences of being a footballer. They were doing the kind of collecting the fines, organizing the social events, and then there became this kind of real lack of harmony within the squad. You know, I I really wanted Potter to work out. I thought he would have been a really good appointment. It goes it goes back to an episode we did last year, doesn't it, about the kind of Sullivan cycle where you'd have a safe pair of hands, someone like uh a Sam Allardyce or a David Moyes, or hopefully, well, I think what he intended was a a Nuno. Get rid of them when things, when fans start complaining about the football being a bit turgid and defensive, go to someone sort of progressive and exotic and and more possession-based. And then when results start to to drop off, go back to a safe pair of hands and just repeat cycle. But you know, in doing so, you burn through so much money because you need different type of players. And we can talk about the money from from Declan Rice. You know, this they tried to appoint. I think to be fair, that was that's the right direction to go, having a technical director or director of football, whatever you want to call him. But some of the signings just weren't good enough. I mean, let's have a look. We've got m Max Killman, 40 million, John Claire DeDebo, 34 million, Mavrapanos 30 million. That's 91 million pounds on on central defenders, and yeah, Mavrapanos has been the only one that's been a success, really. Let's let's move on. We've got Edson Alvarez, he was out on loan this season, Folkrug out on loan this season. You know, that's another 50, 60 million between them. I mean, what what do you think?

SPEAKER_02 38:20

Yeah, I think it's just it points back to the main problem, and I think where you're right about Potter in this respect is there has to be a huge cultural reset of the club. You know, the whole club culture has to change. We have to join the 21st century. As you you mentioned a really great point earlier about Moyes, just the lack of infrastructure, still doing scouting on paper for crying out loud. You know, there are fans out there, you know, like Jack Elderton and Callum Goodall who do their own podcasts, you know, and they too and they these guys are just two guys who just have an interest in the thing, and they are absolutely I mean the club has them doing a little bit in the uh program, but why not employ them? Why not actually use two fans who love the club and use their expertise to benefit you? Because these are guys who will what do go the extra mile and maybe find a player going, what about him? What about him? Sometimes you know the data sheets don't match the actual talent, but that's what Brentford do well, you know. But that's where the both sides of the game come into it. You can actually find a player who looks good on paper, go and watch him, and then chat to people and say, you know, he looks good on paper, he's a good player. What do you like as a lad behind the scenes? Because we're trying to build a good culture here, you know. And that's what Porter did at Brighton. He found the right guys who were you know good on paper, good on the pitch, but had the right attitude. And that's what we've got here. I mean, Tadebo's falling out with all three of the managers we've mentioned. So great player, you know, on his day he could be a fucking fantastic defender. Yeah, but he's got an attitude problem. You can see that. I mean, coming off against Newcastle for 25 minutes and smirking, that reeks to me of a bad attitude. Because you know, and then arguing with the goalkeeping coach, it's a bit like first of all, you played shit. Second of all, you know, you've come off with a smirk on your face, like a I'm I'm too good for these lot, fuck you lot. And then third of all, arguing with a arguing with your superiors, it just reeks of a bad attitude, you know. You can get the up and go, oh, it's fucking shit and all that, but then you have your piece and then you leave it be. But I think it has to be a cultural reset. You need to have the right leaders, you need to have the right characters in that. I like Jared Bowen, I really do. I don't think he's a captain. I think it's I think you never make your star player your captain. In very rare circumstances do you do that. You know, unless unless they're a leader anyway, and they lead by example and they become star player as a leader. That works. But if you're you've got a star player like Boeing and you go, okay, we're gonna give you the captaincy because you're our best player, it never works. I mean, you can look at multiple sports where they've done that and it backfires. I mean, the England cricket team have done it how many times, and it always goes wrong.

SPEAKER_03 40:52

Yeah, you need to see. I mean, I don't I don't necessarily disagree with that. I suppose um I wonder who I mean that there was a kind of a void of leadership, wasn't there? And Bowen uh I don't uh I don't know. I think he has been a leader in ways. I know he got a lot of stickers. He he's perhaps not the most vocal and there were kind of sendings off, weren't there? Was it Pakata against Liverpool where you know people were saying he should have intervened earlier and stopped him getting sent off? But I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 41:19

Paketar was on it, Pakata was gonna get himself sent.

SPEAKER_03 41:22

I think so. You know, I you could probably argue Scott Parker was our star player and he was a brilliant captain.

SPEAKER_02 41:27

Yeah, true, true. But was he was he ever club captain? I'm pretty sure because I'm pretty sure it was me absent. He was he was officially captain. That's good. Yeah, probably Parker ended up being the locker being what yeah, what they call the locker room leader in that respect.

SPEAKER_03 41:40

So yeah, no, okay, I take that back. You're right. I apologize. Yes, uh I don't know. Uh one thing I did want to say on that, I I I think I think Bowen has been a leader over the last few weeks. You know, he's always the one that will come out and talk to the press and and visit media, yeah, and acknowledge that things just haven't been good enough, which is ultimately why I return for him. I think he's a fantastic character. But I also want to give a shout out to someone, and I don't I've not seen much of this written anywhere, but Carl Walker Peters, I'm really impressed by I think he has got real leadership quality, and he's always kind of first to acknowledge that things haven't been good enough. He's always at the end of the match on Sunday, when they were contemplating doing a lap of honour to also not lap of honour, but to thank the fans and a walk around the pitch. Carl Walker Peters is right up there with Jared Bowen, who's leading, you know, they're leading the way, and he's only been there since the start of the season. And you think he looks like a good character. If we'd had a few more, a few more like him, would we have been in this mess? Because he he's never really shirked it. He's only been a probably a bit of a bit part player, but I've I was just very impressed with him. I think hopefully he stays.

SPEAKER_02 42:50

Me too, because you're right. Bowen, Walker Peters, Mavericanos.

SPEAKER_03 42:54

Yeah, you know, self check, always self check.

SPEAKER_02 42:57

Self check always, yeah. Fernandez. Fernandez, these are the kind of characters you build your team around because they give it a go. Tatty, Wilson, these are the kind of characters you build your team around because they go out on that pitch and they look like they're giving it a go. I like Diasse. It's a shame he's gonna go back to Chelsea and they'll probably won't play him because you know even playing for the first half of the season. What makes you think they're gonna stop playing him now? But I hope he goes somewhere good because he's the kind of character who could benefit a squad. I think that's the thing. You've got that's what Moyes did well. He built a squad. He didn't build just a f a good first eleven of players playing on talent. You've got to play as a squad. That's the great that's always the thing that comes across with international football, isn't it? You can have the best team on paper, but if they don't play as a team, they fall apart. That's why the Dutch have never won anything, you know. They're a great you know, fantastic talent, but they can never gel as a squad. The French are the same, you know. When they play as a team, they whip everybody in sight. And if they're you know half divided, they fall apart, you know, the first hurdle. So same with England, you know, unless you're playing as a squad, you ain't gonna do Shit, and I think that's the thing now. We need to build a squad in a championship. And I think there are some senior players like Carl Walker Peters, but also some Young'uns, Freddie Potts, Oli Scars, you know. You know, they're they're a championship level at the moment. I know that's mean to say, but that that's kind of their level of quality at the moment, and they'll grow into premiership players over time. They'll get the experience, they'll get the know-how, they'll get the match experience, and they will grow into really good players, and they love the club. And that's the main thing, you know. That's the thing Marky Noble always did. He would all you know, even when times were shit, you always knew Marky loved the club, and that kind of bled through. Yeah, I think that's it bled through to the players as well. They you know, they respected Mark Nobes as a as a result. So I think that's the thing you've got to look at, rebuilding a whole culture there. And I think Potter would have been great for that.

SPEAKER_03 44:48

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 44:50

But I think now, I think Parker or Gary O'Neill or whoever they get in has to really grow a culture there. You know, really start from scratch, really modernize the club. So I think I know a lot of people saying we'd never get in an ambitious manager, and they're probably right. But I think like the Aladdin thing, you would get, you know, but that's the problem. You get stuck in the same thing you need, but the methodology is you go for pay as they fans, you stabilise, and then you get the ambition in. But the problem is why not just go for fucking broke? We're down, we're a bit wounded. That's the kind of time you get someone who's got a bit of ambition to go, do you know what? We're there in the fucking list. Let's have it.

SPEAKER_03 45:35

Yeah, yeah, I think there's there's an argument for that, isn't there? So a couple of things just before we move on to the to the to the last part.

SPEAKER_00 45:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 45:43

I wanna it's one thing which just to sort of round off on on Sullivan, I guess, and the structure of the club, because I think really from a governance standpoint, there's there's really three things that a football club needs, which is effectiveness, transparency, and accountability. And and really, do we have any of those three at the moment? We've got decisions being made by one man through his you know trusted agents. There's no real checks or process. That's just a kind of scattergun approach to to recruitment, to to everything really throughout the club. We've seen a real exodus of staff. Obviously, Karen Brady went in April, the CFO leaving at the end of the season, the executive director already out the door. I've seen they've recruited this the CEO from hashtag United to fill in on an interim basis. And there's no real sort of institutional knowledge at an elite level of football. He's just making decisions himself. He hasn't got he he almost feels like it would be cheating to bring in competent staff to help him run the football club, which is what Brighton and Brentford have been doing, you know, making intelligent decisions to inform their decision-making processes.

SPEAKER_02 46:52

That fundamentally fits into what David Sullivan's done. I think a man who gets to that position has his done, and he did it all himself. That much you can't take away from David Sullivan. But I think when you get to that position and you've maintained that position for as long as he had, you don't listen to other people because in your mind you know better. It's very much narcissism, but it's also built on a bit of megalomania. You know, I know better than all of you because I'm the one who came from nothing and I've made everything, so what the fuck do you know? But the problem is football's a different business to pornography. You know.

SPEAKER_03 47:27

I mean, there's a few overlaps, but they're very tenuous at best. I'm sure you could come up with some great innuendos, but that's probably not not a proof of the podcast. Yeah. Similarities between the the porn industry and the football industry. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 47:38

That's next week's episode.

SPEAKER_03 47:39

Uh okay.

SPEAKER_02 47:40

But no, I think that's the thing. Accountability, that's the thing I really wanted to start at. Because did you see the club statement that the club put out on Sunday saying, you know, thank you so much. You know, we recognise that this is not good enough. Not one point did they go, we fuck this up, we are sorry. Just the word sorry would have been enough because it just feels like we can do better. Yes, you could very obviously do better, you've been relegated, but just the pure fact to go, you know, we got this wrong, we're sorry, we will do better. That changes the whole language and makes you go, well, at least they admitted their shit, and at least they're saying they're sorry. Just not the fact that you've even gone, oh you know, sorry, even if they don't mean it, just the pure actor saying the word sorry lowers the defense, uh calms the hostility around the club at the moment.

SPEAKER_00 48:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 48:36

So I think there's something there, just you know, effectively, as you said, scattergone approach is never gonna help anybody. You've got to go with as we say, cultural reset, actually look at the how recruitment's being done, copy what the guys who are doing it effectively are doing. You're not gonna do it the exact same, but you know, if you put the and and the competent people, if you say transparency, who are these people? Where do they come from? What is their expertise? Who is someone who's got a high level of experience who you can bring in who isn't controversial, isn't problematic, yeah, who can do a good job. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_03 49:09

Yeah, I agree, I agree. You you you mentioned something there, which was comms, and this comes to something I want to just quickly touch upon because obviously we we've ended up with Nuno. I think we all say he inherited a really weak squad, but he was also manager for the best part of 30 odd games this season. So last week or the week before, I read something that was rumored that he was gonna they wanted him to stay on, even if they were relegated. Yesterday I'm reading he was called in for crisis talks and he's likely to be sacked. So, even from a comms perspective, regardless of what the fact is, it's messy, isn't it? There's never you know, there's just this switching of of minds forever, and you know, even even Brady saying that she wanted Potter to be there for the long term and that he bought into the vision, and a couple of weeks later he was gone. The comms are really messy, there doesn't seem to be any strategy, and we we're just in a mess. I want to ask you, would you like Nuno to stay?

SPEAKER_02 50:05

No, I eight wins in 32 games is not great. You know, I know he's drawn a fair amount of those games as well. I know I know out of is it 32 games he's you you know lost 15 and he's what he's kind of not lost more than he's actually lost, that makes sense, doesn't it? Yeah, yeah. Making sure it makes sense in the edge, yeah. Yeah, but I think that's the thing. No, I don't think he should stay. I think he's endemic of the whole situation. As you said, the pair of safe hands, who evidently isn't that safe. You know, I know he won the championship, but he got a lot of good talent to come in. You know, I mean, Christ, they built that team on the back of Ruben Nevesh, who is a great midfielder. Let's not get that twisted. But I think, yeah, I think the comms have been poor for a long, long time. I mean, Christ, Jack Silent was leaking things on Twitter back in the back in the 2010s. You know, it's just it's a lack of things, and as much as I like ex-West Ham employee, you know, him and Dave, they do a lot of great stuff with the the West Ham way. I think there is also the problem of having in the nose is a dangerous business because you know, you come out and say, you know, West Ham are gonna sign. I'm just thinking off the top of my head here a player who might realistically come to us, Taylor Harbour Bellis from Southampton. What then stops another club going, okay, if West Ham were in front, why don't we beat him to the punch and nick him off us? And then we'll stood, you know, a Veg on our faces going, but he was supposed to come to us. How did we find out? It's like because you should fucking let the in the nose, no. My dad always says to me, anybody know your business, son, you know, because that's true, you know, because as soon as people want to snipe for you, you know, the sooner the higher up you are on the pyramid, people want to snipe for you. That's what corporate business kind of points at to you. I mean, football being corporatized now, people think in the corporate minds that they're gonna snipe it you, they're gonna nit the players off you who make who could make your team better and make their team better. It's a dog eat dog world. There's this football Darwinism, mate. There you go.

SPEAKER_03 51:53

There's my there's my theory for the day. Okay, so fair to say we we've addressed some of the long-standing issues going back to the start. We've had a look at the season, and we we've we've left ourselves limited time to discuss the future. But let's speculate. Obviously, we don't know what's going to happen. We're working off some sort of information, the best information that we have available. The ownership picture, I think, has changed quite a lot. Obviously, the gold sadly passed away a few years ago. Family stake was divided up, and Krasinski has bought into that now, and he holds roughly 40%. So I think he owns as much as Sullivan now. They both have 40%, which I think from what I know of situations like that doesn't typically tend to end up that well. If you have two people with different mindsets, they've made their money in very different markets, they probably have very different ideas of how they want to run the club. It'll be very interesting to see how that pans out because I can't envisage that situation will last particularly long. I think we only need to look at the way Chelsea have been run with kind of key investors and people with kind of equal say's and in what a mess that's been, not even qualifying for Europe this season. So I think it's very hard to run a football club when you have two people with clear ideas and that have both been successful in their own right in their own industries, right? So whether Sullivan now would want to sell, probably not. If the club's been relegated, it's gonna be worthless, so he won't get as much as he would have got, you know, a few years ago when Krasinski bought into the club. That's gonna be a problem that we're gonna have to wait to see what happens. I wonder whether some of these stories about Sullivan coming out will force his hands somewhat to to up and leave. I don't know, that's purely speculation. We'll have to wait and see, won't we? But just for a bit of context, Daniel Krasinski has this the the Czech Sphinx. I like that. It sort of sounds like a riddle, doesn't it? Like uh one of the uh what's the Daniel Craig murder mystery things? Knives Out. Knives Out sounds like uh sounds like a knives out film, doesn't it? The the Czech Sphinx. So he's he's made his money from investing in perhaps industries that other investors wouldn't perhaps go near. So kind of bricks and mortar businesses. He obviously bought a a Royal Mail. I think he's bought into Sainsbury's as well. He sort of sees value where perhaps others don't, and he looks to modernise. He's probably looked at West Ham and goes, I I can probably help modernize this and and kind of increase the value. I've seen a few things about things that he would like to do or managers that he would like to bring in. I saw Marco Silva sort of name dropped somewhere, which would be interesting if he would, you know, consider leaving Fulham given they're in the Premier League in West Ham, aren't so? There's lots of different things up in the air. Let's deal with what we know. What do you think the future kind of looks like?

SPEAKER_02 54:37

Guardiola's taken over, mate, didn't you know?

unknown 54:40

No.

SPEAKER_02 54:40

Oh, yeah. I'm joking. I'm joking. No, I think the future looks like I think next season is gonna be a rough ride. I don't think it's gonna be a first-time bounce back. I think we are gonna struggle. I think, as you say, I think the civil war between Krasinski and Sullivan's gonna rage on.

SPEAKER_03 54:56

And I think I'd like to know what their relationship's like, whether they think get on or don't.

SPEAKER_02 55:02

I think in an ideal world, most West Ham fans would want Krasinski to take charge, buy out Sullivan, take charge, you know, put footland people in charge and run it like a proper business. That's the that's the idea you think that that's the that's the ideal scenario kind of where we're still at the moment. That's not gonna happen because nothing ever goes smoothly at West Ham. Otherwise, it'd be a boring club to support. But I think there is a real question here that needs to be asked of yeah, what happens if Sullivan's a big stumbling block here, it always will be the obstacle of Sullivanism, as we coined it last season. You know, and I think I think there is a real question to ask here. What happens with him then determines the future of the club, really, in my opinion. What would you say?

SPEAKER_03 55:44

I think there's there's there's a few things, isn't there, to figure out. I'd be I'd be keen to see Krasinski take over. I they're both businessmen, so I don't think there's any reason to suspect Daniel Krasinski would have, you know, altruistic interests in the club. But what I think we could safely assume is he would run it better than David Sullivan. I think there's there's definitely that thing of be careful what you wish for, you know. Yeah, and I I and I think we there is a real danger of being, yeah, you know, wishing for something and and then perhaps it having unintended consequences. And but I think at least he has experience of of developing businesses and adding value to them and bringing in professional people. And you know, the strength of leadership is acknowledging what you don't know and bringing in good people around you that are knowledgeable, that you don't feel threatened by to help you with your decision making. And I think Daniel Krasinski would at least do that. I think there's certainly things they could do around the stadium to improve the the experience for supporters. You may not knock it down. Well, potentially, you know. I mean, if we were to go on some of the other reports we've we've heard, that that perhaps not too far-fetched. And then I think there's probably we but we need to probably also be realistic about the finances here, right? So, last in the last season of the podcast, we spoke to Chris Weatherspoon from The Athletic, who'd done a piece. There's been other reports that have come out since about the amount of money that the club are expected to lose. So, on average, clubs lose around 46% of their revenue in the first year of relegation. For West Ham, that's that's likely to be a pretty large sum. Last season, they generated 238 million pounds in revenue, so 46% of that disappearing. You're looking at a drop in around 130 million, plus they made a loss of 105 million in the last recorded accounts. The wage bill is going to be pretty high. I suspect they're in the top half of the Premier League for kind of wage bill. I'm hoping, I'm presuming there's a there's a relegation clause drop-off in terms of the salary dropping off. But I do remember the 2002 free season. They a lot of those players didn't have that clause. You know, they probably didn't envisage being in this situation. So sadly, a lot of those players, you know, it's a thing of the players that you'd want to keep your Somerville's, Bowen, Mavrapanos, Fernandez, you know, Tati. Realistically, they're the ones that other clubs are going to want, and we're going to be stuck with your Kilmans, your uh, you know, Pablos, who he seems like a nice lad, but God, I I really haven't seen much impact from him. I think I think it's you know I think you're right. I think next season's gonna be tough. I think we're gonna lose a lot of players. I would love to see Summerville's Fernandez and Boeing all stay and Mavrapanos. I just I don't I don't know how they're gonna be able to afford to keep them as much as anything.

SPEAKER_02 58:25

No, I agree with you there. I think celebrated assets are gonna be the ones who are gonna have to sell to you know balance the um pench sheet in that respect. Yeah, so I think there is gonna be a real pro yeah, I think that's what I said. I think you know it's gonna be a real culture change. I think that's the time you make the culture change because cleaning house in that respect. Yeah. So yeah, you want to keep a clean house, you know, keep it tidy, don't take the piss. But as we've kind of proven, as Andy said right in our first ever episode, Christ, I'm really throwing it back here, you know. If you're gonna move into a house, make sure you look after it. And this is a house that is very much not been looked after.

SPEAKER_03 58:59

Yeah, yeah. Everything's done on the cheap, isn't it? It's the lack of proactivity, even the fact that the season that they didn't go and sign Fernandez until they'd already lost three games of the season, you know, just uh not having a proper striker, all of these, all of these things, really, isn't it? Okay, let's let's try and end with some positives. We'll do some awards for the season, shall we? I know it's not been a particularly good season, but let's let's try and do some awards. Um Max, what's your goal of the season been? It's a recent one actually.

SPEAKER_02 59:33

Tati against Newcastle. Yeah, that was a great finish, wasn't it? That was great. Because it came out of nowhere, that's what made it special. Yeah, what would you say your goal of the season is?

SPEAKER_03 59:43

I was thinking about this. I I pulled out three, so just sort of humour me. So I thought Wilson's uh goal against Bournemouth. Oh yeah, he chested it down and volley, that was an absolute bullet. That was a great finish. I think Fernandez against Sunderland, top bins, that was a fantastic strike. There was also the Paquetta one against Chelsea, which was also a good strike. But and actually, this possibly is the least sort of attractive end product, but of the the ones I mentioned, I'm gonna go for Tatty as well, but against QPR in the FA Cup because of Somerville's assist on the wing, you know, he did that bit of skill, it was it was an extra time, it was pretty drab, it was freezing cold January, and they hadn't won a game in forever. And I think we all just thought this is going to go to penalties and we're gonna get knocked out in the third round and we're never gonna win another game again this season. And he just skinned that man on a plate, lovely little left-footed cross, and Tatty nodded it down. And so I think it was for the assist as much as the finish. Well, it was a good finish, but it was for the hope, I think, as much as anything, because they'd lost the forest during the week. They were like seven points off relegation, and it was just like a small glimmer of hope, I think, that maybe they and they did go on a bit of a run after that, didn't they?

SPEAKER_02 1:00:56

Yeah, I like that. I didn't really think about that, you know, symbolic goal rather than an actual quality goal. I like that. That's that's a nice that's a really nice answer. I really like that, mate. Thank you. Right, signing up the season. I think you've got to say it's been Mate Fernandez, haven't you? Really?

SPEAKER_03 1:01:12

Yeah. I think it is probably unsurprising. He's been linked linked away to other clubs, but he's technically a fantastic. What I really love about him is his work rate. You know, he he he puts in a tackle, but he can also shoot, pass. He's kind of got it all, hasn't he?

SPEAKER_02 1:01:27

Yeah, can I give an honourable mention though for a signing of the six? Yeah. Paco Hemers. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. I know you're a fan. Yeah, big fan of Paco. You know, I think he just completely just the whole whole club changed after he came in. You know, he said that right. It's not a coincidence that you know the club got better after he came in. And also he understood that you can't play Max Killman in the Premier League because he's not a good defender. Bless him. I like Max Killman, but he evidently has not got the quality in the Premier League at this price size moment in time. His head's gone. I think he needs a fresh start himself.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:57

So as as a namesake, I thought, you know, he would be calling out for more Maxes in the Premier League.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:03

You know, there's very few Maxes who actually, you know, really live up to the hype, so you know. It's a strange one.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:09

I I think I've got to agree. Mateus Fernandez, 38 million. I I remember Southampton fans, a few Southampton fans saying why West Ham signing all of our crap players that we don't want anymore. But I think that looks actually to be a bit of a bargain and it looked like quite a lot of money at the time, didn't it? But 22 years old, yeah, I think he'll he'll go far. Yeah, well. Okay, match of the season.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:28

Who have you got? It's a good one. I really had to think about this one. Yeah, so the QPR game.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:35

QPR.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:36

Yeah, purely for the fact of as you said, it was traveling horrible, but it gave us a bit of hope. Yeah. Going into the second half of the season. So I think that has to be the game of the season in terms of actually, you know, reigniting something in us that had been missing for a long while. What would you say yours is?

SPEAKER_03 1:02:52

Again, humour me. I've got two, two candidates. I've got the winning away at Spurs and the last minute Callum Wilson. Yeah. And my reason for that was that was a bit of a turning point, wasn't it? I think that was them starting to slip and us starting to maybe believe we could do it. And I think it was perhaps just evidence that Nuno's tactics were starting to give a bit of reward, you know, like defensive first, but counter-attacking and scoring from set pieces. So it's the perhaps the hope that that gave gave us, and the fact beating Spurs is always good, isn't it? And then Wolves at home, because that was like pretty convincing, maybe from 40 minutes or whenever they scored the first goal. And it was just the first point I was like, oh yeah, we might actually we might actually do this, you know, where that that minus the the points gap between 18th and 17th started to reduce, and I was just like, you never know. Because I think if we'd lost that, we would have almost certainly been down anyway, wouldn't we? But it gave it gave us some some hope that actually we could go. Player of the year.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:50

I think I've got a group of the rest of the fans on this one. Maverick's.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:54

He has got us out of so many situations across the season. You know, there's been that villa game where we lost 2-0. I think we would have lost much more heavily. That guy put his body in the line again and again and again. Do you remember that? Have you seen that thing of Scott Sterling? Like on the ESPN, he constantly gets getting hit in the face all the time. Yeah, with the penalties, he thinks he does the volleyball and all that. That is Manfred Panos in that villa game. He took so many knocks, bumps, took the ball to the face, to ball to the bollocks. He took the ball everywhere on his body at some point in that game. But I think we would have lost much more heavily if he wasn't in defence in a few games the season.

unknown 1:04:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:29

Who would just penalty? Well, I I I think strong search out, and I think as much as anything, it's a bit of a redemption arc for him, wasn't it? Because a lot of a lot of fans really didn't like him. I'm not singling anyone out, but my brother was one of them. Just really didn't oh Max as well, okay, right. Didn't they?

SPEAKER_02 1:04:45

Do you know what I met him last year at the London Stadium actually? I did uh something for work there and I bumped into him, and he is such a lovely guy. It's a bit like, how can I hate you? You're actually an absolute sweetheart.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:58

Yeah, yeah, no, he seems like a lovely guy.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:00

And I'm the reason Maveranos got better.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:02

I'm just putting it exclusive. So I think I would have to go Maveran, but I think Boe in as well. I mean, where would we be without him? He's just we'd be so we wouldn't even be close to staying up without him. It's just fantastic I I'm so gutted he never made the England squad. I think he's his numbers, his attitude are so much better than some of the players that have been picked. But you know, let's let's not judge too cool until we get knocked out in the group stage. Young player of the season.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:26

So what age are we doing the cutoff point at? I don't know, we never agreed. We did never agree. What were we gonna say?

SPEAKER_03 1:05:32

I would I would have said I would have said Fernandez.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:34

I would say Fernandez as well, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:36

22. I mean I think that's pretty young still, isn't it?

SPEAKER_02 1:05:39

Yeah, that that fits into the young player of the year war pretty well, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:42

Yeah, okay. And I think the actual young player of the year went to Wes Ramiers, didn't it?

SPEAKER_02 1:05:46

Yeah, which is a well deserved thing. You know, there's a player in there. I think with a couple of low spells in the lower leagues, then maybe playing for us if we're in the championship still.

unknown 1:05:53

Yep.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:54

In a couple of years, I think that might be doing the world of good.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:56

Two final awards. I like the name you've given this. This is the John. Monk Tom Foolery Award. Yes. Yes. Would you like to tell listeners what this is award is about?

SPEAKER_02 1:06:06

Uh basically it's for a very funny moment during this season, or just something that you just got to laugh at and just at the club being absolutely useless and going, Oh, for fuck's sake, West Ham, only you could fucking do this. And I'd probably have to give it to the club for their club statement this year. You know, when we got relegated, because how can you not say sorry? Who would you who was your winner for that one?

SPEAKER_03 1:06:28

I've gone for a Dharma Troy against Chelsea. You know, the bit where Shao Pedro squares onto him and then instantly regrets her. Yeah, the amount of memes I saw out of that was fantastic. Yeah. Do you know I've a Dharma Troyore feels like a bit of a forgotten figure actually already, but he I there was that game against Leeds, wasn't there, where he was absolutely brilliant. And I just again I wonder if he'd been fit for a few more games. Well, I don't know. I don't know. That's a cup quarter final. Yeah, he was fantastic, didn't he? And he was he was he was really good, and uh he might be alright if they keep hold of him. I I don't know what the terms of his agreement is whether he'll be there next season, but I could see him doing doing bits, I think young people say his brilliant championship defences, yeah, just pinging off him. Yeah, that'd be hysterical funny to watch. Okay, now we never like to be too down on things, do we? So we've got a reasons to be cheerful award. Reasons to be cheerful, part three. What would you like to, or who would you like to, or what is what what would you like to give this award to? Reasons to be cheerful.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:31

The fact that despite all the shit we've dealt with this season, our fans are still great, you know. Even even on Sunday, you were there and I was watching it from home. We were still singing, we were still having a good time. We knew we were pretty much done and dusted, but we made sure to have a party in the sun, and that really is reasons to be cheerful that we ain't lost that kind of we ain't lost that spirit, you know. Despite all the shit we've had thrown at us, we've still got that spirit in us. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. What's your reason to be cheerful?

SPEAKER_03 1:08:03

So it's a bit of gallows humour, isn't it? I think it's just uh one of the one of the best lines I heard was we're coming for you, we're coming for you. The Millwall Football Club, we're coming for you. Um my reason to be cheerful is we'll get more games next season and there's no VAR. And that is a reason to be cheerful, that's very good. Three three more home games, you know, that's that's not bad, and no VAR to disallow a late Callum Wilson goal. Right, I've got a very quick quiz to uh I know this is gonna be a long episode. Yeah. This this answer might take a while as well, so we might need to uh re-record this depending on how long it takes. That's fine. So, since Golden Sullivan bought the club in 2010, West Ham have signed 56 strikers or players.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:53

Can you name 20 of them? Feels like I'm gonna do We Didn't Start the Fire now, innit? by Billy Jump. Can we have this playing in the background as I'm going for it? You know, um why not? No, I'm joking, I'm not gonna do it like that. So let's start from the beginning. Mido, Alain, Brittany McCarthy, Andy Carroll, Diafraserco, Annie Valencia, Javier Hernandez, is Marco not a feature count as an attack striker? I think so, yeah. Okay, cool. Simon Zarza, Jonathan Cageri, Sebastian Heller, Nicholas Folkrook, Cannon Wilson, Tati, Pablo. How many male up to you? You're up to 15, so another five shouldn't be a problem. No, another five shouldn't be a problem. Alba Energetic, there you go. Albianergeti, there's a good one for you. It ended up at Celtic. It did end up at Celtic. I'm gonna go for a real one just to fuck you over here. Brian Montenegro. Yeah, yeah. I had to get that one in. Sam Bulldock and Nicki Maynard. Love his stuff. Did to keep it short, so I kept it short. Is there any big names I missed?

SPEAKER_03 1:10:10

I will run through the list here. Mido, Benny McCarthy, Frederick Piccion, Victor Albina, Denver Barr, Robbie Keane, Sam Bulldock, John Carew, Brian Montenegro, Paul McCallum, Nicki Maynard, Ricardo Vaste, Madibo Mayega, Andy Carroll, Sean Maguire, Marco Borrielli, Gordon, Petrich, Colton Cole, Enna Valencia, Ziafrasaco, Victor Moses, depending whether you call him a striker or not. Mario Zarate, Nene, if you remember Nene, Martin Samuelson, Mikel Antonio, you could argue was a winger that converted. Nikita Yelovic, Emmanuel Emenek, Belich, uh, Simone Zazar, Jonathan Calliari, Ashley Fletcher, Tony Martinez, Viguli, Andre Ayu, Marko Anotovich, Javier Hernandez, Jordan Hugo, Aphalayan, Lucas Perez, I've forgotten about him, Yarmelenko, Zander Silva, Sebastian Eller, Alban Argeti, Ju, Jared Bowen, Lucas Komaka, Maxwell Cornet, Danny Yings, Callum Wilson.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:18

Yeah, forgot about Danny Yings. That's a good one. I miss I missed big names in there. But I mean, I'm impressed I got 20 as quickly as I did. And I'm impressed you managed to get that out all within a minute. So that's what 56 strikers. That's impressive, mate. I don't know. I think I think you deserve the award for reasons to be cheerful that you meant through that in a minute.

SPEAKER_03 1:11:36

Well, thank you everyone for for if you've made it this far into the podcast. Thank you for your perseverance. Much like uh this season, it's been a bit of a slog, isn't it? And I know there's a bit of doom and gloom around the club, but we've been down. And my actually my other reason, sorry, to be cheerful is as the podcast is named, the West Ham syndrome is based on the premise that West Ham fans will turn up to support their club. Doesn't really matter what division they're in or the quality of football, that fandom is more important than quality. And so that's where the name of the podcast comes from, that kind of market research into fandom. And we'll be back, you know. Fans will always turn up in thick and thin, and we all know that actually we don't support football for being in the Premier League, do we? We support it for the everything that comes with it, you know, the family, the friends, the social, the community, the identity. You know, we will be here longer than Sullivan, and you know, we'll be back as well as a as an institution.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:30

We will be back.

SPEAKER_03 1:12:31

Don't know when, but I know Premier League will meet again. Well, thanks again, everyone, for listening. We'll be back next week, probably with something a little bit more uplifting and lighthearted. But until then, come on, you ains. Come on, you eyes.

SPEAKER_04 1:12:45

You can get in touch with the show by emailing thewestham syndrome, or lowercase, at gmail.com. Thewestham syndrome at gmail.com. And connecting with the show on social media at the West Ham Syndrome. Come on, you own