Barton - Contract Terminated

[calscot 0]

The thing I find it hard to understand is the lack of self awareness of Barton - he has a huge ego, but surely it should have been obvious to him he was making a huge fool of himself and his reputation, which is bad for his ego? Sometimes it's good to reign in your ego, let it be lightly bruised, and save some face, which is better for the long term health of your ego, which for him has taken a kicking.

 

He's come out of this really badly, and people will just remember him for not being able to handle the demands of Scottish football - which is a place he was expected to excel.

[calscot 0]

I think it also reflects badly on the state of the English Championship - their best player came to Scotland, looked mediocre, couldn't handle the pressure, and ended up effectively sacked after 8 games.

 

The English leagues have plenty of money, but it's not a guarantee of quality.

[Uilleam 5,429]

I think that there will be managers who believe that they can squeeze performances out of him, like Sean Dyche did, with notable success, at Burnley.

 

But you are right - any manager will have to deal with his attitude, and his motivation.

 

Still, he is gone, the book is closed, and his time at the club is not worth a lengthy post mortem.

[Norris Cole 0]

I think it also reflects badly on the state of the English Championship - their best player came to Scotland, looked mediocre, couldn't handle the pressure, and ended up effectively sacked after 8 games.

 

The English leagues have plenty of money, but it's not a guarantee of quality.

 

Entertainment-wise it's a great league, but I guess there's a reason it's home to most of the Scotland squad.

[calscot 0]

Entertainment-wise it's a great league, but I guess there's a reason it's home to most of the Scotland squad.

 

I don't watch it so wouldn't know.

 

However, I think the Scotland squad are there for the money, which looking at Barton as an example, seems like they are over paid. They would be in the Prem if they could choose.

 

I must admit it's strange when you look at that league with so many quite big, famous clubs - but I think that's just a result of England having 11 times the population, meaning more big clubs and more competition that changes over time.

 

Scotland is different as most of the resources normally go to two teams, making a massive, sustainable gap between them and the rest. There is a lot of jostling for position of the rest but they are such small clubs, nobody really notices, and it's more of a case of a sea of mediocrity, where no-one excels rather than being highly competitive. Kind of like league one or two in England.

 

The strange thing is that Scotland is ripe for some rich person, wanting a bit of fun without a financial return, to take over a club - like Man City, Chelsea, Hoffenheim etc or for the likes of Red Bull. Almost guaranteed European football and quite a lot of extensive exposure albeit in a smaller audience.

 

I suppose Mad Vlad tried it, but he didn't really commit.

Edited November 11, 2016 by calscot

[Norris Cole 0]

Mad Vlad. The first half of that 2005/06 season I thought Scottish football would never be the same again. Think they won their first 10 games or something. That project fairly died on its arse.

 

I still think a 'rich person wanting a bit of fun' would choose ourselves or Celtic to play with. I just can't see Hamilton Accies in a Champions League semi v Barcelona.

[calscot 0]

I think the more obvious thing to do would be to something like buy Dundee and Dundee Utd, merge them and spend OF type money.

 

Like Celtic you wouldn't get to the semi - but you could win championships and cups, get to the CL or have a good run in the Europa - you could achieve pretty much anything the OF have done in the last 20 years.

 

The point being that this would cost you 20M a year or something rather than 100M and the success be more guaranteed. I'm talking about a lower level of oligarch or bored entrepreneur.

 

20M wouldn't do you any good in the EP or the other big leagues, but you could go from some unknown, boring rich guy, to one of the most talked about characters and recognised in the country, where everyone wants to interview you and pap you etc.

 

The reason for Dundee is that with one club - as long as the supporters got behind it, they have the potential to have a reasonably big support of over 20k, and they are not as inaccessible as Aberdeen.

 

The supporters would resist but would probably jump on the band wagon of success if the trophies started coming in and they couldn't resist going toe to toe with the OF in a nice, new, modern stadium with padded seats and safe standing. I doubt the rivalry runs as deep as the likes of Hibs and Hearts - who would otherwise be ripe for this with a potential of about 40k supporters.

 

If MK Dons can build a very nice stadium of 30k capacity for a support of 8k then it can happen in Dundee, with a bit of local council support.

Edited November 11, 2016 by calscot

[Uilleam 5,429]

if I remember correctly, Angus Cook, owner of Dundee, floated the idea of a merged team, Dundee City or somesuch. He was chased by

both sets of fans.

Economically, it made sense, and probably still does, but public backing was somewhat lacking.

 

Inverness Caledonian Thistle is a merged club, and, I am told, there are still supporters of the previous clubs loathe to back the new entity. Its poor crowds would seem to support this.

 

Wallace Mercer (remember him) also suggested an Edinburgh merger, though whether in jest or in earnest, was difficult to judge.

 

With football, it seems that economic rationality tends to go out of the window.

[Waltersgotstyle 297]

Transparency? So you want the club to was their dirty laundry in public so that the haters can use it against us? You want the club to go public, giving Barton a greater bargaining position resulting in us having to pay him more?

 

I don 't see any advantage of transparency and I don't need to know what Barton specifically said or did.

 

If you have ever been involved in a complicated dismissal case then you would know that these things have to be handled delicately or else you end up paying a lot of money.

 

Nobody can say whether the club handled this perfectly or not but I've not seen anything that suggests that they didn't.

 

This is not a normal business. Clubs sign players to intice fans to invest in the product.

 

People bought season books expecting to see Joey Barton. They deserve to get some explanation as to what happened.

 

They don't need to know the ins and outs but the club could add some clarification. A small statement explaining why they felt the need to handle the situation as they have would suffice.

[limeburner 0]

"On the advice of legal employment experts,we handled the situation as best as we could".Would that do?