I would bet that our wage bill for this season was in the top 5 in the league. Underperformance is from the players and coaching. Everyone likes to blame Raj but he provided a wage budget this season i think enough to have done better than 12th

I think one of the main reasons Raj is stalling on completion is if done before the final game the crowd will let him know what they really think of him and his interim board.

Interesting, if that were true then Raj would have no case ro answer. Think you are in a very small minority with that view.

Think it is true in footballing terms. The case against Raj is the club set up for recruitment and his clueless advisors.
Can't see what's wrong with the old school manager telling his scouts what he wants rather than needing the Director of Recruitment telling the manager who's coming in? It's so easy now for scouts and managers to see what they're interested in with every ga.e being available online too.

Raj paying wages in the Top 5??!!?? You having a laugh???
Raj = Pound Shop Pools....and he wants back every Pound....and MORE!!!
He's up there with the worst ever owners of a Football Club...Ever...FACT!!!

Maybe get muddled up with the old Halifax Town.
Obviously ya gotta take inflation into it.

He's single handedly took us out of the EFL when it was almost impossible.

And now turned us into a club that can't even compete in the worst div 5 ever.

Please no u turn

Hardly single handedly, he's had plenty of help.

Yes, he hired it.

If I was Raj I’d give it a miss, hardly gonna be abcase of not a dry eye in the house time is it.

When the ship hits the rocks, the Captain gets the blame…end of…responsibility goes up to the top level.
Owners’s can sack managers when things go wrong, but when you keep sacking managers you have to start thinking…whoa, hold on a minute, where is the real problem?

So are you saying all of our managers, coaches, and players are blameless then?
I get the accountability bit going to the top (but bear in mind the man at the top is only accountable to the owner), but responsibility also lies with those hired to do jobs on his behalf. The Captain of the ship goes to bed at night and leaves an Officer in charge, if he steers the ship onto the rocks its His fault not the Captain's.
Does anyone believe Raj does all the player recruitment, coaching, team selections, tactics, etc? Does anyone believe we've hit the limit to what we could have achieved this season with the resources available?
Raj has f*cked up royally by setting the club up as a model which hasn't worked, putting the likes of Sarll and Lawrence in charge of team affairs, and more but failings on the pitch are not directly his fault. Getting Senior appointments wrong is.

Think you're being slightly disingenuous there

If the Captain is asleep when the ship hits the rocks, is it not a case of being asleep at the wheel? Ultimately it's the Captain's responsibility as he's in charge and he left somebody else in charge on his behalf. The Captain is still responsible.

We had first mate Phillips doing a reasonable job steering the ship through choppy waters- before he was replaced by first mate Snarl who ineptly drove us towards the iceberg. The Captain is STILL responsible for us heading towards the
iceberg regardless of how you dress it up!

Not really the way football, or most business works though is it?
The top man is accountable for the entire business and setting the overall strategy, others are appointed to be responsible for various levels of the business and unless they're micro-managed are allowed to make decisions and take actions within their area of responsibility.
If an Amazon van driver hits and kills a pedestrian it's not Jeff Bezos that goes to jail is it?
I'm certainly not defending Raj here, because he's made far too many hugely costly errors in the last 4 or 5 years. Possibly the worst being setting us up in the mode of a PL outfit and his selection of directors.

Jamie Vardy looking for a new club.

What a statement of intent that would be from the new owners.

Very funny Kevin.
But if he were to drop down a fair few leagues, how about Carlisle.

i,m quite sure he will not have made as many mistakes in his day to day business of recruiting people at all levels to work for him. one decent manager amongst those of varying degrees down to the incompetance of hartley and sarll.

still think the manager has the last say in which players are signed no matter what name is given to a chief scout with more responsibility.

The speculation is that Vardy is going to Wrexham. He scored 18 for Leicester in the Championship last season so it's a smart move by them. The Yanks can afford his wages!

Football isn't the same as business though, is it?
You've gone from Ships to vans.We're not Amazon are we , we're not global like Liverpool or Manure. More like a corner shop that only people in the locality are bothered about.

You keep contradicting yourself - you say your NOT defending Raj in one sentence, and then DEFEND him in the next.

Not entirely sure what point you're trying to make.

Ultimately Raj is in charge and is responsible for the mess that the club is in. The gross mismanagement of the football structure of the club is what he has implemented- whether advised or not. (That's without getting into the dark arts of how it's all been financed over the years)

No contradiction whatsoever.
I've said Raj has made massive errors and pointed out what I think the biggest ones were, so how's that defending him?
The Amazon driver analogy is fact even though it doesn't suit your agenda or opinion. In fact going by your account of how it works, why do we have directors, managers, coaches, physios, etc if they never have any responsibility? Might as well just have an owner and a team eh?

If payments to agents are any guide, Pools' squad wage bill will be nowhere near those of York, FGR, Oldham and Southend - all play-off sides unless Sarfend screw up at Gateshead on Monday.

But yes, Pools are underperforming badly by finishing in mid-table again. We surely outspend Halifax and Gateshead on players and will be at least on a par with Rochdale - but miles off in league positions.

its not about who spends the most or the least its who spends the best. a manager could have a blank cheque book and buy who they want only to see his 11 individuals beaten on the pitch by the manager who has recruited a team that gells on a low budget.

Agenda - you having a laugh?

You consistently back Raj and have done for sometime. (In fact other posters have suggested, you have strong links to the club). That's your choice, I happen to disagree.

I would argue that we have directors only in name.
Think you're being churlish to suggest that I believe managers, coaches, physios etc have no responsibility. Of course they do, in the day to day of doing their job to the best of their ability - that's a given. They don't hire and fire themselves though
do they?

So if not, you're mate Raj, to carry the can for this shambles - who else who has been there the same length of time as him, do you believe is responsible, Brenda the Tea lady? Or have we just been unlucky

edit- You might be on to something there PTID
Just having an owner and a team- think of the money we'd save. Dorking have done ok with that model!

Chelski do that every summer - not had much silverware recently mind

The Amazon analogy is bad no matter the agenda. How many degrees of separation are there between Bezos and a delivery driver? 100s? Now how many between the managers and Raj? 0 or 1?
If I’m a middle manager in a company and I’ve hired something like 15 people to work below me in the last 8 years, yet only 1 has been a success. Would you be surprised if I was sacked/criticised? No.
The other 14 people I hired might’ve all been incompetent and that’s on them but who hired them? Who decided these people were right for the job and trusted them with money to spend?

Most of the best managers are the bastad ones who demand discipline from day one.
Fair but firm if you donate 100%

Clough
Fergy
George Graham
Bruce Rioch
Sean Dyche etc

Cyril Knowles
Danny Wilson
King David etc.

After watching a few you tube videos at HQ Durham and games on firestick
It's plain to see there's a major lack of discipline.

New gaffer from the new owners has to be a bastad/kunt.
That would certainly make the task of improvement which is needed at a rapid pace a lot more straightforward.

We will see and Fucken hopefully sharpish.
UTP
WSO

problem is most of those names are from the distant past. like it or not times have changed and pools cannot take things back to an earlier time where we might feel happier in. not just in football but in the workplace where the arse kickers are long gone and any who try it end with workers leaving as quick as they can.

Did we not try that with Uncle Darren this season - it was an unmitigated disaster!

Regardless of 1 level or 100 levels of separation, each takes responsibility within their own remit. Swap Amazon driver for Arri a bus driver, it's the drivers fault if he makes a mistake and kills someone not the Directors or owner.
That's hardly backing Raj or the club is it?
Look at Everton change of owner didn't change their football fortunes but changing the manager did.
Man City won bits and bobs but once they employed Pep they dominated without changing owner.
The point I'm making is that Raj has undoubtedly failed us over the last 4 or 5 seasons but he's not done it all by himself.

One wonders where you get such drive and energy to try and claw back some credibility for Raj when most people can see he's lost it. He is the problem for our lack of progress. This is NO flash in the pan disappointing set of results, nor a single season of underachievement. It is year after year. The issues have been continuous but the players and managers have not.

who has failed more though who were not directly employed by him. cannot see him having no say in any major appointments the club has made. the director or owner does not employ the driver himself but they might be the one who employs someone to do that even if recommended by a third party.

Yes you're correct but it the outcome does differ based on the levels of separation. If Arri the bus driver kills a man, he's at fault and loses his job. If the guy who hires the bus driver's then hires another bus driver who kills someone, then the bus driver also takes responsibility and gets fired. If the guy who hires the bus drivers continuously hires bus drivers who keep killing people does he get off scott free? Or does he get fired as he clearly has horrific judgement in bus drivers?
Now if I'm the CEO of a company who has 100 levels of separation between me and the bus drivers, I can blame the guy who hires them and then his boss for trusting his judgement multiple times. If I own the company AND hire the bus drivers then it is entirely my fault.
Using your Man City example, when would you say they started winning the bits and bobs? Was it before or after they changed owners (I think we both know the answer)?
We've had 8 years of Raj Singh now. Apart from 1 manager, who has succeeded? Has it been the fault of the 11 other managers who have been sacked that we are in this situation? Or would you say the man who hires them takes a larger share of the blame than the 12 different managers? If not what kind of split of the blame are you giving Raj Singh, Bates, Money, Hignett, Challinor, Lee, Hartley, Curle, Askey, Phillips, Sarll, Lawrence and Limbrick?

He’s ultimately in charge, the buck stops with him.

I've never disputed that, I'm saying there's responsibility and therefore blame at other levels too.
For me changing owner alone will not solve the problem, Lawrence and the recruitment guy have to go, as do the long serving senior players, we need a new broom not just a quick dust around the place.

its hard to imaging anyone getting 11 out of 12 managerial appointments bad or sacking a couple too early and replacing them with very questionable appointments. even the person who puts pools at the top of there hate list would have done better even by accident.

disinfected and a deep clean on top of it.

I think it truly is time for a change….there’s no other way of sorting things out.
Every thing else is just talk.

Agree completely with Snowy Raj has always maintained he is the man. He has employed poor people to do important jobs but has failed to give them the budget or freedom from petty rules to in some cases to fulfil their potential. as Snowy quite rightly says the buck stops with him.

But no ones actually saying that? I don't think anyone believes if everything else stays the same but we swap Raj with A.N. Other we will suddenly win the league. What people are saying however is that we have become stale under Raj. He cannot pick a good manager, we constantly churn through players and struggle to hold onto our better players. If he stays for another 10 years can you see things changing in this regard? He's done the same thing for 8 years here and Darlo fans say the same things about his time as we are seeing at Pools. The only way to inject some positivity into the club and bring hope back to the fans is for Raj to go and someone with fresh ideas to come in and do things differently.

What I don’t get is if posters don’t solely and completely blame Raj for everything from the chips being cold to Mani missing a sitter they are Raj bum licker appologists. The bloke might be a lot of things I don’t know but the level of hate for someone who stepped in when the club was on its arse and couple of years later was promoted is strange. If the take over doesn’t happen and this has repercussions I could understand it, let’s hope things are positive in the next few weeks.

If you look back through the thread someone stated that Raj has brought on our demise single handedly - I disagree I think he's had help that's all.

Raj wants out and has been wanting out since last season ended.
If his heart is not in it then what more needs to be said apart from new owners please!

Careful you'll start me getting all misty eyed!

No one on here has stated hate for Raj- this isn't personal. He clearly had the best intentions when he took over the club and yes he stopped us folding.

However he's decided to bail out and should do so gracefully, after taking us as far as he can on the budget he was prepared to support. I thank him for his efforts but now we need an amicable parting of ways and both parties need to move on.

Recieved a phone call this afternoon from a mate down the Town, Hes been told that the deal is done and Shelly Hammond is not best pleased with RAJ saying the Season tcks early bird is down to him, She knows nothing about it.
He also said the NEW academy structure is her doing as is the Kit Manafactuer.
Fingers crossed its true, We all know what that vindictive twat is all about!

Would've thought the kit manufacturer and academy deals would've been kept under wraps until the takeover was done. Lots of rumours, just got to hope it doesn't drag on and on and we end up in limbo and then have to go into panic mode to assemble a squad.

Well said. Raj Singh will only go down in history as Pools' worst owner if he puts the club into administration. All Poolies want at the minute is a smooth transition to new ownership - maybe even with some fan involvement? (HUST are very quiet at the minute...)

Unfortunately don't think this is the case. The kit and academy deals would've taken a while to sort etc. so unless the deals been agreed since before the 26th March, when the academy restructure was announced, I think it's someone putting 2+2 together and getting 5.

But he is in charge,…. everything else is done under his supervision and therefore ultimately his responsibility, he employed them.