Glen Williams at last writing sense

Wales online

No one is suggesting that running a football club is easy. It is patently the opposite. But Cardiff are doing the same things over and over again and are expecting different results, which is quite rightly a maddening mystery to supporters. Join the Cardiff City breaking news and top stories WhatsApp community.

The fiasco surrounding the appointment of Omer Riza was symptomatic of the dithering, blame-shifting nature of the decision-making process in place at this football club, something which has led Cardiff into this ever-deepening mess. If he was to be their man, when they were riding on a high and off the back of six games unbeaten would have been the opportune moment to appoint him. Seize on the very rare, positive momentum surrounding the club. Has any club ever appointed a manager who has failed to win their previous five games while interim boss?

After the owner, chairman, CEO, "one of the largest football agencies in Europe" and "two very experienced former and unnamed football managers" conducted a suitably rigorous search for Erol Bulut's successor, they opted for a Championship rookie who was on the back of five winless games.

And please do not misconstrue what I'm saying - that is not a dig at Riza at all. He shot his shot and predictably got the gig. He did well in his interim stint. But the lack of leadership and the indecisiveness always threatened to undermine him and, in many people's view, set him up to fail.

Who is leading all this? Who is overseeing and implementing the direction of the club, from a footballing standpoint? What is their criteria and markers for success? Who is telling supporters what the next one, three, five years looks like? Just saying "we want to get back to the Premier League" will not suffice. Now, after relegation to League One, that statement simply sounds absurd and fans will not have it.

Times are hard. Fans are loyal and passionate, but not all of them will continue to blindly fork out for season tickets, year on year, if the light at the end of the tunnel continues to become vanishingly dim.

There is a bottleneck of power at Cardiff City and below the three key decision-makers is a vacuum of leadership and a chronic lack of football knowledge. It's such an antiquated way of running of football club and the apparent refusal to accept any more help on a more permanent basis could only be because of sheer hubris at this stage.

Dozens and dozens of players and managers have come and gone during this period of what can only be described as managed decline, but those are the top remain in situ. Add the Cardiff catastrophe to the disaster in Belgium, too, where Vincent Tan's other club, KV Kortrijk, finished 15th out of 16 teams and are in the relegation play-offs again. Footballing success is simply not on the agenda for Cardiff's owner and Lord knows what it will take for him to make drastic, radical changes at the top.

Cardiff have won just 56 of their last 183 Championship games. Drink up that staggeringly stark statistic. It's appalling, bordering on shameful, for a club with this potential, with this physical infrastructure, fan base (both actual and latent), catchment area and expenditure. It would be an impressive figure it wasn't so agonisingly depressing for the supporters.

How painfully sobering for a club which consistently tells its fans it plans to be back in the Premier League at the earliest possible opportunity. Shocking, really.

Last season was an outlier. All of the underlying numbers seemed to suggest that Cardiff should have finished far lower than they did — they finished 12th, 10 places and 10 points higher than their expected goals for and against suggested they should have finished — in the table and perhaps that led to a misplaced confidence. Whether it was complacency, poor planning or missing out on key targets — or a combination of all these things — in the summer transfer window, it meant Cardiff once again failed to address key areas, such as pace and goals, and so began the worst start to a league season in the club's storeyed 125-year history.

And let's not get started on the porous defence. A few months ago I described it as the worst Cardiff City defence in a generation and it's difficult to argue against that. Sixty-nine goals in 45 games — only Plymouth Argyle have conceded more. Damning.

Look, Tan pumps in eye-watering money, regularly, and for that he must be given credit. Whether you are in the 'Tan in' or 'Tan out' camp, that cannot be disputed. But on the other side of the coin, so much of it is wasted. That's due to many factors, including but not limited to, the lack of football IQ at the club, the under-resourced recruitment department, horrendous decision-making on managerial appointments, and part-time employees in crucial roles of a business which in the last financial year turned over £23.2m. It's so often good money after bad. So sympathy or even gratitude is scarce on the ground from supporters, I'm afraid.

If the right structure was in place then that money would go so much further. The academy has been run well in recent years. The women's team are flying. So why is the blue-ribband product the exact opposite?

The anger is understandably aimed at those at the top. The lack of direction, plan and communication from the board is unacceptable and the supporters are not willing to stand for it. For the record, the media are just as frustrated as the fans when it comes to the radio silence from the decision-makers — it's not for the want of trying, of that I can assure you. That quote at the top of this article is the last time the owner bothered to offer his time to speak to supporters, albeit through the media.

So, what now? What happens when the dust settles on this disastrous day for this football club? Because people need to stick their hands up and drive this club through the dark towards brighter days. The fans deserve so much better.

But while everyone over these last five years have to take a portion of the blame, those at the top have repeatedly ignored warning signs, failed to listen to everyone who has been banging the same drum for years and the club — moreover, the fans — now must pay the price.

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Well put together, but another post which could/should have been put out at christmas, most of us knew by then what was happening.

Very good piece, but should have been put out years ago and even earlier this season.

Another Tan puppet finally speaking out.

Wales online

No one is suggesting that running a football club is easy. It is patently the opposite. But Cardiff are doing the same things over and over again and are expecting different results, which is quite rightly a maddening mystery to supporters. Join the Cardiff City breaking news and top stories WhatsApp community.

The fiasco surrounding the appointment of Omer Riza was symptomatic of the dithering, blame-shifting nature of the decision-making process in place at this football club, something which has led Cardiff into this ever-deepening mess. If he was to be their man, when they were riding on a high and off the back of six games unbeaten would have been the opportune moment to appoint him. Seize on the very rare, positive momentum surrounding the club. Has any club ever appointed a manager who has failed to win their previous five games while interim boss?

After the owner, chairman, CEO, "one of the largest football agencies in Europe" and "two very experienced former and unnamed football managers" conducted a suitably rigorous search for Erol Bulut's successor, they opted for a Championship rookie who was on the back of five winless games.

And please do not misconstrue what I'm saying - that is not a dig at Riza at all. He shot his shot and predictably got the gig. He did well in his interim stint. But the lack of leadership and the indecisiveness always threatened to undermine him and, in many people's view, set him up to fail.

Who is leading all this? Who is overseeing and implementing the direction of the club, from a footballing standpoint? What is their criteria and markers for success? Who is telling supporters what the next one, three, five years looks like? Just saying "we want to get back to the Premier League" will not suffice. Now, after relegation to League One, that statement simply sounds absurd and fans will not have it.

Times are hard. Fans are loyal and passionate, but not all of them will continue to blindly fork out for season tickets, year on year, if the light at the end of the tunnel continues to become vanishingly dim.

There is a bottleneck of power at Cardiff City and below the three key decision-makers is a vacuum of leadership and a chronic lack of football knowledge. It's such an antiquated way of running of football club and the apparent refusal to accept any more help on a more permanent basis could only be because of sheer hubris at this stage.

Dozens and dozens of players and managers have come and gone during this period of what can only be described as managed decline, but those are the top remain in situ. Add the Cardiff catastrophe to the disaster in Belgium, too, where Vincent Tan's other club, KV Kortrijk, finished 15th out of 16 teams and are in the relegation play-offs again. Footballing success is simply not on the agenda for Cardiff's owner and Lord knows what it will take for him to make drastic, radical changes at the top.

Cardiff have won just 56 of their last 183 Championship games. Drink up that staggeringly stark statistic. It's appalling, bordering on shameful, for a club with this potential, with this physical infrastructure, fan base (both actual and latent), catchment area and expenditure. It would be an impressive figure it wasn't so agonisingly depressing for the supporters.

How painfully sobering for a club which consistently tells its fans it plans to be back in the Premier League at the earliest possible opportunity. Shocking, really.

Last season was an outlier. All of the underlying numbers seemed to suggest that Cardiff should have finished far lower than they did — they finished 12th, 10 places and 10 points higher than their expected goals for and against suggested they should have finished — in the table and perhaps that led to a misplaced confidence. Whether it was complacency, poor planning or missing out on key targets — or a combination of all these things — in the summer transfer window, it meant Cardiff once again failed to address key areas, such as pace and goals, and so began the worst start to a league season in the club's storeyed 125-year history.

And let's not get started on the porous defence. A few months ago I described it as the worst Cardiff City defence in a generation and it's difficult to argue against that. Sixty-nine goals in 45 games — only Plymouth Argyle have conceded more. Damning.

Look, Tan pumps in eye-watering money, regularly, and for that he must be given credit. Whether you are in the 'Tan in' or 'Tan out' camp, that cannot be disputed. But on the other side of the coin, so much of it is wasted. That's due to many factors, including but not limited to, the lack of football IQ at the club, the under-resourced recruitment department, horrendous decision-making on managerial appointments, and part-time employees in crucial roles of a business which in the last financial year turned over £23.2m. It's so often good money after bad. So sympathy or even gratitude is scarce on the ground from supporters, I'm afraid.

If the right structure was in place then that money would go so much further. The academy has been run well in recent years. The women's team are flying. So why is the blue-ribband product the exact opposite?

The anger is understandably aimed at those at the top. The lack of direction, plan and communication from the board is unacceptable and the supporters are not willing to stand for it. For the record, the media are just as frustrated as the fans when it comes to the radio silence from the decision-makers — it's not for the want of trying, of that I can assure you. That quote at the top of this article is the last time the owner bothered to offer his time to speak to supporters, albeit through the media.

So, what now? What happens when the dust settles on this disastrous day for this football club? Because people need to stick their hands up and drive this club through the dark towards brighter days. The fans deserve so much better.

But while everyone over these last five years have to take a portion of the blame, those at the top have repeatedly ignored warning signs, failed to listen to everyone who has been banging the same drum for years and the club — moreover, the fans — now must pay the price.

Feels like it’s to little to late

I fear the worst here. I can't see how we can manage without Tan and there doesn't appear to be anyone showing substantial interest in buying Tan out. Tan also doesn't appear to be showing any real interest in sorting this mess out.

He'll probably get cut out the loop now, the board done like it when the media don't do what they're told.

I always believed that the media were there to challenge the club, but for some reason that hasn't been the case with Wales Online.

Unless there are drastic changes made. I would be very surprised if we made an instant return to the championship

I fear the worst here. I can't see how we can manage without Tan and there doesn't appear to be anyone showing substantial interest in buying Tan out. Tan also doesn't appear to be showing any real interest in sorting this mess out.

There are people out there but its one of those subjects where everything is a secret.

I fear the worst here. I can't see how we can manage without Tan and there doesn't appear to be anyone showing substantial interest in buying Tan out. Tan also doesn't appear to be showing any real interest in sorting this mess out.

There are people out there but its one of those subjects where everything is a secret.

So many owners unwilling or unrealistic when it comes to selling club ? Very few are obtained without drama of one type or another! Relegation might make city more attractive given Wrexham and Birmingham promotions if tan wants to cut his losses that is.... maybe watching Wrexham as entrenched his thinking though about getting to premier league so no interest in leaving either...

Such a shame. Fantastic city. Huge catchment area.
Ideal club to takeover given the right ownership

I feel there's a lot worse to come, but Tan & Dalman has got so much invested into club, do they run it down take what they can and let the club sink with no one getting paid & pulling all profits and any spare cash out of the club,They are invested in the Sala case so that might save us, or do they look to get Cardiff back up and invest in the club, a statement would be nice from them to show there intentions.

Great write up by Glen. He gets too much hate from our fans, he cares just as much as us.

Great write up by Glen. He gets too much hate from our fans, he cares just as much as us.

So why has it taken him until we're relegated to find a backbone and print something which could have been put out at christmas.??

Great write up by Glen. He gets too much hate from our fans, he cares just as much as us.

So why has it taken him until we're relegated to find a backbone and print something which could have been put out at christmas.??

Fans are understandably angry but good journalists like Glen should not be the scapegoat here. He's damned if he does, damned if he doesn't. People will call him a "puppet" but he wouldn't put this out if that was the case.