" Our "Ffwtbol" Friend - In Defence of Dave Jones "

Taken from this website http://ffwtbol.co.uk/2010/12/14/cardiff ... ave-jones/ I have added my comments in brackets after the original article.

I resent having to write this article. Part of me feels I am contributing to a discussion that shouldn’t even be aired. I usually try to understand and accept other viewpoints, however absurd they seem to me. But now, with Cardiff City in 2nd place in the Championship, I hear some people are calling for Dave Jones to be fired and I am dumbfounded. (A rather self-gratuitous, self-obsessed start…)

Usually I can ignore such reactionary nonsense by avoiding the places where it is aired. But now, incredibly, the argument for Dave Jones’ dismissal is gaining ground amongst some of the wiser heads. There are people whose opinion I respect, people who have been through the 80’s and 90’s with Cardiff City, who believe that Dave Jones is no longer the best man for the job. (It is you being reactionary, those offering a differing opinion to you could be considered proactive rather than reactive like you as they are highlighting deficiencies of Jones despite perceived “success” at the moment. Also, if you “respect” these people’s views, why do you give the impression of feeling nauseas even talking about such viewpoints that have the temerity to doubt his Holiness?)

Where do I begin? (Do you have to?)

When Dave Jones was appointed manager of Cardiff City in 2005, Cardiff were a club whose financial deceit had just been uncovered. He was appointed at a struggling side, but this being Cardiff, this being football, people felt that they should be doing better: (If you were ignorant enough not to know about the problems before this then don’t assume everyone else is as ignorant as you.)

As Terry Phillips wrote after Jones’ predecessor was fired:

Lawrence left City on something of a low note following a season trying to stave off relegation with a squad most believed should have been nowhere near the lower reaches.

Doesn’t that sound familiar? The culture of entitlement was already there when Jones arrived. (Only to a small degree do I agree. The innuendo from that piece – and I’m no Phillips/ Echo fan – is that a team having what were many Premiership players such as Gabbidon, Earnshaw, Collins, Kavanagh, McAnuff etc and many others of a decent stature also should indeed have meant that Cardiff were not battling relegation. At no point was it suggested that such unrealistic ambitions of promotion and the like be achieved, merely that mid-table should have been within the reaches of a squad that boasted several players of Premiership ability. Is that so grotesque and unreasonable?)

Dave Jones came in to a club that was close to financial disaster. He needed to raise funds urgently. His brief was to keep the club in the Championship. Not to get promotion, just to survive.

The club has been teetering on the brink of ruin since 2006, with a series of court appearances, winding up orders and have been very close to administration on more than one occasion. (This is indeed true and given the reduced budgets he had to work with for the first 2 seasons he did a fine job steadying a ship in very choppy waters. Few Cardiff fans, even fierce critics of his, will say anything other than what a good job he did initially for the first 2 years.)

In November 2007, against this background Cardiff dropped to 20th place in the Championship. Dave Jones was given two games to save his job by Peter Ridsdale, and was physically threatened by supporters. That season, Cardiff reached the FA Cup Final, which was simply unimaginable in my lifetime, and in 2009 finished in their highest position for 28 years. (Jones had an astronomical wage bill that season of over £13m. Reaching the F A Cup Final was and is an incredible achievement, however kind the draw may have been, but for a balanced perspective, a below mid-table finish – 13th if memory serves – which is the ultimate priority was for such an exorbitant and unaffordable/ unsustainable budget very poor indeed. Despite the myth perpetuated by Messrs Jones & Ridsdale, the “historical” debts were greatly exacerbated under their leadership, facts proven via the Club’s accounts.)

He achieved this high position after selling Aaron Ramsey to Arsenal, Chris Gunter to Tottenham, Cameron Jerome and Roger Johnson to Birmingham and and several other players for good money. By the end of 2009, he had brought in £33 million. (Yes, incredible that club’s have to sell players to make ends meet, how unfair… All clubs, even the very biggest – remember Ronaldo? – sell players to balance the books, get over it. There is also no mention of the astronomical amount of money Jones has blown on wages since 2008. JFH cost around £2m alone for one season, Fowler & Sinclair were hugely expensive failures too costing around the same between them, whilst since then Jones has been given lucrative wage budgets – around £12m a season despite this being more than the clubs entire turnover - with which to work which has been only partially subsidized by his profits in actual fees. You may not understand how things work as you seem a bit dim, but the wage bill is the biggest expenditure at any club, not transfer fees. The debt has continued to grow under his & Ridsdale’s leadership in complete contradiction to his claims the debt is purely historical and not remotely of his making; they have unequivocally exacerbated the problem yet further.)

To replace those players he spent just over £5m. Anthony Gerrard was bought for £200,000 to replace Roger Johnson, who had been sold for £5 million. That is an example of Cardiff’s economics. That is what Dave Jones has had to deal with. (Yes, incredible that Championship clubs don’t have much money to spend. What is incredible is that Cardiff are able to spend £3m & £20k a week on Chopra, £1m & £14k a week on Hudson, around £25k a week on Bellamy, Koumas & Olofinjana on roughly £15k a week apiece, while not so obviously expensive mistakes such as Feeney & Capaldi picked up princely wages - £5k a week approx. – for very limited productivity indeed. Jones, just like any other manager, has made many very good buys, but many bad and expensive ones too. Just because they didn’t come with a big fee doesn’t mean they weren’t expensive.)

In October 2009, he told the Daily Mail

I personally feel I’m being punished for old debt. I think a lot of managers feel like that. When I arrived my brief was to keep the club in the Championship. The year before they’d just escaped relegation. I was then told we’d have to sell Jobi McAnuff, Danny Gabbidon and James Collins to survive. We then had to sell Peter Thorne. The debt had to come down. I understood. (See above comments, did a good job first 2 years or so, since then he has only delivered pretty much what he should have given his budgets, though even the first 2 years provided enough funds to have made relegation a very unlikely prospect, despite the propaganda.)

Last season City reached the play-offs after finishing fourth – another longstanding record was broken. It was our highest position for 39 years. (So it should have been, the quality of the league apart from the top 2 was very ordinary, whilst City lost out on promotion to a team with a budget approximately a third of Cardiff’s with Chopra alone costing more alone than the entire Blackpool squad. He’s also had the biggest budgets in 39 years so he should be getting such a position at the very least.)

We are now in 2nd place. We are higher than 23 other teams in our Division; teams who have had money to spend; teams with massive parachute payments from their time in the Premier League; teams with higher average attendances; teams without a huge historical debt to pay off; teams who have just as much right as we do to earn promotion. (Cardiff were big spenders last season, whilst this season big players have been brought in on huge wages which is of course the biggest drain on any clubs finances. Apologies if you find that confusing or inconvenient for your agenda. Yes, some have bigger wage bills, but that shows just how badly they have been run too, rather than how impoverished Cardiff are which is and has been a myth for a number of years. There also aren’t many – that means none- in the Championship who can boast of having one of the best players in Europe at their club on huge wages of which significantly more is paid for by the parent club. This also didn’t come about down to Jones persuasive charms, merely the self interest of Bellamy in simply wanting to be near his family in Cardiff & Man City’s reluctance to allow such a player to play for a fellow competitor. Bellamy’s dissatisfaction with Jones much ridiculed tactical appreciation already threatens the short-lived love-in.)

So what do Dave Jones’ critics have to say? Firstly that he is “a bottler”. This is based on the failure to maintain superb form throughout a season. He would be better advised to start poorly and finish well. It doesn’t matter what the eventual points total, Jones is penalised for his good starts. It is imagined that somehow, he gets nervous towards the end of a season, and this is transmitted to his players. (You argue for the point you attempt to argue against! As you say, the end position is indeed all important so why do people bang on about being second now, it’s December for God’s sake and the signs for a number of years, not weeks, have been worrying for those who can see further than their nose. History proves his teams “bottle” it so why shouldn’t those justifiable and statistically proven concerns be aired? Just as his relative historical successes are aired as why he should stay, shouldn’t this be balanced with the negatives too? You’ll be telling me he was sinned against at Southampton next and sacked for well publicized non-foootballing reasons when a court of law proved otherwise; he was sacked because he wasn’t good enough, just as he wasn’t at Wolves. This “bottling” almost cost him promotion with Wolves, despite another expensively assembled squad, while Wolves fans do not speak highly of Jones, indeed nor do Southampton fans either so it isn’t just Cardiff fans who don’t like him.)

Even if this were the case (and I don’t believe it is), then people should remember how we got there in the first place. Look at it objectively. City have reached 7th place, or the playoffs despite a disrupted boardroom, an uncertain future, with players who have missed wages, at a club in a precarious financial situation. They shouldn’t be anywhere near the playoffs by right. (Yes they should because they have effectively cheated/ manipulated the system in being able to get away with operating on unsustainable budgets for a number of years enabling them to attract players they can ill afford. Jones has embraced this gleefully and reaped the rewards, without actually producing anything above what he should have achieved in the first place. Cardiff’s player budget for last season was around £13m, Blackpool’s nearer £5m, yet it was Jones lamenting the size of his squad whilst Holloway simply got on with it and massively over achieved with a far less expensive and less talented squad. What do you think Jones would have achieved with a budget of around £5m? We laud him as our savior for managing to keep us up several years ago on a budget of £8m, Holloway took Blackpool up several years later with even less of a budget!)

They are there because over his time at the club, Dave Jones has taken awkward, unwanted, discarded players like Whittingham, Burke, Koumas, Chopra, Bothroyd, and combined them with cheap unproven players like Loovens, Johnson, Parry, McCormack and McNaughton. (I could go on), and turned them all into fantastic footballers. You only have to look at the form of people like Ledley, Parry, Chopra, McCormack, and Loovens after they left the club to see what he gave them. (As before, there have been many successes, but many failures too. You seem insistent on looking at only the positives rather than offering a balanced perspective. The only reason I’m focusing on negatives is to provide such a balance. JFH, Fowler, Sinclair, Capaldi, Feeney, Reddan, Hudson, Gyepes, indeed I could go on too my friend. He also inherited a much respected youth system that has yielded the likes of Gunter, Ledley, Jerome, Ramsey & Matthews, yet since Jones took over the well, apart from those already in it, began to dry up. Indeed, Jones believed Ramsey was no central midfield player – Wenger seems to think so, but then what does he know bearing in mind Jones belief that unless you’ve played at a higher level than his Holiness you can tell him nothing about the game – while he has hung young Matthews out to dry and put his prodigiously promising career that was and is destined for the higher echelons of the Premiership back years. Jones is strangling the young talent at the club when it should be the strength and future of the club.)

The other criticisms are that he doesn’t wave his arms enough, that he somehow undervalues the importance of the Derby fixture against Swansea, and that he is grumpy with the local press. Listen, I am grumpy just having to listen to the shit that he puts up with, I’d hate to imagine what I’d be like in his shoes. (Me too, but that’s for another day & off topic anyway. The ability of Swansea to consistently outplay and outfight Cardiff in virtually every game they have played should be ignored then should it? One lucky win & several comprehensive defeats suggests Jones does indeed have a problem in either motivating the team, tactical awareness, or a combination of the two and not just against Swansea.)

So against all of this… against a record of unprecedented success on the field since the 1920s, and with a massive profit in transfer dealings at a club in financial meltdown, with a proven record of player development, and developing an exciting style of winning football over his five years at the club, Dave Jones’ job is on the line. Because we have only taken 5 points out of the past 6 games, 2 of which were against the teams in 1st and 3rd places. Six games. (You for real, man? Unprecedented success? Have I missed something? What have we won? Are we still in the Championship? You’re deluded. The profits on transfer fees are completely engulfed by the huge & unsustainable wage budgets he has operated with, the club is still in financial meltdown and has only been bailed out of liquidation by the Malaysians who could still pull out at any time. If you think the financial woes have disappeared you’re very much mistaken. Proven player development can equally be shown to be destructive to many other players, especially younger ones, whilst as for exciting football, well, if you call a refined version of the long ball exciting I suggest you watch some real football my friend. It’s also 5 points out of the last 21 available which also includes the bottom 2 sides (I know you’re a bit dim given your spewings thus far, I didn’t realize you couldn’t count either – I’m presuming you are literate?), while the concern isn’t just your analytical preference (reactionary hullaballoo) but borne out of poor performances even when Cardiff were winning and views over a prolonged and sustained period.)

I hope Dave Jones goes and finds himself a club where he is appreciated because Cardiff City don’t deserve him. And then once he’s gone, we can replace him with a normal manager, somebody who will get the results this broken club deserves. Somebody who we can shout and scream at to make ourselves feel better about our own inadequacies. Dave Jones is too good for us. (Me too, but for different reasons it would seem. Will you go as his number 2? Just like when any new manager comes in, it could be positive or negative, only time will tell which. I’m not obnoxious or naive enough to not embrace the possibility that things could go down hill without his Holiness, but I also believe a manager that actually is good couldn’t fail to deliver Premiership football with such an expensively assembled squad that Jones is privileged enough to have been quite literally afforded. Jones has done much good for the club, but he also manages to disrespect the fans every time he speaks, has clear and obvious tactical inadequacies that continue to astound & is arrogant & conceited beyond belief. His £800k a year wages are extortionate for outside the Championship, very credible even for the Premiership in truth, yet has Jones been by some distance the best manager outside the Prem for the last several years as his inflated salary would suggest? Most definitely not.

If Dave Jones was even half as good as he seems to think, he would probably be managing Barcelona - & England on a part-time basis no doubt -, but for Dave the truth is somewhat different. He is a decent mid-table Championship manager, nothing more, nothing less, if only he had a modicum of humility in him and treated the fans with the respect they deserve he may have in turn gained the respect and adulation you think he warrants, regardless of him having to earn it and the feeling of respect being mutual. Rather than your embarrassing, teenage girlish, toe curlingly gushing praise of his Holiness in saying poor Dave isn’t appreciated, loved & deserves so much more, a more pertinent question is don’t the fans deserve more than a manager who treats them with utter contempt? Jones should realize it is he who is privileged to manage this club rather than we are to have him.)

Salad, Dave Jones Appreciated for what ?

Having the Biggest Wage out side The Premiership.
Having Spent more money on Transfers and WAGES IN THE HISTORY OF CARDIFF CITY.
No Respect for Our Fans.
Claims Our Club HAS NO HISTORY.
Great Managers Win Trophies/Titles and Promotions, Jones is yet to Win One.
Cant be Bothered With Our player of the year Do(First time in 25 years had to be cancelled), Childrens Xmas do etc etc.
Anti Welsh.
Anti Welsh Youngsters coming through.
Brings injury prone players on old pals act or Donkeys Like Naylor/Keogh/Kennedy/Cooper etc
Over paid players like Eddie Johnson/Fowler/Hasslebank/Hudson/Sinclair/Koumas even My Mate Warren Feeney was Stunned by his Wage.
His type of striker is Eddie Johnson, £20,000 a week for a Season.
IN 112 GAMES, WHEN WE ARE 1 NIL DOWN DAVE JONES IN NEARLY 6 YEARS HAS NOW COME BACK TO WIN APPROX 9 GAMES,WORST RECORD IN HISTORY FOR A LEAGUE MANAGER.

Just a FEW OF MY REASONS WHY I FEEL HE SHOULD NOT BE OUR MANAGER or BE APPRECIATED, Just MY OPINION WITH FACTS TO BACK IT UP.

I know you're not a fan of long posts, Annis, and boy is this one long, but if you read just parts of it you will see that I was countering this guys delusional ramblings rather than agreeing!

For the record, I only responded in kind to his rather derogatory and condescending tone so quite maturely he started it, so I joined in!

I know you're not a fan of long posts, Annis, and boy is this one long, but if you read just parts of it you will see that I was countering this guys delusional ramblings rather than agreeing!

For the record, I only responded in kind to his rather derogatory and condescending tone so quite maturely he started it, so I joined in!

SORRY Salad, Your right I dont like reading long posts and just picked out some of the post

I know you're not a fan of long posts, Annis, and boy is this one long, but if you read just parts of it you will see that I was countering this guys delusional ramblings rather than agreeing!

For the record, I only responded in kind to his rather derogatory and condescending tone so quite maturely he started it, so I joined in!

Thank God for that, I thought you were talking to yourself via a message board post

That baffled the crap out of me sorry salad and i read it all. it did sound like you was all for him then all against!

But now i understand

I used to be a fan of Dave Jones at the start but he has definately taken us as far as he can go!

Let's just shake his hand, send him on his way and get a manager with some sort of premier league experience.

I will be renewing my season ticket either way but i surely hope i dont have to watch his standard of football next season.... (especially when most of our loan players go back and other contracts run out)

Re: " IN DEFENCE OF DAVE JONES "
by castleblue » Wed Dec 15, 2010 7:28 pm

Forever Blue wrote:
This FORUM LETS EVERY ONE HAVE THEIR SAY and LETS FANS BACK DAVE JONES, I RESPECT EVERYONES OPINIONS



Castleblue wrote

Bit of a read that but it does sort of bring some prespective to the debate regarding DJ position at the club. It would be stupid to suggest that whilst he is manager that we would be at risk of being relegated, I think most would accept that he is a good Championship manager and given the playing budget he has well it should be unthinkable.

But the aim of the club is promotion and I think it's important to remember it is the clubs aim as for us the supporter it is always our dream which we hope will one day come true. Unfortunately for DJ we as supporters see that he has the best playing squad in living memory and yet we are not comfortably in an automatic promotion place, yes we are second but does anyone not really think deep down we should be top 2 in our own rights.

Most I believe will say yes and some will say being top 2 is good enough as we are in a good position to kick on and make the automatic position our own. We ALL hope we do and if DJ is manager we will all probably write to the Pope and suggest his beatification.

However we are on a poor run and at the moment no signs of coming out of it, some will say the poor run is only over the last 7 games however we have won only 16 out of a possible 36 points against the bottom 12 clubs in the Championship. IMO dropping 20 points against the bottom 12 teams is not the sort of form after 21 games to fill me with confidence that automatic promotion is possible.

Many fans say give DJ this season and if he fails well he will have to go then but over the last 5 years only 2 teams out of 10 have gone on to win automatic promotion having secured fewer points after 21 games, Sunderland in 2006-2007 and Stoke City in 2007-2008 with -7 & -3 points respectively.

So it is possible to win automatic promotion from our current position but in 80% of the cases in the last 5 years we are heading for the playoffs. How many would regard that as a successful season, most of us believe we have a fantastic squad but our points total is 10 behind Newcastle last season, 10 behind Wolves and 7 behind Birmingham the season before and 13 behind Reading and 9 behind Sheffield Utd in 2005-2006.

History tells us we have at least 1 more blip to come and history also tells us that we are on the edge of making the automatic positions from our current position. So the question is how will people view the playoffs, probably a success if we ultimately get promoted and of course it would be, but for me the playoffs would represent the bare minimum for this squad.

I'm nervous at the moment and probably a few wins over Christmas will ease the nerves but I will be expecting the next blip and we simply cannot afford to have one. DJ says there lots of games left but I think there are fewer than any of us think and thats the biggest worry of all.

Should we be thinking of replacing him even though we are second well I think yes even though that in itself will bring risks with it. In defence of DJ for no other reason than his work in the previous 5 years he probably deserves the chance thats probably the least we could do for him.

But another failure would then have to bring and end to his time at the club, in fairness to everyone.
castleblue

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Castleblue

Tony Williams wrote

Re: " IN DEFENCE OF DAVE JONES "
by Tony Blue Williams » Wed Dec 15, 2010 8:10 pm

David Marshall (G)
Kevin McNaughton (D)
Lee Naylor (D)
Mark Hudson (D)
Gabor Gyepes (D)
Pete Whittingham (M)
Michael Chopra (F)
Stephen McPhail (M)
Paul Quinn (D)
Tom Heaton (G)
Darcy Blake (M)
Aaron Wildig (M)
Jordan Santiago (G)
Chris Riggott (D)
Jonathan Meades (M)
Aaron Morris (D)
Martin John (D)
Anthony Gerrard (D)
Nathaniel Jarvis (F)

Once the loanees and out of contracts have left our club, this will be what's left next May. Value wise it is pretty poor with only Chopra and Whittingham have any real market value.

On the up side I would imagine even with a big earner like Chopra, the wage bill wouldn't be that high.

Tony Williams

There are 9 defenders there and we will still need to buy some in January

There are 9 defenders there and we will still need to buy some in January

Now that is Shocking, Well pointed out by Tony and You Stokesy, Thats wound me more up.

Shouldn't this be more reason for us to play Matthews in mid field. Why waste him as another defender????

Waste of time and talent if you ask me!

I may come to the Ninian Park Pub for the 1st time with on Saturday before the game. I normally go to the casino (easier parking) but my daughter is coming with me

Shouldn't this be more reason for us to play Matthews in mid field. Why waste him as another defender????

Waste of time and talent if you ask me!

I may come to the Ninian Park Pub for the 1st time with on Saturday before the game. I normally go to the casino (easier parking) but my daughter is coming with me

Good point

Your Both Very Welcome, Might See you in the Ninian Park Pub

You will definatly see me

Lets hope it's not to drown our sorrows afterwards

From Facebook

Stephen Harris He's gone to some depth on that annis , but can fully understand what he is saying ..
3 hours ago · Like

Nigel Pepper A good article , my own view DJ is a shy unassuming man and a bloody good manager. I firmly believe despite recent results , which I expected as it's nov , we will go up . Most fans from other champ teams I've talked too , online , believe we will go up. Perhaps we could stop self imploading by criticising players and DJ. And look to the future in a positive manner.

Has saled ever written a short thread? its time for change FACT JONES IS NOT DOING THE JOB.time to part company with a man who has no respect for us fans whatsoever

There are 9 defenders there and we will still need to buy some in January

Now that is Shocking, Well pointed out by Tony and You Stokesy, Thats wound me more up.

And I'm sure Meades has been playing as a left back for Moss (sure it said that in the Echo today), and I got the impression he sees it as his position. So that is 10

I realised straight away from the first bracketed comment that Salad was opposing this guy.

I read this guys blog when it first came out and thought it was a very weak argument in support of DJ. It was full of holes and came over as a desperate attempt to salvage DJ reputation that has been severly battered in the last couple of months. Salad with his bracketed comments I would like to say has used the blogs arguments and turned them around so they are against the blogger. However I cant say that as the article was poor and all Salad has done is to make it embarrassing for the blogger.

There are 9 defenders there and we will still need to buy some in January

Now that is Shocking, Well pointed out by Tony and You Stokesy, Thats wound me more up.

And I'm sure Meades has been playing as a left back for Moss (sure it said that in the Echo today), and I got the impression he sees it as his position. So that is 10

The good news is, if we play 10 at once we might not concede a goal

play 8 and bellamy and we might even be able to nick a goal!!

Now thats Plan B

I realised straight away from the first bracketed comment that Salad was opposing this guy.

I read this guys blog when it first came out and thought it was a very weak argument in support of DJ. It was full of holes and came over as a desperate attempt to salvage DJ reputation that has been severly battered in the last couple of months. Salad with his bracketed comments I would like to say has used the blogs arguments and turned them around so they are against the blogger. However I cant say that as the article was poor and all Salad has done is to make it embarrassing for the blogger.

Sorry Buddie, i didnt look at the link first which is why i didnt get it straight away

Salad - good article and I appreciate what you're saying, Jones has been good for us but the time has come to part ways! Ww will not go up with him as manager! The warning signs are there already! With the squad we have, and the poor standard of the division, we should be doing much better! I appreciate we are second but we have been in lofty positions before and Jones has bottled it and he's doing it again! I don't trust him to get us up!