I have been very critical of Levy's failure -at key moments- to either sell players or buy players. But I think it is equally important to recognize what the bloke has done for the club, given we are not oligarched or barroned.
I also think it is important to recognize what a fantastic job has been done on the structure of the club, the training ground, the stadium, the partnerships, all of it. Covid turned the beer money and gigs off. No-one knew it was coming. Even the debt has been restructured so as we won't go under. So let's recognize that. All of it. Because it is amazing.
Honestly mate, I disagree that it has been an amazing feat to semi-competently handle the club's own money and plough it into infrastructure instead of the team. It's a binary choice for a chairman - the club generates X, do we spend it on infrastructure, or on players? For 20 years, he chose infrastructure, when he chose spending at all. As a result, we have the stadium, and the training ground.
We charge the highest ticket prices in the league, and have done for about 75% of Levy's tenure here. Our position as a London team affords us that possibility. Other than that, from 2001 to 2021, the Premier League grew enormously, and took us with it - a lot of the revenue we've ploughed into the stadium and training ground is from the broadcast deals the league as a whole has signed.
What has Levy done that's so transformative?
Our progress on the pitch? Redknapp and Poch, entirely. GHod knows, Levy stood in their way and put obstacles at every single point possible - I give him next to no credit for hobbling both of them (indeed, people like
@parklane1 praise him for actively hobbling his coaches). The CL income? Down to those two. The increased exposure likewise.
Our growth in commercial income? Honestly, I've posted the graph here previously - our growth has been roughly the same as two of the top six, and well below two. We've only outgrown Arsenal in that time in terms of commercial income. Where's the naming rights deal, and the wider proof that he's a genius in that sphere?
Levy is essentially a glorified CEO for Lewis. If we had hired an actual CEO, would we have done any better or worse these past twenty years, for the, what, 25m-50m we've paid him in that time?
And would we have won more, perhaps, than we ended up winning under this supposed genius?
He is being absolutely honest re: private, and furthermore (what I am about to say is a fact) he is not the best of communicators in the sense of warmth. He is quite shy in that regard and would much rather not engage. It is a personality thing. The video? I am going to guess this was not his idea, but that of his right-hand person. Frankly, I didn't find it offensive at all. Now, I have found the inability to find wages for Mane and Winaldjum offensive, and the failure to sign Grealish a total joke, but this? Not so much. It is what it is.
The saddest thing is, he has made some terrible mistakes at vital moments because (IMO) the slight specter of ego plus the ruffle of an attractive amour's skirt threw him. Ego = trying to go an extra yard on deals rather than doing them, ruffle = Mourinho's camp. Awful mistakes.
But I think it is very important to acknowledge what he did do for us, has done for us and can do for us. Curiously, the current appts look like he might be leaning finally...we can but hope. COYS.
Mate, you believe he's being honest. A couple of pages ago, I posted about the first lie he ever told us, when he took over on that unfortunate day twenty years ago. He claimed to be a lifelong Spurs fan with a box at the Lane. Two years later, he admitted to a pretty reputable journalist that he had no interest in football and chose to get into it because it was the biggest money spinner. It's there in text for everyone to see.
He lied on the first day. He's lied every year since about something or the other, and before this video, was most recently caught lying about the ESL.
I don't know what makes you think he's in any way honest, about anything. Even this video's full of it - one memorable bit is where he swerves the question he 100% wrote himself about spending money to answer that the club reinvests all income...firstly, that's wrong, because we made a payment of 20m to ENIC a couple of years ago, iirc, and secondly, the questions the fans want to know is - will you spend ENIC's money on the club? Not if you'll barely competently reinvest the club's own money - you've done that for twenty years.
He doesn't care, mate. Not about us, not about Tottenham Hotspur Football Club. He cares about ENIC's portfolio, and he's a glorified salesman fresh out of his discount Mr.Byrite clothing store. Him and Lewis, both.
You can believe he's changed - to me, everything suggests he hasn't. Chief among them hiring Fonseca, the cheap option, the discount option, the bargain bin option. I wish him well, but it's clear why he's here - he's cheap.
Nothing will change in terms of how we're run, because Levy never intended for anything to change, pre or post stadium. Fonesca will struggle against the current, one hand tied behind his back. Levy will penny-pinch, spend 999,999 weeks knocking 5p off a deal. He'll lie to fans, the media, everyone about what he actually wants.
What *is* changing is everything around the club. For the first time, no one's buying it - not even the media, which usually falls for Levy's schtick. Journalists are asking questions about where we've actually gone under Levy's 'model', fans are turning on him, and the increased exposure he himself has wanted so dearly has now backfired in putting him under a microscope.
I have hope that it's the things around the club that drive change at the top. And once ENIC are gone, we can dream again - about anything, about everything, about becoming a footballing institution again instead of a perpetually trophyless, penny-pinching line on an ENIC balance sheet.
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