• Dear Guest, Please note that adult content is not permitted on this forum. We have had our Google ads disabled at times due to some posts that were found from some time ago. Please do not post adult content and if you see any already on the forum, please report the post so that we can deal with it. Adult content is allowed in the glory hole - you will have to request permission to access it. Thanks, scara

Daniel Levy - Chairman

parklane1 said:
Amen to that. this club started to turn round in 2001 ( Levy) and then in 2004 by MJ.
Click to expand...

I was not convinced by Levy until BMJ came in if I am honest. The 2003-2004 season was perhaps one of the most depressing. Seeing Glenn go and not achieving what I thought was his GHod given right to was so disheartening. Watching Pleat's pragmatic football to avoid relegation, yes relegation, was glum especially the ginger Pele. The fact that we knew Pleat was an interim manager as well, and for most of the season, I just didn't know what was going on and, if I'm honest, I feared the worst. I thought this ENIC lot were a bunch of chancers and Sugar had sold us to them just to show us how bad owners could really be.

I remember us losing at home to Charlton and Fulham. Fulham spanked us. Bolton beat us home and away! The only good thing was this site (or was it Spurs update at that stage?) with characters like Sir Les, Moonlit Knight, Paul Parker (??) and others.
 
Gazzasrightboot said:
I was not convinced by Levy until BMJ came in if I am honest. The 2003-2004 season was perhaps one of the most depressing. Seeing Glenn go and not achieving what I thought was his GHod given right to was so disheartening. Watching Pleat's pragmatic football to avoid relegation, yes relegation, was glum especially the ginger Pele. The fact that we knew Pleat was an interim manager as well, and for most of the season, I just didn't know what was going on and, if I'm honest, I feared the worst. I thought this ENIC lot were a bunch of chancers and Sugar had sold us to them just to show us how bad owners could really be.

I remember us losing at home to Charlton and Fulham. Fulham spanked us. Bolton beat us home and away! The only good thing was this site (or was it Spurs update at that stage?) with characters like Sir Les, Moonlit Knight, Paul Parker (??) and others.
Click to expand...

Yep, living through those seasons means I have a near perpetual sunny outlook on the last few years.
 
JerusalemMan said:
Yep, living through those seasons means I have a near perpetual sunny outlook on the last few years.
Click to expand...

Completely agree. I'm just happy that we are an exciting team. When we first finished fifth under BMJ in 2006 with Edgar Davids in the team (and the dodgy lasagne!!), I couldn't quite fathom it. I remember saying to myself that that was it. We were going to get relegated the next season. The fact we finished fifth again the next season, I just quite didn't know what to think!!
 
Gazzasrightboot said:
Completely agree. I'm just happy that we are an exciting team. When we first finished fifth under BMJ in 2006 with Edgar Davids in the team (and the dodgy lasagne!!), I couldn't quite fathom it. I remember saying to myself that that was it. We were going to get relegated the next season. The fact we finished fifth again the next season, I just quite didn't know what to think!!
Click to expand...

It's like being a battered housewife, supporting Spurs.

Really good things happen, and as you celebrate... in the back of your mind you're thinking "it won't last, this isn't what happens to me, he's going to turn round and punch my face in"
 
Gazzasrightboot said:
I was not convinced by Levy until BMJ came in if I am honest. The 2003-2004 season was perhaps one of the most depressing. Seeing Glenn go and not achieving what I thought was his GHod given right to was so disheartening. Watching Pleat's pragmatic football to avoid relegation, yes relegation, was glum especially the ginger Pele. The fact that we knew Pleat was an interim manager as well, and for most of the season, I just didn't know what was going on and, if I'm honest, I feared the worst. I thought this ENIC lot were a bunch of chancers and Sugar had sold us to them just to show us how bad owners could really be.

I remember us losing at home to Charlton and Fulham. Fulham spanked us. Bolton beat us home and away! The only good thing was this site (or was it Spurs update at that stage?) with characters like Sir Les, Moonlit Knight, Paul Parker (??) and others.
Click to expand...

I do agree about the football being poor however it was the same for most of the 90's when our average finish was 11th in the table, we ( our great club) had sunk into mid-table mediocrity and we were heading nowhere. Levy ( ENIC) came in started to try and turn the club around and it was bound to take a while, Under Levy (ENIC) our first three seasons were ( 9th,10, 14th) and i agree they were poor ( but we should have been used to it after the 90's), we also made a cup final in his first season but thanks to Sir Les who forgot his shooting boots and a MOM performance from Friedel in nets for Blackburn we lost it, he also had the problem ( as a football chairman) of falling for the nonsense that if a club is failing you have to change the manager every couple of seasons ( some fans are under the same impression) most of the time it does not work anyway.

Since then look at the progress this (Great club) has made ( not just on the pitch but off it), i agree MJ was the turning point on the pitch but Levy ( ENIC) started the ball rolling and for that i will be forever grateful.
 
Levy and ENIC coming in has been on balance, an excellent overall job. Without a doubt, a few issues will always stain the tenure like the way Jol was sacked and Ramos was employed (regardless of if it were the correct decision), the bizarre way George Graham was sacked just prior to that semi final although that was more David Buchler, the Hoddle/Pleat debacle of 2003/04. Those kind of things aside though, I have to say his growth of the club has been very organic and would be exactly what we would have wanted if we could have foreseen exactly how we have recovered our position within the elite group of PL clubs and been asked how we wanted to get there in 2001.

When He/Enic first came in, financially we couldn't compete on any real grounding with regards transfer fees/wages and for the first couple of years signings were pretty sparse and then from 2004 we went down a road whereby we used the scattergun effect for a couple of seasons and made quite a lot of low cost signings in the hope that a few would prosper and either be sold on and make good money or be first team regulars and that model worked very well for us when you consider that the likes of Huddlestone, Jenas, Robinson to name a few became regulars for between 4-7 years and then players we bought reasonably cheaply were then sold on like Routledge, Tainio, Carrick, Edman, Pamarot, Mendes who made us some money. He has also been very astute in the sponsorship/supplier market with the Puma/Under Armour deals being pretty good at the time for a club that was battling to be a contender and will no doubt pull off a very good deal regarding stadium sponsorship.

He definitely has his faults but I think certainly over the last 5-6 years he has learnt from previous errors and I don't think I would be able to pick out a particularly glaring error on his part since we first qualified for the CL. I think since then he has got rid of his managers at the right time given circumstances at that point and I think his transfer policy generally has been good overall in an ever-changing and demanding landscape especially in deciding when and who a key player should be sold to.
To say we have only finished outside the top 6 twice since 2006 is a pretty good record imo and it is unlikely we will finish outside of that in the near future unless we have a complete 'mare of a season and Levy is a massive part in why that is now our reality and for that I am very thankful.
 
The great thing about Levy is

1. he is smarter than his peers - that enabled us to be able to be the consistent best of the rest from 2005 on wards while other clubs that could have been up there with us - Villa, Saudi Sportswashing Machine, Everton, hell, anyone that had a stadium our size or bigger, yo-yo'd about.

2. He has definitely learned from his mistakes. This hasn't been a case of someone coming in, executing his master plan and having it go flawlessly. But he has finally learned the lessons that enabled us to compete against wealthier clubs. Maybe that's what he was always driving towards, but couldn't get the hiring right, but it seems like he has finally been strategic. And strategic is making sure we understand our place in the world, understanding our advantages in comparison to the rest, and organising the club to be aligned to take advantage of those advantages.

It seems like he wanted it ever since Ramos, a tactically astute manager that made a team greater than the sum of its parts, and was able to promote youth. Only Ramos couldn't work in England, Harry was a crisis aversion, AVB was a lot less interested in youth, and Sherwood was well, Sherwood. Maybe he got lucky with Poch, or maybe he realised from the waste of the Bale money largely that we couldn't rely on a model where we sell one big player to build the rest of the team, and demanding our managers compete against the others with poorer finances available to them. It was almost like once he reduced expectations, got a manager that truly believed in youth, as well as being tactically astute and understanding this league, it call came together. And now what we are achieving is ridiculous, way beyond where we should be competing.

With all of that said, if he leaves us with a phenomenal stadium, a state of the art training ground, and a title challenging squad and doing all of this on our budget, sustainable, it will be one of the greatest achievements in football. Emirates Marketing Project and Chelsea can win all the trophies they want with their budgets, but nothing they ever do will compare to what we have achieved and will achieve, and it is thanks to Levy. It's taken time, he's had to learn, we've had set backs like dodgy lasagna, we've had rich Russians and Arabs distorting the competitive landscape, but I repeat, if we achieve all that we have done it will be one of the biggest achievements in football. We have Levy to thank.
 
BrainOfLevy said:
The great thing about Levy is

1. he is smarter than his peers - that enabled us to be able to be the consistent best of the rest from 2005 on wards while other clubs that could have been up there with us - Villa, Saudi Sportswashing Machine, Everton, hell, anyone that had a stadium our size or bigger, yo-yo'd about.

2. He has definitely learned from his mistakes. This hasn't been a case of someone coming in, executing his master plan and having it go flawlessly. But he has finally learned the lessons that enabled us to compete against wealthier clubs. Maybe that's what he was always driving towards, but couldn't get the hiring right, but it seems like he has finally been strategic. And strategic is making sure we understand our place in the world, understanding our advantages in comparison to the rest, and organising the club to be aligned to take advantage of those advantages.

It seems like he wanted it ever since Ramos, a tactically astute manager that made a team greater than the sum of its parts, and was able to promote youth. Only Ramos couldn't work in England, Harry was a crisis aversion, AVB was a lot less interested in youth, and Sherwood was well, Sherwood. Maybe he got lucky with Poch, or maybe he realised from the waste of the Bale money largely that we couldn't rely on a model where we sell one big player to build the rest of the team, and demanding our managers compete against the others with poorer finances available to them. It was almost like once he reduced expectations, got a manager that truly believed in youth, as well as being tactically astute and understanding this league, it call came together. And now what we are achieving is ridiculous, way beyond where we should be competing.

With all of that said, if he leaves us with a phenomenal stadium, a state of the art training ground, and a title challenging squad and doing all of this on our budget, sustainable, it will be one of the greatest achievements in football. Emirates Marketing Project and Chelsea can win all the trophies they want with their budgets, but nothing they ever do will compare to what we have achieved and will achieve, and it is thanks to Levy. It's taken time, he's had to learn, we've had set backs like dodgy lasagna, we've had rich Russians and Arabs distorting the competitive landscape, but I repeat, if we achieve all that we have done it will be one of the biggest achievements in football. We have Levy to thank.
Click to expand...
fudging lasagna.
 
parklane1 said:
I do agree about the football being poor however it was the same for most of the 90's when our average finish was 11th in the table, we ( our great club) had sunk into mid-table mediocrity and we were heading nowhere. Levy ( ENIC) came in started to try and turn the club around and it was bound to take a while, Under Levy (ENIC) our first three seasons were ( 9th,10, 14th) and i agree they were poor ( but we should have been used to it after the 90's), we also made a cup final in his first season but thanks to Sir Les who forgot his shooting boots and a MOM performance from Friedel in nets for Blackburn we lost it, he also had the problem ( as a football chairman) of falling for the nonsense that if a club is failing you have to change the manager every couple of seasons ( some fans are under the same impression) most of the time it does not work anyway.

Since then look at the progress this (Great club) has made ( not just on the pitch but off it), i agree MJ was the turning point on the pitch but Levy ( ENIC) started the ball rolling and for that i will be forever grateful.
Click to expand...

You're absolutely right, and to some extent I was used to it but it was because I believed that ENIC would be better than Sugar that I was frustrated that it didn't happen. Having an interim manager for that period of time, I took for not caring. Obviously I was wrong, and I don't think there would be a bigger supporter of Levy than me. @BrainOfLevy sums it up very well. Levy has learned from his mistakes, and has made us punch above our weight consistently regardless of manager.

Like you I am very grateful for all that he has done. He's been a great custodian of this club and were it not for a rich russian and a rich arab, I think we would have won a lot more. But you play the hand that you are dealt, and he has done so better than any player I know.
 
Bullet said:
It's like being a battered housewife, supporting Spurs.

Really good things happen, and as you celebrate... in the back of your mind you're thinking "it won't last, this isn't what happens to me, he's going to turn round and punch my face in"
Click to expand...

A "different" analogy, but I guess it works!! Say it quietly though, I don't think we're going to get punched again and I think we will kill the husband off soon.....
 
Lord knows I've had my say on Daniel Levy. But, looking through RAWK tonight in the aftermath of the Dippers' loss to Saints, I came across this....

net spend.png



They're complaining about three windows without a net spend leaving their team so threadbare that Jurgen 'German Shankly' Klopp has to make do without rotating it.

We had *twelve to fourteen* of them between 2010 and when we finally broke the bank last summer.

And we usually came out ahead of them throughout that time period, despite them blowing huge wads on Andy Carroll, Mamadou Sakho and others of that ilk every single window.
 
DubaiSpur said:
Lord knows I've had my say on Daniel Levy. But, looking through RAWK tonight in the aftermath of the Dippers' loss to Saints, I came across this....

View attachment 3085



They're complaining about three windows without a net spend leaving their team so threadbare that Jurgen 'German Shankly' Klopp has to make do without rotating it.

We had *twelve to fourteen* of them between 2010 and when we finally broke the bank last summer.

And we usually came out ahead of them throughout that time period, despite them blowing huge wads on Andy Carroll, Mamadou Sakho and others of that ilk every single window.
Click to expand...

And their is actually flimflam as they sold players at a loss brought only the window before he came in (Benteke for one) who paid for the likes of Mane
 
Bedfordspurs said:
And their is actually hogwash as they sold players at a loss brought only the window before he came in (Benteke for one) who paid for the likes of Mane
Click to expand...
There's a question for some weirdy beardy statto type who has more time on their hands than me. How many players has Levy sold at a loss?
 
Rorschach said:
There's a question for some weirdy beardy statto type who has more time on their hands than me. How many players has Levy sold at a loss?
Click to expand...
http://www.topspurs.com/thfc-transfers.htm

A cursory glance seems to show most numbers are there or thereabouts. Clauses are a bit of an unknown - for example, Bent was sold for an initial £10m but the clauses and sell-on meant we did not make a loss on him.
 
JerusalemMan said:
http://www.topspurs.com/thfc-transfers.htm

A cursory glance seems to show most numbers are there or thereabouts. Clauses are a bit of an unknown - for example, Bent was sold for an initial £10m but the clauses and sell-on meant we did not make a loss on him.
Click to expand...

What a great find! Thanks Jerusalem.

Truth be told there are quite a surprising number of losses in that little lot (I counted more than 50 since Enic's takeover) but of course bald figures tell you so very little. For a start you have to factor in amortisation, whereby a player's value to the club over the term of his contract is calculated. So we pay out a big fee for a star player, get several seasons out of him before either selling at a face-value loss or releasing him altogether. So most maybe not always the loss they would seem at first sight

Looking through that list it does hit you just how much dross the club shelled out for in Levy's early years, a trend that seems finally to have been reversed in recent seasons, suggesting our chairman has indeed learnt massively from past mistakes.

Nowadays we often make very handsome profits not only from players bought and sold but also of course from our academy. Add in the £13m we got for Townsend (not included in the list) and we have raked in more than £50m for home-growns over the last six seasons compared with a meagre £3m (mainly for Luke Young) in the whole of Levy's first decade with the club.
 
Nowadays we often make very handsome profits not only from players bought and sold but also of course from our academy.
Hopefully we have now created a virtuous circle because many local youngsters will see our youth set up as ideal and prefer us (maybe to the wealth of Chelsea) or to the arse.
 
Earz said:
Thanks for this. Some absolute blasts from the pasts in there!
Click to expand...
Yeah, interesting. Some really good buys too.

Seeing N'Jie for £8m makes me shudder... but then seeing Pritchard out for £8m makes me realise that the market nowadays is VERY different to the past.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back