The Solid Foundations of Success

As Crawley hammered the final nails into Orient’s season, thoughts turned immediately to next season. These weren’t calm thoughts about strategic plans for the future but angry and frustrated people voicing concerns that next season might be lost even before it has begun. Even Danny Webb, who has attempted to spin positive lines in even the most difficult circumstances, felt moved to challenge whoever is currently running the club to back him. I got the impression he felt he no longer had anything to lose. Speak out and face the sack for stepping out of line. Keep schtum and he could either be out of a job when his contract expires in the summer or find himself as a manager with no players.

Regardless of whether Webb’s pleas get the desired response, the 12 June court date hangs heavy over the club. No player in their right mind would commit themselves to a club that could feasibily no longer exist in three month’s time if they have a better offer elsewhere. But if Orient go have a future and whenever that future starts, a major rebuilding exercise is required. Forget about instant returns - it may take some time to lay the foundations before building for success.

Francesco Becchetti’s impatience with managers at the first sign of trouble has been well documented. What of the players themselves?

Since Becchetti, who has always been closely engaged in first team affairs, took over at Orient, 77 different players have made league starts for the club. 61 of those players have been contracted to the club, with the remaining 16 loanees. That is 21 more players than in the last three years of Hearn’s reign, almost an entire squad of players.

It was always said that Russell Slade’s sides were slow starters to the season. It was an unfair criticism of a manager who found himself rebuilding during most summers. It was no coincidence that when he had the most continuity between the 12/13 and 13/14 seasons we made a flying start and ended at Wembley.  In the Wembley season only 24 players made starts. Only 6 of them were permanent new signings. Were it not for the circumstances that led to Slade fielding 5 different goalkeepers that season it would have been even fewer.

2014/15

By contrast, Becchetti dismantled the ‘squad with no future’ instead of building on the successes of the previous season. In his first season in charge 31 different players made league starts. 12 were inherited from the play off season, 12 were signed and 7 came in on loan. Slade’s new players struggled to find their feet at the start of each season. In Becchetti’s first season we never got off of our knees as the team was constantly changed and was never given a chance to gel before the season ran out and ended in relegation.

2015/16

Only 7 players from that first season returned in 2015/16. 3 of the play off squad (Cox, James and Baudry) and 4 of the 12 new signings made in the first season (Wright, Simpson, Pritchard and Cisak). Orient were in contention for the play offs for most of the season but the longer the season went on without breaking back into the play off places the quicker the merry go round went again. By the end of the season at total of 33 players, 7 of them loanees, had made League starts. 14 contracted senior players made their debuts during the season and they were joined by 5 youth team players taking their first bows. Once again, the team wasn’t given an opportunity to gel but the relative stability before Ian Hendon was sacked at least prevented us from sinking into a relegation battle.

2016/17

The lessons weren’t learned though. Of those 14 players signed in 2015/16, only 6 of them stayed and made starts this season. Two of those players were Sean Clohessy and Sammy Moore, who were both deemed surplus to requirements early in the season. Dean Cox, the last remaining member of the play-off squad, was also gone just over two years after the Wembley final. Alex Cisak is the only player still at the club who has started in each of Becchetti’s three seasons.

33 players have made League starts for Orient this season so far, a third of them recent promotees from the youth team. Even if some of those youth team players had been blended with a few more senior players during the January transfer window the chances are that, as was the case in 2014/15, it was already too late for them to develop any sort of team chemistry.

What chance?

There is no doubt that most if not all of Becchetti’s managers would feel that they weren’t given a proper chance to show what they could do. The players could justifiably claim the same. ‘Permanent’ players that have started league games under Becchetti but have since left the club were given an average of 23 starts to show their worth before they departed.  That includes that nucleus of 12 players from the play-off squad, who on average went on to make just 22 further starts each.

And it’s got worse rather than better. 11 senior players have made their debuts for Orient this season. They have made an average of 18 starts each, less than half of the games. By the end of the season a significant majority of the squad will have started less than half of the league games.

For any club to be successful it requires stability. That goes right from the boardroom, to the managers and the players that are on the field. And it may require patience from fans as well. Chances are we will be starting from scratch again at the start of the season. We should have learned by now that we will go nowhere but backwards if the next batch of players and their manager aren’t given a proper chance to develop and build.

Where did they play?

Goalkeepers – 5

Right back – 7

Left back – 8
Centre backs – 13
Right wing – 5
Left wing – 5
Centre Midfield  - 16
Strikers – 18

The team with the most appearances

GK:         Alex Cisak

DR:         Nicky Hunt

DL:          Shane Lowery

DC:         Mathieu Baudry

DC:         Tom Parkes

MR:        Gavin Massey

ML:        Dean Cox

MC:        Bradley Pritchard

MC:        Nigel Atangana

A:            Jay Simpson

A:            Ollie Palmer

 

Remember them? The team with the least appearances

GK:         Adam Legzdins

DR:         Neal Eardley

DL:          Adam Chicksen

DC:         Alan Dunne

DC:         Jean Yves Mvoto

MR:        Ulrich N’nomo

ML:        Calaum Jahraldo-Martin

MC:        Michael Petrasso

MC:        John Lundstram

A:            Kevin Lisbie

A:            Scott Kashket

Town Called Malice

So, in the meaningless football parlance of the time, we go again on 12 June. Orient’s future on and off the pitch remains in the hands of others, with the odds stacked against us in both cases. Becchetti’s decision to pay the tax bill and promise a further £1 million ‘investment’ generates new questions about his motivations.

The revelation that club photographer Simon O’Connor is owed £6,000 by the club has confirmed a the commonly held view that Becchetti’s ownership has been characterised by petty malice and spite. However, I’ve never actually believed that. Maybe it is because I realised years ago that paranoia makes us feel important but the sad reality is that most people just don’t care enough to pursue a feud against you. And that is my point. At this point Becchetti cares about Leyton Orient as one of his business assets but has no greater personal feelings towards us then he does the average waste management plant.

His decision to pay the tax bill without telling anyone, particularly the staff at the club, hasn’t been done to mess with the minds and emotions of anyone who cares about the club. It is simply a continuation of the autocratic way that he has run the club over the last 2 and a half years. No one has been consulted about it, it hasn’t been announced and it hasn’t been explained. Becchetti and Becchetti alone runs the club and he doesn’t believe he needs advice or approval from anyone else. You only have to look at his refusal to even seek assistance from an interpreter when issuing rare announcements to ensure that they make sense and convey the meaning that he wants. That is pretty low level stuff when it comes to accepting the advice from others.

In his mind he knows best and will run the club his way. Barry Hearn was no different when he first came into the club, although fortunately he never thought the way to succeed was to throw money down the drain. Just as importantly he learned from his mistakes. He worked out where he knew best and where he should take advice from others. And when he asked the wrong people, he worked out who the right people were. Becchetti on the other hand has made expensive errors one after the other, never appearing to have a long term plan and never acknowledging mistakes. Each impatient decision he has made out of increasing frustration that he hasn’t been able to get what he wants immediately –success and the respect and kudos that follows.

As was inevitable he eventually lost patience and admitted defeat (to himself rather than to others and a long time before the famous Blackpool protest). Did he finally decide to bring someone on board who could help him deliver the success he craved? No because in his mind it wasn’t him that was the problem, it was the club and its unappreciative fans. The solution? To take his money to another team where his methods will lead to success. Ternana Calcio in Italy are the new lucky benefactors. To him now Leyton Orient is just a business, an asset. The only interest he has in it is how much money he can recoup from it. The only reason invest any more money into it is to make sure he protects whatever small return he may get back from it.

The counter argument to that is that if he really cared about maximising what he can recoup he wouldn’t have condemned us to non-league football. For a start that presumes that just because he wants to do something he goes about it in a competent and logical way. And secondly, by cutting his costs by releasing senior players and withdrawing all but the bare minimum essential financial support for the club he is simply cutting his losses. He believes that the relegation will cost him less than continuing to pay their wages. It is a business decision, not a football one. He has done it before on an individual basis, as high earning players have been released with mutually agreed pay offs rather than continuing to pay their wages for the duration of their contracts.

The staff and creditors who have showed loyalty and patience to the club and community have deserved to be treated much better than they have been.  When viewed by fans who love the club and care about the people, vindictiveness seems to be the only explanation for such behaviour towards the. However, a businessman and entrepreneur’s first loyalty is to himself, his business interests and his financial backers. His decisions will be based on that alone, albeit clouded by emotion and impatience.

What Orient fans need to fear and has remained unchanged today, is that at some point Becchetti will feel as though he has no other options than to make one final and fatal cutting of his losses.  He may do just that if he thinks that what he has to put into the club for it to remain viable will be more than he is ever likely to get back at this point. Administration may seem like a positive thing, a convenient way of relieving Becchetti of his ownership. But it will plunge the club and its staff into even greater uncertainty. And if, as I believe to be the case, Becchetti will remain as the club’s largest creditor, it may be no more appealing to a new owner than it is right now. Armed with hindsight Os fans pre-2014 could give Os fans post-2016 some good advice – be careful what you wish for.  Sadly the club we love will continue to be kicked around like the proverbial football for quite a while longer.

Fit and Proper Person

The most frequently asked questions at Brisbane Road over the last 2 years have been why do we always concede just after half-time, why can no-one take a decent penalty and how did Francesco Becchetti pass the Football League’s fit and proper person test? The answer is, quite easily because the test isn’t what you think it is or would like it to be.

The League’s Fit and Proper Person test was introduced in 2004 to stop unfit individuals from running football clubs. It applies to anyone who has significant control over the running of a football club, not just owners. The Test isn’t a subjective assessment of whether someone would be a successful owner. You couldn’t objectively assess that against a set of rules that are transparent, fair and consistently applied.

So what does make someone unfit to own or run a football club in the Football League’s eyes? Under its rules an unfit person is anyone:

·         Serving a ban, suspension or disqualification by either a sporting governing body or a professional body (e.g. the Institute of Chartered Accountants)

·         Anyone who has admitted to breaching or found to have breached rules on betting on football matches

·         Has unspent convictions for criminal offences involving fraud, corruption or dishonesty anywhere in the world (anything from perverting the course of justice to siphoning your neighbours Sky TV into your own house)

·         Any unspent convictions that result in imprisonment for 12 months or more, anywhere in the world

·         Subject to a banning order under the Football Spectators Act

·         A registered offender under the Sexual Offences Act

·         Anyone disqualified from being a Company Director

·         Anyone subject to insolvency matters (e.g. bankrupt, in administration or subject tto other debt recovery matters)

·         Has been involved at a club that that has gone into administration twice since 2004, or at two different clubs that have both gone into administration

The disqualification criteria are pretty black and white and there is no question that Mr Becchetti complies with the Football League rules.

One suspicion about the rules is that they can be circumnavigated by using shell companies that cloud who or what actually owns and controls a club.  But the rules apply to anyone controlling the running of a club. For instance, when Massimo Cellino ‘took over’ at Leeds United he was only minority shareholder in the holding company that actually owned Leeds. However, Cellino was still subject to the test as he was seen to be acting on behalf of other the other shareholders of the holding company. The Leeds case also disproves one of the other myths going round about the rules. It has been said that the Test is only applied when someone first takes over the club. That isn’t true and Cellino has been disqualified at different times during his Leeds tenure as details about alleged prosecutions have come to light (and subsequently been dismissed, leading to the removal of the bans).

The other instructive example as far as Orient are concerned is the first club Director disqualified under these rules, Denis Coleman at Rotherham. Coleman was a Director at Rotherham when they twice entered administration. That is the one section of the rules that covers someone’s ability to run a club competently. But Coleman was unfortunate to fall foul of the rules through no mis-management on his part. The reasons given for their struggle at the time was that Rotherham were saddled with a huge wage bill that had to be reduced. Once that was done they were no longer able to compete and they dropped down the leagues and attendances went down. Their second issue was having to continue paying rent on their Millmoor ground to their previous owner!

At this point, with Becchetti seemingly willing to sell the club and with an interested buyer in the wings (www.guardian-series.co.uk/sport/15147983.Prospective_buyer_still_interested_in_Orient__no_matter_what_league_they_are_in_/?ref=twtrec), the question over whether Becchetti would still pass the test is hopefully irrelevant.

However, scrutiny of the rules is still relevant. The League’s rules do stop unsuitable people from owning football clubs (probably a far better description than ‘fit and proper’). But it is clear that the League’s Governance rules do nothing to stop clubs being run unsustainably and saddled with huge levels of debt and then crashing and burning. Fans should demand better because short-termism is what has afflicted so many clubs over the decades, especially in the Premier League era, not clubs being de-frauded by known criminals. So long as all of the money is hoarded at the top of the game in the Bank of the Promised Land and clubs can spend freely to try to get there, clubs will keep plunging through the trap door when the money dries up.

And that is why, even if there is a relatively smooth transition to a new wealthy owner in the next six months, the Orient Regeneration Fund (www.leytonorientfanstrust.com/fund.asp) is so vital. If the fund allows Orient fans to have a real stake and a say in how the club is run it will be worth every penny.

Orient Revival

After five years in mothballs I got the understandable urge to revive the blog I used to write about Orient. Back in 2012 I’d found it difficult to find things to write about every week and instead of being enjoyable it became a bit of the chore that I didn’t look forward to anymore. If that isn’t the perfect segue into Leyton Orient in 2017 I don’t know what is. Plenty to talk about and twitter isn’t quite enough to express it.

In the briefest of moments on Wednesday night possibly one of the most important decisions in Leyton Orient’s history was taken via a show of hands by 200 supporters. The Ex-Servicemens Club in Leytonstone was an appropriate venue for a club with a proud history both on and off the pitch.

Contradictorily, the decision appeared to be a no brainer but was based on trying to guess the next move of the predictably unpredictable Francesco Becchetti. It was also a decision not to be taken lightly as it affected not only the 200 Leyton Orient Fans Trust members present and the wider support. Leyton Orient still employ a number of excellent staff who have continued working in the club’s best interests under extreme conditions for the last 2 and a half years. Just as they have a duty of care towards the club, so the fans owe them a duty of care when taking decisions that could affect their employment and lives. The Trust have put in incredible hard work to understand the situation the club is in and explore the options available to the fans. Those fans owe them gratitude and constructive contributions.

Ultimately the Trust felt it was left with no other option. Personally I was relieved that there were options that could help to keep the club alive. The idea that Becchetti could decide to cut his losses, not attend the hearing and allow the club to be liquidated was scary to say the least. That scenario is entirely possible if he has decided that he isn’t going to find a buyer willing to meet his terms and isn’t prepared to put any more money into the club. The news that LOFT and other shareholders can try to convince the court to appoint an administrator who could sell the club to new investors was more important than the pledge by Waltham Forest Council about the future of the ground.

Orient’s creditors would also be able to make their own representations to the court. The nature of their submissions would depend on whether they believe their financial interests are best served by the club continuing or for it to be liquidated and its assets sold to service the debts. I don’t know whether the court would entertain any submission from the biggest creditor in all but name – Francesco Becchetti.

All of this would only come to pass in the event that Becchetti does not appear in court to either pay the tax bill or seek an extension to allow himself the time to do so. No one knows exactly how likely that is. I think that Becchetti is the only one who can put a convincing case to the court that it would be worth their while adjourning the case to a later date. Any appeal for a delay by LOFT would give the impression that talk of potential investors hasn’t got any further than that – just talk. It is clear to me that LOFT cannot afford to be sitting on its hands should the winding up petition not be contested because by then it would be too late, there would be no club to save.

One of the side-shows at the LOFT meeting was on the point of points. We all want a viable football club playing at the highest possible level. A phoenix club starting from scratch after liquidation could find itself as low as the Essex Senior League, with a rubbish name like AFC Orient. There are no guarantees it would even get off the ground, let alone come back up the leagues. If it goes into administration Leyton Orient could have 12 points deducted this season or next season or face multiple deductions as it goes in and out of administration. It would still exist to try to win the points back on the pitch. It would still exist to employ people and we’d still have a team to watch at Blackpool in May and AFC Fylde in 2017/18.

The Fans Trust cannot afford to allow the current situation on the pitch to affect thinking about the long term future of the Club. A decision on administration must be taken at the right time to ensure the club continues and that needs to be the only consideration. The club can still survive if it is relegated to the National League but not if it has been condemned to the history books.

Every step that is taken now is based on an assessment of the risk of doing something compared to the risk of doing nothing. We can’t sit and hope any more, everyone must, together, stand up for the Orient.