I think this is also part of the issue though with Levy. We’d occasionally get a manager in who would achieve something through force of their own personality and ability, but it was never consistent with a long term club strategy. It was continually hoping for some short term shot in the arm to help us make that next leap. That’s why I agree with the idea that since 2019 we’ve been in decline. Whether it was intentional or he stumbled upon it, Levy struck gold with Poch. And he threw it away. Didn’t realise what he had, and didn’t understand what made Poch able to be successful.
Up until 2019, Levy was the best chairman in the league. Incredible achievements in the infrastructure side and consistent over performance relative to transfer spend and wages paid. But he reached the limit of what he could do, he had no idea how to take us forward in our new reality.
Ironically, constraints often lead to better, more focused strategy. And so the combination of Levy and Poch, the focus on youth, the playing style that everyone could buy into and be suited for, it gave us a culture and a way of working that was hard to replicate. And yet with those constraints lifted, Levy didn’t know what to do. We have just been nothing since 2019. We lost the alignment, we didn’t know how to use our resources effectively, and thrashed from one idea to the other in the hopes of a short term shot in the arm that would help us take that next step. Even in the Allnut article today it references going back to youth, which Levy suggested was a deliberate move after some of the failed big transfer signings. But it left us short to compete properly in a league that was getting more physical, and set us back from even our base level expectations of 5th/6th, let alone being able to push on with the new stadium.
I actually think the Lewis kids and Vinai ‘get’ this. I find it unsavoury how they are planting stories to make it look like Levy was a fool when they gave him free rein for a quarter of a century. But if their question was how are they going to become a regular title challenger and they looked at what Levy was doing, I can see why they concluded he was holding us back. And the three main things are a lack of patience, a lack of long term strategy, and too tight a wage structure.
With the best will, I think they were trying to fix some of these things this season. But they initiated too much transition too quickly, and it almost ended in disaster.
