Vintage PR

By: Martyn | June 25th, 2009

Spot the thin man... Cardiff City chairman Peter Ridsdale has never exactly been the shy and retiring type, but surely there comes a time when even he realises that it’s not just best for the rest of the world that he shuts his portly gob now and again, but himself. Prior to the start of the 2008/09 campaign, I penned this piece dissecting some of the rubbish emanating from the goldfish fan’s overused organ. Here is a snippet that encapsulates the man’s sheer incompetence when it comes to running football clubs (I won’t even begin to penetrate the triumphs of his Leeds United reign):

Meanwhile, Hasselbaink was not wanted anymore, but a clause in his contract entitling him to another season had been activated despite the Bluebirds claiming they had a verbal waiver, and City could now face legal action.

“Hindsight is a wonderful thing,” observed Ridsdale.

“Should I have ordered Jimmy to sign something? Probably. But when someone tells you their word is their bond well you do like to think that would be enough.”

This is so bad that it warrants no further explanation. But if ever you wanna *borrow* a fiver for lunch and the bus then Pete’s your man.

Correspondingly, it’s good to know that Ridsdale sticks to his guns:

“[I am focused on] the league table when it comes round to May and ensuring Cardiff City are in that top six. That is our minimum ambition.”

Peter Ridsdale’s Cardiff City – The club where a manager failing to achieve the minimum (even when the need to achieve this objective is reaffirmed during the season by overloading the wage bill with the likes of Chopra, Quincy, Taylor, and Routledge) results in the chairman batting away clubs when they make approaches to take him off our hands! Presumably Ridsdale ran out of paper with no member of staff available to run down Staples when it came to printing Jones’s P45, but if the club do manage to get their hands on some A1/2/3/4/5, our Liverpudlian Gin & Tonic guzzler won’t be finding new employment as a tour guide if the video embedded in this blue underlined bit is anything to go on! It’s all very stiff and British innit? Rather like a dad trying to show off all that his wealthy and successful son has achieved to family friends with their new video camera. However, the praise is bitterly-tinged because father is still put out by recently discovering said child is homosexual with a lifestyle one would not dare consider raising in reply to polite small-talk when asked “How’s the kids?” during the aftermath of a board meeting.

Anyhow, Pistol Pete having his heart broken by the Eddie Murphy lookalike and asserting that the play-off’s were the minimum expectation is sooooooo last season. This summer, Peter is back to doing that other thing he does best: Getting crap net profits on transfer deals!

Naturally, we’ve been here before. But then again is there anywhere that this club hasn’t been?! Glenn Loovens provides a great example. Loovens sulks. The club ignores it. Player’s agent touts him to all and sundry. Our chairman states a £3m price tag. Loovens starts the season. Loovens looks like he’d rather be organising elections in Iran than playing for a South Walian soccer side (keeping Loovens was about as “beneficial as using sandpaper as a dishcloth” : my verdict after a hideous showing against Ajax). We finally sell as deadline day nears. Price and net profit is nowhere near the supposed figure demanded by the club (£1.9m net).

Now, replace Loovens with his former central defence partner – and the only known human being to have a bicycle seat for a head – Roger Johnson and this summer mirrors last (the exception being we’ve got the inevitable deal out of the way a helluva lot earlier this time round). So as to understand why I’m particularly peeved at the chairman’s outbursts for the second summer in succession, I draw your attention to this article:

Ridsdale told BBC Sport: “A fee of £5m, subject to how it’s paid, is a figure where we’d have… to put it to Roger.

“I’ve had informal feedback from Roger that he would like to talk to a Premier League side. Clearly we wouldn’t stand in any player’s way if the price was right. Regrettably every player has his price but we’re not letting people go on the cheap.”

He continued: “Birmingham have made their interest clear and the amount they’re prepared to pay.”

Putting the £5m in context of today’s market (not that you can read too much into the state of the world economy when it comes to the Premier League and its £80m deals), Brum’s already extravagant spending this summer (£9m for the outrageously talented yet untested in English football Benitez, the hefty wages of England international Joe Hart, and fellow English Championship CB – with under 21 level representation – Scott Dann for £4m from alliteration-fans favourite team Chris Coleman’s Coventry City), recent fees received for better-than-average defenders at this level (Jagielka £4m, Lescott £5m, Bougherra £2.5m) and the truth that despite RJ being voted POTS two years in a row and a combative player capable of comfortably averting every opposition ball into the box, Johnson’s pass completion rate was less than someone overdosing on Imodium’s backside-pass completion successes and anyone unfortunate enough to meet Johnson on a night out after a few drinks inside him will know that as a man, he’s an idiotic cretin.

So yeah, on the surface, this looks like a good deal considering it was a one horse race involving a club with an owner who recently noted in a fashion akin to a city high-flier promising his daughter lavish financial gifts so long as it means the little brat stops bothering him;

“We’ve got to put a few million in next week to pay the summer wages because we don’t get any money from the Premier League until August and there is a hole in the finances. And we’ve got to pay for the work on the main stand, the television and all the other things we’ve promised.”

Likewise, it’s good to get anyone who doesn’t want to be here out of the door asap (the manager’s use of the word “sympathize” in this BBC Sport piece is tragically misused: how on earth do you feel sorry for someone paid a high four-five figure sum every week to play a sport the rest of us have to pay to play a five-man team version with our mates?!), and £5m is more than enough for Dave Jones to find a replacement in an area of the pitch he’s had his only consistent luck with in the transfer market.

So 1. Why the deuce have we ended up with just £1.25m up front, and the potential recuperation of just £4.25m overall IF all clauses are adhered to?!!

2. Why does Ridsdale think that bringing Ronaldo into his selling justifications not once but twice helps matters? It’s a pathetic attempt at a diversionary tactic that fools nobody who follows the club into overlooking that yet again Ridsdale has accepted less than the best for this football club.

3. “My job is to balance the fact we may have players who wish to leave, but also a responsibility to supporters to put a stronger side out on the first day of the season than we did last year.” Firstly, that use of the word “may” troubles me. For crying out loud, the future of the club (on the field) is at stake here, don’t let those blasted mercenaries be ambiguous! Put your expensive and polished loafer down and get a straight answer. Secondly, I’m irked by the declaration that a stronger side will contest this season’s routine opening day home fixture against a team beginning with an ‘S’. Did he really need to say this? I mean if he doesn’t say it, it’s the very least the supporters expect anyway without having to be ‘promised’. But by physically blurting it, when the inevitable happens (i.e. the team is not as good as it was from rounds 1 – 42 last season), the Yorkshireman is gonna look a little daft. Here was the team for the opening game against Southampton last season, a game which we won courtesy somewhat ironically of an injury time Roger Johnson goal:

Cardiff City: Heaton, McNaughton, Loovens, Johnson, Kennedy, Whittingham (Parry 74), Rae, McPhail, Ledley, Thompson (Bothroyd 67), McCormack.

Of that team, Heaton is back at Manchester United having never looked capable at any point of the campaign, Loovens is playing Champions League football for one of Europe’s biggest sides, Johnson and Thompson – both of whom scored that day – are now playing in the Premier League, McCormack and Ledley look set to join them, and Parry, Kennedy, Rae and McPhail are past it at this level. That leaves just three players capable of fulfilling Ridsdale’s bold words, with 10 positions to not only fill, but better (if we include the 2 subs required that day). This is at a club with just 1 senior CB (who hasn’t even been at the club for a year and has no pace), no decent CMs, and an array of widemen with form as consistent as Shane MacGowan’s teeth-brushing habit.

After heaping such unnecessary pressure on himself with that trap of his for the umpteenth time, Ridsdale’d better get crackin’, splashin’ and wishin’.