As part one of the latest round of blame-game, Simon Grayson has spoken publicly about his time at Leeds during BBC’s Late Kickoff:

A few things have come out since I left the football club that I wasn’t too pleased with because I’ve kept my silence and my dignity.

[....]

I think finishing 7th the previous year we over-achieved. We got ourselves by, just missing out on the play-offs, but then that summer came along and we wanted to invest in players that would take us to the next level, and we didn’t manage to do that, we didn’t get the players that I would’ve liked to have got to really have a go for it and then results dictate eventually what happened, but we weren’t in a bad position when we left.

[....]

Every manager would [like more money] and I think if you get to a certain position you would like to think that you can go on and take the club to the next level. You look at Southampton and Reading, two teams who are probably going to go up, and they have spent money in the summer with the likes of Jack Cork who went to Southampton and Gorkss who went to Reading, and these were the players who we were trying to sign in the summer but they went elsewhere. There are big expectancy levels at Leeds and sometimes the expectancy levels aren’t matched elsewhere.

Grayson might wish he hadn’t said:

We’ve got a group here who we feel can get promoted but it’s all about succeeding in that.

And following the announcement on Monday that Ben Parker and Mika Väyrynen had been released, Ken Bates said on Wednesday:

[Ben Parker]’s a lovely fella, we just wish him all the best. We really do. Although we’ve finished with him, he’s going to carry on training with us until the end of the season to make sure he’s fit for next season.

He continued:

Vay-ry-en… I can never get his name right, I don’t know why we signed him. Nice guy but a complete was of money. Made two starts and cost us half a million quid in fees and salary. I just don’t know why he was signed. And I’m sorry for him but even more sorry for us. It’s better that he goes and seeks the rest of his career somewhere else.

Bates’ comments didn’t go down well with Väyrynen (i’m told it’s pronounced vie-rye-nun) who was none too pleased, tweeting:

Obviously money can’t buy class!!!Comments from an old man who don’t even no my name.I wanted to play but wasn’t used.My bad!!!!

Thanks for your support,you guys have been great n deserve big things. #LUFCfans

Like Simon Grayson, Ken Bates must be wishing he had never said:

I think we might have unearthed another hidden jewel. He’s 28-29, played 31 times or thereabouts for Finland and he’s a tough midfielder which is something we have been lacking.

Similarly Shaun Harvey must be feeling a bit silly for saying this:

Some very good players are available on free transfers. Forssell and Vayrynen for example – international footballers without a club. Sometimes I think people would be happy for us to spend £1million on a sack of potatoes just to see us spend £1million.

One thing’s for sure: the blame-game hasn’t done either side any favours at all.

Perhaps we should end on a positive note. Two, in fact.

1) Simon Grayson identified last summer:

The money was there to go and sign players, whether it was loan deals or permanent deals we were trying to sign players to make us better and increase the competition.We know we are still a few bodies short but saying that we still have good players here, some of which were enquired about but we managed to keep hold of them, something which is obviously good news.

One of the key things for Grayson was holding onto key players. You might think that Snodgrass was one who was enquired about  given his recent comments. This season Neil Warnock has managed to find what would seem a cushy contract for skipper Snodgrass. In that article Grayson also bemoaned the way players’ moves depended on other players arriving at their club and how he was gazumped on the proposed Puncheon deal. Warnock divulged after the Blackpool game that one player has all but signed and is expected to be announced in the first week of May, with others following soon after.

Whatever we think of past mistakes, and whoever we blame for them, the future is looking bright if these are the quality players that Warnock’s been promising.

2) As Ken Bates mentioned in his radio address, Don Revie’s statue will be unveiled soon:

just to remind everybody of the great event on May 5 when the Don Revie statue will be unveiled at 11am. He’s going to stand opposite the new entrance to the East Stand so he’ll be looking across and keeping his eye on who goes in and who goes out. It’ll be a great day. It’s been well organised. There’s functions in the Pavilion and elsewhere. Billy’s Bar will be open and so will Howard’s. So May 5th, if you’re not going anywhere in particular, forget about your shopping or your… 11 o’clock, May 5th, Lowfields Road outside the East Stand is the place to be.

I am amazed it hasn’t been done before. And I think it’s a tribute to the fans that they’ve done it. The club hasn’t done it. This is a fans tribute to a great man and I understand from Duncan Revie that he’ll be there with a party of family and friends. So they’re coming up for it. This is going to be a great occasion.

Ben Parker was the longest serving Leeds player until today. A lifelong Leeds fan, Parker was a very highly rated youngster at Leeds and made 16 appearances for the England U16-19s. After breaking into the first team in 08-09 with 24 appearances, Parker picked up a hamstring injury in the opening game of Leeds’ promotion season and would eventually manage just four appearances in the season.

With good support from Simon Grayson and the backroom staff, Ben Parker was nurtured back to fitness over the past two seasons and even played 90 minutes in Leeds’ unlikely 1-1 draw with Arsenal last year, and in the replay. This season he played a full 90 minutes in the Carling Cup against Bradford, while he notched up four full matches at Carlisle in February, scoring the winner in his first match.

Parker might have seen this coming for a while, refusing to make excuses for the club when put on the spot by Peter Lorimer over Jonny Howson’s sale in January.

A hard worker with undeniable talent, the fans always supported Parker and I’m sure we all wish him the very best in his future career.

Mika Väyrynen, meanwhile, arrived in September but made only two league starts (against Peterborough and Barnsley) and found his time at Leeds blighted by injury. Writing on Twitter, Väyrynen said:

Thank u all 4 great support. Wasn’t meant to b so best decision 4 both parties. Wish club, players, fans all the best in the future. #on2thenext1

Ben Parker and Mika Väyrynen were probably our two most injury-plagued players and their leaving marks the beginning of Warnock’s promised clear-out. Speaking on Yorkshire Radio last Monday, Ken Bates outlined the early stages of Leeds’ plans:

Our squad is ridiculous. 30 in number. That’s got to go down by seven at least without even starting. Then, that will leave us 23 of the existing squad and some of the squad I think Neil wants to change.

The mature response in these circumstances is to reflect and re-consider the reasons for current situation, that the `blame game’ be avoided. But to be frank, I’ve never really held with that.

What follows is a candidate list, of the 5 worst decisions (and this is entirely subjective – and opinion based) which have lead us to where we are – a voting option follows beneath.

1. Selling the crown jewels

We overachieved in our first season back in the second tier. A 7^th place finish was more than we could have dreamed of on the day we scraped past Brizzle Rovers. Yet we ended up disappointed to miss out on the play offs. The key to that? A coveted cache of some very talented players :-

Jonny Howson, home-grown, Leeds supporting, a box to box midfielder capable of defence splitting passes, late runs into the box, and the odd meaty tackle, a second division lampard if you want. Yes he went missing from time to time, but at 23 you can forgive him that.

Max Gradel, a top quality striker cum winger, an Ivory Coast international, with bags of pace, flair, and a genuine hunger for goals. You `pitied the fool’ who was given the job of marking him, and despite a foul temper, generally much loved by the Elland Road Faithful.

Bradley Johnson – Not everyone’s cup of tea,  Johnsons proclivity to aim for Row-Z was a shortcoming, but he remains to this day, full of running, a genuine ball winning midfielder, and able to score goals of almost mind bending quality (see Arsenal FA Cup 2010). Like Michael Brown in his prime. He was a player we plucked from relative obscurity at Northampton town.

All the above of course are now plying their trade elsewhere. Howson at Premier League Norwich, ditto Johnson, and Gradel at Ligue 1, Saint Etienne. Collective transfer fees of close to £4m received for those players seems of little comfort when we review the threadbare squad at Elland Road.

Howson seemed a sacrificial lamb,. He wanted evidence (like most of us) that Leeds were serious about the premier league next season, and like all of us saw zero investment of any note into the squad. Refusing to sign a new contract until the time was right, he was hardly engineering a move out. But lo and behold in January Bates and Harvey decided to cash their chips and accept £2m for a player worth probably 3 times that amount – had they not delayed and bungled a new contract (of which more in point 2)he might be with us still.

Would keeping Howson have kept us in contention for the play offs? Well he’s playing for Norwich now, and isn’t it March? We were all told he wouldn’t be fit until April? A key player, with good fitness record, and a scorer of critical goals (Carlisle, Bristol Rovers) Howson was Mr Dependable, and one of few who coped well with pressure.

Gradel was of course `not for sale’ a phrase which should be banned from Elland Road forthwith – we’re sick of hearing it. Apparently he wanted to be close to his Family in France (who are Paris based I believe) by moving to St Etienne – a 5 hour 525Km drive from Paris. Mmm? £2m later on transfer deadline day and he was sat in the conference room of the rather unspectacular French club, (who most of thought were an Indie Beat Combo from the 90’s), next to some bloke who looked like the Toymaker from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang – with a big grin on his face. Gradel would have bagged us 20 again this season; perhaps a bigger contract might have encouraged the Gradel clan to move to Yorkshire? Didier Drogba doesn’t seem to be hell bent on playing for Sochaux or Auxerre to be closer to his brood? Just dreadfully handled and like Howson despite the cash and saved wages – where was his replacement?.. Still waiting.

Johnson publicly stated he wanted to sign a new contract (much as Howson had done) and yet come the close season he fell off the radar and we all knew he was on his way with Norwich, West Brom and a couple of other mid table premier league sides interested.

He’s since slotted nicely into Norwich’s midfield, and we all look on enviously. Why on earth did we let one of our key players leave? But as per the two previously mentioned where was the `superior replacement?

Bates has got out of jail with the emergence of Adam Clayton, but an aged Michael Brown, the bizarre Mika Vayrynen, and the inconsistent Ramon Nunez and Lloyd Sam just haven’t cut it. There have been latter additions like Robbie Rogers, but their impact has been limited, and the odd loan who couldn’t stick it (Townsend) surely keeping hold of your best assets is key – we sold them – and didnt adequately replace them.

If our budget on day one was £9m for playing staff and we were up by £4m (£5m if you include Schmeicel) how does a £12M spend represent a strain on the business? Youd still be in the money. So bad decision 1 selling our best players.

2. Failing to tie players down to contracts

As already mentioned Howson and Johnson’s contracts were running down a la Jermaine Beckford, but they weren’t alone. Neil Kilkenny also basically got fed up with waiting for championship wages, and like Johnson voted with his feet.

We all sat in disbelief as Johnson and Kilkenny’s contracts ran down. Surely we’d learnt our lesson with Beckford? But amazingly the club had the gall to suggest that the Beckford decision was a calculated one, and that Leeds pick and choose who they offer contracts to – andf hold players to them. A total nonsense when you review the Gradel saga. We all considered losing Howson, Johnson, and Kilkenny – surely we wouldn’t lose all of them – would we? Erm yes.

Not only did we manage to get beaten to the punch for David Norris by Portsmouth, Keith Andrews by Ipswich, who were frees we allegedly came close to signing, we failed to offer our own enough. And the market is dictated by the consumer. Kasper Schmeicel’s situation was more bizarre still – we apparently spoke with his agent and established he might want a pay rise at the end of the season – the response, a trip down the M1 to Leicester and a gleeful ken Banking a near £1m transfer fee (allegedly) Schmeicel replacement Rachubka haunts all of our nightmares, and Lonergan has proven just as inconsistent as Schmeicel.

You’d have thought our asset stripping this season might have taught us a valuable lesson, but apparently not. With Aidan White, Adam Clayton and Robert Snodgrass, Ross McCormack close to the end of their deals we still haven’t clarified what next?

Some clubs seem to do this under the radar so as to achieve a good price for players. Our contract lengths seem almost fair game, and negotiations seem to turn bad rapidly. Remember Brad Johnson’s lambasting at the hands of Ken Bates for Picking his `ma up from the station instead of meeting with him to discuss wages – we should definitely get rid of the arrogant so and so Ken..

Bad decision 2 – mishandling players contracts

3. Failing to invest in new players

So you get £2m for Gradel, plus his save wages, £2m for Howson plus his wages, you save Kilkenny’s Schmeicel’s, Johnsons wages – you get like for like – right?

Erm no.. we scrabbled around the bargain bin again, imagine what class of winger you’d get for £2m and at say £12K to £15k a week – already budgeted for. A rising star from League One, a premier league youngster, or a star from one of your rivals. Well let’s not forget this is Leeds. We already had Lloyd Sam and Ramon Nunez – so why not plump for a centre half? Or rather, why bother.

I wont go on.

The usual tripe we’d gotten used to got trawled out – “why buy – when you can do loans? You’ll get premier league quality without the transfer fee”.

“The player was asking for an exorbitant wage – we told him where to go” – the greedy sod.

“We only want players who want to play for Leeds – not mercenaries, if the wages were all that were important – we dont want him.”

We ended up taking a squad to Scotland for Pre-season reminiscent in depth to that which Dennis Wise took – mid-insolvency to Eastern Europe. Which player we brought in this summer sparks the imagination? Sets the pulse racing, or has made a real difference? Answer – none of them. A restrictive wage policy and an aversion to paying transfer fees was for a time glossed over by some `ok’ performances, and by some of the youngsters doing well – for a time.

But our failure to invest and strategize long term is at the root of our dreadful squad.

Bad Decision 3 – not investing in players

4. Investing £7m in the East Stand

But the figures show a profit for 2010-11? £3.5M (near enough the combined transfer fees for Howson and Gradel)

Surely we do make money? Well yes we do, and have a healthy turnover where income conveniently seems to nearly match our outgoings. A rarety in business.

Where did most of our investment cash go in the summer of 2011? The East Stand redevelopment.

Most of us will never see the fabulous Ivory trimmed Pleasure Palace of which Kublai Khan would be jealous – where Ferrero Rocher run like a mountain stream alongside lashings of Lambrini and Carling Black Label. Joking aside we put (by the looks of it) £2m of cash into those boxes from our own turnover and borrowed a further £5m.

Whoopidy do! – so what are the visitors going to watch, more championship drudgery? – did they enjoy 7-3 versus Nottingham Forest more than someone sat in the cold Yorkshire Air that night?

Investing copius amounts of money on our rented ground when the premier league is far from guaranteed seems the most mind blowing piece of bad judgement. £2m would have made some serious inroads into redeveloping our squad, or even our youth set up, as would a £5m loan. It seems like the emperors new clothes. A vanity project which has left us embarrassed. Its the type of decision you lament when in administration. Why was cash flow so poor? Well we were servicing a loan for empty corporate boxes, empty because we didn’t get promoted. Why didn’t you see to it that you did get promoted? Well we needed money for the corporate boxes. Goodnight Vienna.

Bad Decision 4 – Investing what money we did make into corporate boxes.

5. The sacking of Simon Grayson

This is a two-tiered bad decision.

The board were vocal at the time of Grayson’s imminent departure and immediately afterwards concerning just how much they had backed him in the transfer market. And while our erstwhile manager made some gaffes (Paynter, Bruce, Bessone, Sam, Rachubka) which manager doesn’t? Especially one forced to trawl the bargain bins with the aplomb of a 76 year old pensioner (too close to home Ken?)

Generally he did find us some gems, and gave starts to some decent youth players (Somma, McCormack, Gradel, Clayton, Naylor, Lees, White) He returned a decent win ratio of course (over 50%) too.  But his lack of backing in Summer 2011 – at precisely the time he should have been rewarded for strong showing in the championship saw a season of struggle almost inevitable, worse still as per the above his best players got sold from under him.

A manager like Grayson needs backing, not slagging off in public. But the real rub came in the shape of the timing of his departure and the `planning’ around it. Sacked just after the transfer window closed – the club brazenly admitted the move was engineered so the new man could `get the best out of the existing squad’.

They went on to appoint Neil Redfearn, a likeable guy, but at best an assistant at this level ,and certainly not a man to heap a disillusioned and over-tired squad on, losing at Coventry away and Brighton at home is the difference between where we sit now – and the play offs. Sure we brought in Warnock (who seems on paper to have performed worse still) but that decision was appalling in its timing – why didnt they sack Grayson at Christmas, or earlier in the season if they didnt rate him?

Bad Decision 5 – Sacking Simon Grayson

And while I could then easily segue into a quip about the Simple Minds of footballers, that would be too cheap a dig, well what do you know I’ve already done it. I digress.

The Simple Mind about whom this is dedicated is none other than our Beloved `Barn Door Missing’ Billy Paynter.

He’s scored one goal, a good one it has to be said, against Preston last season. But his tale of woe is well-known to most supporters of Leeds. Signed as our chief centre forward for the 2010-11 season he’d trumped even our beloved Beckford to the top of the scoring charts in League One, implausibly scoring 29 goals for them the preceding season.

His goal scoring record then speaks for itself, a strikers value is measured in how many he scores, as per the title of Allan Clarke’s autobiography he told us all `goals are my business’. He came way behind the likes of Becchio who made the transition from League One to Championship with ease.

If only goals were Mr Paynters business. If only he was 1% as good as Allan Clarke.

Simon Grayson’s stock has fallen with many Leeds fans since the appointment of Neil Warnock, but in a rare moment of vision he did more to damage Brighton’s play-off bid than any formation change, loan signing or tactical substitution. Paynter’s loan to Brighton – unsurprisingly unproductive – coincided with a slide down the league table that perhaps only beleaguered fictional comprehensive school Waterloo Road could compete with.

So what now? The training ground’s a-buzz, Paul Connolly has been re-animated; Darren O’Dea has purchased a Kisnorbo hat and started to defend. And Paynter seemed to be on that path too, on the bench for Warnock’s first three games, in which we didnt score, but – then didnt get on the pitch?

The YEP is telling us today that he’s turned down the chance to play for Notts County for the rest of the season, presumably so Warnock could see if he really can play. He wants to fight for his place. Well great.

You’re put in mind of Mike Grella (now at Bury) he refused (allegedly) to play on loan at Bradford; he thought he could do better, and indeed better than Beckford and Becchio, so wouldn’t go. Which attracted the ire of Simon Grayson. His fall from grace is all too visible, and he’s – by the looks of things – decided time on the bench at Brentford also isn’t acceptable to a player of his talents, opting for the bench at Bury instead.

What’s irritating to the average fan in these situations is:-

A) To the outsider it would seem a gilt edged opportunity for the player to find his goal scoring boots again, and he’d (hopefully) come back the better player

B) If it didn’t work out, we’d have some clarity as to whether he was in the squad next season

C) That might enable us to sign up a player coming in on loan for this season (which will invariably be lined up)

So in summary, Paynter not going creates inertia in the squad, and you’d have to say that our striking options are not brilliant. Forssell is clearly not up to it, Webber seems more of a winger, so if Becchio and McCormack got injured that would bring in Paynter, with a lack of match fitness and an inability to score at the moment, which a spell at Notts County might assist.

Come on Billy, Nottingham’s’ quite a nice place you know? Not as good as Leeds (naturally) but where is?

If you take your eyes slightly out of focus (isn’t that what you usually do when you play?) you can pretend you’re playing for Newcastle or West Brom. On finishing this i note that Lloyd Sam has taken the very same option with both hands. You’d argue he probably had a better stake for a first team place than Paynter, so where does that leave him now? Good luck Lloyd, it’s an opportunity to show us all what we’ve been missing.

The Leeds United keeper admitted that he shouldn’t feel “relieved” to have been released from the burden, but that he wasn’t disappointed when Neil Warnock replaced him with Robert Snodgrass as Leeds United captain.

Speaking of the 0-0 draw with Hull City, Lonergan said that he felt a point away from home was always “a point gained” rather than two points lost. He added that the condition of the pitch at The KC Stadium (which also hosts rugby games) wasn’t ideal.

Lonergan also spoke of the improved defensive performances over the last three games, explaining that the biggest difference was Leeds were now defending “as a team” and not taking too many risky chances. The Whites goalkeeper felt Leeds had previously gifted chances to the opposition by not taking easy opportunity to clear their lines.

Despite a positive response to Neil Warnock’s first couple of games, and despite an understanding that Neil Redfearn’s spell meant promotion was pretty much impossible this season, the moaning returned from a section of our support.

It seems the “honeymoon period” for Leeds United managers is precisely three games long. It’s strange when you consider Warnock has had no time to make any serious changes – what else were people expecting? Since Ken Bates decided to leave the hunt for a new manager three weeks, we missed the January transfer window and are, by and large, playing the exact same team – a team that fans should understand by now, isn’t good enough.

It’s not far off in all honesty, but ‘not far off’ doesn’t get you promoted. It leaves you mid-table. Had we kept Max Gradel, Jonny Howson and Bradley Johnson we’d probably be in a much stronger position, but we didn’t, and Neil Warnock has been left to pick up the pieces.

The biggest issue for the last two seasons has been the defence. Two clean sheets away from home, and beaten by a solitary goal at home to the league leaders Southampton – who we absolutely battered – should be taken as a huge positive.

No football team scores the way we were and keeps such a strong defensive record, it just doesn’t happen. In tightening up at the back, there’s been a trade-off in our attacking force. This was inevitable. You can either moan about conceding two goals when we’ve won 3-2, or you can settle down and get used to low-scoring matches. You can’t have it both ways. We’re not Barcelona, we won’t be winning 3-0 regularly.

And it’ll never be as exciting as it was under Simon Grayson, but isn’t that what all the moaning was for? Didn’t fans want him displaced to get the defence tightened up? Seemed to me that no matter how many times I pointed out the fact we were still serious play-off contenders, and that he still got results, fans would point to the defensive record and that would be the end of the debate.

It’s the relentless moaning of fans that does more damage than anything else. The ridiculous knee-jerk reactions to what most teams would consider an incredibly strong result. Leaving the KC last night, I posted an update on Twitter via my phone and some of the responses I received were ridiculous. Not particularly surprising, but ridiculous nonetheless.

Expectations are above and beyond what they realistically should be, we have a fanbase that has no patience whatsoever, who think we should win every game and who will be calling for the managers head otherwise.

One manager is replaced because of incessant moaning and the new man comes in. Fans claim they have no real expectations and will offer him the time he needs to build his own team, yet as soon as a game kicks off, all that goes out of the window. It’s madness.

It’s not so much those at the game either, because there will have been very few people at the KC Stadium last night disappointed with the team. It was scrappy, uneventful, horrible football of the worst possible kind, but you couldn’t really fault the effort. The style of the two teams and the rugby pitch they were playing on was the problem, it was conducive to the kind of lower league scrap-fest that comes from two sides determined to keep a clean sheet. But isn’t that what fans were demanding?

Clean sheets come from teams, like Hull City, that defend from the front. Teams that put their bodies on the line to win every ball and restrict the movement of their opposition. Last night, we needed a couple of solid saves from Lonergan to keep it at 0-0, but for the most part, we worked hard as a unit and put on a strong defensive display.

It’s all about next season, it always has been. The play-offs were never realistic when Warnock arrived, so we should be taking comfort from what we’re currently witnessing. We’re seeing a team reinvented and built on a solid defensive foundation. Warnock will continue to tweak his Leeds United side, add some new faces in the summer, and by next season I think we’ll be amongst the strongest sides in the division.

If our new manager doesn’t get bored of the moaning and head for the hills that is.

On November 10th, we posted an article called ‘Simon Grayson a Bargain at £56,320 Per Point’. The article used TransferMarkt‘s best guesses on transfer fees to show that, according to TransferMarkt‘s figures, Simon Grayson was far and away the best value manager based on transfer fees paid – almost half of second placed Kenny Jackett. As a post-script, responding to feedback from commenters, the article then included a table from The Swiss Ramble of wages spent in 2009-10. This showed that in our League One promotion season Leeds spent far more than several Championship clubs including Watford and Swansea. It also showed Leeds spent a lower percentage of their income than any other club in the Championship that year.

On January 21st, we posted an article called ‘The £11.5m Leeds United Warchest’. This article reported disclosures in Leeds’ programme notes from our Chairman Ken Bates. He said that Grayson’s ‘player budget’ for this season was initially £9.5m, and had risen to £11.5m as Bates had bent the budget to support the manager. Using 2009-10′s figures from The Swiss Ramble, we highlighted that Leeds United would have been only 19th in the table in terms of wage spending two years ago. We also mentioned that Leeds’ 2009-10 figures (placing them 14th) were incredibly vague – including not only the players, but the managers, physios, and Board and transfer ‘pot’.

On March 1st, last Thursday, we posted an article called ‘The Wages Saga (Continued…)’. This acknowledged Blackpool’s published accounts that showed a combined wage and transfer budget in their Premiership Season of £15.6m and would not suggest Leeds’ £12.5m budget (risen yet again) for the season was overly poor.

Yet more evidence has come out, again to do with Blackpool’s wages. It seems Ken Bates has shot himself in the foot. While Blackpool did indeed only spend £15.6m in their Premier League season, and even sold Adam for £7m, the Daily Mail has analysed the accounts and have pointed out a scandal:

Blackpool’s financial accounts for that 2010-11 campaign, filed in the past 48 hours and relating to their first season in the top flight for 39 years, reveal that one of Blackpool’s six directors was paid a staggering £11 million in remuneration for the season that ended with the club’s relegation back to the Championship.

And the unnamed director, paid through his company, Zabaxe, was the chairman’s father, Blackpool’s multi-millionaire majority shareholder, Owen Oyston.

[...]

That remuneration smashes every pay record for a non-player in English football and puts Blackpool’s majority shareholder among the global game’s highest earners for a single season, whether it is players, managers or club executives.

The wage that Blackpool’s majority share-holder “earnt” is, in fact, more than highly-rated manager Ian Holloway, star player Charlie Adam and the rest of the squad’s combined!

So it would seem that to excuse what seems to be very low expenditure on the playing side of the club, through the Blackpool’s accounts is odd at best.

Fans will be forgiven for linking the scenario at Blackpool: with the sale of star player Charlie Adam for £7m to the reported interest from Cardiff in signing integral club captain Robert Snodgrass for £8m, as well as the sale of Max Gradel and Kasper Schmeichel, and the refusal to pay for the renewal of the contracts of Bradley Johnson, Jonny Howson, and Neil Kilkenny. Indeed, Ken Bates has shown himself far from trustworthy, with the news eventually surfacing that despite assuring Leeds fans all summer that Max Gradel was going nowhere, the Ivorian international was in fact told he could leave at the start of the summer.

Given his quoting of Blackpool as justification for Leeds’ low investment in the club, you have to question whether Ken Bates thinks this is the ideal way to run a club?

Neil Warnock celebrates Becchio's winner yesterday

The emotional Lee Clark who spent flamboyantly for no results, a similar possibility in Dave Jones, the whining Billy Davies, and the consistent failure Paul Ince would not have fitted the role. Neil Redfearn was not the right man either. Though we owe him gratitude for spending three tough weeks trying to keep the players focused while fans hurled stick at him and the club’s media pushed him forward as Grayson’s potential successor.

In Neil Warnock Leeds get a strong hand at the helm, with plenty of intelligence and bags of experience to boot. As Shaun Derry told Yorkshire Radio before the match, there’s more to Neil Warnock than the comical pantomime villain that fans see in press conferences. A man who demands hard work and application, and who delivers his side of the bargain. Robert Snodgrass told YEP a few days ago that the team need to grow up:

“The fans get frustrated and whatever they want to shout, us as players need to make things right by earning the right to win games and putting our bodies on the line. At the moment, I don’t think that’s happening.”

“Every game you go into, you have to believe that you’re going to win it. The day when you stop approaching games like that, I’d hang my boots up and never play again.”

This is the mentality that we have so sorely lacked recently, and the mentality that Neil Warnock brings to the club. He’s firm, but fair. His interview after the match showed his paternalistic approach to the lads:

“They’re very keen and they listen.”

“They were trying really hard. I think the problem here, with the expectations and everything, is that they just need to relax a little bit.”

The Warnock we know well as an opposition team is the Warnock I’m sure our opponents will keep seeing. He’s not a miracle-worker, either. It took him a few years to turn a mid-table Sheffield United into a promotion-winning team. Nevertheless, he achieved it. He took over at a QPR that was quite well funded, and he used his money wisely and drove them to the Championship title. But he can’t do it all on his own, just like Robert Snodgrass can’t drag the rest of the team with him. Warnock needs financial backing.

Ken Bates and Peter Lorimer have been vocal enough on supposed overspending. There certainly are plenty of high-profile signings who failed to get a place in Grayson’s plans and remained on the wage book. Andy O’Brien from the Premiership, Alex Bruce a proven Championship defender, Billy Paynter supposed to replace Jermaine Beckford after impressing in League One, Mikael Forssell a former Chelsea forward.

Darren O’Dea, Adam Smith and Andros Townsend all see their contracts expire at the end of the season. Without passing judgement, when the club stops paying their wages it will give Warnock some freedom to spend on players of his own choosing. Meanwhile Michael Brown (who has performed under Warnock’s leadership at Sheffield United and was named in the Championship team of the year in 2002-3) and Mika Vayrynen give Warnock the freedom to release or retain for another season, and Lloyd Sam and Mikael Forssell see their contracts expire along with highly rated youngster Aidy White.

But we need more than a few players ending their contracts. The mystery surrounding the club has led some (including me) to briefly consider that we really are struggling to stay afloat. This isn’t the case. We made £12.5million profit on player purchases and sales since Simon Grayson came, by my reckoning. Of this, £7million has gone into stadium redevelopment. That leaves £5.5million. A worryingly high figure to go missing on top of significantly higher attendences than average at top-five Premiership prices.

Tracing this cash is possible through the Ipswich programme notes. The following paragraph has already been published in a previous article:

‘”Where’s the money gone?” is the latest chant from the vociferous few. Well, I’ll tell them. Simon Grayson’s player budget was £9.5M for the year. As I write we have so far committed £11.722M, over budget by nearly 23%. It’s a bad business practice but a demonstration how we have backed the manager and continue to do so.’

We’ve already used stats from The Swiss Ramble on wage expenditure in 2009/10. These statistics would place Leeds’ self-reported £9.5million budget 18th in Championship spending, our revised £12.5million would put us 14th in expenditure (the same as 2009/10 when we gained promotion from League One). Certainly Bates didn’t under-fund Grayson at League One level. Over the past few years players’ contracts signed in boom time have ended and players find it harder to get work as lads like Parnaby and Forssell show. It’s not helped Simon Grayson move on players he didn’t want. Despite that, Bates’ assertion that we’re one of the highest spenders in the division seems laughable. A drop of £4million in average wage expenditure over two years – roughly £3,000 per week per player – would make that the case; such a hefty drop is unlikely.

The next statement in the programme notes was by far the most important and changes the entire scenario for the future. It’s one that I and most others missed:

“With the exception of the museum, that completes the rebuilding, refurbishment, and improvements of Elland Road with approximately £20M having been spent on the clapped out, decaying stadium that I inherited.”

Even if we take this spending to have begun seven years ago at an even pace – when Leeds was fighting for it’s life – the budgets would have taken a £2.85million hit per season. By Ken Bates’ own mouth, his stadium projects have taken away at least a massive £55,000 per-week-per-season that could have been invested into the team. Balance that with roughly £12.5million profit from player sales, and we were still taking away £20,000 per-week-per-season from normal income. These are rough figures. We’re much more likely to have spent more on developments over the past couple of years; James McClean has been rewarded with a new contract recently by Martin O’Neill at Premiership Sunderland said to be worth £10,000-£15,000 per week.

We could pay a lot more towards wages than we have done. We could have afforded to keep our players. I’m not going to debate whether spending on the Stadium is wise. But either way what matters is that Bates has told us “that completes the rebuilding, refurbishment, and improvements”. We know for a fact, using Bates’ figures, that if he refrains from non-football development over the next couple of years, we easily have the ability to back the proven promotion-specialist Neil Warnock in making some quality key signings this summer should we fail in our promotion push this year. If Warnock is not offered adequate backing then I’m sure we will know about it. We do have the money to succeed. MOT!

Case in point is Simon Grayson, a man who I defended to the hilt throughout his tenure at Elland Road. It was never all that difficult considering his win percentage and highly successful start to the job, but when things went off the rails a little, some felt I was allowing Ken Bates’ failings to cover those of Simon Grayson.

I was stuck between a rock and a hard place. Reactionary responses always seem to cloud the bigger picture, and under current circumstances you can’t have it both ways. You can either accept that the side is underfunded and that mid-table is the best we’re capable of (which is what the majority have said all along and predicted long before Max Gradel and Jonny Howson were sold) or you can blame the manager for the kind of inconsistent form indicative of mid-table teams – thus excusing Ken Bates by default. If you expect better than what we’ve seen then what you’re saying is that the team is better than a mid-table outfit. Anything else is contradictory.

People can excuse themselves by pointing to performance levels and tactical observations offered with the benefit of hindsight, but statistics don’t lie. Nor does the league table. If the club has paid for a mid-table team, and we’re in mid-table, then Simon Grayson was living up to all expectations.

When Max Gradel, Jonny Howson, Bradley Johnson and Neil Kilkenny were sold/given away and replaced by has-beens, frees and loanees there was absolute uproar. The fans knew the cheap replacements and loanees would not be of a similar skill level, or hold a similar level of passion for the club. Replacing a young heart-on-his-sleeve midfielder like Bradley Johnson with a has-been journeyman like Michael Brown was never going to be an improvement – and Simon Grayson can’t be blamed for that, he wanted Keith Andrews! But in an oh-so-typical Yorkshire Radio rant from Ken Bates, the Leeds chairman blasted his ridiculous wage demands and Shaun Harvey and Gwyn Williams brought us Brown instead. Andrews meanwhile ended up at the mighty Ipswich Town who, despite a lower turnover, higher wage budget and a similar amount of playing staff to ourselves, could afford him.

But we know all this. We know that our squad of young and hungry players has been systematically cast off and replaced by has-beens, unknowns and loanees because the club first failed to secure new contracts (Shaun Harvey) and secondly, failed to provide adequate funding for suitable replacements (Ken Bates).

So who should we be blaming?

Should Simon Grayson be held accountable for achieving mid-table with a mid-table team?

Should we not be questioning the distinctly average wage bill? The non-existant transfer funds? The constant sales of key players?

If you disagree with my assertion that Simon Grayson was underfunded, then fair enough. You’re well within your rights to complain about the performance. You’re wrong (see this link), but that’s beside the point – at least your opinions aren’t contradictory.

For the rest of you, you can’t look at the evidence, set your expectations to “incredibly low” then complain when the reality lives up to your own predictions. Doing so excuses Ken Bates and his minions, and that’s all Simon Grayson’s sacking was ever about. It was a simple ploy to distract the dissidents by creating division – Ken Bates has been doing it for years, just ask the Chelsea fans.

If you subscribe to the statement that Simon Grayson was sacked to give us a chance at the play-offs, then why are we sat here two weeks and six dropped points later without a replacement? If Simon Grayson was underachieving as much as Ken Bates likes to claim, then why wait until the end of January when there was talk of his sacking at the beginning? And why was every poor performance the managers fault before Simon Grayson was sacked, and now it’s apparently the players?

At this point in time, I actually think Simon Grayson’s downfall was that he over-achieved. The problems we’re now experiencing have existed all along, and always will whilst football isn’t the main priority of those running our football club.

When Simon Grayson led us to a 7th placed finish last season, it set the tone for everything that followed. It allowed the club to pretend the team didn’t need any further investment – “maybe a little tinkering around the edges, but nothing major” was the general theme of transfer discussion from the club – and has since been used as evidence we can do better, despite the sale of key players Max Gradel and Jonny Howson.

So are those of us that write this site overcritical of Ken Bates? Well, the crux of the matter is this – as a hard-working (well, working) customer of Leeds United Football Club, I expect a proportionate sum of my money to be spent on the squad I go to watch. I expect the biggest one club city in England to be aiming towards a successful future, and for the manager to be given the necessary funding to achieve that dream. I don’t want a hotel, I couldn’t care less about the museum and I managed to get suitably drunk long before Billy’s Bar and the Pavilion were added.

These things all come down to Ken Bates. A manager can only be judged by the funding (relative to division) that he receives, and in Simon Grayson’s case, he had a mid-table budget. Who else am I supposed to blame?

All I really expect is for football to be the priority. Is that really too much to ask of a football club?

It’s not as if Redfearn has had it all that tough either. In-form Brighton may have looked like a bit of a tricky fixture, but the reality is, they played poorly. He got the result at Bristol City, granted, but that had a lot more to do with the two red cards than any managerial prowess. Against nine man Bristol, I’d expect our youth team to win 3-0.

Then there’s last night’s fixture away to bottom of the pile Coventry City, statistically the worst team in the Championship. The Coventry City fans must have left wondering how on earth we’re so far above them after that showing – I know I did.

Leeds fans know we don’t have the best team in Championship, not even close. We have an underfunded mid-table side that was living up to all expectations before Simon Grayson was sacked. Then our ever-so-predictable chairman decided to test the cheapest option before looking for a suitable replacement, which leaves us in the mess we’re in now – six points dropped and looking like the worst side in the division.

There are simply no positives I can offer Redfearn. The farcical defensive errors remained, there was no tactical change whatsoever, we have an excellent central midfield in Delph & Clayton that the caretaker-manager got absolutely nothing out of and we were pretty useless in attack – aside from Ross McCormack that is, who Redfearn (in his infinite wisdom) decided to take off when we were searching for a winner.

The crowds chants of “there’s only one Simon Grayson” summed things up perfectly. Redfearn will point to the two penalties and bemoan his luck, but the reality is, we were second best to the Championship’s whipping boys. Grayson may have had his faults, but he was the difference between what we’ve witnessed in the last three games and the mid-table Championship side our chairman hasn’t paid for – and then sold off, before not paying for again.

I don’t expect miracles from Redfearn under current circumstances, I really don’t. But I expect some kind of change, some attempt to secure the job permanently that changes Leeds United’s style completely. Otherwise, what’s the point?

The crux of the matter is this; Simon Grayson had us as high, if not higher than the investment in this squad should realistically achieve – anything beyond that is miraculous. Had we sacked Simon Grayson because Merlin the Magician had suddenly become available then fair enough – “alakazaham” and we’re in the Premier League, job done.

Even if we’d sacked Simon Grayson because Ken Bates felt there was another manager available, whose ideas could give us that final push we needed, I could have bitten my tongue and accepted that too. But that wasn’t the case. Simon Grayson was sacked as part of a shameless ploy to divert attention away from a failing board. The club then tried to cop out of paying for a replacement by testing the cheapest option available.

The most depressing thing is, this was an extremely poor Coventry City side. It took two penalties for them to beat an even worse Leeds United side, which tells you everything you need to know about how incredibly relegation-worthy they are. Like Brighton at the weekend, we’d have probably snatched all three points had we staged the late attacking flurry we were so famous for under Simon Grayson. Instead, our most threatening player (and goal scorer) was removed and we did absolutely nothing.

Quite why we didn’t surge forward is as baffling as Ross McCormack’s substitution because Coventry didn’t look capable of scoring from open play. The biggest threat they posed came from corners and Luciano Becchio was heading most of those clear. Aside from that, they may as well have had two Billy Paynter’s leading the line for all the difference it would have made.

Unfortunately, there’s even less to speak of in terms of Leeds United’s efforts. We constantly threatened to string three or four passes together but then decided against it and returned possession to the home side instead. If nothing else, we’re certainly charitable under Redfearn.

All this leaves us six points off the play-off places, with 5^th placed Birmingham City and 6^th placed Reading both having a game in hand over us. The boards failure to act quickly means we’ve squandered one of the easiest runs we’ll get all season and with just 15 games remaining, a third season in the Championship is starting to look inevitable. And just to rub salt into the wounds, Fabian Delph sustained an injury during the course of one of the worst games of football ever witnessed. Truly depressing times for Leeds United Football Club.

Silver lining? Well, Merlin isn’t available but a twice Championship champion is…

“At the moment we’ve got 16 first team players. My initials stand for Mick McCarthy, not Merlin the Magician.”

Final score: Coventry City 2 – 1 Leeds United