Open Mike night

[style_cafe]

The only exciting bit was Mike Mulvey.

It was also good to hear that the rumours about the COE being independent of the Mariners was false according to Pikey.

(side note...Rowdy and Erin are comfortable and articulate with a mike in their hands.....future MC's at the gosford show perhaps?
Was good to finally meet Cafe Style and Pat Jennings in person. Top chaps.)

Thanks Mate, it was good to finally meet you too.
Nice to meet and chat with Ancient Mariner too.

 

[style_cafe]

Summary.

1. No one wants to buy us.
2. FFA are holding back the development of HAL and potential buyers.
3. Pikey isn't made of money and will lose nearly $1m this year.
4. He isn't going to spend up big.
5. We are going to be smarter in how we operate.

MC also admitted that he had made some mistakes with coaches etc. but he was trying to rectify that with the announcement of Mike Mulvey as the new coach

 

[Ancient Mariner]

Summary.

1. No one wants to buy us.
2. FFA are holding back the development of HAL and potential buyers.
3. Pikey isn't made of money and will lose nearly $1m this year.
4. He isn't going to spend up big.
5. We are going to be smarter in how we operate.

I thought the most interesting thing that MC had to say was that he was confident that next year the Aleague will be independent of the FFA and that this will lead to much more foreign investment in the League. I got the feeling he has spoken to possible investors and that is all that is holding them back. The read I got on him was that this will be a game breaker.

As to point 1. he stated that all football clubs are for sale, but the only interest shown in anyone buying CCM were those who wanted just the license and then to relocate, eg South Melbourne.

 

[pjennings]

@Shaun Mielekamp - thanks for organising tonight. My only problem with the night was we got stuck on one depressing subject for quite a while before the announcement of Mike Mulvey raised the mood.

There were a number of other topics that didn't get addressed before Mike C. time ran out that were raised in this thread. Is it possible that these topics are answered - whether it is by Mike or yourself.

 

[Forum Phoenix]

Thanks for the feed Josh.

I liked Mulvey a lot. On track record and on his performance tonight - clearly the best and most well rounded coach we’ve had since Arnie. And that’s lucky, because with our micro budget and no dollar relief coming, along with some incredibly savvy recruiting, that’s the biggest positive we can really hope for in seeing our performances hopefully improve.

A focus on winning using tactical diversity and not talking about how “I” like to play this way and only this way, is obviously a breath of fresh air and a good start.

Disappointed to hear we’re still losing so much money and regardless of it being an unlikeable amswer that offers such little comfort, it obviously explains why we’re still not spending on our squad. I’ve become as critical as most. Because we’re shit. And it’s very painful watching family walk away after being inaugural members because we’re so poor.

But I had thought until this year we’d been getting into or ar least close to the black over the last 2-3 years? I’d love that confirmed. Did I just get totally confused on this? Because it certainly made me and everyone else I know believe we could/should surely be taking some more financial risk given our awful results and made Mike look a lot tighter.

But if we’re losing a million a season still... And “The Pikey” is not symphoning off money from the COE. (Which I never believed) Then we’re where we are because there’s just no way round it if a more cashed up buyer is not on the cards and MC is not an endless source of cash. Short story, we’re still wedged between a rock and a hard place. And Mulveys going to have to outcoach the hell out of at least half the competition for us to make finals next year and also nail his recruitment,

In which case... sorry lads, but terrible as things have been, blaming MC for not being richer becomes a pointless exercise at best now, and if we just continue to do it inspite of the facts - and unless Mike and Sean are now bald faced lying then that’s what they are - then it just becomes the kind of shithouse petulant behaviour that I’m not interested in.

Though granted, if Mulvey can’t turn us around then everything we’ve said about the breaking point and losing members we also know to be true and still stands. So it’s a precipice we have to walk yet a bloody gain.

Back onto another positive, I liked everything Mulvey said about youth. Including the too big for your boots stuff. And he’s also right that a lot of talent does come out of QLD, so I thought that was positive. He’s also right about the owness also being on the players.

But the flip side of all that is our fortunes are still going to rest on the type of senior players we both keep and can attract on our micro budget. So a good question about his Aussie connections I thought, which was well answered by Mulvey and gives a little more hope.

Ok, so now let’s go pump the scum and move on to greener pastures please. Or at least let’s step out from the mud blood and shit we’ve been standing in for the past 4 years and move onto some merely dry and withered pastures eh.

 

[Big Al]

So our academy coach was rumored to have used to many qlders now it’s Mulvey secret plan

Mulvey can be the guy and his fit is getting better each time we talk about it

I like the house purchase, about time. Will make life much easier for the kids. What we need on top of that is someone to give them part time work like a builders labour so they can do both, learn real life and also earn some money for expenses.

The whole living on the coast by Mulvey and these juniors is a great start and hopefully extends to all first team players. Great idea if only we’d thought of it first

As for the WSMA not so sure about that one. You can’t live and breathe the club if you aren’t within cooee of it. What’s the point of this when he have a house
Is it CCU for WSW? What i mean by that is it an academy for the players at all levels not WSW worthy? There are a few private football academy’s in WSW as well as all the big NPL clubs. Not sure this is a smart move and the cash could be better used as will be a very expensive project getting coaches grounds etc and most of all does a WS kid want to play for WSMA?

And of course we have no money but we knew that and it’s still FFA’s fault. I don’t like how he is hoping for independence as FFA have shown they have the ability to get FIFA to not replace them (maybe that world cup bid was more about political power with FIFA than Workd Cup votes)

Nice job to upgrade from shiny drawings to a coach. Certainly know how to turn a room

Also have to give credit for a couple of brutal questions. Like the club giving the questions the club always gets but love the dodge even better

 

[Big Al]

The highlight from what i saw had to be mike leaning in to the computer as if trying to hear the questions. Mate you have earphones in. Turn them up

 

[adz]

On one hand I thought it was good that question was asked unfiltered. On the other hand I think it shows why they need to be filtered. After the third round of - why don't you put more money in, why don't you just sell the club or f**k off (along with various insults) - even though those questions had been answered, it got a bit embarrassing, and makes us all look like f**king idiots. Just my thoughts on that part.

 

[Insertnamehere]

Was there anything said about Monty coming on board as a coaching staff member and utilising guys who've had success with club as ring in coaches? Obviously MM should choose his own asst, that doesn't mean we can't succession plan which hasn't been done well so far. Even if MM stays with us 20 years....

 

[Pirate Pete]

Was there anything said about Monty coming on board as a coaching staff member and utilising guys who've had success with club as ring in coaches? Obviously MM should choose his own asst, that doesn't mean we can't succession plan which hasn't been done well so far. Even if MM stays with us 20 years....

The question was asked about Monty.
MM said at the moment there is no assistant or other staff. Although he has people in mind.
He was aware of Monty and did say when he coached Roar it was always a pain in the ass
playing us with Hutch & Monty in midfield.

 

[Big Al]

Spoke to my mate at work who lives in Western Sydney (WS) and said we are planning an academy in WS.
He was keen, he said if his son didn’t make WSW he’d absolutely go to that. Didn’t hesitate. I was happily surprised.

 

[scottmac]

On one hand I thought it was good that question was asked unfiltered. On the other hand I think it shows why they need to be filtered. After the third round of - why don't you put more money in, why don't you just sell the club or f**k off (along with various insults) - even though those questions had been answered, it got a bit embarrassing, and makes us all look like f**king idiots. Just my thoughts on that part.

100%, I can not understand why someone thought it necessary to read it every f**king question on the same topic. It was beyond embarrassing. Pick one on the topic or mix some together and then change topic. We had the owner to answer questions and it was completely wasted

 

[tyson]

It might be worth noting that Mulvey mentioned to us that he turned down an offer in Thailand that was 3 times more than what he will earn with us. The guy must really want the challenge.

 

[Big Al]

100%, I can not understand why someone thought it necessary to read it every f**king question on the same topic. It was beyond embarrassing. Pick one on the topic or mix some together and then change topic. We had the owner to answer questions and it was completely wasted

Agree but I suppose the point is we did allow the hard questions that the simple bitch about. While annoying, maybe that is the point. Now we don’t need to do that again. Doesn’t matter how many times they ask he isn’t selling or spending. The end

 

[FFC Mariner]

Whilst I take Adz's point, I tend to feel that MC is fed super positive bullshit from his staff and has a false picture of the mood of his customers. Maybe repetition of the same point will ram it home for him.
I know this is a view shared by some others and explains how out of touch he seems

 

[adz]

Fair point and I also get the feeling he isn't given a very accurate picture, probably shielded from all that goes on here. I think it was pre-game when we did retro round last season, he looked shocked at some of the things being said to him. Maybe that needed to be done but not sure how much good it will do in the end? If it was me I probably would have gone f**k this, if you want me to sell up there is a stack of expansion bids that will happily buy the licence... and take it to South Sydney, Tassie, Brisbane, Wherever.

He seems like he genuinely wants the club to do well and puts a lot of money in. Some of the stuff he gets called is over the top and pretty unfair. I was talking to some people that don't follow the A-League at all and don't know anything about the club, they were shocked when I said we have a guy putting in a million dollars out of his pocket into the club every year and he gets called all sorts of names - because he won't spend more!

There are some issues that keep festering - it's like a little rumour gets started and there is nobody to shoot it down so all of a sudden it's fact and the pitch forks are out - and I realise I just described the internet there... but maybe we need more regular communication from Mike? Maybe he needs to address some of the shit that goes on every now and then, but having said that - when he answers a question and then gets shot down because he didn't say what people wanted to hear, and it gets asked over and over... plus a few "you Pikey c**t"s... what are you meant to do then?

Personally I'm not sure money is *the only* answer. Even if we were spending the cap and a bit there is no guarantee the quality would be there. I think we tried to spend more wisely this season, have a decent quality (comparatively) striker - and that failed. That's been acknowledged and things been put in place to prevent that happening again. I can't believe all the player hiring came down to the say-so of one person anyway! Any other professional club will have a team of people working on this shit. We also shouldn't have done as badly as we did with the players that we had. That would come down to inflexible coaching, and "man management" I guess, and we've also addressed that one (potentially).

I'm just not sure what people are expecting here. There doesn't seem to be a line up of billionaires waiting to buy the club with a home ground in GOSFORD and chuck a few million every year into it. Constantly ripping into the guy that is propping up the club doesn't seem fair to me. Pissing off and ripping up your membership doesn't seem very helpful either. If we only wanted to support a club with deep pockets we would all throw our membership cards over the fence in a little tantrum and go support Melbourne City.

 

[scottmac]

Will be very interesting to see who mulvey tries to re sign from the off contract list or who he's allowed to more to point.

 

[style_cafe]

I`m happy more than happy with the way the open mike night went
I was a brave move to have the owner & CEO opening up to some pretty fierce questions.
I was impressed with honesty that both showed & the way they took the questions.
Neither got upset & both acted & spoke well with the best interest of the club first & foremost with each answer.
Yes,the questions did get a little repetitive but look beyond the questions to the passion & frustration of those that asked in the first place.
I`ve followed QPR all my life,so i`m used to the roller-coaster ride.
Times will get better,I`m 100% sure of that.I`m just not sure when though...
So I`ll keep renewing every year & as Ancient wisely said "Until the club dies or I die"

 

[serious14]

Good bye.

Are you Shaun in disguise? A paying member from literally the day the club sold memberships that has travelled interstate and overseas (independent of any club tour) to watch them play is so fed up with the way things are run they're prepared to boycott until the owner moves on... and all you can muster is a good bye?

If I was anyone even remotely connected with the club I'd be investigating why each and every lapsed member has done so and then passing that on to whoever can do something about it. Dismissing our entirely valid concerns with "hurr durr you're not a real fan jog on" is the opposite of what you should be doing.

 

[serious14]

Most of that sounds like a cop out.

That's exactly what it is. That's exactly what this fools ownership tenure has been. A list of excuses.

And let's not forget the _stunning_ heights of 8th, 9th (probably twice) and 10th that we've been guided to since he got here. Yaaaaaaaaay.