"Sack the Board."

          The other day West Ham supports staged a protest at the ownership of their club by Davids Gold, and Sullivan. Supporters stopped the game three times with pitch invasions and then supporters congregated beneath the directors box, screaming abuse and the adult industry mogels that run their club. Unhappy at leaving their spiritual home, moving to a bigger stadium with no atmosphere and continuing with yet more mediocrity and then appointing David Moyes as manager. Supporters want change and they deserve it.

          Forest had similar issues last year. Protesting at the Al Hasawi family's ownership of the club. supporters were unhappy with the repeated sacking of managers, unpaid bills giving Forest a bad name and the downward spiral that came every season as our final position was lower year on year. That all ended this summer, with the takeover by Greek shipping magnate Evangelos Maranakis, and it came in the nick of time. Under Hasawi, the trend in league finishing positions would have seen Forest relegated.

          These clubs aren't exactly anomalies either. Clubs have been mismanaged for years from 1990's Doncaster, through to pleasant day Coventry and Blackburn. All of which, you'll read about below.

Owners are usually only in football for their own game these days.

          Coventry City are the first club on the agenda. The current owners, Sisu Capital, took over in December 2007, saving the cub from administration and a points deduction whilst still in the Championship. At the time there was much local optimism, but this would prove to be short lived. After almost ten years under the control of Sisu Capital, Coventry City face almost certain relegation to League Two. Let's not forget that this team won the FA Cup in 1987, and were in the top flight of English football from 1967 to 2001. As of yet they have no deal arranged for them to play at the Ricoh Arena after the end of this season. Their training ground is at risk of being sold off to have houses built on it and they are also contemplating the closure of their academy in June. The peak of resent towards Sisu came when Coventry were evicted from the Ricoh Arena, and had to Groundshare with Northampton Town, approximately 35 miles from Coventry, at the Sixfields Stadium. They currently sit bottom of League One, 14 points from safety.

A mostly empty stadium, this is becoming the norm for the Sky Blues.

          In 2010, the Venky family bought Blackburn Rovers from the Jack Walker Trust. The Indian Chicken magnates took on debts of between £10m-£20m. That figure is now up to over £100m. The managerial revolving door has been going for 8 years now, all starting with the dismissal of Sam Allardyce in 2010. Other managers include Henning Berg who lasted 57 days, and Michael Appleton who lasted the comparatively long 67 days. Attendances at Ewood park continue to dwindle and if there has been any improvement of late it is almost definitely to do with the fact they are in the promotion hunt, albeit following their relegation at the end of last season. The recurring theme in recent years has been the sale of the best players at the club, leaving supporters dismayed. Meanwhile the silence from the boardroom is deafening.
          Now, onto my favourite story in this list. I first heard about the goings on at Doncaster Rovers under Ken Richardson from 1992-1998 in a 'Banter Era' thread on Twitter and it's almost unbelievable what happened. I suggest you read it for yourself (link at the bottom.) Richardson took over the club in 1993, having previously ran non-league Bridlington Town, who he actually bankrupted. His first madness was listing the clubs Belle Vue Stadium as  'For Sale' in national broadsheet papers, despite not owing the ground. The council, who did own the ground, were not impresses. In 1995 one of the stands caught fire, it was arson, but who was behind it? The first game of the 1996-97 season began with Sammy Chung arriving, only to be told an hour before kick off that he was no longer the Doncaster manager. Summer 1997 was just as mad, rather than building on the successes of the previous season they sold their four best players. Not only that, Doncaster had planned to put the Borough Crest on the shirt, they had 2,000 made without seeking permission. The council refused, still annoyed at Richardson trying to sell the ground and the shirts were wasted. The club were in a mess. shipping 13 goals in their first two home league games, Manager Kerry Dixon left due to being unhappy at Richardson's influence on teams selections. Most owners would deny this, not Richardson, who took caretaker charge and lost again. I honestly urge you to go and read this thread. It's so bad at points you'll laugh.
https://twitter.com/vivarovers/status/968267589611851776?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw&ref_url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.planetfootball.com%2Fquick-reads%2Fseven-best-banter-era-twitter-threads-everton-west-ham%2F&tfw_creator=planetfutebol&tfw_site=planetfutebol

Doncaster were a sorry mess in the 1990's

          I feel like i'm only scratching the surface here. I'm yet to talk about the Munto Finance mess at Notts County, the Oyston Family and Blackpool, and everything that went off at Portsmouth that lead to the numerous relegation's. At some point there will be a part two of this.

That's all for now though,

Cheers

Craig