I've taken to not posting after the match because it's basically the same post every time and nobody wants to read the same post every week. Instead, I like to sit back with a drink and think about where it all went wrong. Many will blame Randy Lerner and you'd be right, but it's not that he wants to fail or he wants to be relegated. It's that he knows little about football and listens to the wrong people.
It's his decisions that have been bad. Somebody somewhere should have told him that Fox was a bad idea. I've tried to write it for a while and for full transparency, I've got to now tell you why. You see, the talk isn't just talk anymore. It looks like that he and his cronies are going to get the sack.
Not sure how true it is, but hearing Tom Fox is done at #avfc at end of season.
— The Villa Blog (@AVFCBlog) February 28, 2016
When Fox was appointed as the CEO, I reached out with one question. The question was a simple one that could have been answered really easily. The question was this; what was the rationale in giving a new contract to the manager after so few games into the new season and after two seasons of near relegation?
Tom Fox didn't answer the question the right way. He answered it like an American that knew little about football.
Not the only reason
But that wasn't why I took an instant dislike to him. I bumped into a couple of people at Crystal Palace away that season in the Directors box. One was Villa, one was Arsenal. I wont tell you what they both said, but it was pretty much the same as I was told by another person. That confirmed it for me because I trust two of those three people and one wasn't in the room.
Tom Fox then went on a meeting rampage with anyone connected to Aston Villa. I think I was the only person that said no. When his secretary reached out I replied "I think it would probably be a waste of time for both of us". I knew in 2014 that Tom Fox was a waste of space. I'm just sad that it's taken this long to get rid of him while we are on the cusp of relegation.
But I don't blame Randy Lerner even though he has to take responsibility. He made mistakes in appointing the wrong people when it was so obvious that they were the wrong choices. The previous CEO appointed McLeish and the current, soon to be sacked CEO, just made mistake after mistake after mistake. The next CEO can be the office manager as long as they know something about football. You don't need an MBA to run a football club and Paul Faulkner showed that you just need a cheeky smile.
Passion and common sense are more important. And someone that doesn't get drunk on the attention. But that's not easy to find and that's why Randy thought he was making the right choices.