RIP Jack Hayward

[Elgrande]

[Garawa]

"You don't become Chairman of Unilever because you have a passion for soap powder or because you were born close to the company's offices".

You are correct Rimshot but why should football be different to EVERY other business out there? It is different to the fans by miles but why should it to those at the top? Are all chairmen out there supporters of their club? The West Ham lot were Birmingham owners recently and there is one (can't think of him name now, want to say John Madjeski but its wrong) who has been CEO / chairman of several league clubs. He puts money in but as loans to be paid back! Scally isn't unique by miles. Going one further lets say a chairman is expected to pay lots of his own money into the club "because he loves football" and then he becomes chairman of the FA or FIFA. Should he continue even though it is still the game he loves or stop because its not a club even if one he doesn't actually support anyway???

Put money in to get a business off the ground if fine, I accept that but when it can stand on its own financially the chairman is just a highly paid member of staff like at any other business. Find an investor to add funds into the club is quite different in my book.

[gillsfan1066]

No one buys an "established" First or Second Division club to make money, if they do they are dreaming,and by established I mean a Gillingham,Port Vale, an Aldershot,a team that has spent 99% of it's life in the 3 or 4th division,and plays in front of a small crowd week in week out .
If Scally had loved Gillingham, if he really bled blue, if he was PROUD of what he had he would have NEVER ,NEVER allowed us to be relegated from the Championship,he would have sold the farm,wife and kids to ensure we stayed playing with the big boys, this BS about not wanting to see Gillingham FC go into debt, all BS.
My guess is half the Chairman and the Board of teams in the lower divisions put their hands in their pockets every year to help the club, and I bet they loan money to the club in wads repayable over huge amounts of time at 10 quid a week.
Scally bought Gillingham to play the big shot, look at me everyone, midget made good, no more working in those Hobbit movies or Harry Potters bank for me, I'm the Chairman of a football club,bet for the first 2 weeks he couldn't even remember the clubs name.
I don't give a fig what Scally makes, I don't give two figs on how many times he gets taken to court,how many managers he hires and fires, I don't give three figs how many times he lies to the fans and Bs's himself telling the World he is going to build a new 90,000 domed all seater stadium under the Medway Bridge, all I ask is the he put a decent product on the field, a product that the supporters can be proud of, I don't care if we miss promotion but for Gods sake get us into the race, give us a team that can sit in the top 7 of the division and give us something to be PROUD of.

[Rimshot]

I've given you half a dozen reasons why it's different. Football is a mass market product but it is delivered on a field of play, live, unpredictable,in front of the customer and in front of the customer's opposition. It has physicality, confrontation, emotion, passion -it's the outcome of human endeavour without manufacturing, packaging, transport and so on.

No customer of soap powder goes into manic depression or kicks the cat upstairs if the shirt ain't white !

It's the product that makes it different and therefore the chairman's job too.

[Garawa]

I do agree wholeheartedly with you but I think you are emotionalising a little. Your approaching, rightly, from a consumer perspective rather than a business one. Of course what you just said wouldn't happen at other businesses but that is probably with only a small proportion of your customers, there are many more who will use the business with far less enthusiasm.

"Football is a mass market product but it is delivered on a field of play, live, unpredictable,in front of the customer and in front of the customer's opposition. It has physicality, confrontation, emotion, passion -it's the outcome of human endeavour without manufacturing, packaging, transport and so on."

Again I agree with you but you could argue that this could describe multi-channel TV (the TV being the field of play, the opposition being....well the rival firms), premium car manufacturers (the road being the field of play, ok there is manufacturing and transport but that doesn't really equate to much and opposition sides will be "delivered" to their destination in much the same way). What about F1 or boxing owners / promoters? This describes everything you mention but they make themselves very rich ONLY if lucrative deals are signed as they won't use their own money.

Again, I agree football is different to other companies but I still maintain it is owners or benefactors that put the money in but in most cases the chairmen simply run the company and get paid well for doing it.

[CadburyMan]

Gary has put down where my thinking was going and almost certainly my original comparison was not the best. I would expect anybody who works for the business to be passionate about what they, and why they do it, but do you have to throw shed loads of money to be passionate. I obviously got it wrong by not thinking that passion can only be measured in cash.

Wasn't it Mr Hayward who publicly referred to his family as using him as a "cash cow" for the Wolves shortly before he relinquished the position of chairman.

(Gary- I think it may be Milandric)

[Garawa]

That's the one!!! Owned and been chairman of several clubs and when Portsmouth was about to go bust one of the damning factors was that he wanted his "loan" back. He puts money in but it never looks like a gift and he clearly can't support all those clubs, they merely suit his lifestyle in much the same way as Scally only Milan appears to leave more mess!

[CadburyMan]

Clearly Milandric us not an example of "good" but I think my first response was to question what is "good". I've never said Jack Hayward was anything less but more to ascertain the qualities/motives that make a " good" chairman