The Club

[DuvB]

Its fashionable on here to slag off or as some will claim 'criticize' various members of staff, the football management, individual players and occasionally the owners.

Well I for one want to say that in 60 years as a supporter, I have never seen so much effort at all levels to try and make our club successful and the latest Zoom meeting further emphasises how much our leadership team are doing to progress our club. Our season card support is also unbelievable.

However, I do not think that it is at all helpful to see concerted efforts to denigrate the head coach, the DoF, the number of coaches and specific players. I recognise that this MB would be a lesser place if there were no different opinions but as a example, the Lings thing has gone too far IMO.

I know that I will now be accused of being a 'happy clappy' but I am just grateful for what we have got. A reasonably successful L2 club.

[Lovejoy]

Some people have short memories, without the current owners who funded the promotion from the National League we would probably still be there. Now the signing of better players is under way, some people are still looking for scapegoats and are too quick to criticise. Saturday's result shut the doom merchants up for a while, but for how long? The singling out of players for criticism, one in particular, is appalling.

[Ronnie Hotdogs]

So we're all agreed, no more mentioning anyone who plays badly? Got it.

[EH16]

Mostly agree with this. Given the recent history of our own club and the absolute shambles at various other clubs I am broadly content that our club is in the hands of owners who, as far as I can tell, genuinely care about the club and what it means to people. Of course, there will be differences of opinion but, at least, we all want the same thing - for Orient to be as succesful as they can be.

I do think, also, that some people just cant see how money has radically altered football over the last 20 years or so and don't, therefore, have realistic expectations. Without different owners and a massive injection of funding I see no prospect of Orient being able to compete long term even at Championship level. This is NOTHING to do with a LACK OF AMBITION. It's cold hard economics.

[Disoriented]

Its fashionable on here to slag off or as some will claim 'criticize' various members of staff, the football management, individual players and occasionally the owners.

Well I for one want to say that in 60 years as a supporter, I have never seen so much effort at all levels to try and make our club successful and the latest Zoom meeting further emphasises how much our leadership team are doing to progress our club. Our season card support is also unbelievable.

However, I do not think that it is at all helpful to see concerted efforts to denigrate the head coach, the DoF, the number of coaches and specific players. I recognise that this MB would be a lesser place if there were no different opinions but as a example, the Lings thing has gone too far IMO.

I know that I will now be accused of being a 'happy clappy' but I am just grateful for what we have got. A reasonably successful L2 club.

You are quite right - you are a happy clappy.

[EH16]

So we're all agreed, no more mentioning anyone who plays badly? Got it.

Stop being dense.

[BiggsyMalone]

What’s worse? Talking on a message board about player performance, debating the pros and cons about players playing in certain positions, questioning decisions the DoF/the board get wrong or booing the players off at half time and full time after a poor performance?

I don’t care if things were bad under a previous owner, he’s long gone now. Most of the criticism that’s on here is warranted.

[DuvB]

What’s worse? Talking on a message board about player performance, debating the pros and cons about players playing in certain positions, questioning decisions the DoF/the board get wrong or booing the players off at half time and full time after a poor performance?

I don’t care if things were bad under a previous owner, he’s long gone now. Most of the criticism that’s on here is warranted.

Really? So the constant attacks on the Lings and Embleton are OK in your book?

[Ornchurch]

What’s worse? Talking on a message board about player performance, debating the pros and cons about players playing in certain positions, questioning decisions the DoF/the board get wrong or booing the players off at half time and full time after a poor performance?

I don’t care if things were bad under a previous owner, he’s long gone now. Most of the criticism that’s on here is warranted.

At least booing the players off is more open and honest.

[BiggsyMalone]

What’s worse? Talking on a message board about player performance, debating the pros and cons about players playing in certain positions, questioning decisions the DoF/the board get wrong or booing the players off at half time and full time after a poor performance?

I don’t care if things were bad under a previous owner, he’s long gone now. Most of the criticism that’s on here is warranted.

Really? So the constant attacks on the Lings and Embleton are OK in your book?

You ever thought that maybe they get things wrong so much that they get criticised more? The biggest problem with what you’re saying is the people who go over the top in supporting them and then spam every thread after a win baiting all the ‘Ling and Embleton haters’. Most people who post any criticism only want the best for the club. I can’t remember a time when the criticism was personal either.

[BiggsyMalone]

What’s worse? Talking on a message board about player performance, debating the pros and cons about players playing in certain positions, questioning decisions the DoF/the board get wrong or booing the players off at half time and full time after a poor performance?

I don’t care if things were bad under a previous owner, he’s long gone now. Most of the criticism that’s on here is warranted.

At least booing the players off is more open and honest.

Great, that will do their confidence the world of good.

[Beradogs]

The problem is we have always been an open, family orientated, community driven, diverse, fill in the blanks club. It’s nothing new and it’s all good. The issue is, nobody pays their hard earned for that. Performance on the pitch is all that matters. We are still in the bottom division after all these frigging years. Of course, that is nothing to do with the new owners and we are certainly moving in the right direction (albeit appointing Embleton is baffling) but forgive some fans for being a tad fed up.

[Ornchurch]

What’s worse? Talking on a message board about player performance, debating the pros and cons about players playing in certain positions, questioning decisions the DoF/the board get wrong or booing the players off at half time and full time after a poor performance?

I don’t care if things were bad under a previous owner, he’s long gone now. Most of the criticism that’s on here is warranted.

At least booing the players off is more open and honest.

Great, that will do their confidence the world of good.

As will people slagging them off 7 days a week hiding behind a keyboard.

[Ornchurch]

The problem is we have always been an open, family orientated, community driven, diverse, fill in the blanks club. It’s nothing new and it’s all good. The issue is, nobody pays their hard earned for that. Performance on the pitch is all that matters. We are still in the bottom division after all these frigging years. Of course, that is nothing to do with the new owners and we are certainly moving in the right direction (albeit appointing Embleton is baffling) but forgive some fans for being a tad fed up.

Could be Bolton. Or Sunderland. Or Portsmouth......................

[Rich Tea Wellin]

Agree on most of your points but disagree that anything has ‘gone too far’. Just because things are stable now doesn’t mean that every decision is right for our club now and in the future.

Holding owners to account in football clubs is absolutely necessary - at a minimum it makes owners think twice about decisions that might not be in the best interest of the football club and at best it is a means to stop or at least call out early when owners of a club are starting to bleed a club dry or putting it in danger of going into administration, for example.

On the other side, a culture of challenge from the cleaner, to the players, coaches, staff and fans should not only be encouraged but should be woven into the fabric of any aspiring business that wants to not only be successful but to have full engagement from customers (I.e. us). Usually success off of the pitch translates into success on it.

Although some may think that the criticism of certain people is petty, it is usually the result of a bigger issue in the decision making process or culture within the club. In my humble opinion, whilst I’m comfortable with how we are run overall, some of the decisions have been puzzling and some have simply stunk. Again, at a micro level, it’s not the end of the world. But if/when that bad decision making becomes the norm, or part of the culture (which is a pretty regular thing for businesses) it becomes toxic and it’s a slippery slope.

Frankly, it amazes me that after what we ALL went through with FB, there’s anyone who WOULDNT want to hold our owners to account. Unfortunately, some of those people are the ones who weren’t interested in holding the last lot to account purely because they owned the club they loved - so whatever they did was acceptable.

It’s also worth noting that our owners, from everything I’ve seen, embrace challenge (which is why they have open forum Q&A’s). They are experienced business men who have modern approaches to these things and I’m sure they appreciate the challenge (maybe not the singling out of players, granted).

The weird thing is the only people concerned with any sort of challenge are some of our fans, like they have to protect the poor rich owners. To those people, I’d advise a book called The Challenge Culture: Why the Most Successful Organizations Run on Pushback. It really sums this up well. Written by a bloke called Nigel.

[EastDerehamO]

I agree with the gist of the post.

I think back to where we were under FB, and I look at where we are now, and I am enormously grateful to NT/ KT and everyone at the club to have presided over this improvement.

We all have our thoughts on squad/ players/ manager, and we’re all entitled to our opinion, but looking at the bigger picture I’m more than happy.

[DuvB]

Apple Wumble, I agree with your well argued and written post. I still feel the constant criticism of the Lings and RE by some on here is ridiculous and not productive.

[Top of the JES]

You could go onto any clubs message board and you will find fans complaing about all sorts of things, some like the ownership issues at Charlton and Wigan are extremely serious and understandable, On almost every board I bet you will find fans moaning about signings or lack of them. It's human nature to moan, but having lived through the Italian era at this club I find it very difficult to fault our current owners.

They held their hands up when they got the managerial appointment wrong and corrected it pretty quickly, they have been open on all sorts of issues and communicated extremely well with the fans, I'd like to know what decisions "stunk" because I just see that as being over dramatic.

For me we are being guided through difficult times by a wise board of directors who have hardly put a foot wrong so far.

[MrB]

People just carry on with your own opinions!!

[AckneyAwks]

I always look at Leyton Orient being potentially a league One club who could become strong contenders on a regular basis for promotion to the championship. What timescale that would take to achieve i dont know but with our current owners and the way the club is functioning commercially, i am optimistic that in the near future we will achieve that.
Once in the championship that could be a whole new financial project.

[BiggsyMalone]

At least booing the players off is more open and honest.

Great, that will do their confidence the world of good.

As will people slagging them off 7 days a week hiding behind a keyboard.

People have a choice whether they want to read this forum or not. They don’t have a choice whether they hear a losd of knobheads boo them off the pitch

[OyinbO]

Lots of stuff here defending the owners. Great. I don't think they've come in for any serious flak at any point since they arrived, and why would they?

But some of the stuff here makes me feel very sad - I know the Beelzebub era was traumatic, but has it really crushed so many of our aspirations that being mid-table in the bottom division now satisfies us? Go back 10, 20, 30, 40, 50, 60 years and the fans of that time would have thought it was a really poor show (yes, they did back in 2000 when it actually happened).

Yes, I know context is important - we nearly lost the club, our first trophy winning manager in 49 years promptly carked it - but it feels like everything that JE brought to the club is slowly being lost by the inadequacy of our response to replacing him. And you'll have to forgive me for feeling incredibly frustrated by that, as we keep fumbling opportunities for progression.

I don't think this is a negative outlook. Au contraire, innit.

[Top of the JES]

Lots of stuff here defending the owners. Great. I don't think they've come in for any serious flak at any point since they arrived, and why would they?

But some of the stuff here makes me feel very sad - I know the Beelzebub era was traumatic, but has it really crushed so many of our aspirations that being mid-table in the bottom division now satisfies us? Go back 10, 20, 30, 40, 50, 60 years and the fans of that time would have thought it was a really poor show (yes, they did back in 2000 when it actually happened).

Yes, I know context is important - we nearly lost the club, our first trophy winning manager in 49 years promptly carked it - but it feels like everything that JE brought to the club is slowly being lost by the inadequacy of our response to replacing him. And you'll have to forgive me for feeling incredibly frustrated by that, as we keep fumbling opportunities for progression.

I don't think this is a negative outlook. Au contraire, innit.

If you go back any of those time periods you mentioned we were never at such a low ebb positionally as when FB left us, I was delighted to get out of the National League at the second attempt, but need to be patient because not every year is going to be a promotion year, the club has rebuilt nicely up till Covid hit us, still think we are in a good place to progress, I don't think anyone had settled for where we are now but the next step upwards might take a little bit longer.

[Smendrick Feaselberg]

Lots of stuff here defending the owners. Great. I don't think they've come in for any serious flak at any point since they arrived, and why would they?

But some of the stuff here makes me feel very sad - I know the Beelzebub era was traumatic, but has it really crushed so many of our aspirations that being mid-table in the bottom division now satisfies us? Go back 10, 20, 30, 40, 50, 60 years and the fans of that time would have thought it was a really poor show (yes, they did back in 2000 when it actually happened).

Yes, I know context is important - we nearly lost the club, our first trophy winning manager in 49 years promptly carked it - but it feels like everything that JE brought to the club is slowly being lost by the inadequacy of our response to replacing him. And you'll have to forgive me for feeling incredibly frustrated by that, as we keep fumbling opportunities for progression.

I don't think this is a negative outlook. Au contraire, innit.

Fair points. From my point of view the issues are more the lack of constructive criticism from certain boarders with them lashing out because they hold grudges against certain players/staff. They also are intent on microanalysing everything with the objective of placing blame. For example, on Saturday someone posted that we'd lose because Ling is starting. How is that in any way constructive? Or when someone said Ling was 100% to blame for Happe's own goal, which was just an insanely bizarre comment that did nothing but highlight that person's bias. Others just take any opportunity to have digs, which again are not constructive at all.

This obviously doesn't apply to all boarders (some of whom are very good at constructive criticism), but the above seem to be the loudest and most persistent.

[Ronnie Hotdogs]

Mostly agree with this. Given the recent history of our own club and the absolute shambles at various other clubs I am broadly content that our club is in the hands of owners who, as far as I can tell, genuinely care about the club and what it means to people. Of course, there will be differences of opinion but, at least, we all want the same thing - for Orient to be as succesful as they can be.

I do think, also, that some people just cant see how money has radically altered football over the last 20 years or so and don't, therefore, have realistic expectations. Without different owners and a massive injection of funding I see no prospect of Orient being able to compete long term even at Championship level. This is NOTHING to do with a LACK OF AMBITION. It's cold hard economics.

What have our owners got to do with us fans criticising players when they play badly?

They're two entirely unrelated matters. Stop being so dense.