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Nailrod
25-05-2012, 06:47 AM
Imagine you were a General in charge of an old Scottish army regiment. A clan regiment with a proud tradition. A regiment whose standard bears a noble history of battle honours. A regiment renowned for its fighting spirit. A regiment with a badge and a uniform that any young recruit would be proud to wear.

Now let’s suppose for some reason you get rid of all the best soldiers in your regiment, and its commissioned officers, and replace them with a bunch of random recruits. Not proven soldiers, just whoever you can find. Then, every six months for five years you do exactly the same thing. Sack your Colonel and all your officers, discharge all your troops, replace them with a gaggle of new recruits who have never heard of each other, the regiment, or the clan until the day they arrive at barracks…

What sane General would do that to his regiment? Imagine that a General genuinely did that to his regiment. What kind of result would he expect, once he had been through half a dozen of these cycles?

How much would his troops care about the regiment, its traditions, its proud history, its honour, its symbols? How much would they care about their comrades? How much discipline would there be in the ranks? How much solidarity? How well would they gel, and fight as a unit? What kind of fighting-spirit could he expect? How many of his men would be willing to lay down their lives for a cause? What level of performance could he expect in the heat of battle?

The answers are: Nothing. Nothing. None. None. They wouldn’t. None. None of them. Rubbish.

And there wouldn’t really be much point in blaming the Colonel, or his officers, or the troops, or in fondly imagining that if the General just gets rid of them and replaces them with a new set, things are going to get better. Why on earth would anybody imagine that the latest Colonel would make anything more of his hastily-assembled rabble than the previous one?

The Falcon
25-05-2012, 06:53 AM
What if your best soldiers desert and become mercenaries? What does the General do then?


Imagine you were a General in charge of an old Scottish army regiment. A clan regiment with a proud tradition. A regiment whose standard bears a noble history of battle honours. A regiment renowned for its fighting spirit. A regiment with a badge and a uniform that any young recruit would be proud to wear.

Now let’s suppose for some reason you get rid of all the best soldiers in your regiment, and its commissioned officers, and replace them with a bunch of random recruits. Not proven soldiers, just whoever you can find. Then, every six months for five years you do exactly the same thing. Sack your Colonel and all your officers, discharge all your troops, replace them with a gaggle of new recruits who have never heard of each other, the regiment, or the clan until the day they arrive at barracks…

What sane General would do that to his regiment? Imagine that a General genuinely did that to his regiment. What kind of result would he expect, once he had been through half a dozen of these cycles?

How much would his troops care about the regiment, its traditions, its proud history, its honour, its symbols? How much would they care about their comrades? How much discipline would there be in the ranks? How much solidarity? How well would they gel, and fight as a unit? What kind of fighting-spirit could he expect? How many of his men would be willing to lay down their lives for a cause? What level of performance could he expect in the heat of battle?

The answers are: Nothing. Nothing. None. None. They wouldn’t. None. None of them. Rubbish.

And there wouldn’t really be much point in blaming the Colonel, or his officers, or the troops, or in fondly imagining that if the General just gets rid of them and replaces them with a new set, things are going to get better. Why on earth would anybody imagine that the latest Colonel would make anything more of his hastily-assembled rabble than the previous one?

Nailrod
25-05-2012, 06:59 AM
What if your best soldiers desert and become mercenaries? What does the General do then?

I think you mean "What if your best soldiers are recruited by other regiments for large sums of money?'

Either way the answer is the same:

Identify any other decent soldiers you have left and push them out of the door as fast as you can.

The Falcon
25-05-2012, 07:06 AM
I think you mean "What if your best soldiers are recruited by other regiments for large sums of money?'

Either way the answer is the same:

Identify any other decent soldiers you have left and push them out of the door as fast as you can.


I did mean "mercenaries". For sale to the highest bidder with no thought as to the rightouesness of the cause.

Nailrod
25-05-2012, 07:23 AM
I did mean "mercenaries". For sale to the highest bidder with no thought as to the rightouesness of the cause.

In that case the answer is: "Replace them with inferior mercenaries of ever-decreasing quality..."

You seem not to have noticed that every other regiment in the army is subject to the same phenomenon, and manages to negotiate its way around it without a wholesale collapse in morale and performance.

The Falcon
25-05-2012, 08:34 AM
In that case the answer is: "Replace them with inferior mercenaries of ever-decreasing quality..."

You seem not to have noticed that every other regiment in the army is subject to the same phenomenon, and manages to negotiate its way around it without a wholesale collapse in morale and performance.

We replace them with what we can afford. Same as anything in life.

PeeKay
25-05-2012, 08:45 AM
Why would you only want those who love "the regiment" in your army? In WW2 the army was full of conscripts, people who didn't even want to be there. I have never heard anyone say that they were inferior or less brave than the regulars when it came to fighting. Give me a grafter on the park over a badge-kissing waster any day.

scuttle
25-05-2012, 09:05 AM
Join the navy instead

Nailrod
25-05-2012, 09:14 AM
Why would you only want those who love "the regiment" in your army? In WW2 the army was full of conscripts, people who didn't even want to be there. I have never heard anyone say that they were inferior or less brave than the regulars when it came to fighting. Give me a grafter on the park over a badge-kissing waster any day.

I understand that my analogy might be a bit subtle for some people, but what on earth makes you think I'm advocating the 'badge-kissing waster' as opposed to your 'grafter on the park'? Which was 'Pitbull' Claros anyway? Was he your 'grafter on the park' or my 'badge-kissing waster'? What about Jarko Wiss? What about Patrick Noubissie? What about a couple of hundred other anonymous nonentities?

One of the main reasons why ordinary men are able to join an army and literally risk or even sacrifice their lives is because they feel, and are taught from the moment they enlist to feel, that they are part of something bigger. That's one of the reasons why an army is divided up into regiments with their own badges and colours and traditions, rather than just being a random mass of people in rows who are fit and have been taught to shoot a gun.

Anbody who know anything about management, or leadership, or sport, or teamwork in any field of human endeavour knows that individuals can and will perform better if they feel that they are part of a unit, if they feel some bond of solidarity with their team and their team mates. The whole is greater than the sum of the parts.

The point is that it takes generations, even centuries, to build up that kind of tradition. If you set your mind to it, or even if you're simply too stupid to understand the process, you can destroy it in a matter of years.

You cannot take a haphazard bunch of rootless journeymen who a week earlier had never heard of each other, their club, or their manager, stick a green strip on them, and say "Hey. You're Hibs! You're 135 years of history! Get out there and perform!"

And when it's the tenth time you've done it in half as many years, it works even less well.

Nailrod
25-05-2012, 09:18 AM
We replace them with what we can afford. Same as anything in life.

So do St Johnstone, Motherwell, St Mirren, and a number of other teams who don't have half our resources or potential. They manage to do it and at the same time avoid escaping relegation by the skin of their teeth two seasons in a row.

cabbageandribs1875
25-05-2012, 09:26 AM
i'm waiting on what the poster known as captain mainwaring says about all this


http://images.wikia.com/dadsarmy/images/b/bb/DA-AL172348.jpg

The Falcon
25-05-2012, 09:28 AM
So do St Johnstone, Motherwell, St Mirren, and a number of other teams who don't have half our resources or potential. They manage to do it and at the same time avoid escaping relegation by the skin of their teeth two seasons in a row.

St.Mirren have finished above us once (this season) since the inception of the SPL. St. Johnstone have done so twice now although both have spent long spells out of the top flight.
Motherwell, since they exited administration, three times although they are at two for two. ICT same as St.Mirren.

By this argument nobody should be getting upset about the final, given Hearts spending we never stood a chance.

We are poor NR, as poor as I've seen probably. Nobodies denying that.

Hibbyradge
25-05-2012, 09:31 AM
Manchester City.

Nailrod
25-05-2012, 09:37 AM
i'm waiting on what the poster known as captain mainwaring says about all this...

Well while you're waiting I can deffo confirm that Private Fraser says we're doomed.

Nailrod
25-05-2012, 09:40 AM
Manchester City.

Have you ever heard of a bell curve?

Whatever Manchester City's acquisitions might be, I don't think you could categorize them as a bunch of rootless journeymen casting around for a wage packet.

Nailrod
25-05-2012, 09:51 AM
Reviewing the comment on this thread so far, it appears that there are a fair number of Hibbies who think that processing a new group of rootless journeymen in search of a wage packet through our club every six months is a good strategy, and it will work...

The Falcon
25-05-2012, 09:53 AM
Have you ever heard of a bell curve?

Whatever Manchester City's acquisitions might be, I don't think you could categorize them as a bunch of rootless journeymen casting around for a wage packet.

They are certainly mercenaries though :greengrin

Thats what limitless funds gets you.

The Falcon
25-05-2012, 09:56 AM
Reviewing the comment on this thread so far, it appears that there are a fair number of Hibbies who think that processing a new group of rootless journeymen in search of a wage packet through our club every six months is a good strategy, and it will work...

Thats unfair.

Carlsberg made a very good point on another thread, and I paraphrase, that we all want whats best for Hibs its just that we have different ideas as to how that will/can be achieved. Nobody is arguing that recent performances are anything other than poor. Its how we go about rectifying the problems that are the issue. Fenlon is the man tasked with this and I, for one, like the cut of his jib.

proud_and_green
25-05-2012, 11:27 AM
Reviewing the comment on this thread so far, it appears that there are a fair number of Hibbies who think that processing a new group of rootless journeymen in search of a wage packet through our club every six months is a good strategy, and it will work...

I think you are almost missing the point of your own thread. The key is the leadership which brings people - of all qualities - together in the pursuit of a common cause. A common tradition helps, but it is only one of the factors. Loyalty upwards, downwards and sideways is critical to it. Very few soldiers fight for the tradition of their Regiment or for the grand strategic worthy cause, they fight becausehey don't want to let their mates down, their families down and their selves down. Montgomery described leadership as getting an individual or a group of individuals to do something they would not normally want to or be able to do.

This means that you can have the best individuals but still not be able to achieve your goal because you don't have the leadership or conversely with good leadership often ordinary people can achieve extraordinary things.

A great example was an officer in the Second World War (i forget his name) who led from the front and shouted at his troops "come on, one last push everyone knows that 500 yards of standing corn can stop machine gun bullets". He won his second bar to his MC for that action, and - had one of the lowest casualty rates in his Brigade.

Nailrod
25-05-2012, 02:51 PM
Thats unfair.

Carlsberg made a very good point on another thread, and I paraphrase, that we all want whats best for Hibs its just that we have different ideas as to how that will/can be achieved. Nobody is arguing that recent performances are anything other than poor. Its how we go about rectifying the problems that are the issue. Fenlon is the man tasked with this and I, for one, like the cut of his jib.

It's not going to work.

My "General and Regiment" story was an analogy, but it's also true. If a General did do that to one of his regiments it would be catastrophic, and however determined and brave the individual soldiers, they would get massacred in battle against any kind of organised enemy.

Here's a little table for you. It's a '% coefficient' for our last five managers, based on all games against SPL opposition - 3 for a win, 1 for a draw, 0 for a defeat:

Collins: 49
Mixu: 42
Yogi: 38
CWood: 33
PF: 32

Do you notice something? Something that looks like a 'trend'.

Yes! I hear you say. But look! It's bottoming out! Things are going to start getting better!

They're not. We've lost our best defender (McPake) and our best attacker (Griffiths), and we've got next to nothing left that even resembles a 'team'. We'll be starting next season with an even bigger complement of random journeymen who have never heard of each other and are looking for a paycheck than last year, and a manager with six months experience outside the League of Ireland. As Doddie has pointed out on another thread, every agent on the planet with a dud to offload will be thinking 'Hibs...' and licking his lips.

YOU CANNOT RUN A FOOTBALL CLUB THIS WAY.

HibsMax
25-05-2012, 02:58 PM
I think the analogy, while a good one, breaks down when you consider that soldiers are literally playing for their lives. Footballers can lose and then go and get pished.

HibsMax
25-05-2012, 03:02 PM
Reviewing the comment on this thread so far, it appears that there are a fair number of Hibbies who think that processing a new group of rootless journeymen in search of a wage packet through our club every six months is a good strategy, and it will work...

Not this one. The problem as I see it is we cannot force players to join Hibs but during the windows we've needed to make signings. If we can't get players in we sign "someone" even if they are not the long term solution.

We need to break that cycle. We need to start signing players who are committed to the club. Otherwise we're doomed to continue circling the drain.

The Falcon
26-05-2012, 10:18 AM
You are being very selective and a bit patronising.

Doddie, since you quote him, also highlighted the cack that Collins signed and given that Fenlon is at the end of a line of poor appointment then he should be given the chance. McPake and Griffiths were never ours in the first place and while we are hopeful McPake will sign, there are no guarantees he wants to be here.




It's not going to work.

My "General and Regiment" story was an analogy, but it's also true. If a General did do that to one of his regiments it would be catastrophic, and however determined and brave the individual soldiers, they would get massacred in battle against any kind of organised enemy.

Here's a little table for you. It's a '% coefficient' for our last five managers, based on all games against SPL opposition - 3 for a win, 1 for a draw, 0 for a defeat:

Collins: 49
Mixu: 42
Yogi: 38
CWood: 33
PF: 32

Do you notice something? Something that looks like a 'trend'.

Yes! I hear you say. But look! It's bottoming out! Things are going to start getting better!

They're not. We've lost our best defender (McPake) and our best attacker (Griffiths), and we've got next to nothing left that even resembles a 'team'. We'll be starting next season with an even bigger complement of random journeymen who have never heard of each other and are looking for a paycheck than last year, and a manager with six months experience outside the League of Ireland. As Doddie has pointed out on another thread, every agent on the planet with a dud to offload will be thinking 'Hibs...' and licking his lips.

YOU CANNOT RUN A FOOTBALL CLUB THIS WAY.