creative36

A difficult decision awaits me...

As a small Italian club, I have recently gained promotion to Serie A. Having spoken to the board before hand and received the good news that they were planning to expand the stadium, it was a considerable disappointment to have the proposal blocked by the local council.

So, I have a 9000 seater stadium which, even if it sells out for every home match (not unlikely) won't earn me all that much money. Unfortunately, although my players have generally been playing well, I don't think they'll cut it at this level... and my coaches agree - only 1 player in my reasonably-sized squad reaches their standards. Which means I'll need new and better players. Who are all asking for rather a lot of money per week.

So, the dilemma I face:
Since I appear to have hit the glass ceiling at this club, the question is what sort of shape should I leave the club in when I move on? I could bring in the best players possible at whatever cost in an effort to avoid relegation. Or, I could keep the club's finances stable and move on safe in the knowledge that it'll be the next manager's fault if the club goes belly-up.

While I ponder this, I'm curious as to what other LLMers would do.

retired_berrysale

Stay till you get sacked :thup:

creative36

The problem is that there's no way for the club to be competitive without lots more money coming in OR going out. And at the moment, only one of those is an option.

retired_berrysale

That's the point of going up and down the leagues. It takes time for teams to be strong enough to not get relegated.

The yo-yo effect is how most teams eventually get strong enough to not get relegated from the top league.

retired_nelson

You may want to try asking the board to expand again, the local authority may grow more pliable to the idea of a bigger stadium with additional requests. Sometimes it pays to be stubborn.

TOTALPACKAGE

I'd say stay until you think you are not enjoying the team anymore. If you think it would be better to try and fight against relegation without expending much, do it.

If you think anything else, do it. I would stay, trying not to increase the wage budget, and maybe leave when/if a good offer arrives.

retired_lapepe

I say stay and do the best you can for the club. Invest for the future, but don't go overboard on the wages. It can kill you if you go down.

Hmm, is that tipping??

retired_katiuxkita

I think you have received really good advice an only you can decide what is best for you. I would suspect you'll get an offer from a good serie B team sometime and they may be the team you should go with.

Sometimes as in football you have to go back to move forward.

creative36

Well, as tend to be the case with me, I'm letting results guide my path.

So for now, I'm sticking. I'll probably re-evaluate in January.