I'm sure all of us here have heard of the economic clock (or most anyway). I've attached a picture of one below...

I've been thinking about posting this for a while, but this thread (viewtopic.php?f=4&t=7258) pushed me to post it now.

If success comes and goes in cycles (something I beleive to be the case), where are Chelsea right now in our "football success cycle"?. Are we in boom times, the slowdown period, the depths of a recession or a recovery?.

Also, where do you beleive the turning points of the club has been (the points when the boom peaked and the slowdown began or the worst of the worst when things started to get better).

I'd say we were on the downturn without being in a full blown recession. I'm hoping for a soft landing! But that depends on whether the Prime Minister is smart enough to sack the current Chancellor and replace him with one who really understands the intricacies of monetary policy and can convince the people that some short term pain will lead to prosperity in the not too distant future.

I've no idea what's going on at Chelsea football club though

Oh man, i had just typed a lengthy reply to this and i've lost it, god damm back space key!!

in short i would say we are in the depths of a recession right now using that cycle, despite our league and champions league position, the fans aren't happy, the players aren't happy, the management clearly aren't happy. Depending on what happens over the next month or so we could be entering a period of recovery or the recession could be set to continue...

its just a bit of a reccession

we'll be back

none of the above

We are an individual club that is under performing and not reaching potential - the rest of the market is irrelevant

i think sometimes people take football far too seriously !

Where are we in the "football success cycle"?

There's no such thing. Not in the sense of economic recession/recovery/boom.

A team can be in the lower half of the league for decades, and still the only realistic options are standstill or relegation. So their "recovery" would be promotion, of which there is no guarantee, ever. And which cannot be predicted based on economic type forecasts.

I'm sure you'd agree with me though that there are turning points right Lofty?

I'm sorry, but that makes as much sense as saying "where are chelsea in the water cycle?"

Football works a bit differently, as it is now driven exclusively by money. In general, the clubs that were successful in the early 90's were the first to get their hands on the money, and that is the way it will stay as they money is staying.

I don't see clubs like Man U, Barca, Real Madrid, AC Milan etc ever going through real hard times. Sure, they might have the odd trophyless season every now and again, but overall, it would take a good 10 year stint without trophies for them to really slip from their positions of power.

Look at Liverpool - they haven't even threatened in the league for years, but the money is still there and they will still be contenders next season because of it.

Obviously there are some exceptions (like when you get taken over by a Russian billionairre, or manage to get relegated through a corruption scandall), but in general, the rich clubs are going to stay rich and stay successful, and the gap between them and everyone else will widen.

From Chelsea's point of view, the quicker we move to self-sufficiency while still getting trophies is the key. We need to get ourselves to a point where Abramovic could walk away and we would still be a top 3 club.

Football works a bit differently, as it is now driven exclusively by money. In general, the clubs that were successful in the early 90's were the first to get their hands on the money, and that is the way it will stay as they money is staying.

I don't see clubs like Man U, Barca, Real Madrid, AC Milan etc ever going through real hard times. Sure, they might have the odd trophyless season every now and again, but overall, it would take a good 10 year stint without trophies for them to really slip from their positions of power.

I agree in a broad sense...

However, there is no doubt in my mind clubs go through more and less successful periods. Look at Arsenal, their "invincibles" team was a high point, then they sold off a bunch of players and players got older. They then had a slow period finishing as low as 4th (and even them only just). Then their youngsters started to mature and though they will finish the season trophyless, they have many positives and look to be a team on the up once more.

Man Utd are the same. They were top dogs around 99/00 and then slowly declined until eventually players like Keane and Beckham left the club (for varying reasons). They reached a low point, finishing around 3rd I think a few seasons ago and now they appear to be top dogs again.

Sounds reasonably cyclical to me.

Ups and downs... yes

Cycles.... no. Not in my opinion.

All teams are going to go through good patches and bad patches depending on lots of things.

If we had not let in 90+ minute goals against Wigan and Spurs this season, then we would be odds on for the League right now. Then would we would be in a good patch, and Man United would be back in another slump. Then what would that do to the cycle???

To attribute some kind of a cycle to this type of thing is reading too much into the situation.