Simon Jordan slams big off-pitch Leicester City decision | OneFootball

Leicester City confirmed a restructuring behind the scenes as they face the threat of relegation to League One

Leicester City are embroiled in a relegation battle following a disastrous run of form in the Championship and a six point deduction penalty.

The Foxes are in their first year back in the second division after coming 18th in the Premier League in the previous campaign.

The Leicestershire outfit earned just 25 points from 38 games, ending their time in the top flight after just one year.

Martí Cifuentes was appointed in the summer with the goal of earning promotion straight back to the first division at the first attempt, but he was ultimately sacked in February due to poor results.

Leicester were then hit with a six point penalty due to alleged breaches of the profit and sustainability rules (PSR), albeit they are appealing the decision.

This has left new manager Gary Rowett facing a relegation battle, with the club inside the bottom three with only 11 games to go.

Simon Jordan criticises Leicester City restructuring

Leicester confirmed earlier this week that they have restructured behind the scenes with the appointment of James McCarron from the City Football Group.

He will reportedly report to Jon Rudkin, who will become chief football officer, while finance director Kevin Davies has been named as the new CEO.

Simon Jordan has criticised the decision to reshuffle executives into new positions, rather than replace them, suggesting it is rewarding those who were at fault for the club’s breaches of PSR.

However, he believes that the owner isn’t going to change too much behind the scenes as he is the one ultimately still in charge of major decisions.

“Ultimately it’s interesting that you elevate the finance director that’s been responsible for these PSR breaches, to some extent, because it’d be his budgeting, his cost controls and his direction of input that’s allowed people [to spend],” said Jordan, via Talksport.

“Obviously they’ve done it, they’ve done what they chose to do and what they wanted to do, so to elevate him to chief executive is a reward for somebody who has, in part, contributed to the breaches of the governance that has created the problems for Leicester in terms of potential relegation.

“But of course you move people around.

“The owner of the business is not going to move himself from the business.

“The difficulty in football is that you have this chief executive role and then you have the chairman, which is more ostensibly the funder and the control always goes with the person with the money.

“So you ask the chief executives to have all the control, but none of the real influence because the money determines things.

“So, it’s a balancing act between people being skillful at their jobs and it’s about who they’re interfacing within the business.”

Jordan has questioned whether the decision to make these changes is just a matter of placating the angry supporters, or if these people could actually thrive under slightly new roles.

“Are you doing it to placate the fans in some shape or form? Or are you doing it to shape the board up, move the board around and put people into better roles?” he continued.

“If you’re doing it to placate the fans, then you’re not going to achieve it because the same people are in the situ, just having different roles.

“If you’re doing it because you think there’s a better way of creating outcomes from very capable people that need to be given different roles [that can be successful].”

Leicester are currently 22nd in the Championship table with just 11 games remaining and only one point separates them from 21st place West Brom.

Oxford United are two points further behind in 23rd, meaning it is still all to play for in the battle to avoid relegation to League One.

The Foxes are winless in their last nine league fixtures, with their last victory coming against the Baggies on 5 January.

Next up for Rowett’s side is a trip to face promotion-chasing Ipswich Town on 7 March in a 3pm kick-off at Portman Road.

Leicester reshuffle has come too late

Leicester have reshuffled behind the scenes, but it’s too late for it to have any kind of impact on the team this season, and it won’t help their relegation battle.

The financial mismanagement at the King Power has led to this drastic decline, and the punishment they received for allegedly breaching PSR could now be decisive to their season.

Bringing in McCarron has the potential to positively impact the direction of the team, but that won’t be felt until the summer when the transfer window opens and he can start work on recruitment.

The pressure is on the team to get results in the coming weeks, otherwise McCarron will be planning to build a squad capable of promotion out of League One.