David Sharpe appointed Head Of Football Operations

Kersten England has zero to do with Bradford Council anymore. She was replaced last year by another invisible person, she is now CEO of Leeds City Region.

 

Is this also the beginning of the end for GA ? Would love to see Clough here, but that won't happen if he takes Mansfield up.

 

I reckon he'll be out again in a few months citing a nervous breakdown ...

 

You’ve had issues with every manager we’ve had in the last 20 years

 

I have a feeling he’s been recruited initially to get his foot in the door and sort out the number 1 priority , then if Rupp does mean business , he will take over from Sparks . Rupp is actually doing this the right way ….. sort the big issue first ie the footballing side as to be fair the commercial side is fine.

 

Not true.

However, you can’t plan under GA, he’s all over the shop.

 

I dont think he will need to take over from Sparks. They’ve given Sharpe a title of ‘Head of Football Operations’ so he’s essentially a director of football, and Gent will report to him? Officially Sparks is working alongside him but thats just a statement to save face, surely. Sparks will carry on doing the commercial stuff with Longo and now Sharpe will be doing the football stuff, the stuff Sparks was blagging before, but which he has eventually delegated to an expert with experience to make the footballing decisions?

 

I think it's a smart move on all fronts. If Rupp sells, which in his statement he said he is open too, the new owner has a ready made CEO in Sharpe, whereas Ryan might well be seen out the door. If he stays and invests like he said he would, we have an experience guy on the football side of things. It's a good move for all involved.

 

No, think you are missing the point here!

Sparks is still CEO. People are thinking appointing Sharpe changes things. It doesn’t. Give Sharpe what ever title you want. He like the rest of them still reports to Sparks and Sparks makes the key decisions.

 

I don’t agree Fordy. You don’t have a dog and bark yourself! Plus I think Sparks will be eased out of any say on football.
The high likelihood is that Sparks has been doing exactly as asked. Therefore sacking him will feel wrong to Rupp. So here is how you do it, you hire someone better qualified and take all of the football duties off Sparkes and wait for him to leave. I would not be at all surprised to see Sharpe reporting directly to Rupp.

 

Sharpe will make football decisions:
- managerial recruitment
- contract extensions
- transfers
- scouting
Etc

Sparks will stick to the commercial stuff:
- attracting and retaining sponsors / ‘partnerships’
- use of clubs facilities on non matchdays to maximize revenue
- ground lease negotiations
- catering, club shop, shirt agreements and contracts etc

Sparks will also oversee all the boring regulatory stuff, filing of company accounts via the accountant, league admin and paperwork, if we don’t have a secretary?

Sharpe won’t be reporting into Sparks on whether player X deserves a 2 or 3 year deal. He’ll discuss that with GA and Sparks’ only input will likely be to state the budget he’s got to work within, signed off from above from Rupp?

 

We'll see. I

We'll see. Someone with his experience and family business background isn't taking this job to answer to David Brent.

 

Absolutely guaranteed that Sharpe will report directly to, and only to Rupp.

 

We do have a club secretary - Mark Harrison.

 

He can't even get that right, the June 2023 accounts are currently overdue at Companies House.
In fairness, this could be due to the pre-Easter rush and the staff at Companies House just haven't got around to uploading the accounts as yet but given the club haven't issued any statements/headlines comments on the accounts (like they have done in previous years), I'm inclined to think they aren't ready to be filed as yet...

 

Last years were filed 4th April.2023. So hopefully some thing on there imminently.
Otherwise your alternative theory would have some credence.

 

Interestingly, Stephan Rupp was only appointed as a director of Bradford city on the day that Edin Rahic resigned/ was removed. It seems that between the takeover and him leaving, Rahic was the sole director of Bradford city.

 

Yes agree Jordan . Importantly he’s “ sold” a football club before. ie Wigan

 

Absolutely spot on .

 

Cheers. Less for Sparks to do in that case!