A traumatic start to the season and late change of manager made Crystal Palace relegation favourites, but consolidation is well underway amidst foreign takeover talk.
You'd forgive Crystal Palace's fans for viewing the developing story that American billionaire ($2.5bn to be precise) Josh Harris is trying to takeover their club with suspicion.
Firstly, because the ever growing band of the club's "Ultras", which started off as topless 15 year olds with their arms round each other jumping up and down, has since morphed into a movement that makes dramatic, colourful protests about modern football and the riches involved in it. How would it look, how would they respond, if suddenly it was Palace buying players for £30m, if it was Palace hoarding young players in their reserves with no intention of ever using them, if it was Palace financially doping themselves up for an assault on the cups and Europe? It would surely set them, and their admirable stance, against the new owner before he'd even begun.
Secondly, because a rich owner guarantees nothing any more. Back in the 1990s when Jack Walker bought Blackburn Rovers it basically guaranteed them success. They could outbid everybody. People gawped at a £5m transfer fee for Chris Sutton like it had parachuted in from space. Rovers won the Premier League — a club from a town the size of Scunthorpe, with the England centre forward up front. Something similar, on a much richer scale, subsequently happened to Chelsea, who were carted from midtable cup team into dominant force by dirty Russian money.
Now, everybody has a rich owner and, guess what, three teams still get relegated at the end of the year. QPR stand as a shining beacon of the problems relying on one rich bloke can cause. Fulham and the new Blackburn sold out to foreign investors and were immediately relegated in farcical circumstances.
Thirdly, the idea that Harris already owns sports teams and therefore knows how they work — he's got the New Jersey Devils ice hockey "franchise" and Philadelphia 76ers baseball side under his wing — offers little reassurance. Randy Lerner at Aston Villa, Hicks and Gillette at Liverpool, all came from a background of sports "franchise" ownership in the States.
Nor will the current Palace board's promise that they'd only sell to a trusted buyer. They're Palace fans, and the job they've done is a superb one that we'll reflect upon in a moment, but Fulham, Blackburn, Cardiff and others were all told the same thing. Simple fact is, once it's sold it's sold, you can do nothing about what the buyer does thereafter. Flog your house then go back six months later and say you don't like the way they've redecorated the place and see how far you get.
But finally, and most importantly, Palace are actually getting along very nicely indeed thank you very much, without the need for Johnny Foreigner and his piles of money and many beautiful ladies.
Steve Parish may look, sound and dress like somebody more at home as the owner of Crystals nightclub than Crystal Palace Football Club but the job he has done, with a board of Palace fans behind him, is there for all to see. QPR are told they're absolutely reliant on the wealth of billionaires to get anywhere near the Premier League and should be grateful for them stacking up debt and buying the Joey Bartons of this world to maintain it. And yet here we have Palace, playing in a stadium every bit as restricted as Loftus Road (as we'll see this Saturday), with an equal amount of the hospitality facilities we're told are so crucial, with all the extra competition London provides for fans and youth team players, and they've been promoted, stayed up and are now consolidating. Parish is talking about pushing to win cups from next year if they can stay up this — which they almost certainly will.
And they're not doing it with anything you needed a billionaire to buy — just as well, as they haven't got one. In fact, Damien Delaney, Danny Gabbidon and Jason Puncheon — three mainstays of the success — were all players QPR fans couldn't wait to see the back of.
When Tony Pulis resigned on the eve of the Premier League season, the fingers pointed initially at Parish. Pulis was the reigning Manager of the Year, enhancing his own reputation several million percent having rescued Palace from nine defeats in their first ten games and attaining a midtable finish the year before. Pulis wanted to sign Steven Caulker and others, not outlandish demands, and hadn't been able to. Parish was being stubborn, Parish was being tight, Parish was being arrogant, how could Parish do this to Tony Pulis?
Tim Sherwood had also walked away from the Palace job, and at a time when not everybody had quite realised what a prat Tim Sherwood was, that was seen as a blot on the copy book as well.
When, at no notice at all, Palace were forced to turn to former charge Neil Warnock, and as had always been the case in the past he wasn't quite up to the Premier League, Palace did indeed look like a likely side for the drop. Parish was decisive, and saw an opportunity to grab Alan Pardew with Newcastle fans hounding him out. Palace haven't looked back with six wins and a draw 11 matches.
Now, the chairman's refusal to shift from his beliefs about how Palace should be run, even when it cost him the services of a manager who'd, by every account, worked a miracle last season, looks like strong, confident, successful leadership.
Big boots for Josh Harris to fill if this all goes ahead. And by that, I don't mean just stuffing them full of $50 notes.
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