Podcasts

[Richie87]

OTB Sports are doing a Late Night League of Ireland review every Friday night. Last nights podcast . https://t.co/0GPD5kxTHW

[Towelie]

Andy Burton was on the Off The Ball twitter space last night and spoke briefly about his time at Dundalk. Said that there were two Peak 6 eras and still keeps an eye on the club. Also said that his colleagues had an interest in Nathan Shepperd.

Noticed as well that absentee owner in chief Jordan Gardner was also listening into the show.

[Pepsi]

Andy Burton was on the Off The Ball twitter space last night and spoke briefly about his time at Dundalk. Said that there were two Peak 6 eras and still keeps an eye on the club. Also said that his colleagues had an interest in Nathan Shepperd.

Noticed as well that absentee owner in chief Jordan Gardner was also listening into the show.

Andy is watching as he was involved in taking a number of players into the LOI and to Dundalk this season. If they do well, he does well.

[Andy Burton]

Andy Burton was on the Off The Ball twitter space last night and spoke briefly about his time at Dundalk. Said that there were two Peak 6 eras and still keeps an eye on the club. Also said that his colleagues had an interest in Nathan Shepperd.

Noticed as well that absentee owner in chief Jordan Gardner was also listening into the show.

Andy is watching as he was involved in taking a number of players into the LOI and to Dundalk this season. If they do well, he does well.

Evening all. Been a long time viewer of posts on here since early 2019, and always resisted getting involved in any of these chats but tonight, reading this post, I figured why not…?! I’ve remained a fan of DFC since my involvement in the club during 2019. I watched many games online as a fan in 2020, and remained in touch with a number of players, coaches and local supporters during the time since I left.. so as a friendly correction to Pepsi’s assertion here I’m not just watching because of any players that I know or that my company represents! The town sucked me in and I hope to be able to revisit OP now that things are getting back to normal post pandemic. Also to correct you Pepsi (sorry mate, don’t mean to single you out!), but I didn’t bring a number of players to the league! My company and my colleague, Jonathan Douglas, does represent Nathan Shepperd, and helped him come to DFC but we didn’t bring any other players to the league. I highly recommended not only the club but mostly Stephen O’Donnell to Nathan and I am delighted he’s over there with you guys. We do have other Irish players in the league but maybe I’ll go on a podcast soon to discuss it in more detail. My personal interest from a fan’s perspective remains in place regardless of any link with clients though - I spent many Friday nights watching games last season even though it was painful viewing at times... now it’s an exciting new era for the club and I thought there were lots of things for the supporters to be excited about on Friday night. The most pleasing for me was to see so many fans back in Oriel, and from what I hear from my friends in the town there’s a real buzz about the place again, which is refreshing to hear. It’s about time there was that feeling of unity and excitement around the town, everyone of you deserves that after the last couple of seasons! 👌🏼

[Pepsi]

Hey Andy, fair dews for coming on and putting things straight. I must admit, I was lead to believe that the company you are connected to have players at Dundalk, St. Pats and UCD ... but obviously you know better than us if this is true, hence my statement to if they do well you do well.

So now that we have you in here ... I have to ask .... please spill the beans on your time with the club .... was it as bad as people made out under the previous ownership? Was the problem sitting in Florida or was it Chicago? What was your role in / how big was your influence on player signings, management changes etc. ..... :) (OK I dont seriously expect you to answer those .... however if I remember correctly, there were many people asking what exactly your roles was and who was making the signings.)

[Andy Burton]

Hey Andy, fair dews for coming on and putting things straight. I must admit, I was lead to believe that the company you are connected to have players at Dundalk, St. Pats and UCD ... but obviously you know better than us if this is true, hence my statement to if they do well you do well.

So now that we have you in here ... I have to ask .... please spill the beans on your time with the club .... was it as bad as people made out under the previous ownership? Was the problem sitting in Florida or was it Chicago? What was your role in / how big was your influence on player signings, management changes etc. ..... :) (OK I dont seriously expect you to answer those .... however if I remember correctly, there were many people asking what exactly your roles was and who was making the signings.)

Right, lots to get into there…!

We do have players at those other clubs Pepsi, they have pretty much come through those academies though and aren’t players we have brought in to the league - didn’t want there to be any confusion over who we had where etc, or for people to think we had any kind of influence over DFC signings etc - you know how badly that kind of situation can play out!!!!

Generally speaking though, I was there from Dec 2018 to around Oct 2019, and in the 2019 season I seem to recall us winning a league by 11 points, adding a few other trophies and having two good players for every position in a really healthy squad. I can’t take credit for that of course, but I think all of us who were involved did pretty well.

I had involvement in the appointment of one managerial team - Vinny had been offered the job before I got there after SK left and I had to help get it over the line and sort the contracts for the staff. One big challenge was sorting out the regulatory stuff with the FAI around the Head Coach role, working closely with Colm (who during my time was the guy who was the best out of everyone at his role, top operator). We didn’t have any of the issues that later troubled the club regarding pro licenses etc due to the way we sept it up and communicated it. Vinny remained there after I left so there was no involvement in any of the stuff that followed re coaches etc - the last thing I did re coaches was oversee SOD moving to Pats, and I actually ensure the club received compensation for taking him from us back then, which saw me negotiate Stevie’s exit with Garrett Kelleher. I think this was the first time in LOI history a club had received compensation for a opposition scout/analyst leaving for another club!!

Off the pitch I recall we made some small steps to modernise things on the business side such as card machines in the shop and bars for payments, keeping the shop open through match nights as well as paying staff, adding toilets in the away end (glamorous eh?), and the one I’m most proud of - the Temple Street shirt initiative. That project with Temple Street was the thing that led to us saving the Fyffes relationship - when I arrived they’d publicly ended the relationship as they were unhappy with some things, and we were in a tough spot re shirt sponsorship. Martin was a great ally on that and I worked closely with Gerry Cunningham to save that sponsorship as it was a long-standing community relationship that Martin and I felt we could save if we talked it through, which we did. It felt important that we tried to do some improvements to Oriel where we were able to, although this proved tricky, and we also hired some local people in key positions to improve how things run - full time finance officer, someone to do comms etc.

We didn’t always get things right, myself included, but I was always surprised by any criticism when compared to how things unfolded in 2020 and 2021 - last year particularly showed how well everyone involved in 2019 actually did, both on and off the pitch. I think we’d all have bitten someone’s hand off if they offered us 2019 all over again during the craziness of 2020 and 2021.

Re signings, this was always speculated about a lot, but during my time we signed Sean Murray, Jordan Flores, Cameron Dummigan, Andy Boyle, and all of those were identified by the coaching staff at the time. Aaron McCarey, Georgie Kelly and I think Dan Kelly were already signed before I arrived - my job was just to sort the contracts for the guys coming in and to make sure we didn’t overpay or get taken advantage of financially by agents. I also renegotiated contracts for Brian Gartland, Chris Shields, and got close to finalising Gary Rogers last contract too before I finished my stint there. I’d say all of the new ones there made very positive impacts for the club but I can’t take credit for scouting any of them, that was all Vinny and the coaches. Joe McKee came in on loan as a bit of an unknown and didn’t make as much of an impact but he was a short-term signing after the awful injuries in opening two games of the season to Robbie Benson and (I think) Patrick McEleney, so that we had cover. The Pat contract was talked about a lot, but even with 10 months to go on his deal in Feb 2019 I started talks with him and his agent to extend his deal; as he had just scored a ton of goals in 2018 and I was worried that alongside Jamie McGrath we didn’t have them on long-term deals. During my time we didn’t agree terms on Pat’s deal but we always wanted it to happen - I might have just dug in a little harder on giving the agent involved everything he asked for, but then after Bill picked up the reigns it happened pretty quickly. Looking back I think providing resistance to agents was important and the club could have had a different 2020 and 2021 if that had been consistently applied.

My role generally was essentially to provide support to the coaches to help them deliver their objectives on the pitch, as a technical or sporting director typically does, as well as liaise with the owners in Chicago who at the time I came in (under Mike Treacy) really wanted to improve things, and to help hire a CEO to drive it forward.

Much of what was speculated about was wrong, but I figured it was always best to just not get involved in it and focus on the work we had to do - because there was a lot of it! Regardless, as I said before I loved the town, the club and the players, and have remained friends with many of the people I met in that year on the staff, in the squad, and in the community.

[southerncomfort]

success always has many father's and failure is always an orphan ,

good on andy for giving a view, it's bizzare to be looking back at the ' stability ' of 2019 ( did you ban a journalist from OP at one point ?? ) , andy clearly helped hugely with the p6 relationship and the club in general

Agents and agent/manager 'cliks' seem to have a disproportionate relationship with who becomes a manager, who gets talked about as the 'next big thing '... And the managers with the best relationship with stable A / B / C
can't see it being good for player or vlube in the long term , but suppose it's a fact of life

well done to andy for what he did

[Andy Burton]

success always has many father's and failure is always an orphan ,

good on andy for giving a view, it's bizzare to be looking back at the ' stability ' of 2019 ( did you ban a journalist from OP at one point ?? ) , andy clearly helped hugely with the p6 relationship and the club in general

Agents and agent/manager 'cliks' seem to have a disproportionate relationship with who becomes a manager, who gets talked about as the 'next big thing '... And the managers with the best relationship with stable A / B / C
can't see it being good for player or vlube in the long term , but suppose it's a fact of life

well done to andy for what he did

As a former journalist I wasn’t entirely comfortable with one having his access temporarily removed, but I was aware of it and involved in the decision yeah. To be fair, at the time some of what was happening was really unsettling. Rumours were being written as fact (“rumours, in Dundalk?” I hear you say…!), and it was destabilising what we wanted to achieve on the pitch which has to always be the first priority at any football club. Things like us (or me) trying to replace the head coach with specific people such as Nicky Barmby was one mental one - Nicky is someone who I’d never met or spoken to and also came at a time when we had no intention of making any managerial change, were a huge distraction in 2019.

That said, when I was a reporter I pissed a few clubs off too over the years and my old boss at Sky used to tell me you weren’t doing your job well enough if you didn’t have at least one ban per season!!!!

I spoke to the journalist to smooth my personal relationship with him, and I think he was in a difficult position being fed misinformation from a few places. We drew a line under things and have remained in touch - we were both sad about how things played out and vented some frustrations to each other after some of the mad stuff happened last year, so all is well that ends well. We actually get on pretty well now and have bonded somewhat over our love for the team (his being infinitely greater than mine!), and we still swap messages from time to time. This is, ironically, a podcast thread, and we’ve discussed for a while whether I might go on to chat about the team and my time there… I listen to him every single week and if he’s ever running out of guests maybe I’ll go on! He’ll have to be desperate though for sure!!!!

[Pepsi]

Andy, what you are telling us, and it sounds very plausible ... is that when you were involved with the club you were allowed to work away and get on with things without interference from the owners. Vinny and his team were picking / scouting the signings, and everything was professionally run ... the press were however twisting things and stirring sh1te, some of which was directed at your person. Welcome to Dundalk, we love a good rumour! You stating there is nothing to the Barmby rumour will break a few hearts …
In your opinion, what caused the change of heart with Peak6? Were the reports coming from journalists accurate about the antics, phones in the dugout, team being pick…. or was it also being overcooked to suite the agenda? Maybe being stoked by potential new owners or the FAI (where Peak6 didn’t have many friends)? Was the sole problem the pensioners appointment and if so, why was he not replaced? Surely, they lost money on it and if it was so good in 2019, why not keep the investment with serious management structures in place and try to improve it with strategic investment? You seem to be the only one who has experienced them first-hand and are the first to my knowledge who has spoken out publicly.
2-3 final questions ....
Did you guys ever question the publicly funded stadium being built solely for the county GAA teams? Where there ever questions asked of why DFC were out of the picture or did the previous owners walk away and accept it?
Who was advising the club owners after you left? Would it be fair to assume many of last years singings, if not all were signed by Fillipo?
After leaving, were you ever approached to advise / support the owners in any way?

Thanks for your very open answers by the way .. pity they never publically announced your presence nor let you speak to the press during your time at the club. Would surely have shot down many rumours and maybe taken the wind out of a few sails.

[Richie87]

A good LOI Central pod today https://t.co/lOSArA50YF

[Andy Burton]

Andy, what you are telling us, and it sounds very plausible ... is that when you were involved with the club you were allowed to work away and get on with things without interference from the owners. Vinny and his team were picking / scouting the signings, and everything was professionally run ... the press were however twisting things and stirring sh1te, some of which was directed at your person. Welcome to Dundalk, we love a good rumour! You stating there is nothing to the Barmby rumour will break a few hearts …
In your opinion, what caused the change of heart with Peak6? Were the reports coming from journalists accurate about the antics, phones in the dugout, team being pick…. or was it also being overcooked to suite the agenda? Maybe being stoked by potential new owners or the FAI (where Peak6 didn’t have many friends)? Was the sole problem the pensioners appointment and if so, why was he not replaced? Surely, they lost money on it and if it was so good in 2019, why not keep the investment with serious management structures in place and try to improve it with strategic investment? You seem to be the only one who has experienced them first-hand and are the first to my knowledge who has spoken out publicly.
2-3 final questions ....
Did you guys ever question the publicly funded stadium being built solely for the county GAA teams? Where there ever questions asked of why DFC were out of the picture or did the previous owners walk away and accept it?
Who was advising the club owners after you left? Would it be fair to assume many of last years singings, if not all were signed by Fillipo?
After leaving, were you ever approached to advise / support the owners in any way?

Thanks for your very open answers by the way .. pity they never publically announced your presence nor let you speak to the press during your time at the club. Would surely have shot down many rumours and maybe taken the wind out of a few sails.

Hi Pepsi. Again, lots to take in there. My posts were more than plausible, they were factual account of what happened! In the spring/summer of 2019 I was told Bill wanted to help, and that Matt wanted him to help in some sort of way as it would be good for him. I said he could scout players, watch some videos and give us some reports etc to contribute to the recruitment process - bearing in mind he had no credible experience in football I felt that would be a good way to manage him and keep the owner happy. Plus, if he got some satisfaction or positivity in his life out of it then where’s the harm?

When he came over to the Rovers game that summer I took him to the dressing room and he mentioned to me and two of the coaches how much he liked our number 9 that day. It was amusing as we were in the stand off over Pat’s contract and it suited the desire of the coaches who were prepared to keep him at any financial cost and worried that we wouldn’t re sign him (we were always going to). It made it awkward though as Bill was courted by the head coach to enable him to get what he wanted over the line, on more than just Pat’s deal. Long story short, they got very tight with Bill after that, thinking (I presume) it was their “in” with the owner and his influence witg his son could give them a bit more control over things, or at least an influence.

After that, it became concerning the direction things were heading, and even though I was formally offered the role of Technical Director in September I thought it best to politely decline - I’d been involved in a brilliant season in 2019 and didn’t think we could better that, so it was a good time to move on, much as I loved what I had been doing. The contract stand off with Pay was sorted pretty quickly, but it led to some other strange things happening and seemed to unravel quickly - I was surprised to see Chris Sheilds given another contract when we had actually renegotiated him on a long term deal until 2021 earlier that season - google it and you’ll see he got two new contracts that year, which I thought was odd.

It was a real shame to watch what happened after that in 2020, and a frustration to people like myself who had invested a lot of time in moving it forward - disclaimer, my time was invested in 2019 only and others did WAY more than me. I can only imagine my frustration was a small percentage of the feeling felt by those who’d been at the club for years and years who had done way more than me. For me it was a job, but for others it was a lifetime of support and dedication.

Whilst I remained in touch with some players, some of the staff and some of the local fans after I left, as for your questions about who was advising the owners after I left in Oct 2019 and what happened in the time after I was gone - I don’t know as I wasn’t there so it would be wrong to comment/speculate.

Just re the stadium question - my role was mainly to focus on football, with the CEO due to look at business elements. I had enough on my plate with the football things we wanted to work on to get involved with that discussion. Mike had previously had conversations about the stadium issue but it seemed hard to negate. Although, I do recall when Matt was over in 2019 for the European game we did look around Oriel with him, and he spoke positively to Mark, Martin and myself about a lot of improvements he wanted to make to the YDC, Shed, and other areas of the stadium. Why it didn’t happen, I don’t know. In terms of why it all broke down, I always felt that the hassle that came with the new recruitment strategy they tried to implement, individual internal agendas and then obviously the pandemic took some of the fun away. When you lose big money on a project, and you’re rich, the project has to be fun to justify the losses. When it stopped being fun, I think you naturally feel the financial hit a bit more (although I was never told that, just a hunch. On all of his other businesses though, he’d hire industry experts to run them - I think not doing that at DFC was a critical error of judgement.

The most important thing to do now is look forward, not back, because you now have your club back in the hands of locals, who care about it like you do, and it feels like it’s going back to its roots. I felt in 2018/2019 all we had to do was keep the momentum going that SK, Andy Martin and Paul had built. Didn’t need to reinvent the wheel. What I walked into was an amazing club, with a great, great bunch of men in the dressing room, and a group of dedicated staff and volunteers who’d do anything for the club. We just had to keep that going and maybe make some small additions to give it a boost. What happened in 2020 and beyond was heartbreaking to watch, but the people who have the club under their control now, both on and off the pitch, have its best interests at heart.

[DanielSexton]

Just finished listening to Andy Burton's interview on the Press Box. Fair play to the lads for getting it and Andy for doing it. It's 2022 now and we all want to look forward and not back but at the same time, it's genuinely interesting and in my opinion, it's important to know the truth about what went on even if you're only getting one perspective - we're all the good guy in our own stories.

The evidence of how good a job was done by all involved after Stephen Kenny left is in the 2019 trophy cabinet. Andy pretty much says that everything was going in the right direction until Bill showed up. We'll never know now but you would wonder where we'd be if that sliding door moment had not happened. Bill's chairmanship was a complete calamity. However, listening to the stuff about contracts/transfers in the summer of 2019 you'd wonder if everyone involved has the same version of events.

[southerncomfort]

Just finished listening to Andy Burton's interview on the Press Box. Fair play to the lads for getting it and Andy for doing it. It's 2022 now and we all want to look forward and not back but at the same time, it's genuinely interesting and in my opinion, it's important to know the truth about what went on even if you're only getting one perspective - we're all the good guy in our own stories.

The evidence of how good a job was done by all involved after Stephen Kenny left is in the 2019 trophy cabinet. Andy pretty much says that everything was going in the right direction until Bill showed up. We'll never know now but you would wonder where we'd be if that sliding door moment had not happened. Bill's chairmanship was a complete calamity. However, listening to the stuff about contracts/transfers in the summer of 2019 you'd wonder if everyone involved has the same version of events.

great pod , very good assessment above ds , ab seems a nice guy and clearly had a positive role in the 2019 success

to be cynical , he's incredibly complementary of very influential people who will just happen to essentially be his customers as he tries to sell them players ....

while bigging up his own role , he throws some obvious veiled shade at the 19 coaching team who are not currently prospective customers (pert and giller) who clearly felt he wasn't adding much , one was one of the bedrocks of the success and the other a club hero who took a pay cut to help the club , but maybe it's fair minded and not bias

for me there's too much cosy agent / inside track / journalist - dan - johnny - jimbo / player stable - owner 'next big thing' clicks , but that's just soccer in 2022 , some senior players would be best without agents

jr wrote in the argus ( and widely re reported ) while burton there in 19
''
The day after Dundalk's 0-0 first leg draw with Riga the chat in the players' gym was not so much on the match the night before but rather over rumours linking former Tottenham and Liverpool winger Nick Barmby with some form of managerial or coaching role at the club.
''
not sure it was fair to ban him from the ground for this , but surely it does seem a strange thing to print if truth and the success and stability of the team is your goal , was it a throw away joke by a player that is printed by a jounralist? Or floated by an agent who wanted a friendly face making the purchases , who knows , it's a great insight into the sometimes low bar set to get a rumour into print

to be fair to magilton, he seemed to figure out how to get jr on his side and we saw no negative ' barmby' level stuff about him , sure he was able pull an article in it's entirety . a lot to be learned there ... sod and matin will surely have this base covered

on balance , it's good that burton is around to give our owners a perspective, and clearly fan , by the sounds of the pod he was in martys ear in december recommending sod in and vp out ? and advice on his own players ? who knows

doesn't bode well for an agent that he breaches the confidence that the '19 manager didn't want myler , that stuff should lay buried good while , how can a manager trust him if after 3 years he blabs about preferences of a manger ... It's a fascinating listen though , and burton sounds like one of the good guys

success has many fathers , and failure an orphan

we rightly see draw draw and a win against harps as success now , , it was great to be reminded of riga and the emerites

[dundalkfc1903]

John Gill not exactly endorsing this weeks special guest.... Get him on the POD! ;)

The amount of delusional, insincere and self righteous people on some podcasts lately is mind boggling, but I suppose I shouldnt be surprised that the truth never gets in the way of a good story

[Pepsi]

Found this weeks Pod as always very good. Andys special was also a nice listen, made the drive home from work a little nicer. Some interesting points made and I am sure there will be a different version if you ask the others involved and the truth is somewhere in the middle. Would still love to know who was singing to the journaists from within!