Simon Jordan has branded Andrea Radrizzani as “arrogant” and believes his attitude could be why Leeds United have struggled to conclude deals in recent years.
Radrizzani, 48, has been the majority shareholder at Elland Road since 2017, helping the club end their 16-year absence from the Premier League in 2020 but recently leading Leeds back to the brink of relegation to the second division.
Writing in his weekly column for Mail Plus (24 May), Jordan recalled a prior meeting with Radrizzani at the Qatar World Cup which clarified his thinking about the “lack of coherent” leadership in the Leeds boardroom.
“I have great admiration for his acumen in the media world, but he struck me as arrogant, off-hand and slightly away with himself,” he said.
“He was like a marginally more sophisticated version of former QPR owner Flavio Briatore. He had the old ‘look at me, I’ve just arrived in the room’ mentality.
“That sort of attitude might be why deals have been so difficult to conclude for Leeds and why mixed messages have been sent out at this dysfunctional, incohesive football club because leadership has to start at the top.
“In the end, if you lack coherent thinking in your boardroom you will lack it in your dugout and ultimately on the pitch, ending up in the kind of mess that Leeds now find themselves in.”
Shambles
Leeds United has been an utter shambles over the last two years, and the brunt of the criticism has rightly fallen at the door of Radrizzani.
Leadership at a football club must start at the very top and in this case the Italian simply hasn’t had a clue how to get Leeds out of this mess.
From Twitter posts about imminent managerial appointments that never happened to a private social media messages to a fan which included some colourful language, Radrizzani has simply lost control of proceedings in the last 12 months.
It is becoming ever-clearer that he wants to make an offer to buy Italian club Sampdoria and hand the reins to the 49ers this summer, and good riddance.
The theory floated by Jordan about transfers is unlikely to be true, but Radrizzani’s impact on other boardroom members further down the club is a perfectly reasonable assumption.
Radrizzani has run out of lives at Leeds, and it is only a matter of time before there is a change at the top of the club.
