Latics diary: The Mellon talks

The big news emerging from the fans forum last Thursday is that the club and manager Micky Mellon are to begin talks about extending his tenure at Boundary Park beyond the end of this season.

Unfortunately for all concerned, this is not as straightforward as simply rewarding a promotion-winning manager with an improved package and a couple or three more years.

Mellon spoke with typical candour, saying that he is open to the talks and that they had been delayed only because everyone is busy. Darren Royle was sitting next to him wearing his very best chief executive face. Likewise Luke Rothwell, the club’s owner. They gave nothing away, but it’s entirely possible that club and manager are on divergent paths.

The backdrop is that Oldham Athletic are aiming to become a specialist player development club, and Micky Mellon has no track record in that respect. The idea is that, sooner rather than later, the club will sustain itself by producing players to sell for profit through the academy, and recruit the promising rejects from other local academies before selling them too. Young players or slightly older ones with a point to prove are the third preferred player type.

The path Latics are on is much more than a vision or ambition. There are spades in the ground at Little Wembley, things are happening at the Chapel Road and elsewhere on the club estate, grants and funding have been received and spent.

The relationships that the club has forged with Oldham Council and with Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham will oil the wheels of the club’s physical and institutional development, and for now they can rely on any national political support they need. In other words, the Rothwells and Royle are 100% committed to building that type of club and no other, and are past the point of no return.

There is another acute imperative that no one mentioned at the fans forum: in the last year for which figures are available, Latics ran a £3 million operating loss.

There is no reason to suppose that that number has gone down and plenty of reasons to suppose that it has gone up. How many such annual losses can the Rothwells sustain? That number is thrown into sharp focus when you consider that attendances are strong, and the side-hustles of the gym, hospitality and the club shop are doing well.

Micky Mellon hasn’t developed players thus far in his career. He prefers experience over youth. He likes hardened professionals and known quantities, not hit-and-miss youngsters who’ll be star of the show one week and then have a couple of absolute stinkers. Mellon likes consistent performers and has a strong aversion to variability.

At the same time, it has to be said that Micky Mellon is drawn to success and it is drawn to him. Who’s to say he can’t adapt to manage the club through the transition and

beyond? He said at the forum that he wants to do exciting things in the remainder of his incredibly successful career. Does he want the familiar excitement of managing National League and League Two clubs to promotion, or does he want the new excitement of making young men into saleable professional football players? Can he get those youngsters to challenge at the upper end of League Two or to make par in League one?

Player development is absolutely central to the club’s future in the medium term, not a nice-to-have in the long term. If Latics created an abstract profile of the managers they want for the next five years right now, Micky Mellon might not make the cut. Let’s see what gives between now and the spring.