Aitor Karanka: Birmingham City boss has '100%' boardroom backing, says CEO
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Xuandong Ren became Birmingham City CEO following Trillion Trophy Asia's takeover in 2016
Boss Aitor Karanka has "100%" boardroom backing despite Birmingham City lying in the Championship relegation zone, says chief executive Xuandong Ren.
City have slipped to 23rd in the table, their lowest in more than six years.
But Hong Kong-based owners Trillion Trophy Asia remain patient, especially in the light of the economic climate necessitating what they say is the lowest playing budget of their tenure.
"He signed up for a tough job when he came in," Ren told BBC Radio WM.
"There are a lot of difficulties that Aitor has had to face up to."
Ren admits the Covid-19 pandemic has simply added to the financial burden, coming on top of their breach of English Football League spending rules which led to them being docked points in 2019.
"We are still a club in transition," he added. "We are in the very last stage of recovery from the serious mistake we made three years ago.
"Aitor Karanka has the smallest playing budget since we took over this club."
They are also well aware that it took Karanka three years to win promotion to the Premier League with Middlesbrough.
When asked if the Blues board still backed the 47-year-old Spaniard, Ren said: "100%."
'A more than capable manager'
Blues fans have been through a lot in the decade since falling out of the Premier League in the same season that they stunned Arsenal to win the League Cup in 2011., external
Aside from a narrowly failed play-off bid under Chris Hughton in their first season back at second-tier level, they have survived a succession of relegation battles - as well as their ultimately even more costly over-spending, in the wake of Gianfranco Zola and Harry Redknapp's time in charge.
And there are now real fears that City are at risk of returning to English football's third tier for the first time since Barry Fry led Blues out of it in 1995.
Aitor Karanka has won just six of his 30 games in charge of Birmingham City - four of them away from home
Having dropped to 23rd without playing on Tuesday, they are now as low as they have been since Gary Rowett first took charge in November 2014 after the sacking of Lee Clark - and the club record 8-0 home defeat by Bournemouth which followed.
But Rowett turned that round, led Blues to successive top-10 finishes and then had them seventh in the table, outside the play-off positions only on goal difference, when he was sacked in December 2016 - just two months after Trillion Trophy boss Paul Suen's drawn-out takeover was completed.
If that was the moment Blues fans consider the biggest mistake of the past 10 years, then Ren insists that Blues have the right man to turn it round again now - in former Middlesbrough and Nottingham Forest boss Karanka.
"First of all we need to take a lot of things into consideration," said Ren.
"This has been a uniquely challenging year. And he didn't have a proper pre-season. Aitor came in through the door on 1 August and our first game was on 12 September with 14 new players.
"But we have a more than capable manager in place and he can take this team a long way.
"He has the experience. He knows the formula of how to get teams out of this league. We share my owner's vision for this club.
"In terms of progression, I am more than happy. We are playing the sort of football we think will get us out of this league. Not like the football we used to play."
Blues need a return to the sort of form that has helped them beat current Championship leaders Brentford this season, as well as enjoying away wins at Preston, Bristol City, Reading and Neil Warnock's Middlesbrough.
Within that same time frame, without the support of their home following, they have now gone 10 home games without a win - going back to 28 October.
But Ren does not feel they are under any undue pressure as they prepare to host out-of-form Luton Town on Saturday.
"Pressure? That is football," he said. "There is pressure all the time."
Birmingham City chief executive Xuandong Ren was talking to BBC WM's Richard Wilford.
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