.....,and Martinez turned us down!

[peter w]

If I recall correctly the only time I thought we wouldn't go down in 2010/11 is when we beat West Ham 2-1 when we dominated the game after I think Keane put them 1 up early on. Just checked -  16th April. I think it's fair to say we ended well - a la Wigan for a few seasons - but we were undoubtedly in a relegation scrap.

[dcdavecollett]

I recall having a chat over a couple of beers just after new year last year. My two mates (non-toffees) were really praising RM to the skies while I congratulated him on 'falling upwards' after relegating Wigan. Their reaction was similar to that if I'd shat on their lunch-plates.

Funnily enough, when I've seen them since they didn't seem too keen on continuing the discussion...

[paul_e]

Martinez plays decent football, that's undeniable, his teams can put together some decent attacks, but his inability to spot a decent defender or organise average defenders into a solid unit means he'll always struggle unless he accepts those limitations and brings in someone to do those things for him.

[junxs]

He's a very good manager, but he's having a stinker of a season. It happens, like it can happen to players. They'll be fine.

I think the jury is still out but one poor season that might be partly attributed to the demands of Europa League football should not be taken as final proof.

I think it's more of a case of one good season than one poor one. Every year at Wigan they looked awful all season and didn't start playing until the clocks went forward. Over the course of the season Jewell and Bruce looked more comfortable. Lets not forget he did finally take Wigan down too.

His only decent season was last year but that's more, like others have said, due to inheriting a very good side. Now that he's put his stamp on the team they are showing true Martinez colours.

[Gregorys Boy]

He's a very good manager, but he's having a stinker of a season. It happens, like it can happen to players. They'll be fine.

This is what I think.  Thing is he hit the ground running there and just because they were playing a more eye catching brand of football than under Moyes people got carried away in suggesting that he maybe even better (forgetting of course than Everton had punched above their weight for a good portion of Moyes 11 years), but now they are having a poor season the reaction has gone to the other extreme.  I say judge him after this season.  They are in no danger of going down for me, it would be one of the biggest shocks ever if they did.

[Gregorys Boy]

He's a very good manager, but he's having a stinker of a season. It happens, like it can happen to players. They'll be fine.

I think the jury is still out but one poor season that might be partly attributed to the demands of Europa League football should not be taken as final proof.

I think it's more of a case of one good season than one poor one. Every year at Wigan they looked awful all season and didn't start playing until the clocks went forward. Over the course of the season Jewell and Bruce looked more comfortable. Lets not forget he did finally take Wigan down too.

His only decent season was last year but that's more, like others have said, due to inheriting a very good side. Now that he's put his stamp on the team they are showing true Martinez colours.

Thats not really fair though.  On their budget and given such things like support and the kind of players they could attract Wigan were always going to stuggle with the drop reguardless of who the manager was.  I think he did a very good job there and I don't think them going down should take too much away from that.

[SoccerHQ]

I think K-Mac started the entire Young as no. 10 thing because we were short of strikers, and then we stuck to it because Albrighton and Downing were both in excellent form to start the season, and we wanted to squeeze all three onto the pitch at once. I do remember Gabby making some appearances on the wing at some point later on but he was predictably rubbish at it after his summer of bulking up and his general lack of understanding as to how to play there.

But yeah, from what I remember, we got dumped into it because our back 4 completely lost their form (Dunne and Warnock in particular), then completely lost its protection from the midfield, who then proceeded to get injured forcing us into playing luminaries such as 37 year old Pires and Jonathan Hogg there. Not to mention the entire change our style of play thing.

I recall it was something in O Neills mind during that pre-season. Indeed Young actually started for us as a striker in his first few games, playing off Carew. I would imagine much of what KMAC did was a continuation of what O Neill had already put into place, with perhaps more emphasis on keeping the ball on the deck.

Young should never have been played off the striker, he just didn't have the game intelligence for it and didn't score enough goals from open play.

Given the form Downing has shown this season for West Ham playing in an advance role he should've been played there instead with Young kept out wide.

Strange season 10/11. Yes 9th looked alright but we were in a major relegation battle for most of the season. On this weekend of that season we lost dismally at home to Wolves 1-0 who at the time were in the bottom 3 and they weren't far behind us at that point.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/eng_prem/9425547.stm

Look at that table. It's a bit like this season we continue on a mad winning run and finish 10th or 11th. You couldn't say we were comfortable mid table for most of the season could you.

Anyway I rate Martinez as a manager. He won Wigan the FA cup and yeah Wigan were in constant relegation battles but that's purely to the size of the club. It was inevitable they'd go down at some point and look at them now, about to go back down to league 1 which tbh is their natural home.

Everton however have massively underachieved this season. They do actually remind me a lot of us in that 10/11 season, decent attacking players nulified by a hopeless defence so certainly a big year ahead of him next time as Everton should be back pushing the top 6.

[passitsideways]

I would not at all be surprised if I'm wrong on this, but I always felt that Wigan had become much more frugal (relative to the rest of the league) by the time Martinez went there. Not saying they were moneybags and all in their first few seasons, but it did seem like the well had run pretty dry by 2010 or so, outside of him wasting money on Mauro Boselli.

[SoccerHQ]

I think you're correct in that. When they first came up they spent a fair bit under Steve Bruce. People like Heskey and N'Zogbia were being signed for good fees and wages.

Aside from Boselli, Martinez was generally shopping in the cheap foreign market and SPL, he found James McArthur and McCarthy for peanuts from Hamilton so in a strange sort of way his job at Wigan was very similar to Lambert's remit here, find cheap bargains and generally keep the team up.

[ez]

Ok. In the season 2010/2011 under GH,  we were still not mathematically safe with 2 games to go. I count this as a relegation struggle.

I said 2010/11 wasn't expected because of "but from my viewpoint this was the first of of 5 years of not unexpected relegation struggle." I don't remember anyone thinking we'd have a relegation worry that season.

For me when O'Neil walked out it seemed like an opportunity to take the next step up into the top 4 with a new manager. Most of the work had been done and then it only needed the right man to come in and complete the task. I think Randy was thinking the same but when we went in the opposite direction, that was when he lost interest.

[SoccerHQ]

Ok. In the season 2010/2011 under GH,  we were still not mathematically safe with 2 games to go. I count this as a relegation struggle.

I said 2010/11 wasn't expected because of "but from my viewpoint this was the first of of 5 years of not unexpected relegation struggle." I don't remember anyone thinking we'd have a relegation worry that season.

For me when O'Neil walked out it seemed like an opportunity to take the next step up into the top 4 with a new manager. Most of the work had been done and then it only needed the right man to come in and complete the task. I think Randy was thinking the same but when we went in the opposite direction, that was when he lost interest.

I lost a bit of faith in Randy at that point. We'd just finished 6th three times in a row so you'd think with a bit of clear thinking a decent continental manager could've been tempted from somewhere.

Instead Houllier was appointed in farcical fashion and others like Curbishley were being considered.

In hindsight we should've given it McDonald for a bit longer and waited until a decent manager became available at some point in the season as obviously the options were limited that August.

I think he was going to be given that job for the season but 6-0 at Newcastle changed everything and obviously the decisions and austerity since then have pushed us 10 places down the league.

[PaulWinch again]

I'll be hoping he gets his team to turn up and win tomorrow.