Oliver Holt on Sunday Supplement 23/1/2011

[Concrete John]

So the injuries were to blame, a point I would at least partly concede, and not Martin and his buddies doing one all at the same time?

Nobody is saying it is entirely the injuries or that it was entirely about Martin and his coaching staff fecking off.

You seem to think the latter had nothing to do with it, though.

I think that if we can get 7 points from 4 games when the impact is at it's highest, then the effect is being greatly exagerated by some, yes.

Now, I do appreciate that the games may not have been all that hard and that we played them without the benefit of injuries, but when one of our best little runs of form (so far) happened when things should have been at their worst, then saying it had a big impact is wrong.  What did have a big impact was the injuries and Gezza taking a bit too long (IMO anyway) to get to grips with the team and life back in the PL.

[pauliewalnuts]

So the injuries were to blame, a point I would at least partly concede, and not Martin and his buddies doing one all at the same time?

Nobody is saying it is entirely the injuries or that it was entirely about Martin and his coaching staff fecking off.

You seem to think the latter had nothing to do with it, though.

I think that if we can get 7 points from 4 games when the impact is at it's highest, then the effect is being greatly exagerated by some, yes.

Now, I do appreciate that the games may not have been all that hard and that we played them without the benefit of injuries, but when one of our best little runs of form (so far) happened when things should have been at their worst, then saying it had a big impact is wrong.  What did have a big impact was the injuries and Gezza taking a bit too long (IMO anyway) to get to grips with the team and life back in the PL.

Yes, which would have been far less of a problem had he not had to do it during the season.

I didn't ask if the effect of his leaving was being exaggerated, I was interested in whether you thought it actually had anything to do with it.

[Rip Van We Go Again]

So the injuries were to blame, a point I would at least partly concede, and not Martin and his buddies doing one all at the same time?

To my mind, injuries were the main problem.
But the Villa hating madman leaving 5 days before the start of the season certainly played it's part.

[Irreverent ad]

The only way we would had had a limited effect when MON left, would have been to replace him with a similar manager.

However, the culture of the club needed changing. I am shocked when hearing about MON training methods mainly consisting of five a side matches and not much else.

With Houllier I believe we have a chance of making the CL on a more consistant basis with training, players, contacts etc. WIth MON i think he had taken us as far as he could.I may be proved wrong, but that is what I believe.

The journos like Holt who write this crap only want the same teams at the top as more people will read the rubbish stories the pedal out! Other teams, like us, with ambition will get stick.

[Concrete John]

So the injuries were to blame, a point I would at least partly concede, and not Martin and his buddies doing one all at the same time?

Nobody is saying it is entirely the injuries or that it was entirely about Martin and his coaching staff fecking off.

You seem to think the latter had nothing to do with it, though.

I think that if we can get 7 points from 4 games when the impact is at it's highest, then the effect is being greatly exagerated by some, yes.

Now, I do appreciate that the games may not have been all that hard and that we played them without the benefit of injuries, but when one of our best little runs of form (so far) happened when things should have been at their worst, then saying it had a big impact is wrong.  What did have a big impact was the injuries and Gezza taking a bit too long (IMO anyway) to get to grips with the team and life back in the PL.

Yes, which would have been far less of a problem had he not had to do it during the season.

I didn't ask if the effect of his leaving was being exaggerated, I was interested in whether you thought it actually had anything to do with it.

Well, although I want to say 'no' to keep my argument intact, I have to be honest and say the lack of a pre-season with the players would not have helped him.  But the point I'm making, which now goes back a few pages, was the impact of all the coaching staff leaving at once.  I think that argument falls down when we got 7 points from 4 games with nobody, but then much less per game once Gezza's men were in place.