The end is nigh.

[Ennis]

Everyone's got their faults, MON included, but for me he's one of the best there is for getting the most out of players.

this is fast becoming a myth.  Who was the last player that he got the "most" out of compared to where they were before?

Shorey? Harewood? Heskey? Sidwell? NRC? Petrov?

How about Milner - wasting his career in Newcastle's squad as a reasonable winger until MON put him centre-mid and turned him into a £20m+ player touted (admittedly on here) as the natural replacement for Gerrard?

Warnock - again, wasting his career until MON picked him up and got him back into the England squad.

Dunne/Collins - both decent players but unspectacular.  MON brings them in to our side and Chelsea away aside we have the best defence in the league.

That's from 5 minutes thought without trying too hard...

Milner will play for man city (should he leave) in the same place as he played for england in the summer - as a winger

None of these players have gone from average to great because of O'Neil......regardless of how many times you say they're "wasting" their careers just because they were at other clubs

[Mazrim]

I think that, from the position we were in at the time, getting Nike to pay us to make our shirts was pretty awe inspiring. But when all is said and done, it's just a shirt. Still, it was a big coup at the time and far more than we might have expected.

A lot of things were said at that time and we didnt really know what was going to happen. Maybe a few people got carried away with the Euphoria, with renewed hope. I can understand that.

Anyway, I dont think we should start looking at anything as over or in retrospect. There's always a chance we can move on and reach the *spits* promised land. Maybe it wont be with MON but I still think there's more to Football than just finance.

If Spurs can get there and compete (which remains to be seen) so can we.

[Rudy Can't Fail]

If he has no intention of playing them, it's not such a bad idea to get them off the wage bill. Or maybe Martin wants his cake and eat it too? I've no idea but I can't see the problem with getting rid of players we don't use, pay high wages to and replacing them with players that we will.

I don't see a problem with it either, just that I think it might be a case of NEEDING to get rid of them to get the players he will play more often.

I think Randy has enough financial elasticity to allow us to get players in before we off load those we don't need.

[Merv]

I'm not so sure about Milner playing as a winger at City, but anyway.

Credit where it's due - you can't slate the manager for signing players who haven't worked out, and also deny him credit for the ones who have.

Moving Milner into the centre of midfield was the catalyst for him not only going to the World Cup, but also becoming a real contender for a starting place. There was a huge fuss about the size of the fee we paid Newcastle for Milner... look at what he's worth now. Same with Ashley Young - he's helped him to develop into a really good player, perhaps not great, but still with plenty to go.

He's done well with Gabby. With Carew, previously a 'journeyman' striker with an iffy reputation.

Dunne and Collins were nowhere on anyone's shopping list last summer. Nowhere. Dunne was dismissed as slow and past it, surplus at City; Collins just wasn't on anyone's radar. They had a great season.

Consider what he did with Gareth Barry.... the guy's become an England regular because of working with O'Neill. And Petrov.... the manager has reinvented him as a deeper-lying midfielder and it's worked well.

What he hasn't done, so far, is sign a real unknown and developed him into a star, I agree with that, but he has had a positive effect on several players.

[Concrete John]

I don't think Warnock has improved here, just performed on a better stage to catch Capello's eye.

Young, Milner and Gabby certainly have.

He's got Dunne back to his best and I didn't see enough of the pre-Villa Collins to comment, but I very much doubt he's any worse.  

For Luke Young see Warnock.

He hasn't gotten the best out of Shorey or Sidwell.

Carew he has - mainly as he's gotten him to stay somewhere for longer than 5 minutes.

Harewood looked better than we thought in those cameo's in his first season, then faded back to what we all expected.

Knight was better than I thought and sold for a profit, so 1 in the plus column.

Some might not agree with this, but I don't think Heskey either improved or got worse - just stayed as he was.  

Downing is a 'wait and see', as is Delph.

Overall I think the players he's bought in have surprised us, with a few often debated exceptions.  Whether that's a case of him improving them or them being better than we thought in the first place you can decide for yourselves!

[Concrete John]

If he has no intention of playing them, it's not such a bad idea to get them off the wage bill. Or maybe Martin wants his cake and eat it too? I've no idea but I can't see the problem with getting rid of players we don't use, pay high wages to and replacing them with players that we will.

I don't see a problem with it either, just that I think it might be a case of NEEDING to get rid of them to get the players he will play more often.

I think Randy has enough financial elasticity to allow us to get players in before we off load those we don't need.

Quite possibly, but I think he's trying to ease us off dependency on his finances and into reliance on our own.

[Concrete John]

Consider what he did with Gareth Barry.... the guy's become an England regular because of working with O'Neill. And Petrov.... the manager has reinvented him as a deeper-lying midfielder and it's worked well.

Barry was on the verge of joining Portsmouth for around £5m when MON took over, and two years later a CL club like Liverpool are after him for over twice that.

As for petrov, I think he plays the same role for his country, so I'm not sure we can give him that much credit for 'reinventing' him!

[Rudy Can't Fail]

If he has no intention of playing them, it's not such a bad idea to get them off the wage bill. Or maybe Martin wants his cake and eat it too? I've no idea but I can't see the problem with getting rid of players we don't use, pay high wages to and replacing them with players that we will.

I don't see a problem with it either, just that I think it might be a case of NEEDING to get rid of them to get the players he will play more often.

I think Randy has enough financial elasticity to allow us to get players in before we off load those we don't need.

Quite possibly, but I think he's trying to ease us off dependency on his finances and into reliance on our own.

I don't think that's the case just yet, I think the General explained the current situation and position very clearly:

When we screw it up, we need to admit it and learn from the mistakes. Right now, we need to look at the current wages paid and make sure that we are paying them to the right folks.

[pauliewalnuts]

Consider what he did with Gareth Barry.... the guy's become an England regular because of working with O'Neill. And Petrov.... the manager has reinvented him as a deeper-lying midfielder and it's worked well.

Barry was on the verge of joining Portsmouth for around £5m when MON took over, and two years later a CL club like Liverpool are after him for over twice that.

As for petrov, I think he plays the same role for his country, so I'm not sure we can give him that much credit for 'reinventing' him!

I like Petrov, but let's not forget, he was rubbish for nigh on two years.

[Chris Smith]

Everyone's got their faults, MON included, but for me he's one of the best there is for getting the most out of players.

this is fast becoming a myth.  Who was the last player that he got the "most" out of compared to where they were before?

Shorey? Harewood? Heskey? Sidwell? NRC? Petrov?

How about Milner - wasting his career in Newcastle's squad as a reasonable winger until MON put him centre-mid and turned him into a £20m+ player touted (admittedly on here) as the natural replacement for Gerrard?

Warnock - again, wasting his career until MON picked him up and got him back into the England squad.

Dunne/Collins - both decent players but unspectacular.  MON brings them in to our side and Chelsea away aside we have the best defence in the league.

That's from 5 minutes thought without trying too hard...

Milner will play for man city (should he leave) in the same place as he played for england in the summer - as a winger

None of these players have gone from average to great because of O'Neil......regardless of how many times you say they're "wasting" their careers just because they were at other clubs

Oh come off it, would anyone have considered paying £25m for Milner 2 yaers ago? You were probably one of the ones saying we'd overspent at £12m.

[peter w]

Also Barry was an attacking player for us. he was never a deeper-lying midfielder. It was England that changed him into that.

[KevinGage]

I know a few who are in Portugal and I would say the majority of them are not happy with MON. I find it a bit odd as most of our better performances are away from home which would  appease them you would think.

A lot of it stems from the Moscow thing and especially the alleged arrogance showed by MON in his speech at the 'lets make up' dinner afterwards when I gather he effectively dismissed anyone elses opinion on how to run our club.

The Europe thing annoys them in as much as they are very commited fans who enjoy their trips away and can't understand why MON would throw away an opportunity for more by playing weak sides. A lot of people went to Prague Hamburg etc and haven't really forgiven him.

There is certainly an element of truth to this.

I mentioned on another thread, but we had the Heskey signing, the Moscow debacle and the arse falling out of our season all in a relatively short space of time (about two months) of that season.  We've never fully bounced back from that.

We had an OK season last year (at various times it looked like it could actually be a good one), but I think most of the doubts stem from that earlier period. Repeating patterns like poor form in March with a worn out team and fullbacks who aren't actually fullbacks don't help his cause either.

I wasn't one advocating he should go, but I wouldn't have been heartbroken if he'd decided to leave of his own accord this summer.

In the interest of balance, he has made us competitive again. To the point that we've been regularly discussed as top 4 candidates over the past two years. During that time we've managed some pretty spectacular results too. Our better players are also the subject of large bids from other clubs, which although not always desirable is a better state of affairs than our best players going to Middlesborough. Or as was the case in 2006, having virtually no saleable assets on the books at all.  If we can't go the Chelsea/ Man Citeh route (and we can't) the next best thing is to trade at profit, and build a squad over time as per Tottenham and other similar sized clubs on the continent.

But maybe it will take a more innovative manager to build that squad, one who doesn't limit his search criteria to these shores.

[sfx412]

Anybody over the centuries who have proclaimed that "The End is Nigh" have all been wrong.

there were a group of us who sat in the centre circle once  proclaiming the end was nigh.

I remember losing an away  match  at  Port Vale  ot long after, in he pouring rain and thinking how right we'd all been .

so you never know we sometimes get it riight

[Ennis]

Oh come off it, would anyone have considered paying £25m for Milner 2 yaers ago? You were probably one of the ones saying we'd overspent at £12m.

You're right I wouldn't have thought anyone would have considered paying £25m for milner 2 years ago.......i don't think anyone would.

[usav]

There was talk of the 5 year plan when Randy came (although one was never communicated).  This will be O'Neill's 5th season in charge, and probably his last.

My only fear is that the bad blood that is brewing for the manager doesn't run over onto the owner.