The Martin O'Neill thread (with added sacking #2188)

[Louzie0]

c) I tend to think that telling a manager that he has to make massive cuts but he can't tell the fans, is selfish. Houllier, McLeish were willing to tell that lie to the fans and both paid the price.

Don't get the point you're trying to make here at all.

At no point did the club ever prepare the fans for the extent of the cuts. It started off being all about complying with the FFP rules. It has just been one player at a time until the fans reached their own conclusions, which is now presented as if it was always understood.

The last three managers have all colluded in that dirty little trick. Houllier came under a huge amount of pressure due to the consequences of that plan and so did McLeish.

These guys might be richer as a result but the experience did not exactly enhance their reputations.

Hello Droid

Realise that you feel you have to get people away from looking at MON's walkout by going through AV's recent history.
Actually, I was imressed at the start and remained so.  Not with the exit, though.  Still a choker.
Actually, still MON though. If he had been told all that about cutting players and costs by Randy, why wouldn't he have put it out there? Nothing stopping him in August 2010 if he was going to do the walk-out, anyway.

I believe that he was asked what his plans were for various players he had knocking around but whom he hadn't used for months.  I think that's reasonable. That's not FFP that's basic, 'who are we paying and what for?' in any industry.

I know you were in VP in 1980 - something, according to a previous post. I'm just left wondering why as a villa fan (or you would not be on here) you are not cheering Lambert on as he seems to be very good at finding players to do the bizz - yes, perhaps even better than MON was. Also, at finding clubs to take promising, unused or under-performing players on loan. Don't see that doing good business is a 'dirty little trick', however.
UTV

[Legion]

Can someone more savvy than me on technical matters stick up what I wrote about MON the other week for Villa C3PO. Ta.

It was brilliant, but I cannot find it. Can you remember which thread it was in?

[hilts_coolerking]

Hi Kingshirker

Here is my take on things if you wanted to share it with your fellow fans.

After the recent comments about “rewriting history” then I think it only appropriate to detail what I believe that history to be. When we appointed MON he was very much the right man, at the right time.

We had just parted company with one of the most unpopular managers we have ever had. A walking gaffe, who belittled the club to bolster his own ego about why it wasn’t his fault that we were underachieving and a man who had managed to turn a squad of decent players into racing certainties for relegation the following season. The atmosphere at the club had been poisonous for some time.

In no small part that was also down to our desperately unpopular chairman. A man who tried to expunge our greatest triumphs from the annals of our history as he was still sulking about being kicked off the board just before we achieved them. A man that many fans believed had held us back for years and you would hear plenty of arguments about him lining his own pockets, as well as feeding his own ego, being the only reasons he maintained his position. 

So our summer just kept getting better. The pantomime villain chairman agreed to flog the club to an American billionaire and we started to dream of Man City style spending before anyone had heard of Man City style spending. We just needed a figurehead manager to make us relevant again on the back of it. Enter, stage left, MON.

He was well regarded in the game and had been successful at his previous clubs. He was charismatic, he bounced up and down the touchline in a tracksuit and, most importantly of all, he seemed to get us. He walked into the club on a tide of goodwill and into the best working conditions of any Villa manager in living memory.

The first couple of years were fantastic. He had started to put his own team together in that first season and had a real splurge in the transfer market across the course of the second. We finished sixth, scoring a bucket load of goals (mainly from set pieces) and achieved an Intertoto place to give us a shot at European football the next year. Even that year though, although none us were prepared to bemoan it at the time, the first question marks were starting to rear their heads.

At the start of that season we looked short up front and were all speculating as to who the big money, foreign buy might be. A real “bums on seat” player was what we were expecting. Instead we got Marlon Harewood after hijacking a deal at the eleventh hour for his transfer to Wigan. We never did sign any exciting players from the continent in his entire time with us and he was regularly infuriating with his procrastinating over signing players until the last possible moment.

He also got rather lucky. For the first two and a half years of his time with us we could call upon a fit and firing Martin Laursen. A colossal defender, arguably the best in the league over that period, and who was good for a few goals each year as well. It should be noted though that Laursen is a player we would never have signed had it been down to MON. A Dane playing his trade in Italy? Not a chance. What we would have signed was the kind of player we got at the end of the summer deadline that year when he decided that Zat Knight was a better fit for the squad than Gary Cahill.

The third season saw yet more heavy expenditure although, again, none of this went on a striker. By Christmas, our fantastic away form had us looking like outsiders to challenge for the title. We maintained this right until the end of February in fact. This was based on fast counter attacking football.

And then it started to fall apart. Many fans were upset about us throwing our last 32 game in The Uefa Cup against Moscow to chase Champions League football. That we then threw away a two goal lead in the league game against Stoke that weekend only made that irritation worse. Luke Young complained about why we started the season In July if we were to chuck in the towel at the business end of the competition and was quickly ostracised from the first team It then got worse again.

He had rigidly stuck with the same first eleven throughout that season to the point they were out on their feet as March began. We managed to win just two of our last 12 games, falling away from being 8 points clear of fourth placed Arsenal to another sixth place in the league. 

In part this was also blamed on his one January capture. Carew was out injured for a period and we needed more goals to capitalise on our fine start. Instead we signed Heskey from Wigan and, to make matters worse, changed our style of play to accommodate the tumbling bear making us a much less potent attacking force. Lest we forget that this was the same window that Sunderland signed Bent from Spurs for not a great deal more by way of fee and a lesser salary.

The first rumblings of discontent had now begun amongst the support. The odd signings, our lack of any Plan B to break down teams that didn’t give us a chance to counter by parking the bus when we were at home and the feeling that we had let our one big chance of Champions League football pass us by. It was that January that Man City wont the lottery and signed Robinho for example.

Perhaps a more football savvy and ruthless board would have chopped him at the end of that year. They may have taken a view that our end of season collapse was unacceptable for a club that had invested as heavily as we had and that the manager should have made better use of the expensive resources, that he had signed, that were at his disposal. However, we didn’t have football men on the board and MON ran the club from top to bottom. Perhaps with that in mind it was understandable that they gave him yet more money and another tilt at it when we had come so close the year before.

The problem was that nothing had changed. The concerns that some had were never addressed. It was the same tired training methods (Walford and Robertson’s grasp of modern coaching techniques leading to them being known as Bibs and Cones by the players). We were still fishing only in the vastly overpriced UK market for players. We signed yet another back four. The style of play did not alter. His stubborn streak was to the fore at this time and he flatly refused to accept a need for change or any criticism of himself.

An example that springs to mind was a home game where we were behind against relegation strugglers and still plodding on with Plan A. The fans got restless and were heartened to finally see Delfouneso start to prepare to come on, suggesting that we were going to change things up front. It was greeted with ironic cheers. The response from the manager was to sit the player down and bring on a midfielder instead. Again, there was plenty of debate here as to whether this was done to prove a point to the fans that were questioning him.

Now some may argue that at the end of that season some Villa fans were way off beam to be questioning the manager openly. We finished sixth again. Got to a cup final and a semi. But, as plenty of us saw it, he had hit his glass ceiling. This was as good as it was ever going to get no matter how much money we let him throw at it.

We made the same substitutions, at the same time every week (Heskey time as it was known). He still wasn’t rotating the players as he had suggested himself he needed to in both previous summers. A lot of expensive squad players he had signed were kicking their heels in the stiffs and not getting a game. For the first time in his reign the board put a brake on expenditure and the fabled “sell to buy” policy began.

It wasn’t quite as it seemed though. What he had actually been told was to shift a bunch of squad players on that weren’t getting near a game. That the Famous Five he mooted in the local paper were pulling down nigh on £300,000 a week in scratch between them made this seem a pretty sensible thing for the board to do. MON’s problem was that these players were on salaries not commensurate with their talent and therefore it proved very difficult to drum up any interest in them.

He clung on until August in the desperate hope that he could get the owner to open the coffers again to bring further new blood in but this time Lerner remained resolute. I could do a whole piece about the why’s and wherefore’s of his departure. The players he wanted, the political wrangling behind the scenes, the Liverpool job etc. I don’t think that is for here though. It won’t interest you. And I know how litigious he can be.

What we can say without question is that he bailed out on us five days before the start of the season. It left us with no time to find a replacement. No time for that replacement to work with the squad. No time for him to make his own signings. It has been debated to death on here as to whether this was a calculated act of spite, designed to cause maximum damage to our season or whether this was, in fact, simply when he realised he was not going to get what he wanted and walked as he did not believe he could therefore do the job justice.

I suppose in summary it depends what you want as to how long you stick with him. Are you ever going to play free flowing, passing football? No you aren’t. With a couple more years, and plenty more money, you might find yourselves as regular mid table finishers who play decent, counter attacking stuff away from home but that is as far as he will take you . And what price do you put on those mid table finishes?

Where you have a real issue is that he doesn’t seem the same bloke that was our manager. He made up for a lot of his tactical naivety with his ability to motivate players. He did very well last season but looked a pale shadow of the guy who breezed  into Villa Park a few years ago. If he has lost his mojo for the job then you lose a lot of the good things he brings to the party.

I hope it works out alright for you as I happen to think Sunderland are a decent club and, for all the things I take issue with over his time managing us, it is certainly not a case of it being all bad in his time here. Far from it. Just don’t expect him to go beyond his limitations and, whatever you do, keep a tight grip on your wallet.
 

[Legion]

Show-off.

[cheltenhamlion]

VD, as someone who writes a lot about Villa, and plenty on the Board's culpability in some of the matters I take issue with, I can assure you I have no intention to give them an easy ride.

I do however believe at times that pointing the finger at Big Bad Randy is used as a means of hiding MON's deficiencies by some.

The board have clearly made mistakes. None so outrageous as appointing the useless arse whose football we were subjected to the endurance of last season. But to hold them responsible for all Villa related ills is grossly unfair in my view. 

[Billy Walker]

Doug paid Ron Bendall £425,000 for his shares in 1982. From that day on he invested not one single penny in the club.

Just out of interest, what percentage of Villa did Doug buy for that amount of money?  According to Wiki David Dein bought a 16.6% stake in Arsenal for £292,000 back in 1983 which makes me think both clubs were of a similar value back then.  It's astonishing to see the progress Arsenal have made since then, as a business. 

[SoccerHQ]

Round and round and round....

NRC 8.5M- Free transfer, probably on 40k a week.
Sidwell 5.5m, traded for a gift voucher at Harrods, 50k a week.
Curtis Davies 10m, 2m to SHA, 30-40K a week.
Heskey.
Shorey. Dreadful panic buy when Bouma got injured. In for 5m and we gave him to WBA for 50k.
Luke Young. In fairness an excellent full back imo. But signed for 5m when he went to Boro for 3m a year earlier.

And the worst of all Habib Beye. I can never to this day understood why he was signed, at 32 given a three year contract on 40k a week as a few weeks later MON just decided he was going to play Cuellar at RB for the whole season. So we had the ridiculous situation of Young and beye both on the bench earning not far off 100k combined.

He might've gotten away with it if we'd made the champions league one year but we didn't and too many of those vastly expensive squad players just didn't contribute.

That's way despite results not being great so far, I am fully behind Lambert's transfer vision. Benteke, Vlaar, Westwood, Lowton. All impressed me this season and all on less wages than the players they can be compared to above, Beneteke's probably on half of what Heskey was on here!

Hopefully it will be one more season of pain and next year we will be back competiting in the top half of the league again.

[pauliewalnuts]

Let's turn this round, VD. Why do you think we should owe MON a favour or be deferential as to what he did here?

I don't actually, I just contrast the enthusiasm for slagging off MON and the cringing reticence to say anything about Lerner.

You obviously haven't spent much time on this board if you believe there's any truth in this.

[Rudy Can't Fail]

He might've gotten away with it if we'd made the champions league one year but we didn't and too many of those vastly expensive squad players just didn't contribute.

We'd have been knocked of out the qualifiers quicker than you could say "hoof football".

Face it, he got found out and he ran away at the first request of having to do what every other football manager is asked to do.

[dave.woodhall]

Doug paid Ron Bendall £425,000 for his shares in 1982. From that day on he invested not one single penny in the club.

Just out of interest, what percentage of Villa did Doug buy for that amount of money?  According to Wiki David Dein bought a 16.6% stake in Arsenal for £292,000 back in 1983 which makes me think both clubs were of a similar value back then.  It's astonishing to see the progress Arsenal have made since then, as a business. 

Around 35%.

[OCD]

There was £10m of annual salaries wasting away not being used. That would make any owner sick.

[Andy_Lochhead_in_the_air]

Doug paid Ron Bendall £425,000 for his shares in 1982. From that day on he invested not one single penny in the club.

Just out of interest, what percentage of Villa did Doug buy for that amount of money?  According to Wiki David Dein bought a 16.6% stake in Arsenal for £292,000 back in 1983 which makes me think both clubs were of a similar value back then.  It's astonishing to see the progress Arsenal have made since then, as a business. 

Around 35%.

Stand to be corrected but as I understood it, Doug borrowed the £425k to purchase Bendalls shares. He then awarded himself a monthly salary which was roughly equivalent to the loan repayments he had to make.  He was one of the first directors to be paid a salary after the Football Association had changed the rules in the early 1980s.
He increased his holding over the years up to 47% by 1996, then sold off a portion making a £4million profit and reducing his holding to 1/3 in line with rules for the stock market flotation which took place in 1997.

[Billy Walker]

Doug paid Ron Bendall £425,000 for his shares in 1982. From that day on he invested not one single penny in the club.

Just out of interest, what percentage of Villa did Doug buy for that amount of money?  According to Wiki David Dein bought a 16.6% stake in Arsenal for £292,000 back in 1983 which makes me think both clubs were of a similar value back then.  It's astonishing to see the progress Arsenal have made since then, as a business. 

Around 35%.

Thanks.

[old man villa fan]

One of MON's main failings was that he could not sell players, for one reason or another.  Whether he did not feel it was his responsibility or whether his ego could not take the hit of selling players he bought in at a significant loss.

To maintain a healthy financial state, clubs must be able to turnover players.  With MON it was a case of just stacking them up on the rubbish pile.

It is the above that made me change my feelings for MON.  I suppose I came to realise it at the end of the summer transfer window at the start of his last season here when he failed to sell surplus players having invested heavily in a new defence and, of course, failed to buy a decent striker.

I believe to this day that he struck lucky in his final season with Milner moving to central midfield and having a storming season and this papered over the cracks.

[David_Nab]

Round and round and round....

NRC 8.5M- Free transfer, probably on 40k a week.
Sidwell 5.5m, traded for a gift voucher at Harrods, 50k a week.
Curtis Davies 10m, 2m to SHA, 30-40K a week.
Heskey.
Shorey. Dreadful panic buy when Bouma got injured. In for 5m and we gave him to WBA for 50k.
Luke Young. In fairness an excellent full back imo. But signed for 5m when he went to Boro for 3m a year earlier.

And the worst of all Habib Beye. I can never to this day understood why he was signed, at 32 given a three year contract on 40k a week as a few weeks later MON just decided he was going to play Cuellar at RB for the whole season. So we had the ridiculous situation of Young and beye both on the bench earning not far off 100k combined.

He might've gotten away with it if we'd made the champions league one year but we didn't and too many of those vastly expensive squad players just didn't contribute.

That's way despite results not being great so far, I am fully behind Lambert's transfer vision. Benteke, Vlaar, Westwood, Lowton. All impressed me this season and all on less wages than the players they can be compared to above, Beneteke's probably on half of what Heskey was on here!

Hopefully it will be one more season of pain and next year we will be back competiting in the top half of the league again.

Truly awful.Just no long term plan at all , also with Young according to wiki its even worse Boro paid £2.5mil and we paid up to £6mil.

He brought 99% from the UK market and yet the one player he brought cheaply and from abroad Guzan could turn out to be his best pound for pound signing.

With regard to his famed motivational skills I firmly believe that that was partly achieved by sticking average players on huge salaries.