Oliver Holt on Sunday Supplement 23/1/2011

[pauliewalnuts]

Good post, fredm.

Watching the Valencia friendly, I also thought at the time that it was odd seeing MON wearing a suit and sat up in the stand for a good chunk of the match

[Villa'Zawg]

As we discussed a few pages back, he didn't 'take them with him', they also resigned of their own free will, although I think he would have known that would happen when he walked.

And as we agreed, the resignation of an entire football management team en masse, five days before the season started, is unique.

Yet, and this is without doing a full points per game comparison, the results when K-Mac was working without much help were better than they were once Gezza came in with his full staff.

Helped by having West Ham at home and with a full playing staff.

There was obviously an air of disillusionment about for weeks during pre-season.  It has been quoted by others that rumours were doing the rounds in Portugal and the performance both by the team and MON himself in Dublin was quite amazing.  The team were outplayed and outfought by the equivalent of a lower league team, most of whom had played the previous evening. MON came out, walked across the pitch to the dug out, remained seated for the entire match and at the end just got up and walked back across the width of the pitch to the tunnel/dressing rooms without so much as a cursory glance at the large numbers of supporters who had travelled.  In fact, it was so obvious, that we commented on it at the time, as even on days when we had played rubbish and been beaten he had always made a point of clapping the fans who had followed the team.

I think there was a lot of uncertainty going on pre-season which meant that the players were not adequately prepared for the start of the season, either mentally or, in some cases, physically.

Take out the Milner inspired match against the rubbish team of Spammers and we looked like a bunch of players who had been thrown together and didn't know or want to be bothered making any effort for those first few weeks.

It's all well and good second guessing the motives behind gestures and actions and we can speculate on individuals personal thoughts/motivations. The fact remains that we won 3 and drew 1 of our first 6 games, if we had continued in that vein we would be alongside Chelsea and Spurs in the table. The squad went to pot after Gerard began implementing his changes.

[dave.woodhall]

If only we hadn't had to start playing Spurs and Arsenal. If only every game was West Ham at home.

[Concrete John]

If only we hadn't had to start playing Spurs and Arsenal. If only every game was West Ham at home.

I think we're getting away from the original point here, which was the effect of MON and his staffs departure had on our season.  Results during that period, for whatever reason, were acceptable and only went really down hill after the new management team took charge.  So that period of K-Mac doing everything but serving the pies has actually improved our position as it is now, as oposed to harmed it.

[dave.woodhall]

If only we hadn't had to start playing Spurs and Arsenal. If only every game was West Ham at home.

I think we're getting away from the original point here, which was the effect of MON and his staffs departure had on our season.  Results during that period, for whatever reason, were acceptable and only went really down hill after the new management team took charge.  So that period of K-Mac doing everything but serving the pies has actually improved our position as it is now, as oposed to harmed it.

We're not getting away from it; we're pointing out the flaws in your argument.

[pauliewalnuts]

If only we hadn't had to start playing Spurs and Arsenal. If only every game was West Ham at home.

I think we're getting away from the original point here, which was the effect of MON and his staffs departure had on our season.  Results during that period, for whatever reason, were acceptable and only went really down hill after the new management team took charge.  So that period of K-Mac doing everything but serving the pies has actually improved our position as it is now, as oposed to harmed it.

Losing 6-0 to Newcastle is never going to be acceptable.

[Concrete John]

We're not getting away from it; we're pointing out the flaws in your argument.

Unsuccessfully then, as my argument is not about how good K-Mac was or wasn't or how difficult the games he had were or were not.  What I am saying is that in the period between MON and his guys going and Houllier and his guys arriving, we did relatively OK in terms of points on the board compared to how the season has gone since.  So in terms of our league position and win/loss/draw ratio, has that period added or detracted to the overall 2010/2011 effort thus far?   

[Concrete John]

Losing 6-0 to Newcastle is never going to be acceptable.

Losing 6-0 to anyone is unacceptable.  But given our cirumstances one loss in four games is.

[Merv]

Losing 6-0 to Newcastle with a full squad. Going out of Europe with a full squad. GH was barely through the door when the injuries piled.

We're going round in circles here. The situation with MON predates his walk-out... it was bubbling under from April/May and the summer was effectively a waste, the squad stood still, there was an air of resignation and doubt about the whole place. Much joking on here about MON not turning his phone on, but... how much was his heart in it at that stage?

What happened hurt us, no doubt. Set us back. Houllier's been playing catch-up since. Now, from here on in, it's all down to GH - more or less a full squad available, three of his own signings on board, let's see what he can do. Interesting he noted post-match on Saturday that he felt the squad was tighter in recent weeks... he's got shot of Carew, Warnock and Ireland just about banished, Dunne given a chance to redeem himself, Sidwell gone. I think MON left us with more than a legacy of a squad with bloated wages. Seems a few egos and offside attitudes around too. Celtic fans might experience a bit of deja vu if they looked into the post O'Neill situation at Villa.

Let's be clear: we go down, it's down to GH. But let's not play down the damage O'Neill did. It's only just beginning to be set right.

[Dave Cooper please]

Yet, and this is without doing a full points per game comparison, the results when K-Mac was working without much help were better than they were once Gezza came in with his full staff.

Which also coincided with the worst injury list I think I've ever seen, at one point we seemed to have a new player getting crocked every day!

[Rip Van We Go Again]

Yet, and this is without doing a full points per game comparison, the results when K-Mac was working without much help were better than they were once Gezza came in with his full staff.

Which also coincided with the worst injury list I think I've ever seen, at one point we seemed to have a new player getting crocked every day!

11 players out at one point, there isn't a manager in the world who wouldn't struggle to get consistent results faced with an injury list like that.

[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?

[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.

[pablopicasso_10]

little from column A', a little from column B', john...

[Dave Cooper please]

It's all well and good second guessing the motives behind gestures and actions and we can speculate on individuals personal thoughts/motivations. The fact remains that we won 3 and drew 1 of our first 6 games, if we had continued in that vein we would be alongside Chelsea and Spurs in the table. The squad went to pot after Gerard began implementing his changes.

This may be true, but Hotlips has his own ideas, his own style of management and tactics. Perhaps we are just now starting to see how he wants Villa to play? He now has a couple of his own players in as well. Might be great, might be a disaster, we'll see. Either way, bringing a whole new way of training and playing to a team already into the season and set up as a MON team can't have been easy and added to the horrendous injury list you can see why we struggled.