The future of Houllier and McAllister?

[WikiVilla]

Good post jembob

[KevinGage]

In a season of transition -as this was tagged pretty much from the moment MON bailed- you'd expect some up and down performances.

One week great, the next game hardly turning up.

This season when we've played badly we've lost and (often) when we've played quite well - we've still lost.

That tells me that the quality of personnel is still there to trouble most opponents, but we're consistently not getting over the line due to poor choices and poor decision making -most of that from the top.

Not prioritising new defenders -if they felt the current lot weren't up to it- deciding that working on set pieces can wait until the summer and so forth.

If you don't have the platform of a safe and secure defence all the bright approach play and neat triangles will ultimately count for shit.

[WikiVilla]

add to that a potential exodus of our best players in the summer - both youngs, downing, petrov, nrc...

Does not bode well at all

[Greg N'Ash]

i'm sure he wanted defenders in but there's the question of money. Bent weren't cheap and at the time he probably thought that was a priority given our strike force.

[WikiVilla]

Bent was money well spent as I guess his goals have kept us up ?

[Greg N'Ash]

yep. if we'd gone into feb with carew, heskey and gabby, we'd probably be level with west ham

[Ad@m]

I'm sorry gregnash but none of this explains why a team that has consistently challenged for the Champions League places has spent the whole of this season struggling to keep its head above water.

There has been one major player change (Milner) and a number of difficult injuries at the start.  However the players are good enough to be much higher up the league and the management team is the only explanation for why they're not.

[Greg N'Ash]

maybe people were blinded by the results as opposed to the performances under MON, but really we were a well drilled side playing not they skillfull football. yep, we should be higher up the league and if we'd reverted to type this season we'd probably wouldn't be far off last season. But we weren't much cop all told. to me GH was trying to change that, maybe too fast for some, but whoever gets the job can't go back to that style. We threw 80m at it and we didn't crack the top4 playing that way so what makes anything think another 80m is gonna work?

[WikiVilla]

yep i was blinded by the

5-1 home win v SHA
2-0 home win v Chelski
3-1 win at Liverpool
1-0 win at Man Ure
4-2 win v Ci££y
+ countless other wins vs SHA, WBA & Wolves
Yes I'm blinded

[Ad@m]

maybe people were blinded by the results as opposed to the performances under MON

But the results get you points, performances don't.

I could see your argument if it was a short spell of lucky victories but this was a consistent 3 years of high finishes and but for the injury to Laursen we probably would've cracked the Big 4.

I'm no fan of MON - I thought he'd done a great job until I realised just how much money he was chucking at ordinary players who weren't even in the team.  But Houllier and McAllister have been an unmitigated disaster.  They've destroyed the team spirit and confidence we had before whilst causing a load of injuries with their ridiculous training methods at the start and then trying to force the players to play a system which completely ignores their strengths.  I just can't see any positives to their involvement.

[OzVilla]

Fair enough after Mcdonald left, but maybe they did look around. We don't know.

Well i'm talking about the whole period as K-Mac was obviously a stop gap to allow us time, no problem with that (6 games as it turned out which is plenty long enough).

But to then end up with a bloke that hasn't managed for 4 years, has a history of health issues and has been a leading light in that bastion of WC professionalism, the French FA is quite simply madness.

Who would you have appointed?

Well that's an interesting one because we've often said yourself that when a vacany arises at B6 we'd have Managers lining up to take over - i'll give RL the benefit of the doubt and say they wern't and that's why we settled for GH.

That may well be down to the shite timing of MON's departure though so clearly that excuse won't wash this time around.

Houllier wouldn't have been on my shortlist and neither was he on anybody else's it seems other than Randys.

At the time I'd have honestly taken Ericsson over Houllier but ideally I'd like Van Gaal or Moyes now.  I'm secretly hopeful that we might get a surprise application from a proven name that fancies the challenge of taking on a prestigeous, well established Premiership side with plenty of young talent and a free reign from the Board - that should be a highly attractive proposition so that might flush out a candidate that takes us all by surprise - Joachim Louw, Hiddink, etc.

[Greg N'Ash]

yeah and what about the hammerings? last season we went backwards and before that we'd basically hit a glass ceiling which was the limit of how high MON's system could get you., and even MON's greatest supporter would have been worried going into a season with no milner and a strikeforce of heskey, gabby  and carew. If its GH then how come Carew isn't slamming them in from all angles for stoke? they should suit him. bottom line is Milner was a key player not replaced and the likes of petrov and carew have got old and the ex-manager didn't replace them

[TonyD]

Which every way anybody wants to argue this season - it has been bad, very bad.

For me the 2 goals against ManU are the only decent highlight and a false dawn.

Lets hope the board can make a swift move in two weeks time.

[Clark W Griswold]

The only way i could see this as anything but the worst season the club has had since we last got promoted is if we win all of the last 3 games, putting us on 50 points.
Just to recap, a team that finished 6th and got to a cup final and cup semi final last season (albeit playing turgid football much of the time) has;

Lost to Blues in one cup, to see them go on to win it.
Lost to the Wolves for the first time in roughly 30 years. And at home.
Lost to the Albion for the first time in roughly 25 years.
Surrendered in another cup.
Given away countless goals in the last 5 mins.
Flirted with relegation, and still won't be far off if we don't win next week against Wigan.
Had numerous reports of unrest in the squad.

Who do i blame? Everyone at the club with any connection to the playing side is fair game, except a handful of players.

Positives;

Signing Darren Bent, and his subsequent contribution, without which it would have been even worse.
The emergence of some decent young talent, particularly Albrighton.

We need a revolving door in the summer, including the manager, who i wish a speedy recovery.

[dave.woodhall]

Fair enough after Mcdonald left, but maybe they did look around. We don't know.

Well i'm talking about the whole period as K-Mac was obviously a stop gap to allow us time, no problem with that (6 games as it turned out which is plenty long enough).

But to then end up with a bloke that hasn't managed for 4 years, has a history of health issues and has been a leading light in that bastion of WC professionalism, the French FA is quite simply madness.

Who would you have appointed?

Well that's an interesting one because we've often said yourself that when a vacany arises at B6 we'd have Managers lining up to take over - i'll give RL the benefit of the doubt and say they wern't and that's why we settled for GH.

That may well be down to the shite timing of MON's departure though so clearly that excuse won't wash this time around.

Houllier wouldn't have been on my shortlist and neither was he on anybody else's it seems other than Randys.

At the time I'd have honestly taken Ericsson over Houllier but ideally I'd like Van Gaal or Moyes now.  I'm secretly hopeful that we might get a surprise application from a proven name that fancies the challenge of taking on a prestigeous, well established Premiership side with plenty of young talent and a free reign from the Board - that should be a highly attractive proposition so that might flush out a candidate that takes us all by surprise - Joachim Louw, Hiddink, etc.

That's all very well, but I can imagine the furore had Sven got the job fresh from his time at Notts County, Mexico & the Ivory Coast. There may be a fresh slate to choose from in May, but at the time the choice was limited - and didn't the previous incumbent know it.