?% Villa. Martinez, MON and the pie eaters

[Somniloquism]

I agree there's a lot of what if's but i'd say if he'd kept olof that would have given us an alternative to cahill at no cost. I wasn't against the signing of cuellar - i still don't think he's  a bad player, the others: shorey was a disaster from day 1 but i can't remember what i thought of him before he'd played for us. Sidwell, well i remember groaning at the amount of people who seemed to think he was lampard mk2, so personally of his signings then i wouldn't have signed sidwell or Davies which again is the best part of 15m. Either way whether we rated them before they arrived or not the fact remains they were crap which is down to the boss

Olaf went on a free to Juventus, Ok they weren't the club they used to be but it was still a move to a bigger club. Could we stand in his way after his 7 years service? Did we offer him a new contract or did he want to go/ MON want him to leave?

And I don't really want to get into a similar financial to and fro as per you and Perc, but we got £5mil for Cahil, so that money would have to be taken off any saving made on using him instead of other players. Can I ask what Davies did wrong in his first season with us on loan that you decided he shouldn't be bought that summer? ( I will give you the first game he played against Leicester I believe as a free.)

I think the best description of MON time with us is as someone mentioned earlier, a John Gregory mk2. We had potential to go far, had some good seasons at the start, never took the final leap (for differing reasons), and the reign is followed with several seasons of cost cutting and saving Money as ultimately our finances got screwed during the ride.

Talking of speculating on the past, what would have been interesting is if Randy had bought the club in May 2006 and either had to keep Dolly on or replace him without the input of Doug/ Stride who would have been our manager?

[dave.woodhall]

Talking of speculating on the past, what would have been interesting is if Randy had bought the club in May 2006 and either had to keep Dolly on or replace him without the input of Doug/ Stride who would have been our manager?

He still had Steve Stride when he took over, and O'Neill got the job so close to the takeover he may as well have been Randy's appointment.

[Somniloquism]

Talking of speculating on the past, what would have been interesting is if Randy had bought the club in May 2006 and either had to keep Dolly on or replace him without the input of Doug/ Stride who would have been our manager?

He still had Steve Stride when he took over, and O'Neill got the job so close to the takeover he may as well have been Randy's appointment.

I realise MON and Randy would have met pre takeover to discuss things before MON said yes to Doug. But if Dolly was still employed when the takeover went through, would Randy have given him a chance?

[dave.woodhall]

Talking of speculating on the past, what would have been interesting is if Randy had bought the club in May 2006 and either had to keep Dolly on or replace him without the input of Doug/ Stride who would have been our manager?

He still had Steve Stride when he took over, and O'Neill got the job so close to the takeover he may as well have been Randy's appointment.

I realise MON and Randy would have met pre takeover to discuss things before MON said yes to Doug. But if Dolly was still employed when the takeover went through, would Randy have given him a chance?

I hope not.

[pauliewalnuts]

Talking of speculating on the past, what would have been interesting is if Randy had bought the club in May 2006 and either had to keep Dolly on or replace him without the input of Doug/ Stride who would have been our manager?

That's a really intriguing question.

[Villa'Zawg]

...

Paragraph one - you never mention the spending of any club except those you reckon spend more than us. Perhaps if you did, your evidence might be treated a bit more seriously.

Paragraph two, in your words - "When you were posting in support of the board at the height of "the McLeish troubles", I think you should have mentioned in GM at least that you'd been to a briefing with McLeish, before having it exposed on another website."

As explained, I couldn't have mentioned being at a meeting before it had taken place. 'exposed' - like it was something to hide. Very emotive.

Paragraph three - thank you for admitting you lack the ability to answer a question without reporting to foul language and abuse.

I’m happy to discuss our record in relation to any other teams. It seems to me that no-one ever raises questions about our record against the teams that finished below us, it's always that we should have finished higher.

I apologise for that post, I wouldn’t have posted it if I were sober.

I absolutely do have the ability to answer someone questioning my support without resorting to foul language and abuse, I choose not to.

[KevinGage]

Surely with the stated ambition of the board that the club must be financially self-sufficient and the fact that we couldn't maintain the level of spend under MON with 6th place finishes (ie without the Champions League money) proves we underachieved?

Well quite. Apparently some think MON only promised to get into the Europa league with all that expenditure

I guess that depends on what you genuinely expected when he arrived, Greg

For me, I hoped for CL and the transformation in status that can bring, but expected -as a minimum- regular European qualification (and taking the fecking thing seriously) + signing the type of young up and coming players Tottingham were targeting.

With RL's inherited wealth, I can understand why some expected marquee names and all the rest of it. But he was very clear from the outset that it wouldn't be an Abramovich style scenario.  So decent sums on the likes of Ash, Davies, Milner, Delph et al and effectively trying to create our own stars was -to me- progress on the latter Herbert years. When budget priced journeymen pro's or big names on the way down had become de rigueur.

[LeeB]

Talking of speculating on the past, what would have been interesting is if Randy had bought the club in May 2006 and either had to keep Dolly on or replace him without the input of Doug/ Stride who would have been our manager?

That's a really intriguing question.

I think given that he was highly rated, unemployed and clearly interested in the job, the outcome would have been the same.

[Concrete John]

Thinking about it, the thing with MON's spend/success ratio wasn't that he should have achieved more, but that he could have achieved what he did with spending less.  How would the results have been dramatically different without the likes of Beye, Sidwell, Harewood, etc.?

We would have had a smaller squad, which we'd have largely gotten away with as injuries generally favoured us during his time here, but the likes of Gardner the Elder and the Bolton Defender would have had more game time, saving money on the likes of Sidwell and Knight.  His big signings, with the exception of Davies, worked well for us, but it is that extra and needless spend that drags down his record. 
 

[Percy McCarthy]

MON made press comments about how milner was going to leave ages before he left upsetting milner in the process. Whether you believe that was intended to burn Milnerr's bridges so he could get the money or he was just resigned to him leaving is up to personal viewpoint, but i think its pretty clear MON was okay with him being sold.

In answer to my simple question, does that mean 'yes, I'm admitting MON didn't sell him'?

*sigh* please for love of god tell me what you want to hear. Do i think MON had agreed to sell Milner? Yes. Do i think it was all done by the time he left? no

That'll do. You used to say he sold him, now you've changed your mind. A simple 'Yes, I was wrong about him selling him', pages ago, would have done.

[Villa'Zawg]

Thinking about it, the thing with MON's spend/success ratio wasn't that he should have achieved more, but that he could have achieved what he did with spending less.  How would the results have been dramatically different without the likes of Beye, Sidwell, Harewood, etc.?

We would have had a smaller squad, which we'd have largely gotten away with as injuries generally favoured us during his time here, but the likes of Gardner the Elder and the Bolton Defender would have had more game time, saving money on the likes of Sidwell and Knight.  His big signings, with the exception of Davies, worked well for us, but it is that extra and needless spend that drags down his record. 
 

Every club would like to only buy players that work out and only sell players that subsequently decline. So the question is, did we spend more on players that didn't work out than other clubs and have a higher proportion of the players we sold gone on to better things?

[Risso]

Talking of speculating on the past, what would have been interesting is if Randy had bought the club in May 2006 and either had to keep Dolly on or replace him without the input of Doug/ Stride who would have been our manager?

That's a really intriguing question.

I think given that he was highly rated, unemployed and clearly interested in the job, the outcome would have been the same.

Given that that description applied to a few managers this summer and we still ended up with McLeish, I'd say the outcome would have been very different.

[Concrete John]

Thinking about it, the thing with MON's spend/success ratio wasn't that he should have achieved more, but that he could have achieved what he did with spending less.  How would the results have been dramatically different without the likes of Beye, Sidwell, Harewood, etc.?

We would have had a smaller squad, which we'd have largely gotten away with as injuries generally favoured us during his time here, but the likes of Gardner the Elder and the Bolton Defender would have had more game time, saving money on the likes of Sidwell and Knight.  His big signings, with the exception of Davies, worked well for us, but it is that extra and needless spend that drags down his record. 
 

Every club would like to only buy players that work out and only sell players that subsequently decline. So the question is, did we spend more on players that didn't work out than other clubs and have a higher proportion of the players we sold gone on to better things?

I don't think it's a matter of buying poor players, as every manager does that, but rather buying them and not using them in the first place.  How many starts has Beye had, for instance?

In many ways it's a side effect of his desire to field the same 11 for 90% of the season.

[Villa'Zawg]

Thinking about it, the thing with MON's spend/success ratio wasn't that he should have achieved more, but that he could have achieved what he did with spending less.  How would the results have been dramatically different without the likes of Beye, Sidwell, Harewood, etc.?

We would have had a smaller squad, which we'd have largely gotten away with as injuries generally favoured us during his time here, but the likes of Gardner the Elder and the Bolton Defender would have had more game time, saving money on the likes of Sidwell and Knight.  His big signings, with the exception of Davies, worked well for us, but it is that extra and needless spend that drags down his record. 
 

Every club would like to only buy players that work out and only sell players that subsequently decline. So the question is, did we spend more on players that didn't work out than other clubs and have a higher proportion of the players we sold gone on to better things?

I don't think it's a matter of buying poor players, as every manager does that, but rather buying them and not using them in the first place.  How many starts has Beye had, for instance?

In many ways it's a side effect of his desire to field the same 11 for 90% of the season.

Some of the number crunchers have looked at this "utilisation rate" issue.

"Their squad and starting XI expenditures were in line with 9th to 11th place finishes, and O’Neill’s utilization rate was right at the average for the seasons in which he managed. O’Neill did just about as good as anyone could have asked of him, and the only man to do better with such meagre transfer expenditures is Arsene Wenger at Arsenal. "

Transfer Price Index -  Clicky

[Greg N'Ash]

MON made press comments about how milner was going to leave ages before he left upsetting milner in the process. Whether you believe that was intended to burn Milnerr's bridges so he could get the money or he was just resigned to him leaving is up to personal viewpoint, but i think its pretty clear MON was okay with him being sold.

In answer to my simple question, does that mean 'yes, I'm admitting MON didn't sell him'?

*sigh* please for love of god tell me what you want to hear. Do i think MON had agreed to sell Milner? Yes. Do i think it was all done by the time he left? no

That'll do. You used to say he sold him, now you've changed your mind. A simple 'Yes, I was wrong about him selling him', pages ago, would have done.

If what i typed above means "yes, i was wrong about him selling him" in your world Percy, then i'm happy for you. Obviously, Milner would still be here if MON had stayed because the nasty man Lerner would have backed down instead of sacking the poor cherub, which we all know is what happened really.



I love conspiracy theories me.....