AVFC statement - McLeish sacked.

[Fergal]

From McLeish out website

This is a copy of the letter I will be sending to Alex McLeish tomorrow morning.  I have also sent a copy of it to the email of Paul Faulkner and Nicola Keye.  So it should be read by somebody at the club.

 

Dear Mr McLeish,

I am writing this letter to urge you to consider your position as Aston Villa manager. You have been in charge of this great club for 292 days and it has been nothing short of a disaster. You have presided over the worst season seen at Villa Park since the relegation year of 1986/87. We have a truly awful record of 7 wins in 30 games and are in serious danger of being relegated. The similarities between Aston Villa and your relegated Birmingham City side are uncanny. From studying your record I see you have been in charge of a 130 Premier League games and yet you have only won 33, so our record this season is not a blip but it is the norm where you are manager.

So in the 3 seasons you have been a Premier League manager you have managed to oversee 2 relegations, and are a good bet to make it 3 this year. With this in mind I ask you to consider your position and as a professional admit the job is too big for you and walk away before any more damage is done.

I would like to ask you why you believe you are the man to take Aston Villa forward as even your record in Scotland leaves a lot to be desired, especially as you managed to achieve the impossible and finish 3rd with Rangers in a normal 2 horse race and lead them on their record streak of 10 games without a win.

Also I would like to ask you why throughout the course of this season 2011/12 you have managed to blame everybody for our current predicament, but have failed to take any responsibility for it yourself. Why is that? Surely as manager it is your responsibility? A true leader in whatever field of life show’s his/her true courage in taking responsibility when being at the helm. I liken you to a certain Captain Smith of Titanic infamy. We are in my humble opinion akin to the SS Titanic in being unsinkable and your tactics and that of your crew in particular a certain Peter Grant are in true fashion blind to the iceberg ahead. Once you sink Aston Villa, we will remain at the depths of the English Football League and you will leave with a golden handshake of millions of £££’s. Go look in the mirror and say to yourself  “Am I the man to lead Aston Villa Forward”  Your conscience should tell you to do the honourable and decent thing… Walk now Mr McLeish and admit that you could not do the job you said you could when interviewed. You tried, you failed, and are now a multi-millionaire who is unemployable at any other English Premier League club

I have been following Aston Villa for over 25 years now and come from a Villa supporting family with over 100 years’ worth of support, and I can honestly say this is the worst I have ever seen. Aston Villa FC are in major decline and you are at the root of the problem. A poll conducted by a Villa fans site suggests 96% of fans would like you to step down as manager, but still you suggest the silent majority are backing you? I can assure that you have managed to lose the backing of all Aston Villa fans with your negative brand of football. Also the fact your negative brand of football fails to deliver results. Correct me if I’m wrong but football is a results business?

So for the good of Aston Villa please tender your resignation immediately before irreparable damage is done.

Yours Sincerely

Chris Hearn

He's not exactly backward in coming forward is he?

At least he has nailed his colours to the mast.
Dave you often talk a lot of sense on here, do you think the manager should be sacked?

[PeterWithesShin]

The more likely out come is that it'll be tossed in the bin about 10 seconds after opening it because they don’t give two fecks about what the fans really think, if they did then he would already be gone.

The day any board does what the fans want them to is the day they're in trouble.

I agree. They shouldn't get rid of him because the fans want him.

Though they should get rid of him because he's an irretrievably inadequate football manager.

If the internet had been around in September 1989 there would have been just as much demand to get rid of Sir Graham.

Imagine the reaction online after THAT QPR game.

[Monty]

Well yeah, but I'm not entirely sure of the bearing other examples have on this case. Without meaning to exaggerate, literally squadrillions of managers get sacked, some rightly some wrongly, some given a chance when they should've been, some given the boot prematurely. You can only judge a situation by its merits.

Without a doubt, but I'm saying that Sir G then was getting almost as much stick as McLeish is now.

Well that's true enough. However, SGT was still in his 40s, at his first big job, hired on the basis of doing well. Plus you could really see a methodology and a way of playing being defined and refined from his Watford days, and certainly an attacking one. I wouldn't credit McLeish with such positives, is all I'd say.

[dave.woodhall]

At least he has nailed his colours to the mast.
Dave you often talk a lot of sense on here, do you think the manager should be sacked?

There's no point doing something in such a way that you're guaranteed to get ignored. How many letters is this he's sent now and made public? I wonder if he's doing it just so he can complain that they're taking no notice - he wouldn't be the first.

Not at this moment, no. You're not going to get a new manager, or at least not the right choice, so we'd have have Kev Mac until the end of the season and I don't think he wants to be in charge. 

[Fergal]

At least he has nailed his colours to the mast.
Dave you often talk a lot of sense on here, do you think the manager should be sacked?

What about long term? Just how long would you give AM ?

There's no point doing something in such a way that you're guaranteed to get ignored. How many letters is this he's sent now and made public? I wonder if he's doing it just so he can complain that they're taking no notice - he wouldn't be the first.

Not at this moment, no. You're not going to get a new manager, or at least not the right choice, so we'd have have Kev Mac until the end of the season and I don't think he wants to be in charge. 

Do you see him as a long term Villa manager or has he done enough to convince you that he should go after the last game of the season?

[NeilH]

I’m beginning to think that Lerner is bloody nuclear bomb proof. All this vitriol aimed at McLeish and now another bloody letter asking for him to go, just in case the press don’t get it that some of our supporters are a bit upset.

We have got to stumble across the line with McLeish in charge and then address the situation. I don’t believe for a moment that putting KMac in charge will make the slightest difference and as Dave has already pointed out, he clearly doesn’t want to do it.

All that we can do as supporters is drop the vitriol for a few weeks, get behind the team and make sure that when push comes to shove, we’ve given our all to keep us up.

[dave.woodhall]

At least he has nailed his colours to the mast.
Dave you often talk a lot of sense on here, do you think the manager should be sacked?

What about long term? Just how long would you give AM ?

There's no point doing something in such a way that you're guaranteed to get ignored. How many letters is this he's sent now and made public? I wonder if he's doing it just so he can complain that they're taking no notice - he wouldn't be the first.

Not at this moment, no. You're not going to get a new manager, or at least not the right choice, so we'd have have Kev Mac until the end of the season and I don't think he wants to be in charge. 

Do you see him as a long term Villa manager or has he done enough to convince you that he should go after the last game of the season?

As Neil said above, see what the end of the season brings. It can't help matters than much of our team have now played under three managers, plus two caretakers.

[Archbishop Herbert Cockthrottle]

With lengthy letters like that I think its best to read them out loud like Kevin Turvey or Homer Simpson in his sarcastic period.

[Risso]

Well yeah, but I'm not entirely sure of the bearing other examples have on this case. Without meaning to exaggerate, literally squadrillions of managers get sacked, some rightly some wrongly, some given a chance when they should've been, some given the boot prematurely. You can only judge a situation by its merits.

Without a doubt, but I'm saying that Sir G then was getting almost as much stick as McLeish is now.

The first season back in the top division after getting promoted was an entirely different proposition to a manager who relegated a team the season before.  Back then there was hope that Taylor would turn it around the following season given his good record with Watford and Villa until that season.  McLeish doesn't have a record in the Premier League that suggests any such improvement is likely.

[Vanilla]

At least he has nailed his colours to the mast.
Dave you often talk a lot of sense on here, do you think the manager should be sacked?

What about long term? Just how long would you give AM ?

There's no point doing something in such a way that you're guaranteed to get ignored. How many letters is this he's sent now and made public? I wonder if he's doing it just so he can complain that they're taking no notice - he wouldn't be the first.

Not at this moment, no. You're not going to get a new manager, or at least not the right choice, so we'd have have Kev Mac until the end of the season and I don't think he wants to be in charge. 

Do you see him as a long term Villa manager or has he done enough to convince you that he should go after the last game of the season?

As Neil said above, see what the end of the season brings. It can't help matters than much of our team have now played under three managers, plus two caretakers.

The point has been made before about how many more 'transitional' seasons can Villa cope with.

I think the worst thing the club can do (but what they probably will do) is just expect the team to 'hit the ground running' at the start of next season. If that doesn't happen with Villa struggling and tickets sales down, the manager will I think then be forced out, rather than the club having the guts to take the appropriate action over the summer.

Personally, I don't mind if the club brings in a young manager, with a strategic emphasis on talent development, even if that means a period of being stuck in the bottom half. If there are signs of potential and progression, fans will start coming back.

What you feel Villa have with the current manager, is merely a strategy of relegation avoidance each season.

[stubbsyandy]

At least he has nailed his colours to the mast.
Dave you often talk a lot of sense on here, do you think the manager should be sacked?

What about long term? Just how long would you give AM ?

There's no point doing something in such a way that you're guaranteed to get ignored. How many letters is this he's sent now and made public? I wonder if he's doing it just so he can complain that they're taking no notice - he wouldn't be the first.

Not at this moment, no. You're not going to get a new manager, or at least not the right choice, so we'd have have Kev Mac until the end of the season and I don't think he wants to be in charge. 

Do you see him as a long term Villa manager or has he done enough to convince you that he should go after the last game of the season?

As Neil said above, see what the end of the season brings. It can't help matters than much of our team have now played under three managers, plus two caretakers.

The point has been made before about how many more 'transitional' seasons can Villa cope with.

I think the worst thing the club can do (but what they probably will do) is just expect the team to 'hit the ground running' at the start of next season. If that doesn't happen with Villa struggling and tickets sales down, the manager will I think then be forced out, rather than the club having the guts to take the appropriate action over the summer.

Personally, I don't mind if the club brings in a young manager, with a strategic emphasis on talent development, even if that means a period of being stuck in the bottom half. If there are signs of potential and progression, fans will start coming back.

What you feel Villa have with the current manager, is merely a strategy of relegation avoidance each season.

That last line,spot on

[David_Nab]

If Martinez had joined us in Summer and we were where we are now people would still be upset however you could point to him keeping Wigan up with little cash you could point to the foundations he laid down at Swansea, with Mcleish whilst he has had some success in the past there is plenty of failure and that is why fans are so unhappy with him and have little faith we can avoid the drop.

[pauliewalnuts]

If Martinez had joined us in Summer and we were where we are now people would still be upset however you could point to him keeping Wigan up with little cash you could point to the foundations he laid down at Swansea, with Mcleish whilst he has had some success in the past there is plenty of failure and that is why fans are so unhappy with him and have little faith we can avoid the drop.

McLeish, even in the circumstances we are in now, would have way, way more support than he has if he hadn't spent most of the season putting out a team who were sent to play anti-football.

It's one thing being angry at someone because they tried to do something and failed, but it's another when the thing they're trying to do is so fucking horrible in the first place.

The stupid thing is, he's had a few points this season, where he's been in a situation to capitalise on a bit of good work and move on, and every time, he has reverted to type and done exactly what we feared he'd do before he came here.

We were worried he'd play poor, negative, defensive football. That's what he's done. It's entirely his own fault.

For me, the thing that pisses me off and depresses me most about this manager is not the fact we are in 15th in the table. It is that this is the way he manages, this is the way he sets his teams up, it always has been in the PL at least, and it always will be.

The only positive thing that could come out of it is that we could get better results, and it could work more often, but even if that happens, the process of getting them is going to be utterly joyless and horrible to watch - not unlike Sam Allardyce getting results with his own brand of horror show football.

The thought of two or three seasons of this guff is just too horrible for words.

[MonsXI]

If Martinez had joined us in Summer and we were where we are now people would still be upset however you could point to him keeping Wigan up with little cash you could point to the foundations he laid down at Swansea, with Mcleish whilst he has had some success in the past there is plenty of failure and that is why fans are so unhappy with him and have little faith we can avoid the drop.

McLeish, even in the circumstances we are in now, would have way, way more support than he has if he hadn't spent most of the season putting out a team who were sent to play anti-football.

It's one thing being angry at someone because they tried to do something and failed, but it's another when the thing they're trying to do is so fucking horrible in the first place.

The stupid thing is, he's had a few points this season, where he's been in a situation to capitalise on a bit of good work and move on, and every time, he has reverted to type and done exactly what we feared he'd do before he came here.

We were worried he'd play poor, negative, defensive football. That's what he's done. It's entirely his own fault.

Great post, I think it sums up the McLeish problem perfectly! Yes we didn't want him because he was at Blues but equally we didn't want him because of his style of play, unfortunately he hasn't surprised us and has brought his own brand of anti football across the city.

If we could all see what was going to happen then why not Lerner/Faulkner? For god sake the guy played 451 up in Scotland where he had the best squad in the league.

[midnite]

We've turned into the new stoke. No one likes our brand of football... And we now even score from long throw ins