Paul Lambert on Randy Lerner .

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Nobody is happy with the way we have played of late. The difference, and its huge, between McLiesh and Lambert is that we know Lamberts sides can play good stuff and have done so at times this season.

We're a bang average side, currently playing badly and its frustrating as hell to lose to absolute garbage like Stoke. The summer and an influx of three or four higher quality players, especially in midfield, coupled by the return of Okore and Vlaar to the first team promises much better things.

[rob_bridge]

Back neaer to the topic - Lambert is obviously going to say positive things about Lerner as he is ultimately his boss.

Do I think Lambert has done a good job overall? Not especially a good job, nor a terrible job. Slightly below average.

He is very very lucky though to have followed an unpopular and then a deeply unpopular manager.I would hope the home form would have improved this season. Others site this as the major disappointment justifiably.

I don't think he would be sacked unless we get relegated and even then he might not. I believe overall his record is not as good as Clarke's who got binned by Barca Albion t'other week.

That said would I sack him? Nope!

Why?

Because

a) I am not sure we could get anyone who would get more out of the players available. Therefore we wouldn't get any better and could get a lot worse - think McDoom scenario 1987.

b) In doing so the club would be admitting implicitly they had got another managerial appointment wrong. And therefore there is absolutely nothing to suggest they would get the next right - in fact evidence would point to the contrary.

Stick and see how we do for the rest of the season.

[pauliewalnuts]

Nobody is happy with the way we have played of late. The difference, and its huge, between McLiesh and Lambert is that we know Lamberts sides can play good stuff and have done so at times this season

Nowhere near enough, in my opinion. That's the problem.

It's also hard to get much enthusiasm for what might happen in the summer, given it's only December - there's loads of this season left. He needs to get us playing much better, and pretty quickly.

Injuries have been a problem, although not as much as last season or as they were for Houllier I suspect, yes, but it's now a squad which has been almost entirely bought by him.

I'm not sure how much of a valid excuse injuries are when you look at the replacements - bought by him - and they're so underwhelmingly poor.

Last season, we went into January and quite clearly needed to get some decent players in. We got one, from the French second division, who did OKish for us, and we just about stayed up - yeah 15th, not as just about as Sunderland or Newcastle, but the fact remains, we weren't mathematically safe until four days before the end of the season.

This January, again, it looks pretty clear we need to spend again, only this time, he needs to spend it on players who are more experienced and who are more likely to perform quickly at this level. That cheap, hungry, young thing isn't going to improve us enough.

[Chris Smith]

I think we should keep in mind the Houllier season, where injuries ravaged us until January and we we generally struggled for any form. This season we've been unable to field any sort of consistent team and results have again been inconsistent. Take Saturday, both first choice centre backs and both main strikers missing, I think any side other than the very richest would find it difficult under those circumstances. All teams get injuries but we have been particularly unlucky this year which has meant forcing new signings to play more than would have been expected rather than allow them to bed in over time.

Trying to pass any sort of meaningful verdict on a manager under these 'make do and mend' circumstances is, in my view, pointless.

[pauliewalnuts]

Hmm, but the options for "mending" it are players he either bought, or decided he can work with. Left back, for example, we have a player he bought this summer, and a player he bought last year, and even if those two weren't injured, how unconvincing do they look?

The need to make do and mend isn't something that absolves Lambert from criticism.

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Things change Paulie and often very quickly. Look how we went from an awful night sarf of the river on 25th January, to some really good stuff shortly after.

It is within the players and it is within the manager too. The results have by and large been better, the performances are grinding though of late.

[Mister E]

Hmm, but the options for "mending" it are players he either bought, or decided he can work with. Left back, for example, we have a player he bought this summer, and a player he bought last year, and even if those two weren't injured, how unconvincing do they look?

The need to make do and mend isn't something that absolves Lambert from criticism.

As I said, Lambert needs to develop his approach with more flexibility, bringing in players that offer more experience and resilience, who can support the development of the young / untried players. At the moment, the sink-or-swim approach is very binary and does not offer the young / untried players the benefits of being in a mixed group.

[pauliewalnuts]

Things change Paulie and often very quickly. Look how we went from an awful night sarf of the river on 25th January, to some really good stuff shortly after.

It is within the players and it is within the manager too. The results have by and large been better, the performances are grinding though of late.

And by that measure, look how we went from an awful night at Chelsea last season to a run of truly awful results.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not assuming we'll get worse, but I am also not assuming we're going to improve much very quickly. I want to see something on the pitch that makes me think we will, and there just doesn't seem to be enough.

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Chelsea away was a shattering exprience for the players and it had a long lasting effect on the confidence.

Being beaten by a truly awful Stoke side after the annual handing over of the points against Man United, won't in my view, have any long lasting issues for the players.

We have the perfect opportunity to put the right players out, playing the right system, to breathe confidence back into us on Boxing Day against the worse side in the league. An early goal and we will stroll it.

[Dante Lavelli]

I was chatting to a mate of mine who works for a private jet company.  He said they often fly Lambert about.  I assumed Scotland, but he said he's often going to and from Germany.  Any ideas whether he is doing further coaching badges out there?

[Chris Smith]

Hmm, but the options for "mending" it are players he either bought, or decided he can work with. Left back, for example, we have a player he bought this summer, and a player he bought last year, and even if those two weren't injured, how unconvincing do they look?

The need to make do and mend isn't something that absolves Lambert from criticism.

And your criticism doesn't alter the facts that injuries have hit us particularly hard. If our left back has got Vlaar organising him then he looks better. If our midfield have Gabby's runs to pick out then they look better, If Benteke is fit and on form then the whole lot look better.

Now, it might be that those players come back and we don't improve and the manager will have questions to answer but at the moment I think he deserves a bit of patience.

[Sexual Ealing]

Whatever financial restraints he's working under -and whether they're club policy or self-imposed, they're there - there has to be a point at which they change, surely? PL was one of the most saught-after managers in the country when we got him. Why would he agree to come here to work in perpetual (relative) poverty, just to be at a bigger club? What's the point of that if you're not given the tools to succeed?

At some point there must have been some sort of agreement that he gets some better players if he sees us through the readjustment period. Either that or he's simply a masochist.

[Ad@m]

It's also no coincidence that our current poor run of form, just like our poor run of form last year, has coincided with the loss of the experience of Vlaar.  For all his own individual faults you can't deny the rest of the defence performs better when he's on the pitch keeping them in check.

Like others have said, give us a chance with a consistent team, especially at the back, and I think both performances and results will improve, just like they did last year.

[saunders_heroes]

"It's not a challenge I will run away from. This job is years - not just one or two. "

Thank god for that. I was fearing Lambert may have been wobbling after the silly booing at home recently. Glad to hear he is in for the long term.

We will come good and he & Randy are the right men to take the club forward.

Silly booing? Do you expect the players to be applauded off the pitch after yet another dreadful home performance?

I think the home support has been poor this season. I find the booing silly and an over reaction. It smacks of Arsenal levels petulant fans. I want us to be better than that.

I far preferred the open defiance of last season when Lamberts name was sung even in our darkest hour.

Oh you must be joking! The fans have been fantastic this season considering the absolute shit the team has served up to them. There's nothing wrong with booing by the way, and if by full time the team have lost and have served up tripe yet again then they have every right to vent their spleen. You pay your money, and all that. We have a pro-active fan base, and we're not nodding dogs who sit there and accept every bit of crap thrown our way, and long may it continue.

[pauliewalnuts]

Hmm, but the options for "mending" it are players he either bought, or decided he can work with. Left back, for example, we have a player he bought this summer, and a player he bought last year, and even if those two weren't injured, how unconvincing do they look?

The need to make do and mend isn't something that absolves Lambert from criticism.

And your criticism doesn't alter the facts that injuries have hit us particularly hard. If our left back has got Vlaar organising him then he looks better. If our midfield have Gabby's runs to pick out then they look better, If Benteke is fit and on form then the whole lot look better.

Now, it might be that those players come back and we don't improve and the manager will have questions to answer but at the moment I think he deserves a bit of patience.

I am not pretending we haven't been hit by  injuries, like any team, if we lose decent players to injury, we suffer.

I appreciate that with Vlaar there, the defence has looked better, and have thought and said that for a while, but in the middle, and up front, we look desperately poor, and whilst we look better with Gabby, I am far from sure that that improvement is sufficient to make us look considerably better than we do at the moment.

For example - Man United, Fulham, Sunderland, Albion, Everton, Spurs, Hull. All games Gabby featured in, and i don't remember our midfield looking better in those games.

I also have seen plenty of matches when we've had our entire midfield squad available to choose from, but still managed to look like we can't pass the ball 10 yards week after week.

The fact remains, the squad is so weak and patchy, that when we do have injuries, we fall to pieces.

I am not suggesting we sack him, far from it, but the stuff we've been offered this season has - first couple of games excepted - looked truly horrible. That needs to change.