The Paul Lambert thread - poll reset after our capitulation to Hull

[PaulWinch again]

Pretty sad when you start wishing Steve Bruce was your manager. Can anyone tell me why lambert got the villa job ?  Why has this great club been dumbed down so much !!

Steve Bruce. Oh yeh, he's got a stellar PL record doesn't he? Fuck me.

If Lambert is going to persist in this long-ball rut he's got himself into, then there aren't many PL managers I wouldn't swap for. I hate this shit we've played for much of this season.I hated it when McLeish did it, and I hate it when Lambert does it.

It's soul destroying cack, and we should be above that.

This is it, it might be ok for Stoke or Crystal Palace or whoever but Aston Villa should be above this.

Are they really as bad as us to watch? Our football seems to succeed in both being crap to watch AND ineffective.

That's true.

[Irish villain]

You've got one of the biggest clubs in the country, but you have to get all Geroge Osbourne on it for at least two seasons and cut to the bone. Tempting and terrifying. O'Neill certainly lacked the bottle, maybe I am being harsh on Martinez.

Very harsh. If football management was about 'bottle',wouldn't Leeds have got a top manager who was 'up for the challenge' by now?

[ROBBO]

We seem to have a long running virus at Villa Park thats the only reason i can find why we turn what look to be decent players into shit in one season. Started with Lowton who i thought had a pretty good start and looked the goods for twelve months and now is a shadow of that player, Benteke who monstered defences last season but now is starting to resemble Carlton Cole. If i was our loanee left back i would'nt be signing on permanently, Villa Park play there at your peril.

[pauliewalnuts]

We seem to have a long running virus at Villa Park thats the only reason i can find why we turn what look to be decent players into shit in one season. Started with Lowton who i thought had a pretty good start and looked the goods for twelve months and now is a shadow of that player, Benteke who monstered defences last season but now is starting to resemble Carlton Cole. If i was our loanee left back i would'nt be signing on permanently, Villa Park play there at your peril.

Lowton finished the season well, but for much of it, he looked every bit as hopeless as the rest. As did Westwood.

I certainly don't recall either of them being decent for much more than half a season, at the most.

[saunders_heroes]

You've got one of the biggest clubs in the country, but you have to get all Geroge Osbourne on it for at least two seasons and cut to the bone. Tempting and terrifying. O'Neill certainly lacked the bottle, maybe I am being harsh on Martinez.

Very harsh. If football management was about 'bottle',wouldn't Leeds have got a top manager who was 'up for the challenge' by now?

Well that's Ads' argument blown clear out of the water.

[Monty]

Funnily enough I though Westwood was fine today. He has a job he's meant to do - keeping it tidy deep in midfield and spreading the play as quickly and as accurately as he can - and he does it fine. The problem is that both he and Delph are forced into jobs which suit neither of them due to our players uncannily impersonating claret-draped statues.

[saunders_heroes]

Funnily enough I though Westwood was fine today. He has a job he's meant to do - keeping it tidy deep in midfield and spreading the play as quickly and as accurately as he can - and he does it fine. The problem is that both he and Delph are forced into jobs which suit neither of them due to our players uncannily impersonating claret-draped statues.

I thought Westwood was his usual self, which is passing the ball sideways with the occasional forward pass which ends up at the feet of the opposing player. The midfield was terrible as per usual. Only when Albrighton turned up did they create anything.

[Dave Clark Five]

Every time that I leave the ground, an hour after the game, I see Westwood and co getting into their flash cars, looking very relaxed. Sorry, but I resent players like him. They are not respected by me and never will be. I will not look back on them in years to come and think of them like a legend, because they are a joke.

[ROBBO]

Don't start me on Westwood some posters said he played well, today i hardly noticed him. We are so poor it could turn me into an alcaholic.

[Dave Clark Five]

Don't start me on Westwood some posters said he played well, today i hardly noticed him. We are so poor it could turn me into an alcaholic.

He did fuck all.

[Monty]

I'm sorry, I'm not having this. Westwood played quite a few very good passes, especially to the wing and especially in the second half to Albrighton. He was our best midfielder today - the others gave the ball away like spoiled kids throwing away toys. Westwood did his job and then had to do the job of other players who weren't on the pitch. These are the same complaints we used to hear about Petrov - sideways passing, does nothing going forward, all that stuff - and while he's nowhere near as good as Petrov he's better than a hundred hard-man morons like the much-pined NRCs you hear mentioned.

[Toronto Villa]

Pretty sad when you start wishing Steve Bruce was your manager. Can anyone tell me why lambert got the villa job ?  Why has this great club been dumbed down so much !!

Steve Bruce. Oh yeh, he's got a stellar PL record doesn't he? Fuck me.

If Lambert is going to persist in this long-ball rut he's got himself into, then there aren't many PL managers I wouldn't swap for. I hate this shit we've played for much of this season.I hated it when McLeish did it, and I hate it when Lambert does it.

It's soul destroying cack, and we should be above that.

That may be so, and as much as I hate a lot of it, suggesting swapping him for a manager who across 16 years as a manager has won less than 40% of his games, and has been relegated and also been close to relegation on countless other occasions at different clubs is lunacy. It's one thing advocating Lambert be replaced, quite another to even contemplate replacing him with Steve Bruce.

[Monty]

I don't see much difference between Steve Bruce and Paul Lambert, and I never would have thought I'd be that disparaging of Paul Lambert.

[Dave Clark Five]

I'm sorry, I'm not having this. Westwood played quite a few very good passes, especially to the wing and especially in the second half to Albrighton. He was our best midfielder today - the others gave the ball away like spoiled kids throwing away toys. Westwood did his job and then had to do the job of other players who weren't on the pitch. These are the same complaints we used to hear about Petrov - sideways passing, does nothing going forward, all that stuff - and while he's nowhere near as good as Petrov he's better than a hundred hard-man morons like the much-pined NRCs you hear mentioned.

Westwood was rubbish, like he usually is. He is not up to the job. You may think he is the best of a bad bunch. As for 'hard man morons' it is hard men we need.

[pauliewalnuts]

Even so, I'd still take him over a Lambert who persisted with this long ball shit.

I'd rather try to play football, but be mediocre, than play this shit and still be mediocre. It's horrible nonsense. If the choice is a shit manager who tries to play football and a shit manager who plays 80s long ball football, I'm going for the former every single time.

And I didn't say swap him for Bruce, FWIW. I am just saying that the more Lambert goes down this depressing route, the more managers there are I'd take over him.

It's also probably worth noting that if you're criticising a manager for a win rate of less than 40 percent, Lambert's in the PL season at Norwich was 32% and last year for us was 33%.