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

[Irish villain]

Ireland certainly had plenty of chances with Lambert, and so did Given.  Bent is a debatable one - Lambert made him captain at first but seemed to quicly realise that Bent wasn't going to suit the way he wanted to play. He bombed Hutton out after one half of a friendly, but I don't think you'll find many people who would agree he deserved more of a chance than he got.

Is Hutton really that bad? When he signed I thought 'solid Premier League right back'. While being underwhelmed, I never saw why he became quite such a scapegoat for what was a season of underachievement under McLeish. I felt a more adventurous manager could have got two or three more wins out of that side in 11/12. Lambert came in and decided he would have to simply start from scratch even if it meant we lost millions on the likes of Hutton, Bent, N'Zogbia. Their wages were bad enough, but their re-sale value just depreciated in the past eighteen months. 

[Concrete John]

One thing annoys me about Lambert is that fact that he's not sorted our midfield or done much at all to even rectify it. He often says he won't buy for the sake of it, but he's proven just the opposite at times. You could argue, though he scouted Kozak for a while, he wasn't desperately needed. More so was the Holt deal. Though it's temporary and something of a quick fix, could he not have tried to make a similar signing in midfield? Beyond just looking at Hoolahan that is. We're so short of options in the middle and it looks a complete mess. This is in part effecting Lamberts need to constantly chop and change his side. One thing always remains and that is a midfield that lacks balance and quality. He's working around a severe weakness and it's the most important part of a side because it directly affects both your offence and defence.

Strongly agree with this - the midfield is at the heart of all things in a football team: they can make the defence and the attack look either very good or very poor, and our inconsistency is a direct function of our flaky MF performances.
And, if it is so blindingly obvious why has PL not addressed this?

As I said above, it's a fair criticism, but let's not get carried away with thinking he doesn't see what we see.  So blame him for failing to fix it instead of for failing to notice it.

[Concrete John]

Ireland certainly had plenty of chances with Lambert, and so did Given.  Bent is a debatable one - Lambert made him captain at first but seemed to quicly realise that Bent wasn't going to suit the way he wanted to play. He bombed Hutton out after one half of a friendly, but I don't think you'll find many people who would agree he deserved more of a chance than he got.

Is Hutton really that bad? When he signed I thought 'solid Premier League right back'. While being underwhelmed, I never saw why he became quite such a scapegoat for what was a season of underachievement under McLeish. I felt a more adventurous manager could have got two or three more wins out of that side in 11/12. Lambert came in and decided he would have to simply start from scratch even if it meant we lost millions on the likes of Hutton, Bent, N'Zogbia. Their wages were bad enough, but their re-sale value just depreciated in the past eighteen months.

Ireland, Bent and Given all had their chances last season.  And in the case of the latter two they then lost their places to better players.  N'Zogbia also featured a fair bit when fit.

So really that just leaves Hutton where it could be argued he should have had more of a look in, so has this policy really cost us all that much?  No club should play an inferior player over a better one to keep his transfer value up.

[not3bad]

One thing annoys me about Lambert is that fact that he's not sorted our midfield or done much at all to even rectify it. He often says he won't buy for the sake of it, but he's proven just the opposite at times. You could argue, though he scouted Kozak for a while, he wasn't desperately needed. More so was the Holt deal. Though it's temporary and something of a quick fix, could he not have tried to make a similar signing in midfield? Beyond just looking at Hoolahan that is. We're so short of options in the middle and it looks a complete mess. This is in part effecting Lamberts need to constantly chop and change his side. One thing always remains and that is a midfield that lacks balance and quality. He's working around a severe weakness and it's the most important part of a side because it directly affects both your offence and defence.

Strongly agree with this - the midfield is at the heart of all things in a football team: they can make the defence and the attack look either very good or very poor, and our inconsistency is a direct function of our flaky MF performances.
And, if it is so blindingly obvious why has PL not addressed this?

I think the fact that it wasn't addressed during January shows Lambert's willingness to write off this season as long Villa maintained their premier league status.

[Concrete John]

I think the fact that it wasn't addressed during January shows Lambert's willingness to write off this season as long Villa maintained their premier league status.

What are we writing off exactly?  As of 04/01/14 we were out of both cups, not going to win the league or get a Euro spot and highly unlikely to go down.  To my mind, that's exactly the wrong time to buy for the sake of it if you can't find the right man.

[supertom]

One thing annoys me about Lambert is that fact that he's not sorted our midfield or done much at all to even rectify it. He often says he won't buy for the sake of it, but he's proven just the opposite at times. You could argue, though he scouted Kozak for a while, he wasn't desperately needed. More so was the Holt deal. Though it's temporary and something of a quick fix, could he not have tried to make a similar signing in midfield? Beyond just looking at Hoolahan that is. We're so short of options in the middle and it looks a complete mess. This is in part effecting Lamberts need to constantly chop and change his side. One thing always remains and that is a midfield that lacks balance and quality. He's working around a severe weakness and it's the most important part of a side because it directly affects both your offence and defence.

Strongly agree with this - the midfield is at the heart of all things in a football team: they can make the defence and the attack look either very good or very poor, and our inconsistency is a direct function of our flaky MF performances.
And, if it is so blindingly obvious why has PL not addressed this?

I think the fact that it wasn't addressed during January shows Lambert's willingness to write off this season as long Villa maintained their premier league status.

I'm not so sure it's writing off, more that he's seemingly well on the way to ticking off his objective, which is purely and simply premier league existence. That would appear to be the lot in life Randy is happy with at the minute. Despite our poor form I would fancy us to scrape together at least 12 points in the remaining games.
Simply surviving may well constitute a good season for Randy and Faulkner. Hopefully in the coming summer they'll do their best to prove this isn't the case.

[Concrete John]

I think premier league survival is the short term priority right now, but we can only hope that it is so just while we get back on a firmer financial foot.

Time will tell.   

[supertom]

I think premier league survival is the short term priority right now, but we can only hope that it is so just while we get back on a firmer financial foot.

Time will tell.   

Definitely. It absolutely must be this summer where we attempt to move forward, which requires re-investing. We can't have another summer of book balancing and cheap imports. It's got to be quality, especially if we end up losing Benteke in the summer. More Tonev's and Helenius's aren't going to cut it. We've got to be pulling more Okore and Benteke's out the bag if possible, which costs a bit more.

[Dante Lavelli]

I think premier league survival is the short term priority right now, but we can only hope that it is so just while we get back on a firmer financial foot.

Time will tell.   

Definitely. It absolutely must be this summer where we attempt to move forward, which requires re-investing. We can't have another summer of book balancing and cheap imports. It's got to be quality, especially if we end up losing Benteke in the summer. More Tonev's and Helenius's aren't going to cut it. We've got to be pulling more Okore and Benteke's out the bag if possible, which costs a bit more.

I think last years spending total would probably be enough but we just need to concentrate the amount on fewer players.  Furthermore we might be wise to 'cash in our chips' on players such as Lowton/Sylla/Baker.  The specific names are not important, but the players that have either hit a ceiling, their transfer value is in excess of their ability (eg Lowton in the summer?), or if they do not fit into the 'plan'.  This additional income can be reinvested in the next lot of rough diamonds.

[supertom]

I think premier league survival is the short term priority right now, but we can only hope that it is so just while we get back on a firmer financial foot.

Time will tell.   

Definitely. It absolutely must be this summer where we attempt to move forward, which requires re-investing. We can't have another summer of book balancing and cheap imports. It's got to be quality, especially if we end up losing Benteke in the summer. More Tonev's and Helenius's aren't going to cut it. We've got to be pulling more Okore and Benteke's out the bag if possible, which costs a bit more.

I think last years spending total would probably be enough but we just need to concentrate the amount on fewer players.  Furthermore we might be wise to 'cash in our chips' on players such as Lowton/Sylla/Baker.  The specific names are not important, but the players that have either hit a ceiling, their transfer value is in excess of their ability (eg Lowton in the summer?), or if they do not fit into the 'plan'.  This additional income can be reinvested in the next lot of rough diamonds.

I'd have hoped we could cash in on Bent. Even an average season for Fulham, maybe a dozen goals and we might have fetched 5 mill for him in the summer but I think they've discovered what, to Lamberts credit, we already know, that he's probably past it at this level. I think we'll have to give him away practically.
Zogbia's value has plummeted too sadly. A couple of mill for him maybe. That said, getting those two off the books, fee or not, is essential because that'll free up well over 100k a week.
Same goes for Given and Hutton. Give them away in a raffle or something.

[not3bad]

There would be a few clubs willing to take Given on if it wasn't for the wages.

[brian green]

I wish I could be as sanguine as some of you in your assumption that there is no chance we will be relegated.   You may well be right.   I hope you are right but as has been hinted at in this thread finding a couple of midfield players better the the ones we already have (Delph excepted) is not that big or expensive an ask.   My view on events since Christmas is that Lambert has chosen to take a chance on survival based on what happened last year.   He has rolled the dice and taken - in my personal opinion - an unnecessary gamble with our premiership future.

[Dave]

There would be a few clubs willing to take Given on if it wasn't for the wages.

I reckon quite a lot of clubs in the Championship would take him, but I don't think there's anyone in the Premier League who would want him now.

[OCD]

There would be a few clubs willing to take Given on if it wasn't for the wages.

I reckon quite a lot of clubs in the Championship would take him, but I don't think there's anyone in the Premier League who would want him now.

There would be a few who would have him as a back-up but I don't think anyone would take him as their number one as the league is at the moment.

[supertom]

I wish I could be as sanguine as some of you in your assumption that there is no chance we will be relegated.   You may well be right.   I hope you are right but as has been hinted at in this thread finding a couple of midfield players better the the ones we already have (Delph excepted) is not that big or expensive an ask.   My view on events since Christmas is that Lambert has chosen to take a chance on survival based on what happened last year.   He has rolled the dice and taken - in my personal opinion - an unnecessary gamble with our premiership future.

The warning signs were there even after the Southampton game certainly. We'd just gone 5 unbeaten and pulled off a good result against a good Soton side on their own turf, but we hadn't played well during that run. Regularly finishing a distant second in possession in games, and showing awful ball retention. In football, play like we were and the odds are that you'll lose more than you win. That has proven to be the case in the 12 games since. A few here were accused of being doom merchants for pointing out that our poor play was only going to see results nose-dive. Some staunchly defended Lambert (which is fair enough) for the fact we were solid, comfortable in midtable and picking up the required results.  However Lambert is losing backers among the fans. Most of us now are getting impatient it would seem. Some may still argue that mid-table would be acceptable this season and we're still mid-table, but it's bloody precarious. We've let too many winnable games past since the Soton game sadly, we could be all but safe by now. We probably should have crossed 30 points weeks ago, but we didn't turn up against Everton, West Ham or Cardiff (first half).

Lambert is still struggling to find even a passable solution to our poor football. As you say Brian, we're dangerously close to the bottom. I still think we'll find the required points needed. I don't think it'll even be 40 that's required to stay up. As bad as we are too, there's 3-4 below us in form equally as bad, or worse, and I don't see them having the quality to make up the advantage in points and GD we currently have.

Of course, ask me again in 3 games time how confident I am! Could be a very different answer. But this is one of the problems at the moment. We shouldn't be fighting relegation every year, and we shouldn't be getting by, by virtue of how bad other teams are. We've got to be better than this. We're not a Wigan or a Norwich, or the Tesco Bags. We're Aston Villa.