So who do you want as the next Villa manager?

[brontebilly]

I think you're right, Hilts. There must be someone, and an ambitious someone with some passing football ideas. An Oscar Garcia perhaps, or the next Gus Poyet, or even Gus Poyet himself if things don't go well in his discussions with the Sunderland board. However, we're so fucking fucked if the status quo drags on. The thought is pretty scary.

You know what, I really would take Steve McLaren (McClaren?). Fully redeemed now, experienced and getting a young Derby side to play lovely stuff.

swapping Lambert for any one of those goes nicely with re-arranging the deckchairs on the Titanic cliche.

Six months ago the only job McClaren could get was handing out the cones for Redknapp at QPR. Fully redeemed, not sure the failures at Forest, Wolfsburg and Twente second time around are not gone from his CV just yet.

Gus Poyet six weeks ago was on the verge of taking a shambles of a Sunderland side down. Few good results since kept them up but we should be setting our sights a bit higher surely. Pulis took charge of a worse side around the same time and took them well clear. Only the insane would suggest Pulis for our next manager.

Id be more for keeping Lambert on that hiring any of those goons, and I really dont rate Paul Lambert as a manager.

[class-of-82]

ive said it before and i will say it again guys no malice or sarcasm inteneded.
sooner or later lambert will come out after rl has departed and tell us what sort of constraints he was working under, until he has been given proper funding to buy players then he can be judged.
against hull at half time there was 3-4 guys slagging him big style i butted in and said that he has been given the equivalent task of restoring a old classic car but instead of employing the best mechanics and buying the quality parts needed he has only been able to rummage around old scrap yards.
every single one of them looked at me and said "yea your right mate".

[Clampy]

ive said it before and i will say it again guys no malice or sarcasm inteneded.
sooner or later lambert will come out after rl has departed and tell us what sort of constraints he was working under, until he has been given proper funding to buy players then he can be judged.
against hull at half time there was 3-4 guys slagging him big style i butted in and said that he has been given the equivalent task of restoring a old classic car but instead of employing the best mechanics and buying the quality parts needed he has only been able to rummage around old scrap yards.
every single one of them looked at me and said "yea your right mate".

Is it a good enough excuse to be losing 22 games in one season though?

[class-of-82]

no its not but please someone come up with the remedy then. go on wave that magic wand but remember the magic wand we got was bought from the pound shop not harrods like other clubs can.

[Toronto Villa]

Losing that many games and not even coming close to addressing our disastrous form at home irrespective of the documented challenges is very hard to get past. I like the bloke, very much wanted it work. It just hasn't and if anything it is actually getting progressively worse than better.

[Clampy]

no its not but please someone come up with the remedy then. go on wave that magic wand but remember the magic wand we got was bought from the pound shop not harrods like other clubs can.

Let's not go down the road of thinking that he's been given a pittance to spend since he's been here because he hasn't. Tony Pulis managed to get his team to 11th and that was with mainly a championship team and Cameron Jerome up front.

[brontebilly]

ive said it before and i will say it again guys no malice or sarcasm inteneded.
sooner or later lambert will come out after rl has departed and tell us what sort of constraints he was working under, until he has been given proper funding to buy players then he can be judged.
against hull at half time there was 3-4 guys slagging him big style i butted in and said that he has been given the equivalent task of restoring a old classic car but instead of employing the best mechanics and buying the quality parts needed he has only been able to rummage around old scrap yards.
every single one of them looked at me and said "yea your right mate".

Is it a good enough excuse to be losing 22 games in one season though?

or the behaviour of his staff
or the appalling football that was played
or how poor tactically he is
or how useless he is at substitutions
or signing multiple immobile strikers
or losing to bradford over 2 legs
or that he knew the conditions of his tenure before he left Norwich for us
or the worst league finishing result at the club since 1986/97

If we can ignore all that to give Lambert another go fair enough

[class-of-82]

appalling football that was played
poor tactically
immobile strikers
which brings us back to the point that if he hasnt got the players because he hasnt got the money to spend. so when we playing appalling football he looks at he bench and which top quality player does he bring on to change it ??
poor tactically who does he again bring on to change it ???and as for bradford i was as pissed off as anyone but then again those sort of giant killing acts never happen do they.
just been reading leeb remark on the "i must be in the minority thread" and he said no matter who we would of had as manager last year i couldnt of seen anyone doing any better with the players we had or words to that effect.

villa till i die guys keep the faith

[Rolta]

appalling football that was played
poor tactically
immobile strikers
which brings us back to the point that if he hasnt got the players because he hasnt got the money to spend. so when we playing appalling football he looks at he bench and which top quality player does he bring on to change it ??
poor tactically who does he again bring on to change it ???and as for bradford i was as pissed off as anyone but then again those sort of giant killing acts never happen do they.
just been reading leeb remark on the "i must be in the minority thread" and he said no matter who we would of had as manager last year i couldnt of seen anyone doing any better with the players we had or words to that effect.

villa till i die guys keep the faith

Amazing. I'm not alone! The lists used to bash Lambert would be as extensive for any manager with such a level of investment from the owner. He's had a negative investment if you count the money cut from the wagebill, money which he has saved the club from having to spend.

Again, we also have the youngest squad in the premiership, woefully underfunded.

I've said it before though. But for what it's worth I am staggered more people can't see how difficult his job has been.

[Clampy]

appalling football that was played
poor tactically
immobile strikers
which brings us back to the point that if he hasnt got the players because he hasnt got the money to spend. so when we playing appalling football he looks at he bench and which top quality player does he bring on to change it ??
poor tactically who does he again bring on to change it ???and as for bradford i was as pissed off as anyone but then again those sort of giant killing acts never happen do they.

You forget we also lost to Millwall and Sheff Utd at home when we had a near full strength team out and at the time they were about 5th from bottom of their league.

From Chelsea onwards, we were appalling and he didn't have any answer for it. Looking back, its a good job Norwich had the run in they did.

[Rolta]

appalling football that was played
poor tactically
immobile strikers
which brings us back to the point that if he hasnt got the players because he hasnt got the money to spend. so when we playing appalling football he looks at he bench and which top quality player does he bring on to change it ??
poor tactically who does he again bring on to change it ???and as for bradford i was as pissed off as anyone but then again those sort of giant killing acts never happen do they.

You forget we also lost to Millwall and Sheff Utd at home when we had a near full strength team out and at the time they were about 5th from bottom of their league.

From Chelsea onwards, we were appalling and he didn't have any answer for it. Looking back, its a good job Norwich had the run in they did.

Premiership teams lose to lower league opposition all the time in the cups. We're shit with a young underfunded team, and we don't have an automatic right to win any game just because we're Aston Villa.

[Steve67]

He spent 7mill on a striker we did not need, yet people still peddle this underfunded drivel? Why buy Kozak when we could all see that we were very desperate for a ball winning midfielder? Really poor judgment from Lambert that. 43million is not a pauper's spend by any means.

[PeterWithesShin]

That poor judgement kept us up. Without Kozak we'd be in the Championship.

[olaftab]

Time to close this thread?

[Rolta]

He spent 7mill on a striker we did not need, yet people still peddle this underfunded drivel? Why buy Kozak when we could all see that we were very desperate for a ball winning midfielder? Really poor judgment from Lambert that. 43million is not a pauper's spend by any means.

It is when you buy 20 players – and before you say anything you need more than 11 players over a season. He's averaged £2million on each player, which gets you nothing.

The £7million on Kozak is fine considering how reliant we have been on Benteke – I think Benteke having the season he did shows it absolutely made sense to buy another striker. The unfortunate fact is that Kozak got injured for 6 months. Say what you like about Kozak, but he looked like he could finish, which is more than you can say about Weimann and Agbonlahor.

He has been underfunded. It is clearly not drivel. How much money do you think he has saved the club by moving on experienced players and replacing them with the youth we have now? We're talking £20-£30million a season we are no longer paying in wages. He had to replace them. The only players of his who haven't played are Helenius and Tonev – the rest, even people like Luna, KEA, Bowery, they have all played a part in the squad pretty much to the standard you'd expect when you're shopping in the bargain basement.