It's not Sherwood!

[LeeB]

"My objective this season is to stay in the Premier League and I have full 100% belief that we will do that."

I hope that isn't his "objective". That should be the absolute minimum and go without saying/

/lowering_expectations_v5.pdf

[silhillvilla]

Pat Murphy has made him look like a right fucking Thick Bastard.

Any links

[footyskillz]

Pat Murphy has made him look like a right fucking Thick Bastard.

Any links

Sherwood isn't a mastermind he would be first to admit. Think the trouble is he manages as if he's captain and he doesn't have nous on management skills similar to Keane. A heavy defeat tomorrow and he should go. Chelsea haven't been great at all so anything more than  3-0 at worst defeat then shown door and Rodgers or Pearson in who have some experience on how to actually manage players

[paul_e]

Pearson is a massive tw*t and shouldn't get another job in the league let alone at a club of our stature, I honestly think him coming to Villa would be the final straw for me and I'd just give up on the sport.

[andyh]

Sherwood is a bullshitter and a chancer.  No one should believe a single word the man says - he's proved time and again that his every move is based on chance and the hope that something works for him.  He's a gambler who got lucky early on but now his bets are all losing and he's in above his head.  Any positive results that we get under his management here will be due to the luck being with us rather than against.

I really wish people wouldn't sit on the fence !! :-)

I agree btw.

[silhillvilla]

Moyes would be my choice if he is interested.

[rob_bridge]

Pat Murphy has made him look like a right fucking Thick Bastard.

Any links

5live tonight 7:35ish. Get it on iPlayer.

[saunders_heroes]

"My objective this season is to stay in the Premier League and I have full 100% belief that we will do that."

I hope that isn't his "objective". That should be the absolute minimum and go without saying/

And just a few months ago he was claiming we'd never be involved in another relegation battle with him in charge.

[itbrvilla]

Pearson is a massive tw*t and shouldn't get another job in the league let alone at a club of our stature, I honestly think him coming to Villa would be the final straw for me and I'd just give up on the sport.

I know how you feel.

[Vegas]

He's got an ability to talk things up when needed yet he keeps banging on about his remit being just stay in the league. If he was smart he'd never mention that at all and spin it completely differently. Like the goal is finish as high as possible or get into Europe. Yet since things started to go a little wrong he's come out with negative statements about just surviving. Who on earth wants to hear that? That's fine if that was set as an internal goal, but I don't recall any other manager openly admitting that as an aim. It's happening with Sherwood and prior to that with Lambert.

well until mr lerner has departed aiming to avoid relegation is about  the best we can hope for
and unless there is a dramatic improvement in form and results this season
this may well be the year that we dont do it

That'a not the point. Even if internally the club sets certain goals, publicly those goals don't always need to be communicated. Sherwood may very well have been set that objective but in order to boost supporter morale and player confidence there is nothing wrong with him having his own loftier goals for the club. Nobody wants to hear that our only goal is stay up.

That's unrealistic though. All managers downplay expectations. He wouldn't do himself any favours saying publicly "we'll finish top 8", or whatever, then struggling. It's also pretty obvious that we've been investing just enough to stay up for several seasons - nobody wants to hear it, but the problem is that it is true.

But that's not what happened, he made it very clear that the club wouldn't be involved in a relegation battle again, that's an expectation that he himself set.  To now suggest that his only goal is to avoid relegation is a huge u-turn and he has no one but himself to blame if it backfires on him.

I don't know if you're serious or trolling.  I hope you're trolling. 

"He has no one but himself to blame if it backfires" - presumably you mean if we get relegated? Someone inheriting a squad that came 17th, keeping them up when we looked doomed, and then over the summer lost its best players / had one of the lowest net transfer spends in the premier league?  Of all the managers in the league, surely he could say that there are any number of people to blame? 

Has he identified his best team yet? No. Has he made great substitutions every game? No.  Sometimes, it's been hard to understand the thinking. 

But to put Villa's league position firmly at his door - in fact to say there's no one else to blame - is naive idiocy, frankly.  It's clearly the result of years of poor top-to-bottom management underinvestment in the squad, and if anything he's done more than most to try and fix it.

Still, let's get the next manager in so we can start to think about when to sack them, eh?

 

[pauliewalnuts]

He's got an ability to talk things up when needed yet he keeps banging on about his remit being just stay in the league. If he was smart he'd never mention that at all and spin it completely differently. Like the goal is finish as high as possible or get into Europe. Yet since things started to go a little wrong he's come out with negative statements about just surviving. Who on earth wants to hear that? That's fine if that was set as an internal goal, but I don't recall any other manager openly admitting that as an aim. It's happening with Sherwood and prior to that with Lambert.

well until mr lerner has departed aiming to avoid relegation is about  the best we can hope for
and unless there is a dramatic improvement in form and results this season
this may well be the year that we dont do it

That'a not the point. Even if internally the club sets certain goals, publicly those goals don't always need to be communicated. Sherwood may very well have been set that objective but in order to boost supporter morale and player confidence there is nothing wrong with him having his own loftier goals for the club. Nobody wants to hear that our only goal is stay up.

That's unrealistic though. All managers downplay expectations. He wouldn't do himself any favours saying publicly "we'll finish top 8", or whatever, then struggling. It's also pretty obvious that we've been investing just enough to stay up for several seasons - nobody wants to hear it, but the problem is that it is true.

But that's not what happened, he made it very clear that the club wouldn't be involved in a relegation battle again, that's an expectation that he himself set.  To now suggest that his only goal is to avoid relegation is a huge u-turn and he has no one but himself to blame if it backfires on him.

I don't know if you're serious or trolling.  I hope you're trolling. 

"He has no one but himself to blame if it backfires" - presumably you mean if we get relegated? Someone inheriting a squad that came 17th, keeping them up when we looked doomed, and then over the summer lost its best players / had one of the lowest net transfer spends in the premier league?  Of all the managers in the league, surely he could say that there are any number of people to blame? 

Has he identified his best team yet? No. Has he made great substitutions every game? No.  Sometimes, it's been hard to understand the thinking. 

But to put Villa's league position firmly at his door - in fact to say there's no one else to blame - is naive idiocy, frankly.  It's clearly the result of years of poor top-to-bottom management underinvestment in the squad, and if anything he's done more than most to try and fix it.

Still, let's get the next manager in so we can start to think about when to sack them, eh?

 

Surely you can only point at under investment in the squad if the manager is getting near to the best out of what he has?

Can you really say that about Sherwood? I like the look of most of our signings, they look either competent or very promising. We moan about Gestede's ball control and what not, but he has scored a few goals.

These are decent players, but they're looking poor because of the way the manager sends them out.

I'd probably agree with you if Sherwood was not making repeated, easily identifiable mistakes, and if he was getting even 50% out of what this squad is capable, but he isn't.

I also don't see how somehow several years of being shit is seen as an excuse for continuing to be so. Look at Leicester City. Fucking rubbish for most of last year, turned it around, doing well. Look at Southampton, sold practically their entire side to Liverpool, doing well.

It seems like only at Villa is there some sort of rule that because you've had several years of under achievement it is somehow acceptable how ever long it goes on for.

As for Paul trolling - how is it even possible to deduce that from his post?

Everything he said in it is factually correct. Sherwood did quite forcibly say those things, and this week has quite clearly done a massive u turn.

It is all there in black and white.

[pauliewalnuts]

The other thing I'd suggest shows poor management from Sherwood is his coming out with this "I didn't sign the players" routine this week.

How irresponsible is that? How do we think that'll make those players feel? The ones he has to motivate tomorrow?

It looks like the manager covering his personal back at the expense of everyone else.

[Toronto Villa]

It shows how massively naive he is to have come out with the "I didn't sign the players" nonsense. No different to to the "4 weeks ago they were singing my name and in 4 weeks they will be again" or words to that effect. He's making this in to all about him when he should be deflecting any and all attention away from himself. He doesn't get it and is still making the same errors. I am really interested in the team he picks and how he will send the team out tomorrow. We will all see what he's made of and whether or not anyone will be singing his name at 5pm.

[OCD]

I'm interested to see his team and tactics too but more in a way of 'I wonder how he's going to fuck it up this week' kind of way.

[rob_bridge]

The other thing I'd suggest shows poor management from Sherwood is his coming out with this "I didn't sign the players" routine this week.

How irresponsible is that? How do we think that'll make those players feel? The ones he has to motivate tomorrow?

It looks like the manager covering his personal back at the expense of everyone else.

It's Piss Poor Management