Manager for next season

[Monty]

If McLeish was any good the whole Nose thing would have been quickly forgotten. Though I take the point he came directly from them having just been the manager of their relegation, thus making it an even more insane decision.

Keep saying this but for me, if mcleish had been a really good manager rather than a grim doom merchant, taking him from them would have been a bonus.

If we hired Rowett I think the fan reaction would be pretty positive.

[Eigentor]

With manager, we seem to go for the opposite of the last. The opposite of the calm and intelligent Garde would be an uncontrollable nutter like Pearson.

[OCD]

If McLeish was any good the whole Nose thing would have been quickly forgotten. Though I take the point he came directly from them having just been the manager of their relegation, thus making it an even more insane decision.

Keep saying this but for me, if mcleish had been a really good manager rather than a grim doom merchant, taking him from them would have been a bonus.

If we hired Rowett I think the fan reaction would be pretty positive.

I think both Hughton and Rowett are good candidates for the here and now. It's unfortunate that the Blues board are capable of making good appointments but both know the league and organise their sides in such a way that they get the most of them and have been pushing for promotion when they really shouldn't have been. It's a nice bonus that Rowett's a Villa fan so probably couldn't get here fast enough.

[walsall villain]

However comical Newcastle were, they weren't in the same universe of shitness as we are now. They had just enough to build on and turn around. We have to start from the basement up. And after five years of getting almost everything wrong, we suddenly have to start getting most things right, while every ragtag outfit in the league lines up to have a pop. That's going to be some turnaround.

Again though you are looking at it from a Villa fan perspective, and all I am saying is Newcastle fans thought precisely that about their lot at the time. Yet their rag tag lot walked the division. I don't believe that our players are as bad as they have shown, but they need help from some new players and a fresh start with a manager that is going to unite them.

Prior to their relegation, Newcastle hadn't even been involved in a battle against the drop since their previous promotion in 1993. They'd never finished below fourteenth in that period. It seems likely they'd have survived if not for one awful season in which the fuckwittery of appointing managers based on Geordieness rather than ability saw them relegated. Even then, they only went down by a point.

Our relegation, by contrast, is after half a decade of just about surviving, culminating in a relegation with an embarrassing points total.

There is no comparison between their side that went down and straight back up and our shower of shite.

That's what I was thinking. No stats to back it up but I feel teams who drop after one horror season have far more chance of a return. We have long since forgotten how to win (and even how to draw!). Hope I am so wrong but I think it will be 3 years plus.

[class-of-82]

A complete overhaul of the first team squad is needed and we will be left with about 4-5 players possibly grealish gestede Clark Lyden green okore with baker coming back off loan the rest farmed out or snapped up.

[cdbearsfan]

However comical Newcastle were, they weren't in the same universe of shitness as we are now. They had just enough to build on and turn around. We have to start from the basement up. And after five years of getting almost everything wrong, we suddenly have to start getting most things right, while every ragtag outfit in the league lines up to have a pop. That's going to be some turnaround.

Again though you are looking at it from a Villa fan perspective, and all I am saying is Newcastle fans thought precisely that about their lot at the time. Yet their rag tag lot walked the division. I don't believe that our players are as bad as they have shown, but they need help from some new players and a fresh start with a manager that is going to unite them.

Prior to their relegation, Newcastle hadn't even been involved in a battle against the drop since their previous promotion in 1993. They'd never finished below fourteenth in that period. It seems likely they'd have survived if not for one awful season in which the fuckwittery of appointing managers based on Geordieness rather than ability saw them relegated. Even then, they only went down by a point.

Our relegation, by contrast, is after half a decade of just about surviving, culminating in a relegation with an embarrassing points total.

There is no comparison between their side that went down and straight back up and our shower of shite.

Well, there obviously is a comparison there as they are both relegated sides. The particularly telling comparison is that both clubs have had abysmal leadership.

Nor really sure what the relevance is of going back to 1993 either?

It doesn't really make any difference that we have struggled for four years. We are a shit side and so were Newcastle when they went down  - and they are this season too.

There was no relevance in going back to 1993. I just mentioned that they had never been in a relegation scrap and the stat-obsessive in me felt the urge to mention the year.

They shouldn't have been facing the drop, and any vaguely competent manager would probably have kept them up. It's no surprise, therefore, they that when they appointed a vaguely competent manager they got promoted easily.

We've been shite for years and there is  o evidence that we'll stop being shit next season or anytime soon.

At the risk of going all SaundersHeroes, those that think we're in with a good chance of promotion, let alone pissing the league like Newcastle did, are likely to be disappointed.

[Toronto Villa]

So how about now? They employed the former England manager and now have the former manager of Liverpool and Real Madrid and are still utterly bollocks. They have had significantly more qualified stewardship and investment and are marginally better, and on current form almost as bad.

[Villafirst]

Still think Nigel Pearson is the guy to sort this horrible mess out. Look at 'his' Leicester team now. They fight and challenge like 'lions'. He's got a point to prove.

[cdbearsfan]

Now? They're still nine points clear of us having played a game fewer. Even with their incompetent buffoon of an owner they still make a lot more money than us every year and so are more likely to have the resources to invest/hold on to the few stars they currently have. They've just announced a £30 million profit while we make losses every year.

The one thing in our favour is that they (apparently) haven't built automatic relegation wage drops into their player contracts.

[Toronto Villa]

I don't know that Pearson would have done this but the momentum they had from the end of last season carried into this. Ranieri in the end was the perfect bloke to add to the good feeling around the club (football related, not off the field stuff), and he has nudged it along beautifully. Pearson certainly played his part in getting it going and bringing in a lot of the players who are stars today. And they added really well in the summer too. The point about Pearson having a point to prove is interesting.

[Toronto Villa]

Now? They're still nine points clear of us having played a game fewer. Even with their incompetent buffoon of an owner they still make a lot more money than us every year and so are more likely to have the resources to invest/hold on to the few stars they currently have.

The one thing in our favour is that they (apparently) haven't built automatic relegation wage drops into their player contracts.

They should be having spent a net 80m and not having Sherwood followed by Garde, instead McLaren followed by Benitez. The fact they aren't more points ahead shows the depths of their issues. And funny now that Benitez is saying about their players exactly what Garde was saying about ours. That they look anxious, mentally shot and lacking any belief or confidence.

[pauliewalnuts]

However comical Newcastle were, they weren't in the same universe of shitness as we are now. They had just enough to build on and turn around. We have to start from the basement up. And after five years of getting almost everything wrong, we suddenly have to start getting most things right, while every ragtag outfit in the league lines up to have a pop. That's going to be some turnaround.

Again though you are looking at it from a Villa fan perspective, and all I am saying is Newcastle fans thought precisely that about their lot at the time. Yet their rag tag lot walked the division. I don't believe that our players are as bad as they have shown, but they need help from some new players and a fresh start with a manager that is going to unite them.

Prior to their relegation, Newcastle hadn't even been involved in a battle against the drop since their previous promotion in 1993. They'd never finished below fourteenth in that period. It seems likely they'd have survived if not for one awful season in which the fuckwittery of appointing managers based on Geordieness rather than ability saw them relegated. Even then, they only went down by a point.

Our relegation, by contrast, is after half a decade of just about surviving, culminating in a relegation with an embarrassing points total.

There is no comparison between their side that went down and straight back up and our shower of shite.

Well, there obviously is a comparison there as they are both relegated sides. The particularly telling comparison is that both clubs have had abysmal leadership.

Nor really sure what the relevance is of going back to 1993 either?

It doesn't really make any difference that we have struggled for four years. We are a shit side and so were Newcastle when they went down  - and they are this season too.

There was no relevance in going back to 1993. I just mentioned that they had never been in a relegation scrap and the stat-obsessive in me felt the urge to mention the year.

They shouldn't have been facing the drop, and any vaguely competent manager would probably have kept them up. It's no surprise, therefore, they that when they appointed a vaguely competent manager they got promoted easily.

We've been shite for years and there is  o evidence that we'll stop being shit next season or anytime soon.

At the risk of going all SaundersHeroes, those that think we're in with a good chance of promotion, let alone pissing the league like Newcastle did, are likely to be disappointed.

And Newcastle have been the epitome of badly run basket case club for years now.

Don't get me wrong, I too do not think we're going to magically bounce straight back, but I don't really see anything in that Newcastle side that went down in 2009 that we don't have in our squad now.

Yes, it's going to take a decent manager who knows what he's doing, but that goes without saying.

Having said there's no guarantee we are going to piss anything, and without going all Ads on this (he of the supreme confidence in our return), I do think that some of us really are looking ahead to the next disaster before we've finished handling this one.

[curiousorange]

I think it was Laurie Whitwell (journo who writes about the NE clubs) who said that Newcastle had nothing to worry about as long as they stayed up. He didn't go into too much detail as it was a Twitter quotathon but it implied that relegation wouldn't be easy to digest financially.

[VinnieChase84]

Heard fat Sam's name mentioned yesterday

[Stu]

There were a group of blokes in the Bartons yesterday who agreed with me that Mick McCarthy would be a terrible choice of manager, but when I said that we may as well appoint Neil Warnock if we're looking at McCarthy, one of them told me "Oh, we like Warnock."

There's crazy people everywhere.