Next Villa manager

[AVH87]

I'm mellowing. If it's Bruce, it's Bruce.

I'll give him a chance. If he can get off to a good start, and beat those c***s from Bordesley while he's at it, he'll go a long way to winning over us doubters.

Why is Bruce worse than Warnock for you?

I see them as similar, get promoted - Sheffield Utd/QPR for Warnock - Blues/Hull for Bruce, and struggle in the PL - Warnock relegated Sheff Utd and got sacked from QPR - Bruce relegated Hull and eventually Blues after keeping them up for 4-5 years.

[auntiesledd]

Does anyone know who else might be in the frame if it isn't Bruce? Who else is part of the "process" he referred to?

Each candidate has to stand in the Birmingham Wholesale Market at sunrise to try and sell Richards/Gabby/Gardner for a collective sum of more than 50p before reporting back to the boardroom...and the dreaded verdict.

Nice. 

ps They could call it 'The Impossible Job: The Sequel' & have Sir GT doing the voice-over biz.

[Toronto Villa]

How many times has Bruce been fired in his career and how many times has Warnock?

[Sexual Ealing]

I wasn't inspired by Houllier but thought he would steady the ship. Experienced at the highest levels. But he was useless.

I thought Mcleish would be useless. He was.

I thought Lambert would be great for us. An up and coming British manager who had excelled in the lower leagues. Dare I say he was young and hungry. He was useless.

Sherwood, British laddish, I can't stand him but maybe he might get on with the players and...useless.

Change of direction, garde, cultured European, champions league experience. Useless.

Di Matteo, a pretty unique cv, experienced at championship and champions league level. Useless.

All I know is everyone we have appointed since MON has been an unmitigated disaster. One day we will appoint someone who isn't useless. Maybe it will be Bruce, maybe it won't. But
Basing it on people's cvs and types almost seems irrelevant. I can't see enough about
Bruce to make me either opposed to it or enthused by it. Hell either be good or just another step
On the way finding the guy who is good for us.

That's where I am with it too.

[paul_e]

The 10th fence on the racecourse should not be uppermost in your mind, when you are approaching the first.

True but if your goal is to be in first place after the 10th fence then make sure you're not making that more difficult on yourself by only training the horse to jump 1 or 2 fences.

But Bruce has a good record, I don't get the issue?

I think Paul is planning ahead for the 10th fence which is 'finish high up in PL', whereas I am only able to focus on jumping the first for now, as if we don't our race is over.

It's more that I want to see that Round/Wyness/Xia are planning ahead to that fence.

[AVH87]

I'm fairly concerned about not getting over the first hurdle and falling into League 1.

Lots of us said last season that Sherwood was the problem and not the players, and that a coach with half a brain could come in and we'd be OK. For me the squad this season has 1 good CB, average fullbacks and a poor set of midfield options.

[tomd2103]

I've never been a fan of so-called old style British football, big centre-forwards etc and would love to see a Villa team playing with the style Arsenal and Man City fans get spoilt with week in week out - so I'm not getting excited at the prospect of Steve Bruce being appointed.
BUT I've always respected what he has done and always found him a very likeable bloke. I imagine he'd be a good manager to play for - hard working, knows what he's doing, honest with his players, have their respect and be respectful of our club and us. He'll give it everything he's got, that's for sure.
A crucial area as always is who he chooses as his assistant and his coaches. All was going well at Blues until Mark Bowen left to join up with Mark Hughes at Blackburn, and he's not going to be in a position to bring his assistant from Hull with him. This has caught us out in the past with neither Tim Sherwood nor Remi Garde being able to bring their preferred assistants with them.

Good luck Steve if you get the job.

I think there is a difference between aimless hoofing up field and a ball to a centre forward's chest or head that then is laid off and allows a team to play more in the opposition half.  With Elphick and Jedinak in key positions, I'm not sure we are going to be able to play out from the back into midfield anyway. 

[PeterWithesShin]

I'm fairly concerned about not getting over the first hurdle and falling into League 1.

Lots of us said last season that Sherwood was the problem and not the players, and that a coach with half a brain could come in and we'd be OK. For me the squad this season has 1 good CB, average fullbacks and a poor set of midfield options.

The midfield is our weak area but the rest are fine at this level imo. I think that we often still judge our squad by PL standards and not the utter garbage we play against at this level.

[Risso]

Not willing him to fail and not even expecting him too this season but I don't think he has any role longer than 18 months and I don't like the idea of taking on a manager who plays a style that won't be a success where we want to be without at least trying to find someone who could still have a place with us in the premier league.

Are we talking about Bruce? He's had 4 jobs in the last 15 years, including 6 years at our beloved neighbours and has just finished 4 years at Hull.

Yes I'm talking about Bruce the manager who even his strongest advocates on here are saying 'when he gets us promoted then we can replace him with someone to improve us' about.

Fair enough, fan expectations are one thing, but it's clearly not true to say he only stays somewhere 18 months. Viewing his results as a whole objectively, I think his promotions and decent finishes with the likes of Wigan and Blues show that he shouldn't be an unmitigated disaster.

[Risso]

I wasn't inspired by Houllier but thought he would steady the ship. Experienced at the highest levels. But he was useless.

I thought Mcleish would be useless. He was.

I thought Lambert would be great for us. An up and coming British manager who had excelled in the lower leagues. Dare I say he was young and hungry. He was useless.

Sherwood, British laddish, I can't stand him but maybe he might get on with the players and...useless.

Change of direction, garde, cultured European, champions league experience. Useless.

Di Matteo, a pretty unique cv, experienced at championship and champions league level. Useless.

All I know is everyone we have appointed since MON has been an unmitigated disaster. One day we will appoint someone who isn't useless. Maybe it will be Bruce, maybe it won't. But
Basing it on people's cvs and types almost seems irrelevant. I can't see enough about
Bruce to make me either opposed to it or enthused by it. Hell either be good or just another step
On the way finding the guy who is good for us.

That's where I am with it too.

I'm convinced that after two months Guardiola would leave us as a spent force, having put on two stone in weight, wearing a crappy old pair of tracksuit bottoms and having that wild-eyed Vietnam vet haunted look on his face.

[Allan C]

Like a few others on here, I'm now resigned to us getting Bruce and I'll get behind him and the team like I always have.  But it's a poor appointment in my opinion lacking in imagination and vision. I'm also sick of hearing how he's got experience in getting teams promoted from this league. IMO it's a shite league with shite players and shite managers.

[AVH87]

I'm fairly concerned about not getting over the first hurdle and falling into League 1.

Lots of us said last season that Sherwood was the problem and not the players, and that a coach with half a brain could come in and we'd be OK. For me the squad this season has 1 good CB, average fullbacks and a poor set of midfield options.

The midfield is our weak area but the rest are fine at this level imo. I think that we often still judge our squad by PL standards and not the utter garbage we play against at this level.

I'm unconvinced about Elphick at CB, Hutton or Bacuna at RB now De Laet is out for the season and the midfield options are so poor I think any 2 we pick will get over-run by the majority of teams at this level even though they are nothing special whatsoever, it's pretty poor that we have to outnumber teams 3 to 2 in there to be able to dominate.

[PeterWithesShin]

I reckon most sides in this division would love to have Hutton, or even Richards, as a 3rd or 4th choice. I agree fully the CM is our one big weakness.

[PaulWinch again]

Not willing him to fail and not even expecting him too this season but I don't think he has any role longer than 18 months and I don't like the idea of taking on a manager who plays a style that won't be a success where we want to be without at least trying to find someone who could still have a place with us in the premier league.

Are we talking about Bruce? He's had 4 jobs in the last 15 years, including 6 years at our beloved neighbours and has just finished 4 years at Hull.

Yes I'm talking about Bruce the manager who even his strongest advocates on here are saying 'when he gets us promoted then we can replace him with someone to improve us' about.

Fair enough, fan expectations are one thing, but it's clearly not true to say he only stays somewhere 18 months. Viewing his results as a whole objectively, I think his promotions and decent finishes with the likes of Wigan and Blues show that he shouldn't be an unmitigated disaster.

I agree. I'd say if you look at Bruce's career the successes outweigh the failures. I'm by no means delighted by his probably appointment, but at the same time I totally see the logic and it's seems pretty sensible given where we are. Those saying it's an absolute disaster of an appointment I genuinely can't see the reason for that.

[Bottom Right 89]

Like a few others on here, I'm now resigned to us getting Bruce and I'll get behind him and the team like I always have.  But it's a poor appointment in my opinion lacking in imagination and vision. I'm also sick of hearing how he's got experience in getting teams promoted from this league. IMO it's a shite league with shite players and shite managers.

Allan what exactly is it that you want from our next manager? For me they simply get us promoted as you point out the teams we've played are not great but we're not winning. Right now with the managers available the most likely candidate to sort us out and get us up this league is Steve Bruce. Vision is over rated and will keep till we're back in the top flight.