John Gregory Interview.

[eamonn]

Can't believe he's nearly 70...then again, it's no age now, is it? In the last week I've seen Midge Ure and Kevin Rowland prance around on stage, in full fettle vocally and physically.

As for Grecian Gregory, he still likes to talk himself up, doesn't he? Idiotic for resigning - he was never going to get anything as good as the Villa again. An upmarket TacticsTim, good for a quote but he still doesn't mention the absolute turgid style of play for about half of his reign.

[Mellin]

Gregory had his flaws, but he wasn't an upmarket Tactics Tim. If Tim Sherwood had stayed for four years we'd have spent the last 3 in the Championship...

...

...oh.

[Nelly]

I loved JG. Imagine if we had gotten Juninho and Nilis had stayed fit..?!

[usav]

I blame Gregory for me leaving the country.  I was 50/50 and the 2000 cup final performance/tactics tipped it. 

[Villan For Life]

That spell after Yorke left and when Dublin signed was one of my favourite times, with Merson, Dublin, Ginola, Southgate, Ugo etc. unfortunately the rest were bang average!

[PeterWithesShin]

For the amount of money spent he served up some right boring dross. Sherwood was a Poundland Gregory, once the quips and motivation wasn't enough there nothing of substance with either of them.

[Sexual Ealing]

For the amount of money spent he served up some right boring dross. Sherwood was a Poundland Gregory, once the quips and motivation wasn't enough there nothing of substance with either of them.

Yes.

[Villan For Life]

Was it Gregory who used to spend part of the home games running along the concrete in the half-built Trinity, following the play?

[Pete3206]

For the amount of money spent he served up some right boring dross. Sherwood was a Poundland Gregory, once the quips and motivation wasn't enough there nothing of substance with either of them.

Agree on Sherwood but there were some exciting times with Gregory. I do concede that when Gregory quit, he'd run out of steam.

[Clampy]

His book not a bad read.

[brontebilly]

For the amount of money spent he served up some right boring dross. Sherwood was a Poundland Gregory, once the quips and motivation wasn't enough there nothing of substance with either of them.

Was Gregory a bit of a Poundland MON? I love all these stories "I could have got RvN", every ex manager has one. Muzzy Izzet, Juninho, Benni McCarthy...from memory we were constantly linked with them. Failing to go the extra mile for Robbie Keane kind of summed up Gregory, probably used that money to buy Steve Stone. Keane would have been ideal next to Dion Dublin.

[SoccerHQ]

Another enjoyable interview.

Didn't Ginola try to sue him after Gregory called him fat in the press?

In a way the article sums up the general thinking at the time.

We weren't spending 20m under Lerner on individual players so no idea why JG thought it would've been realistic in 2000 when 5m was a very big fee.

Obviously Ginola wasn't a very good fit but he was only 3m and like Merson could win a game out of very little in largely workmanlike team.

Yet the solution to going top in October 2001 was to try to buy Izzet for 5-8m? He'd have just had the same impact as someone like Steve Stone, would give 100% but not the sort to take us to the next level.

Think Izzet went to SHA a year or two later and had to retire after a bad injury. Neil Lennon would've probably been a better fit for us from Leicester in those times.

According to something I read elsewhere we were very close to signing Hasselbaink before he moved to Atletico Madrid. Leeds sold him for 15m and signed Viduka for about 7m so before their financial implosion they were doing better deals than us in those times.

[Villan82]

Ginola was such an odd signing at the time. We already had a couple of flair players, Merson obviously being one.

[FatSam]

I’ve always liked Gregory because he respected the club.

[eamonn]

Was it Gregory who used to spend part of the home games running along the concrete in the half-built Trinity, following the play?

Who else could it be?