I know that many think I support Ole through thick and thin, they are wrong, he should have his chance and if he fails he is toast.
First up, David Moyes. I feel sorry for him, he left Everton where he was secure, to take over from the best manager in history, who, even worse, still came to the club most days.
Our great negotiator got him Fellaini at a dearer price than a few weeks earlier and Mata.
He was his own worst enemy with some of his comments, and everybody breathed a sigh of relief when he was fired, not least himself.
Next up, Louis. I loved this guy, straight as a die, funny, and with a great track record. His teams played defensive, possession football, which lost him the fans.
I don't think that was his aim, I think he wanted total football, ie, everybody comfortable on the ball, and almost interchangeable. Sadly he didn't have the players, so despite winning the FA Cup, he was ludicrously sacked a couple of days after. The sacking wasn't wrong, the timing was.
Then came Jose, the man who could win things, and he did.
The Europa cup, the League cup, for which many thanks, and a second in the league. If you don't like him, which I don't, the temptation is to belittle these, that would be wrong.
They are trophies worth having, two of those got us into the CL, and he did it with a squad which most thought not good enough.
However, in typical Jose fashion, he started to fall out with everybody, including the players, which saw us drop down the table to an unacceptable position, so he had to go.
Finally Ole. The most difficult to assess. A great start followed by an abysmal second in his first few weeks.
Then this season, he has bought well according to many, has played to cautiously according to most, but it's difficult to criticise too much given what he had left to him.
He needs two things to happen. A decent end to the season, let's say no lower than sixth, and a cup final. Worse than that and it should be bye bye. Or fifth and a semi. You get the gist, some decent results, good games, and a reason to be hopeful. Excluding UWW obviously.
Then if he achieves that some good signings in the midfield and attack. I want to see a big, star player come in. We are, or should be, a glamorous club, and it gives an enormous lift to the other players, not to mention the fans
A change of philosophy, from we have a point lets keep it, to " there's three points for the taking, lets get them".
If that happens he has my backing.
Just to mention, I had a good J&B whisky as an aperitif,, and half a bottle of really good St.Emilion with dinner. So if all this is gibberish feel free to ignore it, as the ramblings of a drunken old man.
Our best manager since SAF
posted on 22/2/20
Yeah, Kroos said he had a deal lined up with Moyes. For whatever reason LVG wasn’t keen
posted on 22/2/20
comment by manutd1982 (U6633)
posted 7 minutes ago
But surely he was hired to take on a very important job, there wasn’t really any excuse that he wasn’t experienced enough, he shouldn’t have been hired for the position in that case. Everyone knew how big and important that summer was going to be.
No one pulled the plug on Herrera, we naively thought we could get the deal done in a day or 2 when we since learnt that buying from Basque clubs is a long process and not straight forward which led to the whole fiasco with the lawyers.
Was Kroos lines up for the next summer, I don’t remember?
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Moyes has openly said it was his decision... We made a bid and it was short of the release fee... Herrera was a club target rather than a moyes target so he didn't want to match the release fee without scouting him more
Herrera said at one stage Moyes explained to him what had happened and that he would come back in for him
posted on 22/2/20
comment by Bryan ROBBson (U22311)
posted 10 minutes ago
Yeah, Kroos said he had a deal lined up with Moyes. For whatever reason LVG wasn’t keen
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He was pictured with his brother wasn't he... Was meant to be a done deal
Fook knows what lvg was thinking
Think we were looking at Patrick Hermann too who looked promising at the time
posted on 22/2/20
Then why did we send those independent lawyers to Bilbao?
Odd that LVG didn’t want Kroos, seems like a very LVG type and he would have known his quality at Bayern surely?
posted on 22/2/20
comment by manutd1982 (U6633)
posted 2 minutes ago
Then why did we send those independent lawyers to Bilbao?
Odd that LVG didn’t want Kroos, seems like a very LVG type and he would have known his quality at Bayern surely?
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We didn't... Both us and bilbao denied having any contact with the lawyers involved (altho their firm have been used in Spanish transfers before)
The Kroos thing is maybe down to the world cup... We maybe didn't follow up while Madrid did... Altho we signed Herrera and Shaw before LVG returned so god knows
posted on 22/2/20
RDD asks why I have filtered him.
Because he is the worst poster on the board, and I don't like reading him.
He is the only poster I have filtered.
posted on 22/2/20
Is that true? I thought these independent lawyers are regularly used to help Bilbao transfers to foreign clubs?
posted on 22/2/20
comment by manutd1982 (U6633)
posted 1 minute ago
Is that true? I thought these independent lawyers are regularly used to help Bilbao transfers to foreign clubs?
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Their firm was used for transfers previously (martinez to Munich) but Bilbao denied they were there on their instruction... As did we
Moyes has given interviews stating he wasn't prepared to pay the release fee so i doubt they would be on our behalf if we weren't budging
Altho we did the next season anyway... Kinda sums us up
posted on 22/2/20
comment by manutd1982 (U6633)
posted 2 hours, 41 minutes ago
Rosso
Do you genuinely believe LVG would have improved had he had a third season? Do you not remember how his second season went, the football at times was possibly the worst we’ve seen post Ferguson. LVGs best period was those 3 games near the end of his first season where we actually played some good stuff and at the start of the second season where the football wasn’t great but we were solid. After that it all went down hill and he lost the plot, I don’t see where the signs were to suggest things would have improved going into a third season.
I think all 4 managers where hired at the wrong time tbf.
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I don’t know if he’d have been better, but I think it would have been fair to give him his third season, and I have no doubts that we’d at least have a better squad now if he had got it.
It’s the sequencing of managers that makes absolutely no sense whatsoever, and demonstrates that Ed doesn’t have any kind of a clue what he’s doing.
posted on 22/2/20
I totally agree with you there, not sure if we’d have a better squad had he’d been given that third season, seeing as his transfers in his 2 seasons were very mixed.
The way LVG was sacked was completely wrong but I think it was right for him to go at that point, I think a lot of the players were growing frustrated with his ways by that point. But then I appreciate it isn’t black and white and a lot of the players and their attitude were to blame too as they have been with all the managers post Ferguson.