Just a few thoughts

First off, as I said on another thread, I think we had a pretty horrendous transfer window and the script for this season was written when it shut. Anyone shocked by today's performance better get used to it, we'll be seeing a lot more of that before the season ends.

It's hard to know how much Ole is accountable for that. My feeling is that he is the latest manager to be let down by the ineptitude of those above him. He isn't going to voice his displeasure in public unlike his predecessors, but I find it hard to believe he is happy with this squad.

You can argue to the death about whether the likes of Fred and Gomes should get more minutes but neither would have changed the result today, I think everyone knows that.

My point is that I find it hard to make a definitive judgement on Ole at the moment, because you'd be hard pushed to find a manager on the planet to get a consistent tune out of this lot. Unlike last season I dont think its through lack of effort - we just dont have the quality.

If I had to make a comparison I'd say we're about to have a season something like what we saw in LVGs second year. Blunt displays devoid of creativity, where teams know exactly how to set up against us. But like I also said in that year, I'd still maintain we are moving in the right direction. The idea is there - and whether people agree or not I think that's important. We arent signing players for the sake of it. We are going back to buying players with character, players who want to play for the club. And even if we are unable to achieve it at the moment we have a goal as to the type of team we'd like to evolve into.

There's every chance that, like LVG, Ole just isn't the man to implement all of this. What's vitally important thought is that his successor is the correct one. Because what we did by appointing Jose was tear up the good that LVG actually did do, and it has set us back another 4 or 5 years. And it's why I think people calling for the likes of Conte and even Allegri in the summer were just so, so wrong.

For what it's worth I'd stick with Ole for the season at least, unless things become absolutely untenable as they did under Moyes/Jose. Even if that does happen though, I honestly believe he'd be leaving the next man with a decent platform on which to build.