OzzieMandias

And also how we ended up with Roeder.

The thing is Alex dividends are a good thing, but imo we have regularly paid too high dividends. This has stopped recently as FS and to his credit can't justify dividends due to poor financial performance. The summer of 2003 is where it is at yes. Wasn't it the summer of 69? Wat it Bobby Joe or Mary Sue? Bobby Moncur.

I remember the general feeling, all through that summer, that the squad badly needed freshening. Something to lift it. Yes, Shepherd did say that team-strengthening would only follow CL qualification. And no, a big-money signing would have guaranteed nothing. But what did an £8.5 million payout to shareholders get us? This was our last chance to grab a seat at the top table and we fluffed it. The club's biggest turning-point in the last ten years.

Subsequent disastrous non-qualification for Champions League. Obviously. Typical ignorance of the big picture from you. Troll. As usual. Typical pathetic insult from you, but it doesn't disguise the fact you were asking an extremely dumb question.

Excerpt from Kevin Keegan interview in today's Independent: http://sport.independent.co.uk/football/news/article2383823.ece

Subsequent disastrous non-qualification for Champions League. Obviously.

It certainly puts our inability to establish a foundation for success into perspective.

Excerpt from an article about Bolton behind the scenes: Full article at: http://football.guardian.co.uk/News_Story/0,,2036021,00.html

A couple of years ago everyone was raving on about how we needed someone called Nihat. Whatever happened to him?

Forgive me for pointing it out, but it seems rather strange for someone who so strongly emphasizes "ambition" as a positive value to argue that play-it-safe inaction is the best course simply because the struggle to achieve something better is not guaranteed to succeed.

For me, the Partizan season. The Partizan defeat was where my hope dried up. In the latter part of the KK reign we'd jumped up touched the heights, but weren't able to grab hold of anything. The foundations of our success soon proved to be pretty shaky and a steady decline began. Enter SBR. It took him a few seasons but, against the run of play and with limited resources, he had us up there again, within touching distance of the chance to wedge ourselves at the top. But we needed that CL place, that year, to have a chance of competing with the big boys. I can still remember where I was sitting, looking out of the window, as I mulled over the consequences of the defeat and basically resigned myself to mediocrity for the forseeable future. Everything since just seems like symptoms, rather than causes.

I was very happy when we appointed GR head of the academy, however. Seemed a great man for that job. Now we've lost him in that role, alas.

I think Roeder would be a really crap DOF. Quite apart from the fact that he has no relevant experience to prepare him for the role and hasn't achieved enough to earn the respect of the kind of managers (good, experienced ones) that would hopefully be working under him, he also doesn't seem to shine in the transfer market, evidently has no scouting network, doesn't even seem to have enough contacts to recruit a credible coaching staff, doesn't seem a strong enough character to hold his ground against inevitable interference from Shepherd... This I agree with, however:

I think it's precisely the opposite. If the club were going to get rid of Roeder it should be now, allowing the new man to make his own assessment of the playing staff and prepare his targets for the summer. Letting Roeder bumble through another transfer window and then sacking him a few games into the next season is just about the stupidest thing we could do.

Shearer might make sense as manager if we were in an emergency situation where an inspirational figure is what might make the difference – like the circumstances when Keegan arrived. We're not in that kind of situation now. We need a Bobby Robson, not a Keegan. We need experience.

Exactly.

To be fair to NE5, you might have said it the past to Leazes Mag or Beermonster, I would check before automatically rubishing his reply. Hes replied to my post and said "your sentance" - hes referring to the post itself. Trouble is, hes made something up in his own head, attributed it to me, and is replying to that. Pretty summarises his entire posting history.

You tell me. You were the moron who brought it up. you asked the question first. check the history Yes, I asked the question because you seemed to be labouring under the foolish misapprehension that Shepherd had made some kind of net contribution to the club. Never mind. Your pathetic inability to support your own dumb assertion is noted. your inability to answer the post is also duly noted. prick No prob. We've established that you talk out of your arse and immediately cave in when called on your bullshit. Job done.

You tell me. You were the moron who brought it up. you asked the question first. check the history Yes, I asked the question because you seemed to be labouring under the foolish misapprehension that Shepherd had made some kind of net contribution to the club. Never mind. Your pathetic inability to support your own dumb assertion is noted.

You tell me. You were the moron who brought it up.

Uh-huh. And what, exactly, has Shepherd "put in"? err. run the club for the last ten years? or is that such a piece of piss that you could have done it part time for nowt? So you reckon he's "put in" more than he's taken out, do you?

Uh-huh. And what, exactly, has Shepherd "put in"?

Shepherd should start a rumour that he's going to cash in his shareholding, resign the board and go back to selling scrap metal. That'll sell loads of season tickets.

Well, this is all very well but completely ignores what is definitely Shepherd's main motivation: Money.

He can't afford it. He'd have to borrow. The club would then be lumbered with paying off the debt. That combined with his proven ineptitude in various areas would condemn us to mid-table mediocrity (at best) for a generation. So, the same as now, then? Basically, yeah, but with even less possibility of anything changing. We would be stuck with him until he dies. Or retires.