Parky

There's no shame in that Alex.

Can people who are voting for Roeder please lay out their arguments.

Don't think any of those would come. However I've added Curbs to the list. I don't like the look of ANY of your decent candidates.

FS kind of man surely.

I ended up click Allardyce for the same reason although Hiddink is imo a better manager. Wonder if anyone will admit to the giving GR another year option?

Good point Alex. But I don't see Mourinho leaving for 2/3 years yet. He has been whinning a lot lately but it is his way to redress the power struggle. Real Madrid would be an ideal place for him mind so I wouldn't totally rule out a quick exit.

Big Sam. Great motivator and organiser and also well upto date on modern methods inc computerised performance tracking etc. According to many has a fearful presence in the dressing room if riled. Tactically sound but not hugely creative. I would accept him. Did also buy Anelka when he had the money. SGE His star has risen but I honestly believe is in decline. Again good organiser but would question his defensive tactics. Good understanding of the world game and has many good Euro contacts. I would have him at a pinch, but as is beleived he would be expensive and probably a mega-pay off clause. The other thing that should rule him out is he seems to be FS fav!! Pardew. No. Coleman. No. Hiddink. Would be my choice and he is itching to get back into club football, but doubt he has ever been on FF's list. Great allround manager and a habit of getting limited players to perform. Houllier. Seems to have been talked about on here the last couple of weeks. Not sure for the first team coach role but would make a good DOF. Would have him in charge for 2/3 years and them move him upstairs. Has made noises about his love for the PL. Good tactician, probably the best on this list, but I have doubts about him under pressure. Curbishley I'm still a huge fan of the ex-West Ham midfielder. Would do a job for us. Only doubt...Is he big enough for THIS job. *I haven't inc Mourinho because I simply don't beleive he would come.

Flimsy CV? Won two Swedish cups, Swedish League title and UEFA Cup with IFK Goteborg. Won the Portugese League three times and Cup with Benfica(two spells) and got to the UEFA Cup final and European Cup final, Won the Italian Cup with A.S Roma. Won the Italian Cup with Sampdoria. And on top of that his time at Lazio where he won The Italian League Title Two Italian Cups 1 Cup Winners Cup. His overall record with England was very impressive in competative games, played 67 lost only 5. Yes we bottled it in the end a few times. Not the worst CV in world football if you ask me! OK he has a decent CV, I suggest you look beyond that though and look at Sven the manager who failed to motivate a group of highly talented players in key matches, whose tactical acumen is up there with Sounes and Roeder and whose England side played some of the most wretched uninspiring football I've ever seen. But hey, look at what he's won. Souness won titles and cups FFS, but like Sven his motivation, tactical and all-round general management skills were s**** and hence we were s**** under him. He's s**** man, he's had his day as a manager, let some other mug take the gamble. Souness won fek all compard to Eriksson. The Italian Cups, the Swerdish stuff and the Cup winners are no great shakes tbh..2nd tier competitions.

People don't realise he had a huge coaching staff and loads of money at Lazio...I think he ended up spending €70-80m Euro.

Agree with Vic we have to keep an eye on a money grabber like this....

Hamburg-Ajax.

Need to work on that a bit Kitty.

Are you suggesting that Roeder had extra money available for defenders but instead decided to start a Premiership season with what had to be the smallest pool of defenders ever? If that's what happened then Roeder and Shepherd come off looking even worse. Six defenders, three of which are crocks and another of which is Ramage is not going to get you through a season whatever way you look at it. What on earth were they thinking?! Do you really believe Sibierski, Rossi and Bernard arrived as the result of a carefully planned transfer window or as the result of a last-minute panic? They all arrived in the final few hours, close to midnight August 31st. I remember the chronicle article at the time (the one I assume you're quoting regarding Zat Knight) and it painted a sorry picture. Milner in Birmingham ready to sign for Aston Villa and pulled back at the last minute, it was all a mess. How people can defend that transfer window I do not know, we are still reaping the mistakes today. bid for zat knight and robert huth,attempted to get woodgate....do you suggest we go down the lines of boumsong again ie making sure we get numbers in by paying inflated prices for crap ? He failed to get what we needed, simple as that. I refuse to believe thst there were NO competent defenders we could have tempted here - because what we have is INcompetent. As for the Kinght/Huth/Woodgate thing, you have no more idea than the rest of us about who we REALLY went for. Roeder is a weasel, so anything he says can't be trusted. You can see Roeder's little press tittle tattle dripping out and his little weasel face twitching with glee....And sometimes very late at night in the dark you hear the squeal of a larger rat scuttling around the offices demented in the search of a conscience.

I'll change it.

5th best blah blah blah. Utter bollocks tbh Like your patter. The only thing I would disagree with Rebellious is we have the potential to be fifth best, we have the potential is limitless. Agreed Stevie. One should never put a limit on potential.

Average manager - steep learning curve.

You're going to have to be firmer with him.

Thats an ideal scenario. Fact is that we have no top players in any position when it comes to defence. The nearest thing we have is "potential" in Steven Taylor, but thats it. And the only striker weve had playing for us for 95% of the season who is even remotely Premiership calibre is Martins. Im all for strengthening the squad, but it was madness to blow a sizeable transfer fee and massive wages to replace arguably our best player last season when the rest of the squad had such massive gaping holes. But then, look at the results to see who is in the right here. Weve crashed out of the main cup competitions in humiliating fashion against sides we should have beaten easily (5-1 utter humiliation at home to a bloody championship side, thats 5-1, and a 2-0 spineless defeat against a Dutch side built with pennies, with the nation watching and eventually laughing at us). Weve done worse this year than we did last year in the league, with plenty of shiite results and shiite performances, even in games weve won. So, for those of us who said we should have signed a defender or a forward instead of a backup left winger at the time the signing was made - surely weve been proven correct? Or rather, as certain individuals on this board with specific agendas would have us believe, its just crazy talk to think that our defence would be better with better individual defenders than Bramble and Ramage, or that wed have scored more goals if we had better individual forwards than the likes of Sibierski, Duff and Dyer. Anything to back the board, eh? Anything to slate the board eh ? Despite us being among the top spenders, again Now, thats what I call an agenda In fairness - and I may have misread - but I'm not sure he mentioned or even implicated the board there? When he uses the word board is he not referring to this message board? Happy to be corrected if I'm wrong, but isn't that entire post about how signing Duff was the wrong decision rather than castigating the board? If the point is to castigate someone for deciding to buy Duff, then I would consider that to have been the managers decision, which I will defend BTW, as a proven quality player with his best years ahead of him for the price we paid for him and considering all the circumstances, which have been mentioned in this thread. Nobody was to know he would struggle to find the form he has displayed with other clubs in the premiership. The clubs policy of price limits, wage limits etc, is set by the board. If the manager wanted the player, and the board felt it was within their means or simply chose to back their manager, they are doing what a good board should do as often as possible. My comment about an agenda stands. What I would really like is tmonkey [and he isn't the only one] to tell us is who exactly they consider to be these numerous "trophy players" at the club, and who they would prefer the club to have signed instead. Before answering, they should consider what I said earlier. Do they prefer the club not to sign quality players, or would they prefer the club to sell its best players ? and do they think - before they start whinging on about not being 2nd in the league any more - that we have any chance whatsoever of ever getting back there if the club DON'T buy these quality players, or "trophy players" if that is what they prefer to call them ? Cutting through all the clap-trap this has the hallmarks of a classic FS buy. GR probably didn't even know about it till he was asked to book the hire car.

We couldn't have done any worse than try Zoggy at left back. iirc he had one game there.

Not quite. I think you'll find "home-grown" means players they have developed themselves, but these do not have to be English if the club's English, French if it's French etc. Arsenal are way ahead of the pack here, and they'll still have a multinational squad. Arnesen is stepping on the gas at Chelsea though. They've signed 3 foreign kids in the past 10 days or so, Gael Kakuta from Lens being the latest. How old was Carrick when you picked him up?

Has everything. blueyes.gif

You're talking s***, FACT. He's unfit tonight, isn't he? When was he ever "fit" tbh Overated player,wouldve fail to make the bench in any world class side aside from Roma. What a total crock of shit. Totto is a very good player.

I don't give a monkeys about the EU....So no I've never seen it as a problem. It's a good idea and imo there should be a way of applying some aspects of it. Anyway we're technically not talking about stopping anyones right to work. IMO half of EU law is junk and needs to be challenged.... Infact you'll find the U.K. is not even signed up to the full treaty and we do as we please in other areas where our law still has precedence.

A connesieur speaks.