AyeDubbleYoo

Roy Hodgson is a good example of a player who never had much of a playing career but turned out to be a quality coach. There are no guarantees either way, but being Alan Shearer helps you get respect from the players from day one, something that we really need at this point.

like ? Dunno, that post was a cheeky quip actually! We were going down without a fight, and now we've got a fighting chance, that's the main point I'd want to put across.

Well if he was involved in transfers in any way then he would have to work within the budget, and so has a part to play in keeping costs down when instructed to do so. If you're happy making decisions based on personality then fine, but if we're only going to employ cuddly northern nice guys we aren't going to get very far. Shearer has been painted as a fairly annoying person himself in his time.

Bur we don't really know what Wise did and that's the problem. Originally it was supposed to be to recruit players for the Academy but then it seemed that he was involved in recruiting for the first team. Did he scout the players or were they recommended to him? No-one knows. Yes players have been coming in to the Academy but it will be a few years before we know whether they will make the grade. If that's the case then fair enough, but surely not knowing what someone does can't make you hate them to the extent Wise was despised by some of our fans? Too many people filled the gap with assumptions and painted him as the villain - Keegan's arch-nemesis.

Well nobody really knows do they, seems to me he was part glorified scout, part transfer negotiator. I think his official remit was to find younger players, but nobody knows to what extent he was also involved in first team affairs. He never stood a chance anyway, I still don't know why the hatred was focussed on him so much. I hope it wasn't just because of his personality, the fact he's southern and is not Keegan, but I can't see any other reasons.

I'd say something brilliant, intelligent and insightful... so they wouldn't broadcast it.

I know everyone will be expecting me to say this, but I hope that Mike Ashley doesn't completely dismantle the system that has brought us some good quality, low cost youth and first team signings. There's absolutely no evidence that Dennis Wise has done anything wrong during his time at the club. It's easy to hate him because of the odious little cock he is in person, but he seems to have been doing a decent job IMO. Mike Ashley running the club on whims and based on the fickle protests of the fans might well turn out to be much more dangerous than him running it with restrictions on the manager's spending.

Was he not in an accident or something?

We've got two classics on the staff now, that's for sure. http://img5.imageshack.us/img5/6679/dowie.jpg

This is a big plus, as long as it doesn't mean we get relegated of course.

To me that's the biggest advantage he will have (long term). Similar to Keegan the first time round, he will have a real pull with modern players (some of them will actually have heard of him).

And Smudger having a cheeky smudge in that pic! Probably just really happy to be getting on the pitch.

Depends, he could do quite well and we could still get relegated. Or he could keep us up but still not be the right man for the job. Either way, 8 games isn't long enough to decide. (Edit: Obviously (practically speaking) he will get the nod if we stay up)

By the way...

I hope a suit, for all our sakes. We need Mourinho Mk2 not Keegan Mk2.

I honestly never give any though to what Sunderland do, couldn't give a feck. As long as we stay up, that's all that matters now.

One of my mackem friends has already posted that on facebook, the amount of attention they pay to us is laughable!

Fuck, I just switched the radio off.

I still think it's 50/50, although we will have a much better chance in our home games now the atmosphere will be right behind the team.

Save it for the end of the season eh?

We don't know what his style will be really, do we? He was an attacker, and has played in a lot of good attacking teams, but he always strikes me as quite conservative as a person. May be he will try to keep it tight and scrape enough points to keep us up... who knows.

I doubt the club will make any changes to the system until the end of the season and they know whether Shearer will be the long-term manager. They won't be sacking Wise in the next 8 games.

Also, fair play to the club for rolling the dice and doing something. I've posted before that I didn't think they would act before the end of the season. Whether or not it's enough remains to be seen, but credit where it's due.