fredbob

It wouldn't be quite so bad if there was anything in the world to suggest Wise was appropriate for the job. Ultimately, he's just a lower division manager with some friends in the game. Might as well have gone for Tony Adams. it's a lottery don't you know, when you make appointments so it's a bit pointless taking someones ability into account. Well, lets put it another way. Appointing a manager who has won 4 titles with 2 different clubs and 3 manager of the year awards, is quite worthy of having a good chance, as is an up and coming manager who won the FA Cup and left his team in the top 3 of the league and 2nd phase of the Champions League. As is appointing a World Cup winner. What is your thoughts on Scolari being sacked or are you sticking to your previous criteria and claim Abramovic should step down for taking the club backwards ? BEWARE...STRAIGHT ANSWER ALERT...STRAIGHT ANSWER ALERT. i thought scolari was an ok appointment but his lack of league experience anywhere was going to be a risk.......can you find many who thought souness or roeder were decent appointments ? if chelsea were a business and they made huge losses and that weren't affordable and appointed souness i think that yes, i'd be looking for someone to take over from whoever was running the club.......straight enough of an answer for you ? give it a go you may feel cleansed. oh remember i backed the dalglish appointment and thought they got rid of him too early (don't want you confusing me with someone else) There was a lot of people on here who defended and supported everything Souness did, and you know it. And you admit that abramovic made a dodgy appointment that has taken his club backwards, so do you also think he should step down for his gross incompetence ? Am i reading this right - you're equating Abramovichs decision to appoint World Cup winning manager Luis Felipe Scolari to Freddy Shepherd et al decision to appoint Graeme Souness?? :lol: Ive heard it all now. Utterly clueless. If i was a cunt i'd put that in my sig. Delicious.

nowt to say then ? Just joking man, I'm pretty bored, we all know spending money improves your chances of doing well, but it's not a given, you need the right manager, the right scouts and the right amount of money but you can do well without spending massive amount if you have the right manager e.g. Moyes and Everton. on the other hand, if you are lucky enough to get a decent manager, and it IS a lottery, and don't back him, he'll be off. Like Moyes, unless Everton are taken over or it all suddenly goes tits up for him. When you say "do well", how well do YOU want to do ? It's a lottery getting a good manager? No it's a skill, not an easy one but it is definately a skill. is it now ? We'll see how easily Arsenal replace Wenger and ManU replace Ferguson. Or Everton replace Moyes .......... Even a "good manager" isn't necessarily the "right manager", which I suppose adds credence to NE5's "lottery" theory. Bit simplistic on the whole though, as usual. you mean "realistic", as usual. Which also, as usual, too many people fail to grasp. were you happy with the kinnear appointment ? hey getting a good manager is a lottery right,surely theres as much chance getting a s*** one to turn out good results as there is a good one turning out bad to your thinking or maybe you are piffling again in anattempt to detect any criticism from the your beloved fred ? (conversly it must work with players aswell...shevchenko,veron,woodgate at real,keane at liverpool......good players who didn't do it so surely it means it's pointless spending big as these players prove it works) i'll stop you in your tracks........."back your manager"............what with ? where was the money going to come from......at this point you mention the debt of others and as always i mention the debt of the top 4 is different to ours as they are making money aside from those with sugar daddies where as we have consistently made losses (not a good scenario when begging to the banks with few assets left to hock). look at the other clubs who,like us have lived beyond their means,they are all cutting right back and ask yourself what liverpools or arsenals spending would be like if they missed out on the champs league for 3 or 4 years ? often on here you have alluded to others having thir heads in the sand but it is clear the one one doing an ostrich is yourself in relation to the position fred left us in. silly. Especially when there are still people hell bent on defending Ashley to the bitter end, and I mean bitter end = relegation and with little chance of coming back. Pleased for you that you still appear to write off all those european qualifications and champions league appearances and the manner in which they were achieved. Still, nobody is "embarrassing us" any more, right ? BORING ! we've covered the euro qualifications to death as that has little to do with the position we were in spring 2007. defending ashley to the bitter end......like you defending fred ? i never mentioned being embarassed by fred's utterences. nice to see you keep your head in the sand re our position when fred left. you mentioned Shepherd, not me, with a silly childish comment. Yep, I will "defend" anybody who gave me the only 15 years out of 45 that tried to compete at the levels this club should always compete at, and thus gave me the best most consistent and highest league positions as a result. As I've said before. Incidentally what is wrong to defending someone who's fixing the probelms that were caused by the previous board? ITs a simple eqaution for you, gamble now or sacrifice ambition, the reality isnt as simple as that.

nowt to say then ? Just joking man, I'm pretty bored, we all know spending money improves your chances of doing well, but it's not a given, you need the right manager, the right scouts and the right amount of money but you can do well without spending massive amount if you have the right manager e.g. Moyes and Everton. on the other hand, if you are lucky enough to get a decent manager, and it IS a lottery, and don't back him, he'll be off. Like Moyes, unless Everton are taken over or it all suddenly goes tits up for him. When you say "do well", how well do YOU want to do ? It's a lottery getting a good manager? No it's a skill, not an easy one but it is definately a skill. is it now ? We'll see how easily Arsenal replace Wenger and ManU replace Ferguson. Or Everton replace Moyes .......... Even a "good manager" isn't necessarily the "right manager", which I suppose adds credence to NE5's "lottery" theory. Bit simplistic on the whole though, as usual. you mean "realistic", as usual. Which also, as usual, too many people fail to grasp. were you happy with the kinnear appointment ? hey getting a good manager is a lottery right,surely theres as much chance getting a s*** one to turn out good results as there is a good one turning out bad to your thinking or maybe you are piffling again in anattempt to detect any criticism from the your beloved fred ? (conversly it must work with players aswell...shevchenko,veron,woodgate at real,keane at liverpool......good players who didn't do it so surely it means it's pointless spending big as these players prove it works) i'll stop you in your tracks........."back your manager"............what with ? where was the money going to come from......at this point you mention the debt of others and as always i mention the debt of the top 4 is different to ours as they are making money aside from those with sugar daddies where as we have consistently made losses (not a good scenario when begging to the banks with few assets left to hock). look at the other clubs who,like us have lived beyond their means,they are all cutting right back and ask yourself what liverpools or arsenals spending would be like if they missed out on the champs league for 3 or 4 years ? often on here you have alluded to others having thir heads in the sand but it is clear the one one doing an ostrich is yourself in relation to the position fred left us in. silly. Especially when there are still people hell bent on defending Ashley to the bitter end, and I mean bitter end = relegation and with little chance of coming back. Pleased for you that you still appear to write off all those european qualifications and champions league appearances and the manner in which they were achieved. Still, nobody is "embarrassing us" any more, right ?

Id be happy with a foreigner - just what we need. No good britsih managers about.

All the "best" players that have left thus far wanted to leave. Why can't people realise that? Clubs who want to go places don't sell their best players whether they want to go or not. They keep them, go forwards and make them want to stay. Can't see Gareth Barry braying at the Villa door again this summer. I'll take your Barry, and raise you Henry. Ill also look forwards to seeing where Drogba and Ronaldo end up, not that it adds anything yours or my point, as neither of us have one. Ronaldo's still at Man Utd, despite wanting to be away two summers on the bounce. Ditto Drogba really. another concept again, which appears to difficult to grasp, is when a player has won things at his current club and wants a new challenge. Good spin. So what was Woodgates excuse for leaving? And what if we havent won anything for a while, is that not good enough reason to "want a new challenge". Real Madrid ? You've confirmed - again - you don't understand this. Man City?

nowt to say then ? Just joking man, I'm pretty bored, we all know spending money improves your chances of doing well, but it's not a given, you need the right manager, the right scouts and the right amount of money but you can do well without spending massive amount if you have the right manager e.g. Moyes and Everton. on the other hand, if you are lucky enough to get a decent manager, and it IS a lottery, and don't back him, he'll be off. Like Moyes, unless Everton are taken over or it all suddenly goes tits up for him. When you say "do well", how well do YOU want to do ? It's a lottery getting a good manager? No it's a skill, not an easy one but it is definately a skill. is it now ? We'll see how easily Arsenal replace Wenger and ManU replace Ferguson. Or Everton replace Moyes .......... Even a "good manager" isn't necessarily the "right manager", which I suppose adds credence to NE5's "lottery" theory. Bit simplistic on the whole though, as usual. you mean "realistic", as usual. Which also, as usual, too many people fail to grasp. were you happy with the kinnear appointment ? hey getting a good manager is a lottery right,surely theres as much chance getting a shit one to turn out good results as there is a good one turning out bad to your thinking or maybe you are piffling again in anattempt to detect any criticism from the your beloved fred ? (conversly it must work with players aswell...shevchenko,veron,woodgate at real,keane at liverpool......good players who didn't do it so surely it means it's pointless spending big as these players prove it works) i'll stop you in your tracks........."back your manager"............what with ? where was the money going to come from......at this point you mention the debt of others and as always i mention the debt of the top 4 is different to ours as they are making money aside from those with sugar daddies where as we have consistently made losses (not a good scenario when begging to the banks with few assets left to hock). look at the other clubs who,like us have lived beyond their means,they are all cutting right back and ask yourself what liverpools or arasenals spending would be like if they missed out on the champs league for 3 or 4 years ? often on hear you have alluded to others having thir heads in the sand but it is clear the one one doing an ostrich is yourself in relation to the position fred left us in. Either that or "Im pleased for you that you think it was a bad thing qualifying for the CL and top 5 finishes, hopefully soopa Mike will get us back up there with his masterplan"

Even though Deschamps left Juve after a disagreement with the hierarchy over transfers? If you see it as a simple black and white "Wise will force whatever player he wants onto the manager" then you have a point, but theres evidence to suggest this isnt strictly the case, Deschamp also has a working relationship with Wise and Id imagine Deschamps has a rough idea about the transfer market and being able to stick to the clubs new policy. I imagine Deschamps has the french market cornered which quite frankly is a huge bonus.

Would he want to work with Dennis Wise though? He's working at a selling club at Wigan, I don't think he'd be that picky. Why though? He gets full control at Wigan, which he wouldn't here. He still has to sell players when his boss says so. Not much control over that. How many were there at Wigan on Saturday? 14,000? Well if he prefers that to managing his home town club in front of 50,000 geordies he should probably stay where he is. Of course that's the obvious pull. I'm just saying why would he want to report to Dennis Wise? He doesn't have to if it's a problem, he can always stay at Wigan. You still haven't answered my question. You want me to tell you what Steve Bruce might think? I'm asking you why he would want to have to report into Dennis Wise. Bit of a leading question that Tooj, the question should really be "would he mind reporting to Wise (member of the board)?" To answer your question - becasue Wise is a member of the board.

You've done it again! Its the only way to inject "culture" into our dear old manager. He's as about as exotic as a potato.

Still a no for me, with playes you can address weaknesses by simply looking for improvements on what we have becasue the options to imporve on them again is and should be a contiuos annual process, the same cant be said with managers, ideally you should be looking for the right man who will potentially be at the club for 10 years, not the man who is better than what weve got, which is a complex quite a few people seem to be suffering from. For me Bruce isnt that man, he may be better than Jose but he's not the man to bring this club forward in the long run. Wigan is his only real success and we havent even seen the completion of that job. Ill say it even though no one else wants to, we need to go foreign, there is so much talent out there which just isnt available in the PL, we need some new impetus and it wont come from these shores. Deschamps is my number 1 choice, Zico would work the system well, we need an appointment that everyone can get behind.

All the "best" players that have left thus far wanted to leave. Why can't people realise that? Clubs who want to go places don't sell their best players whether they want to go or not. They keep them, go forwards and make them want to stay. Can't see Gareth Barry braying at the Villa door again this summer. I'll take your Barry, and raise you Henry. Ill also look forwards to seeing where Drogba and Ronaldo end up, not that it adds anything yours or my point, as neither of us have one. Ronaldo's still at Man Utd, despite wanting to be away two summers on the bounce. Ditto Drogba really. another concept again, which appears to difficult to grasp, is when a player has won things at his current club and wants a new challenge. Good spin. So what was Woodgates excuse for leaving? And what if we havent won anything for a while, is that not good enough reason to "want a new challenge".

All the "best" players that have left thus far wanted to leave. Why can't people realise that? Clubs who want to go places don't sell their best players whether they want to go or not. They keep them, go forwards and make them want to stay. Can't see Gareth Barry braying at the Villa door again this summer. I've just answered this too. I honestly think this concept is too difficult for some. Theres no concept there NE5 - its a non point, much like me saying Arsenal dont want to go anywhere becasue they sold Henry, or Viera. Says everything, means nothing. Try again, maybe thats why people find it so difficult.

All the "best" players that have left thus far wanted to leave. Why can't people realise that? Clubs who want to go places don't sell their best players whether they want to go or not. They keep them, go forwards and make them want to stay. Can't see Gareth Barry braying at the Villa door again this summer. I'll take your Barry, and raise you Henry. Ill also look forwards to seeing where Drogba and Ronaldo end up, not that it adds anything yours or my point, as neither of us have one.

Kinnear strikes me as being too stubborn to turn this job away. I genuinely have no idea what will happen next - hoping Jose gets better but Im also hoping he'll walk away from the club.

Wish we'd gone for him when we went for Allardyce instead. Top class manager, always liked him only concern would be his transfer record, nothing about his transfer record really stands out to me. Not obviously anyway.

Summary of Opening Post Please be more specific.

nowt to say then ? Just joking man, I'm pretty bored, we all know spending money improves your chances of doing well, but it's not a given, you need the right manager, the right scouts and the right amount of money but you can do well without spending massive amount if you have the right manager e.g. Moyes and Everton. on the other hand, if you are lucky enough to get a decent manager, and it IS a lottery, and don't back him, he'll be off. Like Moyes, unless Everton are taken over or it all suddenly goes tits up for him. When you say "do well", how well do YOU want to do ? It's a lottery getting a good manager? No it's a skill, not an easy one but it is definately a skill. is it now ? We'll see how easily Arsenal replace Wenger and ManU replace Ferguson. Or Everton replace Moyes .......... Even a "good manager" isn't necessarily the "right manager", which I suppose adds credence to NE5's "lottery" theory. Bit simplistic on the whole though, as usual. Man U will appoint a good successor to Fergie because I bet right now Fergie is invovled in identifying him and monitoring them over a decent time span. not necessarily. But it depends what you mean by "decent". Didn't Chelsea think they appointed a worthy successor to Mourinho ? Two appointments later, and this is an owner who knows about football. I assume you mean Scolari and not Grant! Imo Abramovich is a names man, he wanted to build a team full of superstars, or at list a large number of star names. Hence his eternal pursuit of Sheva. In an ideal world Roman would have got Hiddink in last summer but couldn't for reasons to do with his relationship with the Russian FA, Scolari was the biggest name that he could get, iirc as many people had reservations on how well he would adapt as thought it was a great move. Man U on the other hand will have had a time span for Fergies departure for a couple of years (as soon as he breaks Liverpools record imo) and will have been planning for it accordingly. There will be dossiers on the likes of Hughes, Bruce, Moyes, Quierroz (sp) etc etc detailing every aspect they beleve to be necessary to carry on the success of the past decade. Scolari is also a World Cup Winner. You don't get anything better than that. it just proves that even the best looking CV makes it a lottery in respect that the best CV's will not succeed. Do you think the Glaziers will go looking for an up and coming tracksuit manager or a big world name ? It took them over almost 30 years to replace Matt Busby. I don't disagree one bit, would never argue that a good paper appointment = a good reality appointment. Also worth bearing in mind that had Mourinho turned Chelsea down Souness could well have been in charge of Chelsea! I think Man U wil go foreigh fwiw, if Fergie was to leave tomorrow then maybe they would play safe. Quierroz or Mourinho I could see there, Kinnear at a push I would say Mourinho would be a great appointment for manu, but who knows, it could all go wrong. I think it will be O'neill, he's proving himself to be a top class manager and he was mooted for the job a few years back, also plays a good brand of football. Dont think Man U will ever go to a defensively minded coach, Hitzfeld would be my outise shot.

nowt to say then ? Just joking man, I'm pretty bored, we all know spending money improves your chances of doing well, but it's not a given, you need the right manager, the right scouts and the right amount of money but you can do well without spending massive amount if you have the right manager e.g. Moyes and Everton. on the other hand, if you are lucky enough to get a decent manager, and it IS a lottery, and don't back him, he'll be off. Like Moyes, unless Everton are taken over or it all suddenly goes tits up for him. When you say "do well", how well do YOU want to do ? It's a lottery getting a good manager? No it's a skill, not an easy one but it is definately a skill. is it now ? We'll see how easily Arsenal replace Wenger and ManU replace Ferguson. Or Everton replace Moyes .......... Even a "good manager" isn't necessarily the "right manager", which I suppose adds credence to NE5's "lottery" theory. Bit simplistic on the whole though, as usual. Man U will appoint a good successor to Fergie because I bet right now Fergie is invovled in identifying him and monitoring them over a decent time span. not necessarily. But it depends what you mean by "decent". Didn't Chelsea think they appointed a worthy successor to Mourinho ? Two appointments later, and this is an owner who knows about football. Arguably they did, unfortunately they sacked him in the summer & hired Scolari. Scolari had never managed a club in Europe, he hadn't been involved in club management since 2001. He was a risky appointment that most people thought would succeed based on his reputation. I actually said the same thing in the past when people talked about Scolari as being a manager in the premiership, long before he went to chelsea ie he had not managed a club in europe and so it was very risky, but many people said because he had won a world cup and probably because he is a foreigner, nailed him on as being a certain success. Which just proves the point, that it is a lottery, its all about opinion, and even the best looking appointments can go wrong. In the same way that the 'best looking players' can go wrong?

That’s the strangest thing about Ashley, how can he from a sportswear retail background with a MD from a casino background (and a lawyer previously) think they can run a football club? Even though they know they have made huge mistakes, they still don’t get anyone in other than an inexperienced Dennis Wise – madness. One positive is the academy recruitment policy, but if that’s the “5-year plan” don’t they realise that a lot less than 10% of any EPL clubs academy become any good. And what happens in the meantime? Plenty of people have said that business is business, and it shouldn't be any different. Which is, of course, utter bollocks, and always was utter bollocks. How many other chairman come from football backgrounds though ? FS wasn't was he ? When Keegan wanted to sell Andy Cole, SJH thought he was mad but backed him 'as i'm not a football man'. He then however floated the club which ultimately caused Keegan to walk the first time, which was wrong of Keegan as he wasnt a businessman. Goes both ways imo. not in Ashley’s case, as he clearly knows nowt about football and nowt about the business side of football. He needs help AND soon. Go on, indulge me, what should he be doing with the business side of football? how wouldn’t know how to “indulge” you about the business side of football, that’s the point, neither does Ashley, or haven’t you realised that yet? again, he needs help AND soon. You dont know anything about the business side of football but you know Ashley is doing it wrong? How does that work then?

I wouldn't think so. I think in the summer we will make every effort to get rid of a good number of players who just aren't worth what they are costing the club, and this will allow for more money to be invested on top of the £8 million currently sitting there. Many thought that would happen last summer. And this January. The problem is, someone else has to want them. And we've given two of them nice new contracts. Giving Shola a new contract is daft iyam, but I don't think they had any choice with Butt did they? EDIT: Unless you mean Harper No idea on the Butt thing, I still don't buy us not having any choice in the matter. What, so the deal and wages were already agreed years ago? Seems mental. Quite possibly true though. If you play..... we offer you..... although you'll be free to walk away if you want. Pompey had a similar deal with Kanu. If he played more than 20 games, then he was given the chance to sign for an extra year. Going back to the shola thing, does nobody else think that maybe its to make sure we dont lose him for nothing? Shola would interest a lot of Championship clubs, he wont be on a huge amount.

Did Llambas say anything about the contract? Not specifically, i don't think... i wasn't suggesting that btw. I appreciate the possibility that Joe could be bullshitting, but he's said there's a contract there and i'll take that as gospel for the sake of being pessimistic. This is the most poignant part of the whole interview, imo: It's all about Wise for Llambias, et al, obviously. And if Kinnear is satisfied with working beneath him, then we'll probably see him stay for the long haul. Even if they were pondering getting rid of him... even then it's lose-lose. Stay up: "Oh, he's proved himself good enough, give him the contract." Go down: "We can't attract anyone better, give him the contract." I won't personally make any conclusions yet* - the club's near future does rest on what happens in the summer and who we appoint long-term manager. Whilst Llambias' interview hasn't injected an overwhelming sense of pessimism - it hasn't ignited any hope, either, for me. EDIT: Admittedly, bit of a contradiction there... seeing as i did so in my previous post. Oh ok, presonally Im not fussed if Ashley backs Wise over Keegan, i can see why he's done it and the club certainly seem to have reasons for doing it as well, which is good enough for me. My main concern with the club right now is that we get the right man in charge and any hint of Jose getting a new contract would destroy me. Its theone thing they need to get right.

That’s the strangest thing about Ashley, how can he from a sportswear retail background with a MD from a casino background (and a lawyer previously) think they can run a football club? Even though they know they have made huge mistakes, they still don’t get anyone in other than an inexperienced Dennis Wise – madness. One positive is the academy recruitment policy, but if that’s the “5-year plan” don’t they realise that a lot less than 10% of any EPL clubs academy become any good. And what happens in the meantime? Plenty of people have said that business is business, and it shouldn't be any different. Which is, of course, utter bollocks, and always was utter bollocks. How many other chairman come from football backgrounds though ? FS wasn't was he ? When Keegan wanted to sell Andy Cole, SJH thought he was mad but backed him 'as i'm not a football man'. He then however floated the club which ultimately caused Keegan to walk the first time, which was wrong of Keegan as he wasnt a businessman. Goes both ways imo. not in Ashley’s case, as he clearly knows nowt about football and nowt about the business side of football. He needs help AND soon. Go on, indulge me, what should he be doing with the business side of football?

Did Llambas say anything about the contract?

It's worked in the past. he's already almost 2 years into the "grand plan", these "plans" which people said always succeeded. Or do I take it, he's starting again to see how the next 2 years goes too ? Shame the grand plan of actually capitalising on the clubs fanbase, and strengthening the current first team and encouraging our best players to see a future at the club wasn't on the radar. Ive heard you say this beffore, but ive never been sure quite what it means. How exactly does the club "capitalise on the clubs fanbase" Genuine question. Sounds like management speak to me. eeer.........do you or do you not think that having a bigger fanbase than most other clubs gives us a distinct advantage over clubs like Bolton, West Brom, etc, even though people in the past have been envious of these sort of clubs for some reason and made out they have had better clubs than us ? Is it because you perceive struggling at the foot of the table and not wasting money on so called "trophy signings" which get you good league positions, to be better than trying to make a challenge to the top clubs ? Sometimes I wonder if you're just a poor WUM fredbob. Nice response. Like i say, I'm still not sure what difference it makes. Bigger crowds dont mean more success, sure we get more money fromshirt sales and ticket sales but thats all been accounted for in the account sheets - what next? How exactly would you capitlaise on it? Serious question becaseu i genuinely dont know the dynamics.

It's worked in the past. he's already almost 2 years into the "grand plan", these "plans" which people said always succeeded. Or do I take it, he's starting again to see how the next 2 years goes too ? Shame the grand plan of actually capitalising on the clubs fanbase, and strengthening the current first team and encouraging our best players to see a future at the club wasn't on the radar. Ive heard you say this beffore, but ive never been sure quite what it means. How exactly does the club "capitalise on the clubs fanbase" Genuine question. Sounds like management speak to me.