romavillan

I think Garde deserves a chance to actually have a go at some point, he's not had a chance so far has he? Squad is not his and is dire. I'd love to see him backed properly in the summer, if he leaves I think it will be one we regret when we see him do well somewhere else under better working conditions than here. The ball is squarely in the board's court, looks like Fox is a goner, So will Lerner/Hollis have the balls to back him or not? My guess is not and we start looking for a new manager in June.

This is good news really, but it depends totally now on who they are replaced with. If we want to keep Garde then we need to hire a director of football and a chief scout to support and help him build a team. If we don't want to keep Garde then we should be perhaps looking for a trio that have had success elsewhere (not necessarily in england) and bring the whole unit, director of football, chief scout and head coach/manager. Hollis is essentially Fox's replacement in that scenario. It's ANOTHER massive opportunity to turn this around next year. However, Lerner has totally **** up all the better opportunities that came in better circumstances, so I'm not about to get excited.

wtf is hutton doing for that goal? Ignores his man and then gets in the way of richards.

I'm sure he has loads of positive intentions still for us, it's just that he has no capacity to turn them into reality. I have lots of positive intentions to put parts of my anatomy in some serious hot italian women, but the reality of the situation is I'm old and ugly and have no money.

Of course they will, just look at how they delivered on their promises to back him in Jan when they hired him. He will be tasked with winning the Championship using mostly buttons and string found around bodymoor heath. Making sure to not turn any of the fancy machines on or any lights or anything whilst he's there.

Yeah exactly, he will want us to win the championship and come roaring back straight away, he also wanted us to be comfortably mid table while we got the wages under control to be in a position to invest again and get up the league. I have zero faith in his ability to actually realise what he wants to happen.

Wouldn't be so sure about him making sure we come back up to get the tv money, he has massively **** up us not going down to insure the tv money, which was the far easier thing to do IMO. He just had to invest more money year on year when Lambert arrived. Lambert with 4 or 5 more decent quality players would have avoided relegation comfortably.

If the board engineer this man's exit through incompetence I will find out the postal addresses of those responsible and post my bowel movements to them daily till the day I die That presser, in this situation, what more can he say? He says that the current hideous situation is years in the making, he recognises there is reason to protest. He publicly states that some senior players are not giving 100%, and that it only takes one or two to not give 100% for us to lose on any given Saturday. Why on earth would they not back this man? They fuggen hired him in the first place, and from his own comments (replete with wry smile) he says he didn't realise quite how bad things were, to sort this out.

Which if you ignore the 4 years or so before he got the job would be a condemning statistic. On the other hand if you look at the systematic self destruction through moronic high level management that preceded Garde and created the god awful working conditions he has to operate in, then it means very little.

As it stands after he has basically said that he doesn't want anything to do with certain players who can't be arsed in training but has to pick them anyway because there is no alternative, then either there is radical change in the summer or he is not expecting to be here next year. By saying what he has said, he is right too IMO, he is saying that the board didn't give him what he asked for in Jan and as a result there are players who he doesn't want near the matchday squad who are in it because of there being no-one else to pick. That's both a condemnation of the board and some of the playing staff if you ask me, and as such makes his position here look pretty shaky unless someone on the board has told him he will be backed 100% in the summer to sort this shower of shite out. I have grave doubts as to whether anyone on the board has this level of intelligence.

Indeed, had someone with half a brain been in charge they would have said to Garde to go and sign his captain, the first piece in the new puzzle, someone to build a team around and backed him with whatever cash was necessary to get that player, whatever his position was. Anything to start the process of building HIS team, anything to show him we're serious about wanting to turn this around. In the end the board essentially didn't back him enough to get the 2 or 3 players he wanted (work permit or no work permit) and that just sends totally the wrong signals, if you believe the rumours he isn't happy about it either. We really need someone with a vision of how to play in the modern era, and for them to be allowed to collect the playing staff needed to get that out on the pitch. If that's not Garde then WTF were we doing giving him the job in the first place?

---------------------- Bunn ------------------ ------ Richards -- Okore -- Clark --------- Hutton --- Veretout --- Gana -- Cissokho -------------- Gil ---------- Grealish -------- ----------------- Robinson ------------------ Gil and Grealish between the lines and Robinson on shoulder of last man. Compact and counter. Desperately need to turn up for this one.

That bench doesn't warm itself!

All these negative records have happened on his watch. Complete cockwad.

His choice in the face of the boardroom direction? Or the board sacking him in favour of someone else?

Regardless of how hard it was to watch just how awful we were today (Klopp even felt sorry for us - which whilst a nice touch from him is perhaps the worst thing a visiting manager can do when you think about it) I still back Garde. Just as much as over the last few weeks when he had us mid table in the form table. Today was a mish mash of all the things that are wrong concentrated together in 90 minutes of shambolic football. Individual errors, lack of quality, lack of squad depth, inability to follow instructions, lack of movement... all things that Garde has been trying to address (with some success till today to be fair) without any kind of backing from the board in Jan. So all the same personnel that dropped us in the shite in the first place. Whilst you can say Garde should be judged on results like all the rest, first give Garde a level playing field of at least one window to address the horror show squad he's inherited. Then perhaps we can judge him on a level footing with the recent managers.

Well, we need to not let this get out of hand and score if poss. we've lost obviously but we really need to show some fight now.

Piss poor.

Cissokho for me, but they should cut it out between them long afternoon no.shame we had showna bit of fight before thai.

Wouldn't have needed GPS to find him in the Barley Mow either.

Massive game tomorrow

They were Barton's players though, he was the assistant to Ron Saunders and had helped him put that side together and worked with them all on a daily basis for ages. I find the idea that you shouldn't need your "own players" a bit strange. Name one great footballing side that wasn't constructed by a manager with a vision of what they wanted to do who went out and found the players necessary to do it? Even the Ajax side that last won the Champions League was built with kids from their youth set up, they don't *have* to be huge transfers, they do have to be the managers choice to fit into the system they want to play on the pitch, and be the right blend mentally to fit together and all the other million little things that has to be right. Even in the European model where a head coach comes into a big side, they have input on who the sporting director actually tries to buy for them. I can't think of many successful sides that weren't put together over at least a couple of years. Even Ranieri at Leicester had the summer to help build this current Leicester side based on what they had last season... To some degree Garde has done exactly what you are implying though, none of these players are "his" yet he's managed to change the playing style, tactics, improve the fitness (which is weird seeing as Timmay was giving them double training for months) and start to improve results. I think it would be insane to let him go in the summer, starting over with someone else is going to seriously harm any chance fo bouncing straight back up IMO.

I'm totally down with the go down fighting thing, and yes it will be massive for how next season starts. Garde will weed out anyone who isn't fully with him I think. Obviously Garde and the players have to believe, I don't I'm free to be a bit more realistic. Still though, if we can stretch our current last 5 form to the next 5 games, then the next 5...

I don't think we need to win te next two to have a chance, I think we're down BUT, if we get a point against Liverpool and 3 against Stoke, mathematically it's much more in our favour than at present. If Sunderland, Newcastle, Swansea, West Brom and Bournemouth all lose two on the spin and we get 4 points then I might start thinking there's a chance we won't finish bottom

Aaaaaand they go out of the cup. Cue backlash against us!