praisedmambo

Out of interest do you still think Warnock was a good signing? I will take that as a no. You were wrong about Benteke and you seemingly were wrong about Lambert. You were also wrong when you said we would be better off sacking Lambert and getting Redknapp or when you were envious of Jol's signings for Fulham who now have a squad packed with high paid players past their best on the decline. There is no harm in being wrong, I'm happy to admit I was wrong about Warnock being a good signing although I did say at the time we had paid far too much for him. The key is to know when you are wrong and hold your hands up, you don't seem able to do this. You tried to wriggle off the hook with Benteke, back tracking on what you'd said and claiming you weren't wrong. Now you appear to be doing the same. You got it wrong, Lambert got his approach right, he got his signings right (not everyone but in terms of his policy) with the budget he had to work with (which I hope you have finally accepted he had a budget) and despite some horrible results this season he kept us up which I think ultimately alongside reducing wages was his remit from the chairman this season. Is he our best ever manager? No clearly not but then I'm not sure I've seen anyone claim he is. What I do see are some people who had a belief in him this season feeling vindicated for doing so, I see others who had some doubts but held back expressing great relief that they did and I see you, who wanted him sacked desperately trying to avoid admitting that you probably got this one wrong as well. Even with the question mark i didn't think your question on the comparison between Benteke and Berbatov was rhetorical rather that you were having a go so to speak and my reply was meant in jest. No matter. To answer your question directly, Benteke was twice the signing that Berbatov was for obvious reasons even though Berbatov has been arguably Fulham's best player this season. My point of view on Berbatov was for him to be played in behind Bent which i felt would have been effective. We'll never know how effective that would have been since we didn't sign Berbatov and Lambert has alienated Bent for reasons yet unknown. You have yet again made the accusation that i tried to 'wriggle off the hook' concerning Benteke. I have previously received a warning from on site moderation concerning going around in circles in debate but since you have seen cause to broach the subject again i hope i will be allowed to retort. I fully admitted to being wrong about Benteke and was rightly slaughtered for that. I stated that i made my call on Benteke due to his form at the start of the season which was universally described as poor by pundits and posters and I remember you having a pop at that then and i assume you are referring to the same now so let revisit that. One simple question. On what, or how do you judge a player. Do you judge him on every day matters such as getting out of bed in the morning or do you judge him on form, i.e how he is playing. I made my judgement on how he was playing, you know, form on the pitch. I hope that is abundantly clear for you now or do you need further explanation that only a child would understand? As it turned out, Benteke's form improved way beyond the player that we seen at the start of the season and he proved that i and others who had criticised him were talking through our own arses. He is a super player and i'm glad we have him. Without him we would have been relegated. Lambert v Redknapp. Yep with high-sight i was wrong about that too. You will note however that when i called for Lambert's head to be replaced by Redknapp we were in free fall and Redknapp had a history of getting teams out of trouble with playing good football. Its therefore impossible to prove either way that even under the same constraints Redknapp wouldn't have pushed us on in the same way Lambert has. You can quote QPR and i would retort with Spurs and on it would go. Lambert. I have noted quotes like 'best manager we have had in years' and 'in Lambert we trust' and top three or four managers in the Premiership.' I have not seen 'best ever manager.' You have stated 'you have got it wrong, Lambert got his approach right.' What is this based on? The fact that he has presided over our worst start ever to a Premier League season which has culminated in being threatened with relegation right up until the 37th game of the season and then losing to a team in a cup competition from what league and not being able to keep a clean sheet for how many games now? You will find that i along with one or two other posters voiced our concerns at Lambert's appointment at the start of the season and his subsequent transfer policy and we have been proven right due to the subsequent relegation dog fight we've been in this season. I noted several posts from you during the season which implied we were going down yet you criticise me for getting my concerns at the start of the season correct. In my view that make you the worst type of hypocrite there is. So you're still ignoring the context of the state we were in last summer? Oh. Ok. You're going to keep doing it aren't you. And Benteke is 10x the signing Berbatov is, by the way, not 2x. The only one who is ignoring anything here is you as i've already answered your question and your rebuttal of 10x instead of 2x is childish. No it isn't.

Out of interest do you still think Warnock was a good signing? I will take that as a no. You were wrong about Benteke and you seemingly were wrong about Lambert. You were also wrong when you said we would be better off sacking Lambert and getting Redknapp or when you were envious of Jol's signings for Fulham who now have a squad packed with high paid players past their best on the decline. There is no harm in being wrong, I'm happy to admit I was wrong about Warnock being a good signing although I did say at the time we had paid far too much for him. The key is to know when you are wrong and hold your hands up, you don't seem able to do this. You tried to wriggle off the hook with Benteke, back tracking on what you'd said and claiming you weren't wrong. Now you appear to be doing the same. You got it wrong, Lambert got his approach right, he got his signings right (not everyone but in terms of his policy) with the budget he had to work with (which I hope you have finally accepted he had a budget) and despite some horrible results this season he kept us up which I think ultimately alongside reducing wages was his remit from the chairman this season. Is he our best ever manager? No clearly not but then I'm not sure I've seen anyone claim he is. What I do see are some people who had a belief in him this season feeling vindicated for doing so, I see others who had some doubts but held back expressing great relief that they did and I see you, who wanted him sacked desperately trying to avoid admitting that you probably got this one wrong as well. Even with the question mark i didn't think your question on the comparison between Benteke and Berbatov was rhetorical rather that you were having a go so to speak and my reply was meant in jest. No matter. To answer your question directly, Benteke was twice the signing that Berbatov was for obvious reasons even though Berbatov has been arguably Fulham's best player this season. My point of view on Berbatov was for him to be played in behind Bent which i felt would have been effective. We'll never know how effective that would have been since we didn't sign Berbatov and Lambert has alienated Bent for reasons yet unknown. You have yet again made the accusation that i tried to 'wriggle off the hook' concerning Benteke. I have previously received a warning from on site moderation concerning going around in circles in debate but since you have seen cause to broach the subject again i hope i will be allowed to retort. I fully admitted to being wrong about Benteke and was rightly slaughtered for that. I stated that i made my call on Benteke due to his form at the start of the season which was universally described as poor by pundits and posters and I remember you having a pop at that then and i assume you are referring to the same now so let revisit that. One simple question. On what, or how do you judge a player. Do you judge him on every day matters such as getting out of bed in the morning or do you judge him on form, i.e how he is playing. I made my judgement on how he was playing, you know, form on the pitch. I hope that is abundantly clear for you now or do you need further explanation that only a child would understand? As it turned out, Benteke's form improved way beyond the player that we seen at the start of the season and he proved that i and others who had criticised him were talking through our own arses. He is a super player and i'm glad we have him. Without him we would have been relegated. Lambert v Redknapp. Yep with high-sight i was wrong about that too. You will note however that when i called for Lambert's head to be replaced by Redknapp we were in free fall and Redknapp had a history of getting teams out of trouble with playing good football. Its therefore impossible to prove either way that even under the same constraints Redknapp wouldn't have pushed us on in the same way Lambert has. You can quote QPR and i would retort with Spurs and on it would go. Lambert. I have noted quotes like 'best manager we have had in years' and 'in Lambert we trust' and top three or four managers in the Premiership.' I have not seen 'best ever manager.' You have stated 'you have got it wrong, Lambert got his approach right.' What is this based on? The fact that he has presided over our worst start ever to a Premier League season which has culminated in being threatened with relegation right up until the 37th game of the season and then losing to a team in a cup competition from what league and not being able to keep a clean sheet for how many games now? You will find that i along with one or two other posters voiced our concerns at Lambert's appointment at the start of the season and his subsequent transfer policy and we have been proven right due to the subsequent relegation dog fight we've been in this season. I noted several posts from you during the season which implied we were going down yet you criticise me for getting my concerns at the start of the season correct. In my view that make you the worst type of hypocrite there is. So you're still ignoring the context of the state we were in last summer? Oh. Ok. You're going to keep doing it aren't you. And Benteke is 10x the signing Berbatov is, by the way, not 2x.

If winning 2-1 away at a team that had only lost 4 times at home all season isn't 'going on' then I think you've set your standards a bit high. Yeah and that too. He's ignored the Norwich game and then it's like he's comparing the 8-0 loss to Chelsea to the 2-1 loss, where we really should have won, and making them out to be equivalent performances. It's thinking like this that really makes me wonder if one or two are on a wind up. He's also not blessed with the best subs bench, eh. You can't pull a rabbit out of the hat unless there is a rabbit already in the hat. There's a lot of silly buggers on this thread.

That bit in bold confirms I'd side with Lambert over you any day.

Definitely have to sort out the defence but I'd go further and say we must strengthen nearly everywhere. Our first team is good, but as soon as people like Gabby were getting injured, and we missed Westwood in the League Cup, and the reserve players came in, we became massively compromised as a team. A lot of players need moving out and the squad needs building full of hard-working talented young players, to replace the hard-working not so talented young players already there. That's how we'll improve.

So you are ignoring the context of the mess we were in before he came. Ok then.

What's your beef?

Or, you know, like Spurs i.e a club who has sold their best players in order to buy more and push up the table. If you have a good manager with an eye for talent nobody else spots then this is a fair enough way to approach things. If Lambert has a 50% success rate with his signings, and every second one leaves within 2 years for 4-5 times what he paid for them, we'll be flying up the table How confident are you that Lambert would get all of the proceeds from player sales though ? Considering how Lambert is doing reducing the wage bill, so that we're not losing £50million a year any more, which our chairman, who has put in obscene amounts of money already, can stop paying off that defecit, I'd say Lambert has a very good chance of seeing the money. Once our finances are sorted then the investment can go back on the team rather than servicing debts.

Me too. It's been a ride. You do underestimate the mess we were in, underestimate the difficulty of coming in to manage Villa after the last few years. You over emphasise the change in system as if that is the only thing that Lambert has done well. Have you seen the managers we have had in the last 20 years? I don't think it's that far off to say he is one of the best we've had—judging on what he appears to be doing, which is continuing on the very progressive, impressive, performance he had at Norwich too. You ignore context entirely. And you don't seem to appreciate that people getting behind Lambert now appreciate that Villa should not be fighting relegation, surviving with one game to go. We all feel that, but we all know the team was in a mess. We can see that Lambert appears to have stopped a very serious rot in the club, which a great number of managers would have been unable to do, whilst sorting out the finances, stamping his mark, and getting us to play attacking football. He is doing everything right. I don't have to wait until half way through next season to get behind him, I support his choices 100% and trust him managing this club, that he knows better than me. This season Lambert has done nothing but gain more of my respect—what he did at Norwich was phenomenal—and I am genuinely excited to see what he can do here at Villa, because we are that much bigger a club. I'm so happy he is building a young team and the ethos he is building. In a world where Man City are throwing cash around to win trophies, I think Villa could become one of the easier clubs to be proud of in a few years time. Very few managers could come in and get me feeling like that. I wanted him as manager before Mcleish and never changed my mind all season.

Whether we finish in 11th or stay in 16th this will have no bearing on how much money Lerner makes available to Lambert in the summer. The extra money that we get from a higher position will just go into Lerner's back pocket (sorry the Lerner Family Trust) to cover his "management fees" that he gives himself. I reckon Lerner will give Lambert £15m-£20m to spend on players with 50% of whatever he makes on sales. The rest of the extra cash from TV will go into Lerner's bank account. Sorry I'm so cynical, we've seen this before. Our absentee owner will do the bare minimum to keep us "competitive". Anything extra will be acheived by our manager's skill and ability. He should be given a blank cheque really as I reckon he can take us places now the rot seems to have stopped. I don't think Lerner will match his ambitions though. have our released books not shown that lerner puts far, far more money out of his own pocket into the club than he makes from it? As P3te says, how can anyone say Lerner hasn't put money in? Or that it didn't make sense to sort out the outgoings costing the club £50million a year? I don't understand how blinkered some of our fans can be. Tssk.

Yep. I agree.

I do think you underestimate the reality of football management, and that explains the things you say. Seconded - total rubbish Morph to be honest. Fail to see how you think a pre-season at a club in turmoil and still not having signed all the players he wanted should mean the team should hit the ground running?? No-one said anything about hitting the ground running but then no-one predicted how bad we actually were at the start of the season and i refer the rest to my above post rubbish or not? So what? What's your point? And, er, what matters...the first six games, or the whole season? Especially considering how much this club needed turning around.

He's had about 3 really bad games, Bradford, Norwich and I can't think of another. The rest of the time he has been good. Gets way too much stick in my opinion. He's not perfect by any means but he's a good footballer, he's young, he'll get even better. We could do with another fullback, yeah, but we need to build a squad anyway.

Wow. I think you'll be generalising a lot here. Besides, hasn't Scotland had an obscene number of successful managers, very few of whom buy lots of Scottish players?

I do think you underestimate the reality of football management, and that explains the things you say.

Not really true. We changed formation at halftime against Newcastle after a shocking first half. We did not have to start that game with 3 central defenders. We also didn't have to play such a narrow formation at the start of the season, which saw the worst start to a season we've ever had in the prem. He's fixed it and he gets credit for it but I don't think it's a case of he was forced into playing the wrong formation previously. I think Lambert originally came to the club thinking he could get the best out of the likes of Ireland, N'Zogbia and Gabby in a way that McLeish didn't, and also that he wouldn't be missing Dunne for the whole season. He quickly realised just what a struggle that was and at least tried a few different combinations, with no decent wingers at the club (I'm sure that's why he went for wing-backs). I guess we're lucky that Weimann has been so willing to play out wide and done fantastically, it's a great credit to him and Lambert. Gabby's return to form has been essential and we actually managed to get about 3 performances out of N'Zogbia at a crucial time. The way he kept the club going forward after January has been amazing, I thought we were dead and buried, and we actually have something to look forward to for once so I am well happy. Nice post. And about the transfer money...Lambert's never going to say we'll spend stupid money. We'll only know in time. Bring on the Westwoods and Lowton's though.

Not really true. We changed formation at halftime against Newcastle after a shocking first half. We did not have to start that game with 3 central defenders. We also didn't have to play such a narrow formation at the start of the season, which saw the worst start to a season we've ever had in the prem. He's fixed it and he gets credit for it but I don't think it's a case of he was forced into playing the wrong formation previously. One day these sorts of discussions are going to have run their course. When we're doing much better next season I hope you're still not going on about the same old stuff. For the record, I disagree that our turnaround comes down to width and that was the magic key that brought players back from injury and form and signed Yacouba Sylla. I never liked the 352, who would after all that happened, but I see that Lambert was trying to cope with defensive injuries. As for the first thing I said...happy stop-going-on-about-the-same-old-things day

When this happens, do players normally getting a big signing fee? 500k - 1million? I'm not an agent, I don't know. You're Barry Bannan's mum.

We'll see a few signings indeed, with lots of players leaving. We got caught out this season with injuries, especially in defence, so I'd imagine there to be a lot of activity this summer.

I don't like Chelsea That is the only truth

Terry Tit

We were still signing players at the start of the season. There are many factors that have led to us improving over the season—players like Delph and Gabby and Weimann and Westwood all coming into form has been massive, as was signing Sylla in January. Lambert had overhauled the squad with young players and getting them up to speed took time, but looks like a stroke of genius now. Credit to Lambert there. Can you not see any of this? Things might look so obvious now but who could have predicted Delph's second half of the season, for example? As for the clean sheets, I, like every Villa fan, would prefer to have them than not. We need to strengthen at the back, and indeed all through the team still. There is everything to suggest that Lambert is exactly the right man to do that.

Lets not get ahead of ourselves. He's achieved no more or no less than McLeish. A very long way to go yet before we start building statues of Lambert outside Villa Park. no more than Mcleish? Last season we played some of the most negative football with a clique of a squad, no plan for future progression and playing over paid players, actually signing over paid players in the process. We finished 16 on 38 points, 7 wins and scoring 37 goals. This season we have played exciting football, cleared out dedwood, played young hungry players, increased the value of the squad, not yet finished and potentially will finish higher that 16th, with 10 wins, 40 points and scoring 45 goals. He has only "achieved no more or less than Mcleish" if you are only trying to justify a stance, in any real sense of comparison he has achieved more than Mcleish The points one or two posters have made against your above post concerning balance and the fact that you have been posting we would go down says it all. No-one is trying to justify anything other than being balanced on our performances this season. For two thirds of the season its been dreadful and having to rely on Wigan losing to secure our Premiership status with just one game to go, being diplomatic, is poor. I can understand the over reaction on here stating that he's the best manager we've had in a long time or there are only two other managers currently in the Premiership that you would have instead of Lambert at Villa Park, but that reaction must be based on relief rather than performance. Thankfully we have for the last third of the season witnessed an upturn in form which since the system change has seen us safe by the skin of our teeth. During this period we have played some terrific football and also seen the naivety that comes with inexperience. The manager should be commended for the system change but also should be criticised for the system stranglehold he put on the players for two thirds of the season and as stated before it was due to basic common sense rather than some magical potion that the team's form improved from such a dreadful start. So in context while we are finally safe from the threat of relegation, it shouldn't, by no means be seen as an achievement! To put it diplomatically .... thats rubbish. Our fate was in our own hands and we did not have to rely on Wigan losing last night. As for the 'stranglehold' he put on the team. We had inexperienced players and a terrible run of injuries, mostly in defence, for eight or nine games on the spin. It's easy for posters to say Lambert should have donme this or thatt but then those 'suggestions' will never have to be tested on the field. Not much of a diplomat are you. Take a look in the Arsenal Wigan game thread to see what I mean and it was system change not players returning from injuries that was the catalyst in our change of form. Maybe you're also forgetting our record breaking start to the season or was that down to injuries as well? No, the change in formation coincided exactly with the players returning from injury. We went to wing backs because of injuries, it's all linked. Lambert has taken a downward spiralling team full of players not worth their wages, replaced them with youth, steadied the ship, cut the wage bill, got them playing attacking football: there is so much to be positive about. How we ended the season, once the team were up to speed and once they started to believe in themselves—that is how we can go on. I bet we're not in a relegation battle next season. Touch wood.

We'll be fine next season guys. This is the first chance we have had to build. What an end to the season—we came on as a team, both in attack and defence (regardless of clean sheets), and won when it mattered, we did not fold. Night and day to last season. There's going to be so much saved on certain wages I'm looking forwards to seeing the team and squad Lambert can now form. Because I think we have a great 1st team now, we're just lacking the variety in depth that would allow us different options. Our worst defensive period came when we had a lot of injuries, so I think it's a bit much to say Lambert is clueless. At Norwich he did, however, also concede a fair number of goals—but **** it! He is an attacking manager. I'd have that any day than the football I watched under McLeish, and even MON. With more signings I am confident we will be better defensively next season. We are still very much a work in progress but things should be clearer by the end of the summer. Anyway, clean sheets don't matter, winning matters. We have proved we can win games well now. UTV! I am convinced we have a very talented manager, see.

Con, do you ever wonder if your time might be better spent doing something else?