AvfcTheObsession

Wasn't he back up to Schmeichel for a few years in the 90s?

I think there's a few excuses for Moyes in there. He arrived in July and the squad which Allardyce had playing reasonably well towards the end of last season only lost Kaboul who was an important player as far as I'm aware. He was able to keep players like Kone, and had the players such as Kirchoff and Khazri who were prominent in them staying up following their January arrivals. Moyes was then able to splash 25m net to bolster the squad and that included 8m Djilobidi to replace Kaboul and 17m on Ndong. If they then have a worse squad than teams like Hull and Burnley (which I don't think they do) then that is his fault, it's also his fault if he can't motivate his players to make a decent fist of things. If Allardyce was still there they may well be in a relegation battle, but they'd be competitive and certainly have a fair few more points on the board.

27 this month, and doesn't even make their matchday 18. Going somewhere like City or Chelsea often is a career killer for players excelling lower down the league in the Prem.

I think it will be clear by Xmas that all they are playing for is little records like beating their own previous worst haul of 15 points from about ten years back. Then if they pass that they can focus on getting past our 17-point horror show from last year.

Has anyone on here done many Bingo offers? Have they been very profitable? I did Robin Hood last week, deposit £10, get 500% bonus. I spread these tickets over several games over the next few hours, hoping to see £25-30 returns, however I got a measly £1.50odd back. Must be something I'm doing wrong, I think using tickets in jackpot games was probably a waste of time for starters.

I'd like Henry Lansbury.

They're a good side atm with the best manager they've had in a long time. What I don't like about them though is the arrogance and air of superiority a fair few of their fans have. The latest one is they are expecting Leeds to give them a massive allocation at Elland Road, just because Leeds don't fill the ground. It was the same at Villa Park this season, and last season. 'Well you have the Trinity Upper closed, give us that'. They just don't get it and don't think about the logistics behind what they are asking for and the decisions. It does get pointed out to them that they didn't used to sell out everywhere in the Premier League, so maybe show a bit more humility around other teams and to their fans and not be so arrogant just because you have the most fans and seemingly the best team in this league.

I think Guardiola has Jose's number, I can see another City win this week.

I've been doing this at my leisure over the past 2-3 months, sticking mainly to football, horses and occasionally greyhound offers. It's pretty easy to make a couple of hundred pounds a month, even if you only spend a little bit of time and do the weekend sport offers. How many mug bets are some of you placing? I read somewhere a ratio of 3 mug bets for every 1 promotion is advisable with each bookie, but I've been nowhere near sticking to that to be honest!

I'm not a Westwood fan, he's not athletic or physical enough as a CM and his other attributes aren't good enough to compensate for these two weaknesses. However, I'd pick him until Jan in a 3 with Jedinak and Tshibola as Gardner is even worse.

'don't suffer fools likely' being another one. Let's hope he's good at his job, last two jobs at PL clubs so could be a coup hopefully.

Possibly not. Is the Villa job as stressful as we think though? To someone with pedigree like Rangnick he shouldn't be overawed by an underachieving, mid-level English club. Perhaps the stress has got to people like Sherwood and Lambert because they never had the experience or the pedigree for a club this size.

What about Ralf Rangnick, 58 and currently a Sporting Director after doing several successful jobs in Germany, including a double promotion and vast Bundesliga experience. Speaks English well as he studied at Sussex University. Surely if Dr Xia is as ambitious as he says, these type of candidates should be looked at, not just Bruce et al who we could have got under Lerner.

I'm torn between Bruce and Wagner now, both very different. One feels like a safe pair of hands, the other COULD be the next big thing, however it may take a while for his methods to bare fruit, his Huddersfield side finished 19th last season. I don't think we have the players for the gegenpress at the moment (Tshibola is the only energetic CM we have), but then a good manager should be able to adapt to the players they have at their disposal at any given time.

Did Michael O'Neill play attacking football when in charge of Shamrock? Obviously at NI he is often underdogs so has to be quite defensive.

He's certainly come in for a bit more stick of late, jeered at VP when he got subbed off for example. The problem is the alternative is Gary Gardner, who has somehow managed to look even worse when he's played this season. It's a long time until January until we can sign a good CM.

I think this guy's a good manager, definitely overachieving with Northern Ireland, done really well in qualifying and the Euros. Would represent a risk though as he's never managed a club side in a big or competitive league.

I don't know about his time at Burton, would be interested to hear if anyone saw much of them under him. We'd need evidence of some attacking football if he was to be a serious candidate here, coming in from Blues playing dour football would be a recipe for disaster.

I get the feeling a lot of people calling for Gary Rowett haven't watched Blues play. They are effective in terms of results but sit very deep, even in home games, and look to counter-attack. Bruce and McCarthy aren't exactly known as risk-takers but they would have us playing better football, and have a track record at this level over a much longer period. McCarthy has finished top 2 with Sunderland and Wolves, and top 6 with Ipswich. Bruce has four promotions, Rowett's in his very early days at this level so is pretty unproven with a best so far of 9th, there's literally no advantage to him over Bruce or McCarthy.

True, but Xia has his full team of advisors in place now and settled in their roles (Wyness, Round, etc.), back then he probably wanted a manager in quickly in order to start our transfer business, Clarke could go as caretaker for a game or two now. Plus he may have seen that there is a reason the likes of RDM and Pearson were out of work, nothing worth having came easily.

Don't think he quite said that, just said 'limited time and choices'. Moyes was interviewed, Pearson was clearly available too. However he did only seem to be going for out-of-work managers as you say, but it could be different this time around.

Problem is, fans would turn up to VP planning to go to the football, but knowing how crap we are, just stay in the theme park and the ground would be empty.

He has been crap so far, but what makes him look twice as bad is that we never have any proper off-the-ball movement from players (and haven't for years). As Trent alluded to if we had a manager setting us up properly, I think players would be in space for Jedinak to play the simple ball to, and he could focus on other areas which are more his game.

I'd take Bruce or Warnock or even Mick McCarthy to be honest. I'm being serious. Don't want to gamble on someone like Dean Smith or Lee Johnson based on 11 good game, and think Rowett would be doomed to fail here.

Yeah and Leicester won the league last season with 2 in CM. Kante and Drinkwater. Tshibola looks more than capable, if Jedinak or Westwood can't partner him they shouldn't be a CM as you have to have some level of energy to play in there.