Paul Lambert

[CVByrne]

I think we can all agree the team Lambert has now he assembled, he got backing in the Summer and made a good few signings. As long as Benteke stays fit we'll be where we deserve to be at the end of the season, by March we'll know pretty much if it's a good bad or indifferent season. 

 

I don't get what the impatience is from everyone. The manager deserves at least half a season to get the team playing. I mean what merit is there if we just sacked him now? The only real danger of relegation is if we do that and it destroys the team morale beyond repair. 

 

So everybody just chill out we've a nice 10 games between now and the turn of the year. If we can't get at least 11 or 12 points from them then we need to worry. 

[bobzy]

 

 

 

We supposedly have a good squad that should finish 10-12th. He had to build that squad from the bottom up, on a pittance. That would mean his transfers have been at least decent, no?

Not really, no. Mainly because ~£58m (if we included the £8m he will blow on Cleverley in January) isn't a pittance.

It is when you're trying to rebuild an entire squad almost from scratch. It's easy to just look at the numbers and come to conclusions, but even so $58M over 3 seasons (5 transfer windows so far) is nowhere near enough to be 10th-12th. The teams that are there, West Ham for example have spent half of that each window.

More than 10 members of the first team squad are were inherited. With a further three of them being free transfers. So actually yes, I believe the £58m could have been spent considerably better and having a mid-table squad is the bare minimum I'd expect considering that.

 

 

£58m over 3 seasons with wage constraints doesn't get you from relegation contenders to the top half in the Premier League - especially if the initial squad isn't good enough in the first place.

 

Cuckoo land, honestly.

[Rob182]

The reason we don't have a creative 'number 10' at our club is Mr Lambert!!! He's absolutely clueless, utterly pathe- Oh hang on, we have Joe Cole.

[DCJonah]

If the initial squad wasn't good enough why did McLeish get so heavily criticised?

[NeilS]

 

Its a good reason as to why his job is a difficult one. It doesn't justify the awful football, poor results and consistent losses to lower league teams with much worse financial restraints.

 

 

I'm guessing you're trying to say that EVEN the budget doesn't justify the awful football, poor results and consistent losses to lower league teams with much worse financial restraints.

 

That means we could argue all day (and maybe we will) about whether it does explain it fully or not, or how fully it explains it if it doesn't explain it fully fully, etc.

 

But I get the strong impression that a lot of fans aren't bothering to look even a millimetre beyond the manager for the explanation, no matter how much they might claim they do.

 

I don't know about that, I am pretty sure a lot of fans on here are just as keen to see the back of Lerner as well. You certainly don't see as much support for him on the message boards as you did 3-4 years ago. I would say that Lerner is just as much to blame as Lambert for the poor football, primarily because he employed and continues to employ the man. He has also lurched from one bad appointment to the next without thinking of continuity of styles. After MON's british based team, he went for the more foreign approach with Houllier before switching back to the British based anti football of McLeish and now Lambert. In my opinion he missed the boat when he ripped up what Houllier had started, that should have been the time to bring in another European based manager to build on what had been started. So Lambert has had a mish-mash of a squad put together which he has had to deal with. After two years though and with coaching you would expect a team to have developed beyond our Plan A involving soak it up and counter attack, you would hope to see some ability and cohesion in the team. I am not seeing that reflected other than in very small patches in games.

[Stevo985]

If the initial squad wasn't good enough why did McLeish get so heavily criticised?

Because the squad was 11th when he took over and he took them down to that level?

[Isa]

 

£58m over 3 seasons with wage constraints doesn't get you from relegation contenders to the top half in the Premier League - especially if the initial squad isn't good enough in the first place.

 

Cuckoo land, honestly.

You mean pretty much the same squad he inherited from Alex McLeish, who we all criticised for not doing well enough with despite keeping us up?

Okay.

[DCJonah]

So then if McLeish was under performing surely the squad Lambert inherited was good enough to achieve better.

[Isa]

If the initial squad wasn't good enough why did McLeish get so heavily criticised?

Because the squad was 11th when he took over and he took them down to that level?

That doesn't make sense though, if McLeish underacheived with that squad then shouldn't Lambert, who is supposedly a better manager, have done better than scraping survival with it?

[Stevo985]

So then if McLeish was under performing surely the squad Lambert inherited was good enough to achieve better.

But Houllier overperformed.

 

See how silly this argument is? You could loop up and down until William McGregor

 

 

If the initial squad wasn't good enough why did McLeish get so heavily criticised?

Because the squad was 11th when he took over and he took them down to that level?

That doesn't make sense though, if McLeish underacheived with that squad then shouldn't Lambert, who is supposedly a better manager, have done better than scraping survival with it?

 

See point above. Where do you stop?

 

Maybe McLeish didn't underperform but Houllier overperformed?

You could go forever.

[DCJonah]

Not really. The entire fan base was in agreement that McLeish had performed poorly with the squad he had.

[CrackpotForeigner]

I'm under no illusions that Lerner is the main issue at the club and that Lambert has had a tough job. He hasn't been able to sign top players and he hasn't had lots to spend. But IMO he's still done a poor job even with these restraints. Losing 50% of the time while showing no improvements from McLeish after 2 years just isn't good enough. You obviously feel differently and you're entitled to but I feel he should have and should be doing better.

 

 

I'll be honest and say that, like 99% of people on VT, I have no clue about the finer points of football tactics, so I have no clue as to whether Lambert is crap at them.

 

If it'd been me I'd have made different, and earlier, substitutions against QPR, but then we don't get to see the same game played twice, with Lambert's subs and then mine for comparison. But we lost the game, so obviously I'm the winner of that particular tactical battle with the Villa manager, eh

 

I absolutely do not think that losing 50% of the time is good enough, and I hope you aren't suggesting that those supporting Lambert think it is.

 

Ultimately he'll be around for longer than his detractors would like. So if I was the ruler of the world, calling for Lambert's head would be banned until it was a realistic possibility.

[Isa]

See point above. Where do you stop?

 

Maybe McLeish didn't underperform but Houllier overperformed?

You could go forever.

Well as I said before, I thought Houllier had mitigating circumstances for the performance that season but in principle, his squad was better than McLeish's.

[Keyblade]

If the initial squad wasn't good enough why did McLeish get so heavily criticised?

 

It's not that they weren't good enough per se, but they were costing the club too much. Do you not remember Lambert having to essentially change the whole squad due to the wage bill? McLeish under-performed because he almost relegated a squad that was on a top 6 wage bill and finished 9th the previous season (who also under-performed, but the 2 best players from that season left).

Edited October 30, 2014 by Keyblade

[Isa]

If the initial squad wasn't good enough why did McLeish get so heavily criticised?

It's not that they weren't good enough per se, but they were costing the club too much. Do you not remember Lambert having to essentially change the whole squad due to the wage bill? McLeish under-performed because he almost relegated a squad that was on a top 6 wage bill and finished 9th the previous season (who also under-performed, but the 2 best players from that season left).

I can't say that I do. This was the first team ever picked by Lambert:

01 Given

04 Vlaar

06 Clark Booked

32 Baker

34 Lowton

07 Ireland

08 El Ahmadi

10 N'Zogbia (Gardner - 74' )

16 Delph (Bannan - 77' )

09 Bent

14 Holman (Weimann - 61' )

So he wasn't forced to change the whole squad or exclude every high earner. The only two players that it can be argued he wasn't allowed to play due to financial reasons were Alan Hutton and Steven Warnock. Now the issue isn't how good any of these players are but whether the squad that he inherited was significantly weaker than the one available to McLeish. I'd argue that it wasn't.

Edited October 30, 2014 by Isa

[P3te]

Two things spring to mind:

1. He bought better quality players into the club but he is not capable of getting the best out of them = he is a poor manager.

or

2. He bought players into the club that are no better than what he already had = he is a poor manager.

For what it's worth I am running with number 1.

I'd be interested to know which of our exciting megabucks signings you think Lambert isn't getting the best out of, and why.

And there's also a possibility number...

3. He bought players into the club that are no better than what he already had because he is operating on a budget = we still don't know if he is a poor manager.

You mean

3) he spent a very limited budget on players no better than he already had instead of improvements - poor manager

[Keyblade]

 

 

If the initial squad wasn't good enough why did McLeish get so heavily criticised?

It's not that they weren't good enough per se, but they were costing the club too much. Do you not remember Lambert having to essentially change the whole squad due to the wage bill? McLeish under-performed because he almost relegated a squad that was on a top 6 wage bill and finished 9th the previous season (who also under-performed, but the 2 best players from that season left).

I can't say that I do. This was the first team ever picked by Lambert:

01 Given

04 Vlaar

06 Clark Booked

32 Baker

34 Lowton

07 Ireland

08 El Ahmadi

10 N'Zogbia (Gardner - 74' )

16 Delph (Bannan - 77' )

09 Bent

14 Holman (Weimann - 61' )

So he wasn't forced to change the whole squad or exclude every high earner. The only two players that it can be argued he wasn't allowed to play due to financial reasons were Alan Hutton and Steven Warnock. Now the issue isn't how good any of these players are but whether the squad that he inherited was significantly weaker than the one available to McLeish. I'd argue that it wasn't.

 

 

Implying I meant he was forced to change it all in one window and 20M to spend. Of the bolded only Delph and Bent(only because we are unable to shift him) are still in the squad, and Delph is still here because he earns the wages he's paid and then some after playing the best football of his career in the past couple of seasons so my point still stands. All the high earners (many of whom were first-teamers) have been shifted and replaced with cheaper options.

 

But that wasn't even the point I was making in that post, the rest of which you seemed to ignore.

[P3te]

 

I'm increasingly getting the feeling that, even if we had the most creative player in the world available to us, that we would be utterly unable to use him properly

 

*edit*

I'm also suspicious that Lambert hasn't REALLY been interested in signing that kind of player, or we'd have one

 

Kiyotake, Hoolahan

 

When did we sign them?

[Keyblade]

 

 

Two things spring to mind:

1. He bought better quality players into the club but he is not capable of getting the best out of them = he is a poor manager.

or

2. He bought players into the club that are no better than what he already had = he is a poor manager.

For what it's worth I am running with number 1.

I'd be interested to know which of our exciting megabucks signings you think Lambert isn't getting the best out of, and why.

And there's also a possibility number...

3. He bought players into the club that are no better than what he already had because he is operating on a budget = we still don't know if he is a poor manager.

You mean

3) he spent a very limited budget on players no better than he already had instead of improvements - poor manager

 

 

No, he spent a very limited budget on players on vastly inferior wages than those they replaced, which was a policy enforced by our owner.

[CrackpotForeigner]

 

 

Kiyotake, Hoolahan

 

When did we sign them?

 

 

We didn't. We could have offered an extra 4 million to be sure of landing Kiyotake (or an extra fiver to land the 43 year old Hoolahan), but we didn't. I'm sure the funds shortage at the club couldn't possibly be a factor in our failure to sign either of them.

 

Anyhow, we got the 42 year old Joe Cole in on a free. He's a bit injury prone, and really we should have gone for a younger prospect costing about ten or 15 million. I'm sure the funds shortage at the club couldn't possibly be a factor in our failure to do so.