The Rémi Garde thread

[Stevo985]

We've some interesting fixtures coming up. We have Man City first, all I want from this is to see some kind of improvement and organisation. Everton away would be a game i'd like to see more improvement, is a point possible? The first major game for Garde is against Watford at home, a must win. Then we have Southampton away, Arsenal at home, Newcastle away and West Ham at home, before we end the year at Norwich away.

9 points minimum needed from those I think... 

January is a month we need to be looking at maximum points, if that happens we'll be on 25 points for the run in.

That's what I'm hoping for. November for Garde to get organised and decide on his system and personnel and target some points from Watford.

December to develop what he's started and try to get some points from Newcastle and Norwich. 

January is when we should be hitting our stride and picking up a number of victories. If we haven't started picking up the wins by January we're well and truly gone.

[KHV]

I still can't believe that there are people who actually believe this squad is bad enough to be cut adrift at the bottom of the table.

Nobody is expecting miracles. All we want is the team to have a bit of direction and look like they're remotely playing to their potential.

Sherwood had us far far short of that,

No competent goalkeeper, dodgy error prone centre backs, weak central midfielders and no goalscorer. I think it's easy to see why people belive this squad is so bad

[Stevo985]

I still can't believe that there are people who actually believe this squad is bad enough to be cut adrift at the bottom of the table.

Nobody is expecting miracles. All we want is the team to have a bit of direction and look like they're remotely playing to their potential.

Sherwood had us far far short of that,

No competent goalkeeper, dodgy error prone centre backs, weak central midfielders and no goalscorer. I think it's easy to see why people belive this squad is so bad

There's a difference between bad and bottom of the table with 4 points in mid november.

The former isn't an rgument. We are bad.

However, we're not as bad as our league position suggests. If you believe we are then you're doing the players a disservice.

[Mantis]

That fact that we weren't getting soundly beaten every single game suggests that it was down to management rather than a poor squad.

[MikeMcKenna]

Earlier Lexicon asked the question '..who do you think was the last grown-up we had? "

I agree totally with Briny Ear's answer "Ron Saunders". However I would add that despite the nightmare of the last 4/5 seasons that I think the club may also have finally "grown up" by appointing Garde.

But what was/is it about Garde and Saunders that qualifies them as "grown up" whereas others may not have been or at least not always? And why do I claim that the club has also finally grown up? 

Obviously we are a dire situation and there are many issues that Garde has to deal with but I am going to stick my neck out and say that IMHO we are on the verge of a new era. Before anyone jumps down my throat, of course it could go horribly wrong like every other time this century, but visa versa it could be the start of something good if he is given time. 

Time ultimately will tell if we are right but like Saunders I sense Garde is his "own man". For him there is no ambiguity about who runs the football side of the club. But being aware of the sheer complexity of the modern game, he realises that he cannot do everything. It was much less complex in Saunders day. Players did not hold the upper hand as they do now. Things have changed in terms of finding new players and the complexity of negotiating and writing contracts - you need specialists devoted to this area full time - this is how grown up clubs operate. The whole coaching and  fitness infrastructure of a modern club is akin to an F1 team with specialists required for each area. But Garde is ultimately "The Manager" who brings it all together and he has a lot to prove if he is to live up to the claims of the likes of Wenger and Houllier. However I do sense that unlike other previous managers,  that he is not wrapped up in his own ego and the hype. 

The Guardian recently stated that Garde is a "Humble Visionary..." Quoting an adviser to president of Lyon who said he " is a very intelligent guy, he is a visionary and he has an approach to football that I think is remarkable …" However he may find it almost impossible in this age of Arab and Russian £billionaires to emulate Saunders success. 

http://www.theguardian.com/football/2015/nov/03/remi-garde-aston-villa-lyon-humble-visionary

Saunders had a vision and also a  remarkable approach considering our clubs then limited means. Against the odds, he took us up from division 2  in 1974/75 while winning the League Cup,  in the same season, the league cup again in 1977 through to the ultimate English achievement by becoming League Champions in 80/81. Despite his shock departure it was also his team that won the European Cup in 1981/82. 

With his hard man persona, Saunders was similar in an old fashioned way to Garde. The word "vision" wasn't used in his time but he had it. He was intelligent and had a distinct approach to team management. He knew where he wanted to take the club while being very focussed and quietly passionate. He often said it was all about the club and fans. In his book after the 80-81 league win he said:

"I rate them so highly that I consider myself one of them, with the rider than I am also fortunate enough to be the manager of Aston Villa and in that way I represent them"

He considered managing Villa to be a privilege. I believe Garde will acquire the same passion, even if he cannot yet be called a "fan". It will not be solely about him and the players but to do with achieving success for the club and fans. The Lyon fans were devastated when he resigned.

As Saunders, we have already heard that Garde will not suffer division in the team or individuals who think they are bigger than the club. He will be a strong manager and do his talking behind the scenes not through the media - again like Saunders. Clearly Garde's management of these highly paid individuals and tactical approach must by the very nature of today's game be different. Similarly like Saunders he has an in depth understanding of tactics, maybe more so, and that physical and mental fitness are key factors. They will inevitably differ when it comes to the media in that Garde must engage, whereas Saunders had little time for them.

No other manager since Saunders in my opinion has had the strength of character or vision till hopefully now Garde. It wasn't always the previous managers  faults, some were never allowed to develop. During Ellis's time managers had to play second fiddle to him and accept the irrational way he ran the club. However he also employed some shocking managers. We never had a direction or strategy for long term success. We stumbled from not quite breaking through, despite winning the League Cup a couple of times, to eventual stagnation under Ellis. 

So if IMHO Garde is our first grown up since Saunders why do I think his arrival also may indicate the club has "grown up"?

Like many when Lerner arrived, I thought it was going to be different and the start of the 2nd révolution for Villa. I was very excited by the appointment of O'Neill. But with hindsight he was yet another dinosaur with no long term strategy or vision. He demanded that everything on the playing side had to be controlled by him and was very much in the mould of his old boss the equally divisive Brian Clough. Speaking to people at the club since, O'Neill brooked no interference from anyone. There was a them and us culture. Feared literally stalked the corridors and MON was always right.. He went out and bought many older players who were often Captains at their previous clubs but many we're on the verge of becoming journeymen getting their last big pay packets. 

As a result of his largesse the squad had next to no depth and for several years was one of the smallest in the PL. He paid these experienced players at the top of the  scale and when injuries struck he had nothing to fall back on. He was very short term and it never occurred to him that the state of the clubs finances would be dire if we didn't breakthrough into the CL. When he left we were up **** creek! 

Lerner was ultimately responsible and very immature in allowing O'Neill so much rope. He didn't lead the second revolution. Lerner in many ways had carried on where Ellis left off. He surrounded himself with fools and amateurs. He thought that advice from the likes of Alex Ferguson and others could bring success. Krulak was a joke and Faulkner was out of his depth. As a result we continued in the same vein. Lerner was also out of his depth, has blown his money and didn't understand the game. But more worryingly he wasn't learning by his mistakes.

The appointed of Houllier was naive given his health situation and he was never going to be anything more than a stop gap. The arrival of McLeish was a PR disaster and unfathomable - he had just relegated our hated rivals and could hardly be considered a manager that would help us rise again. When Paul "the project" Lambert arrived and the talk was of living within our means with the need to bring through lower league players and the youth we all knew that deep down it wasn't going to end well. It was almost the opposite of O'Neill's approach. We needed a combination of quality, potential and youth. Lerner had lost the plot and all but given up. In his desire to sell the club he realised he needed to take a more professional approach and appointed Tom Fox. 

I believe that Fox realised that Lambert had to go but that it took a while for him to persuade Lerner. Fox decided to bring in Hendrik Almstadt and Paddy Reilly to beef up the player recruitment. But he got his first manager appointment wrong. Sherwoods  never really filled many of us with great expectations. That he may have done well for a limited period with Spurs and had a reputation for bringing through kids, didn't seem enough. He lacked experience and despite his % points total at Spurs their fans considered his tactics and approach to be haphazard. He sounded good when he arrived, walked the talk and saved us from going down but IMO he was a younger version of many managers that we had before. I still don't think he was Tom Fox's first choice for manager but the default option. I really believe he wanted Garde in February. But Garde would not break his promise to his family that he would take a full year out. 

Perversely I believe we are fortunate that Sherwood did not do well and that Fox acted quickly. Ultimately he did not have the intelligence, persona or vision to change Villa's future. 

Tom Fox (and Lerner) may have eventually got it right. Since Fox's arrival the club has started to put the right individuals in place and at last we have a grown up manager. 

In my opinion, Remi Garde is potentially a modern incarnation of Ron Saunders. He may be too late to save us from relegation but I would rather have Garde at the helm than the likes of Pulis, Allardyce or many of the others touted who offered us nothing for the future. 

Rémi Garde va conduire la seconde révolution - aller les claret et bleu! 

[KHV]

I still can't believe that there are people who actually believe this squad is bad enough to be cut adrift at the bottom of the table.

Nobody is expecting miracles. All we want is the team to have a bit of direction and look like they're remotely playing to their potential.

Sherwood had us far far short of that,

No competent goalkeeper, dodgy error prone centre backs, weak central midfielders and no goalscorer. I think it's easy to see why people belive this squad is so bad

If you believe we are then you're doing the players a disservice.

The players have shown very little thus far so I disagree

[Wainy316]

I know they are in fact French but we now have the most French looking coaching team ever.

[Stevo985]

I still can't believe that there are people who actually believe this squad is bad enough to be cut adrift at the bottom of the table.

Nobody is expecting miracles. All we want is the team to have a bit of direction and look like they're remotely playing to their potential.

Sherwood had us far far short of that,

No competent goalkeeper, dodgy error prone centre backs, weak central midfielders and no goalscorer. I think it's easy to see why people belive this squad is so bad

If you believe we are then you're doing the players a disservice.

The players have shown very little thus far so I disagree

Because they've been managed by a total moron. I fail to see how people are still dismissing Sherwood's performance.
We were underperforming under the previous manager

 

[NulliSecundus]

Rémi Garde's claret and blue army!

[jackbauer24]

I still can't believe that there are people who actually believe this squad is bad enough to be cut adrift at the bottom of the table.

Nobody is expecting miracles. All we want is the team to have a bit of direction and look like they're remotely playing to their potential.

Sherwood had us far far short of that,

Not picking on you but you made a concise point so I wanted to ask a simple question if this is your thinking. You say we have a good enough squad to survive and it just needs direction and them playing to their potential so, if we are relegated, does this mean Garde failed and was another bad manager?

My issue is I DO think this squad is bad enough to be cut a drift, I genuinely do, and take no pleasure from it (I have a season ticket a few rows from the dugout so have to exper8this pain every few weeks!) but have seen very little individual quality in the players even if you put aside the team aspect.

Richards for example has shown leadership, aggression (too much!) and gone on a few marauding runs but Veretout, Crespo, Gana, Sanchez, Lescott, Gabby, Gestede haven't shown any quality, to differing amounts. Gana looks ok but fairly anonymous, but no where near Delph quality and you'd expect that regardless of management he individually would have created more excitement even if there was no end product, a run, a shot, something. Gestede is solely about attacking headers (but his flickons are awful, watch them next match) and no amount of training and organisations is going to give Lescott back the years.

I think our 'best XI' is still far far too weak. The best defence we can muster has at least one dodgy CB. The strike force we have is simply not good enough, it's the key aspect that relegates teams not scoring goals and even the most optimistic fan recognises we HAVE to place hope in Ayew as there are no other options. In the midfield we have a lot more choice and luxury players which is the one area Garde may make an impact.

I'll be back at VP year on year regardless of what division we're in. I'll support any new manager and the players during the match. But I can't lie to myself to pretend these are good enough players to help us survive because I don't believe that. Garde might be able to take them in and get them organised and understanding each other and perhaps even fitter and concentrate more, but I doubt he can make them significantly better and younger! If he makes us more solid we will pick up a few points and draws, I can see that, but I'm fairly sure it'll also kill our chances of scoring as we struggled to do that with a gung-ho approach.

I hope I'm wrong.

[KHV]

I still can't believe that there are people who actually believe this squad is bad enough to be cut adrift at the bottom of the table.

Nobody is expecting miracles. All we want is the team to have a bit of direction and look like they're remotely playing to their potential.

Sherwood had us far far short of that,

No competent goalkeeper, dodgy error prone centre backs, weak central midfielders and no goalscorer. I think it's easy to see why people belive this squad is so bad

If you believe we are then you're doing the players a disservice.

The players have shown very little thus far so I disagree

Because they've been managed by a total moron. I fail to see how people are still dismissing Sherwood's performance.
We were underperforming under the previous manager

 

Are we under performing though? Villa stopped acting like an established premier league club a few years back.

[BOF]

Given that we've only been losing by one goal and it was Sherwood that was managing that, I would expect Remi to be able to improve us in that regard and turn losses into draws and wins.  Otherwise Sherwood begins to look like a good manager and I can't be having that, because he wasn't.  Given that we've 27 (realistically 26) games to claw back a 4pt deficit then I don't think it's outrageous to say that yes it would be seen as a failure on Garde's part if he didn't keep us up.  Like Stevo, I don't for a second believe this squad, managed properly, would be cut adrift at the bottom.  I now fully expect that they will be managed properly.  So that's nice

[Keyblade]

Pete Colley is a **** stupid ginger clearing in the woods, embarrassing questions. 

 

Garde however came across as very considered, focused and intelligent, so, so far so good.

Finally watched the press conference and holy ***** is he a word removed. Managers consulting with sporting directors and the like is such a non issue but he made such a big deal about it. I love the way Remi responded to him though 

[Mantis]

I still can't believe that there are people who actually believe this squad is bad enough to be cut adrift at the bottom of the table.

Nobody is expecting miracles. All we want is the team to have a bit of direction and look like they're remotely playing to their potential.

Sherwood had us far far short of that,

No competent goalkeeper, dodgy error prone centre backs, weak central midfielders and no goalscorer. I think it's easy to see why people belive this squad is so bad

If you believe we are then you're doing the players a disservice.

The players have shown very little thus far so I disagree

Because they've been managed by a total moron. I fail to see how people are still dismissing Sherwood's performance.
We were underperforming under the previous manager

 

But the media told me that Tim Sherwood was doing a good job. I mean, he got us to an FA Cup final you know.

[Dodgyknees]

I still can't believe that there are people who actually believe this squad is bad enough to be cut adrift at the bottom of the table.

Nobody is expecting miracles. All we want is the team to have a bit of direction and look like they're remotely playing to their potential.

Sherwood had us far far short of that,

No competent goalkeeper, dodgy error prone centre backs, weak central midfielders and no goalscorer. I think it's easy to see why people belive this squad is so bad

If you believe we are then you're doing the players a disservice.

The players have shown very little thus far so I disagree

Because they've been managed by a total moron. I fail to see how people are still dismissing Sherwood's performance.
We were underperforming under the previous manager

 

But the media told me that Tim Sherwood was doing a good job. I mean, he got us to an FA Cup final you know.

He did an incredible job, a team of winners he created.

[KHV]

I still can't believe that there are people who actually believe this squad is bad enough to be cut adrift at the bottom of the table.

Nobody is expecting miracles. All we want is the team to have a bit of direction and look like they're remotely playing to their potential.

Sherwood had us far far short of that,

No competent goalkeeper, dodgy error prone centre backs, weak central midfielders and no goalscorer. I think it's easy to see why people belive this squad is so bad

If you believe we are then you're doing the players a disservice.

The players have shown very little thus far so I disagree

Because they've been managed by a total moron. I fail to see how people are still dismissing Sherwood's performance.
We were underperforming under the previous manager

 

But the media told me that Tim Sherwood was doing a good job. I mean, he got us to an FA Cup final you know.

How many goals have we conceeded through bollocks defending and bollocks general play? You can be the best manager in the world but when your players are incaple of passing it to each other, attempting stupid balls in dangerous areas, being brushed off the ball like a child, not being able to track a runner or in Guzans case flapping around at balls in the area and even more shockingly for a professional footballer not having the capability to kick the bloody thing then your buggered.

[Mantis]

How many goals have we conceeded through bollocks defending and bollocks general play? You can be the best manager in the world but when your players are incaple of passing it to each other, attempting stupid balls in dangerous areas, being brushed off the ball like a child, not being able to track a runner or in Guzans case flapping around at balls in the area and even more shockingly for a professional footballer not having the capability to kick the bloody thing then your buggered.

The players are better than that though. While a manager can't legislate for all individual errors I think it was blatantly obvious that tactically Sherwood didn't have a clue what he was doing hence why our players have often seemed confused and rudderless.

Edited November 6, 2015 by Mantis

[Neil]

What was painfully obvious was that Sherwood was being out thought tactically.  Other managers were spotting the glaringly obvious weaknesses in our setup and exploiting them to get the win.  Sherwood seemed oblivious to this and failed to counter with any changes.

If reme can spot these and act accordingly, being one step ahead of the other managers tactically then that could immediately be half the battle won

[Villarocker]

I think that part in the PC, where the journo asked Garde if he had it in writing that he has the final say on transfers, was the journo having the same sense of dismay at how transfer dealings happen at Villa as other people. I didn't see any harm in that.

My biggest worry was that, when asked if he had it in writing that he would have final say on transfers, Garde's response was "that's the problem". Maybe he is accustomed to working with the same kind of set-up as he had at Lyon but, if he doesn't get it the same way here, how will he then react? For all we know, he could think he will get it his way and, if he doesn't, walk out on the club and who knows where we would be then. Before anyone shoots me down for suggesting that, did anyone foresee Martin O'Neil quitting the club on grounds of constructive dismissal just days before the start of a new season?

[Mantis]

What was painfully obvious was that Sherwood was being out thought tactically.  Other managers were spotting the glaringly obvious weaknesses in our setup and exploiting them to get the win.  Sherwood seemed oblivious to this and failed to counter with any changes.

If reme can spot these and act accordingly, being one step ahead of the other managers tactically then that could immediately be half the battle won

Exactly, but who is Reme?