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Steve Bruce


Demitri_C

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1 hour ago, bannedfromHandV said:

I can’t argue with you because I wasn’t sat there but having been a villa fan for 30+ years and having been to VP countless times during that period I really find that hard to believe.

Perhaps you should believe someone who was there and is an eye witness?

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2 minutes ago, Keyblade said:

Don't know why we're even still debating his time with us. As if yesterday didn't make it clear why he failed with us. That's how he always set up against the top 6 and crucially, against Fulham in the final. You'll win a game maybe once every 5 tried playing like that. It's just so negative it really makes you wonder if his aim is even to win a game of football in the first place.

I/we're not debating his time with us.

It's the associated hyperbole and 'worst manager we've ever had' crap that's being debated, keep up.

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2 minutes ago, bannedfromHandV said:

I/we're not debating his time with us.

It's the associated hyperbole and 'worst manager we've ever had' crap that's being debated, keep up.

There's some stuff competition to be sure. It's hard to compare different situations and eras though. I'd personally give it to Sherwood followed by RDM. But if we're talking about performance relative to resources available, Bruce has to be up there. 

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9 minutes ago, Keyblade said:

Don't know why we're even still debating his time with us. As if yesterday didn't make it clear why he failed with us. That's how he always set up against the top 6 and crucially, against Fulham in the final. You'll win a game maybe once every 5 tried playing like that. It's just so negative it really makes you wonder if his aim is even to win a game of football in the first place.

His whole footballing approach is based around the idea that away from home or indeed against any team that is even close to equal to his own, a draw is good and a win is just a bonus. It's awful.

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4 minutes ago, Mantis said:

His whole footballing approach is based around the idea that away from home or indeed against any team that is even close to equal to his own, a draw is good and a win is just a bonus. It's awful.

It's funny because his perception of a good team always seems to be based on the league table. Remember the 17/18 season, one of the first games of the season against Reading. That's how he set up, and we got absolutely mauled. Why did he set up like that? Because Reading were playoff finalists the season before. Turns out that season they were only relegation fodder the whole time. Bruce wouldn't know though, he was probably too busy setting up on how to stop Lewis Grabban.

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1 hour ago, bannedfromHandV said:

I can’t argue with you because I wasn’t sat there but having been a villa fan for 30+ years and having been to VP countless times during that period I really find that hard to believe.

im sure i read that there was a particular individual that gave bruce stick most matches that bruce said he squabbled with a few times. considering the things that were spouted on this forum and social media i too would be amazed that the first utterances of discontent towards bruce from the stands were his last game.

36 minutes ago, TheStagMan said:

Cannot believe the support he still gets on here. Amazing. Oddly enough those supporting him are by and large the ones who have been very critical of Smith from the off. Very strange that.

look lets agree to disagree. it's like brexit, no one is going to change anyone's view on this subject. i choose to give bruce credit for his time here (and loved it when he bit back, for the record). i also acknowledge he was right to be dismissed. and i am very happy with smith...a couple of mistakes aside

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6 hours ago, Genie said:

Bruce steadied our sinking ship and then got us to the cusp of the big time

As has been mentioned but can't be repeated often enough, we got hugely lucky twice.

Not because that charlatan "steadied the ship", many managers could have done that. When RDM was blown out, we had a pretty good squad that hadn't delivered results and Bruce was given plenty to change the squad in his own image.

And because he only got us to the cusp of the big time and failed by stinking Wembley out with the team and tactics in his own image.

The double stroke of huge luck was his failure directly lead to Xia being exposed as a total chancer. The second stroke of luck was we didn't end up with him as our manager in the PL as Wyness and Xia stayed in place to wreck the club.

Be in no doubt, had we gone up that year we absolutely would have "done the Fulham" that the lazy pundits have been talking about this year. we'd be skint and in the Championship.

 

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56 minutes ago, Keyblade said:

There's some stuff competition to be sure. It's hard to compare different situations and eras though. I'd personally give it to Sherwood followed by RDM. But if we're talking about performance relative to resources available, Bruce has to be up there. 

So in my lifetime, people who I would say did a worse job taking everything into account:

David O Leary

Graham Taylor the return

Tim Sherwood

Remi Garde

Dr Jozef Venglos

Alex McLeish

Roberto Di Matteo

 

That's just in my lifetime and it only accounts for less than 1/5th of the history of Aston Villa FC.

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11 minutes ago, bannedfromHandV said:

So in my lifetime, people who I would say did a worse job taking everything into account:

David O Leary

Graham Taylor the return

Tim Sherwood

Remi Garde

Dr Jozef Venglos

Alex McLeish

Roberto Di Matteo

 

That's just in my lifetime and it only accounts for less than 1/5th of the history of Aston Villa FC.

Obviously "of all time" is hyperbole. Who knows, there might have been an utterly woeful manager who lost all his games in the 1920's. For the ones you've listed, like I said, I can only really agree with Sherwood and maybe RDM (though 11 games is hardly enough to make a definitive statement on). Alex McLeish for example managed to stay up despite losing both Ashley Young and Steward Downing and only being allowed to replace them with Charles N'Zogbia for 1/4 of the proceeds. Turgidly defensive manager, but he got the job done. Can't say the same for Bruce unfortunately.

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9 minutes ago, Keyblade said:

Obviously "of all time" is hyperbole. Who knows, there might have been an utterly woeful manager who lost all his games in the 1920's. For the ones you've listed, like I said, I can only really agree with Sherwood and maybe RDM (though 11 games is hardly enough to make a definitive statement on). Alex McLeish for example managed to stay up despite losing both Ashley Young and Steward Downing and only being allowed to replace them with Charles N'Zogbia for 1/4 of the proceeds. Turgidly defensive manager, but he got the job done. Can't say the same for Bruce unfortunately.

I had a season ticket during the McLeish season, I didn't even attend 3 or 4 games toward the end of the season such was the shite being displayed, I enjoyed far more of Bruce's reign than I did McLeish's.

I'd kinda be surprised if anyone could - objectively - say anything otherwise.

 

 

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2 minutes ago, bannedfromHandV said:

I had a season ticket during the McLeish season, I didn't even attend 3 or 4 games toward the end of the season such was the shite being displayed, I enjoyed far more of Bruce's reign than I did McLeish's.

I'd kinda be surprised if anyone could - objectively - say anything otherwise.

 

 

We had a better relative team under Bruce. We had the Championship equivalent of Liverpool or Spurs' current squad. I daresay I'd have hoped the football would be a tad more enjoyable than watching Chris Herd, Stephen Warnock and Alan Hutton slugging it out in the PL. 

Put it this way, how different was watching that McLeish season to what you saw last night from Newcastle, stretched out for a whole season? I got flashbacks from that season watching that, followed by a huge sigh of relief. We're a newly promoted side off the back of 3 defeats on the spin too. I'd have ripped up my season ticket on the spot after that.

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40 minutes ago, Keyblade said:

We had a better relative team under Bruce. We had the Championship equivalent of Liverpool or Spurs' current squad. I daresay I'd have hoped the football would be a tad more enjoyable than watching Chris Herd, Stephen Warnock and Alan Hutton slugging it out in the PL. 

Put it this way, how different was watching that McLeish season to what you saw last night from Newcastle, stretched out for a whole season? I got flashbacks from that season watching that, followed by a huge sigh of relief. We're a newly promoted side off the back of 3 defeats on the spin too. I'd have ripped up my season ticket on the spot after that.

Were Newcastle much worse last night than we were last week against Wolves?

The reality is that Newcastle are still above us as things stand. 

I enjoy the football even more under Smith yes, but, I enjoyed the football and results under Bruce far more than I did under any of the previous 3 or 4 Managers.

All this relative talk, saying that x isn't worth as much because it wasn't in the PL and that we should have done x and y because we were a bigger fish in a smaller pond - it's all pie in the sky shit, at the end of the day you can only play and beat what's in front of you and we did that more often than not under Bruce so I just will not be convinced that he was a disaster because, he just wasn't.

 

Edit - and very selective mentions of players there (Herd, Warnock et al) - you could have also said; Shay Given, Fabian Delph, Darren Bent and Petrov.......though I think we can all concede that we had a bang average squad that season whichever way you cut it.

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3 minutes ago, bannedfromHandV said:

Were Newcastle much worse last night than we were last week against Wolves?

Yes, possibly one of worst away performances ever at VP. We were shit vs Wolves but that was down to the players. 

I don't think any of the Newcastle players were not following team instructions 

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2 minutes ago, bannedfromHandV said:

Were Newcastle much worse last night than we were last week against Wolves?

The reality is that Newcastle are still above us as things stand. 

I enjoy the football even more under Smith yes, but, I enjoyed the football and results under Bruce far more than I did under any of the previous 3 or 4 Managers.

All this relative talk, saying that x isn't worth as much because it wasn't in the PL and that we should have done x and y because we were a bigger fish in a smaller pond - it's all pie in the sky shit, at the end of the day you can only play and beat what's in front of you and we did that more often than not under Bruce so I just will not be convinced that he was a disaster because, he just wasn't.

So is it about the results, or how enjoyable the football is? Make up your mind. Like I said, McLeish got the result at the end of the day. Did his job, but made our eyes bleed in the process.

Also yes, Newcastle were worse than us against Wolves imo, we were sloppy and disjointed while they weren't even interested in competing in the match. But even if they weren't worse than us against Wolves...that performance was an aberration in our season so far whereas theirs was par for the course really. That's how they set up every single game. So I'll ask again, how would an entire season of that compare to Alex McLeish's season with us?

It obviously is worthwhile to take into account situations and context. Comparing Bruce's stint with the biggest club in the Championship, bankrolled to the hilt to Alex McLeish's stint with PL also-rans, ran by a penny-pinching coward just isn't fair. Which is why it would be better to compare Bruce at Newcastle now to McLeish's time with us, as they are much more comparable situations, wouldn't you agree?

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2 minutes ago, Keyblade said:

So is it about the results, or how enjoyable the football is? Make up your mind. Like I said, McLeish got the result at the end of the day. Did his job, but made our eyes bleed in the process.

Also yes, Newcastle were worse than us against Wolves imo, we were sloppy and disjointed while they weren't even interested in competing in the match. But even if they weren't worse than us against Wolves...that performance was an aberration in our season so far whereas theirs was par for the course really. That's how they set up every single game. So I'll ask again, how would an entire season of that compare to Alex McLeish's season with us?

It obviously is worthwhile to take into account situations and context. Comparing Bruce's stint with the biggest club in the Championship, bankrolled to the hilt to Alex McLeish's stint with PL also-rans, ran by a penny-pinching coward just isn't fair. Which is why it would be better to compare Bruce at Newcastle now to McLeish's time with us, as they are much more comparable situations, wouldn't you agree?

No not really, you're comparing something that happened 7-8 years ago with something happening today, football has moved on considerably during that time. For example, when McLeish was here there was only a 'big 4' of clubs, that's now a 'big 6' for starters so you can't just take the two and put them side by side as if it equates to the exact same value or metrics.

We flirted with relegation all season and finished two points above 18th so I'm not sure you can say 'McLeish got the result', don't forget at that point we hadn't become the laughing stock we were by the time Sherwood/Garde came in either and we'd finished top half the season before.

 

I can't believe we're debating this kind of shit, McLeish was absolutely atrocious all ends up, a car crash waiting to happen from day one.

 

 

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Last night couldn't have been anymore classic Steve Bruce. Coming off the back of a couple good results and getting the fans optimistic his team strolls up with what looked like no desire to win and play absolutely horrific football. How many times did we see that?

I'm bloody delighted we won that last night and just how easy it all was. Can't stand the bloke. 

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1 minute ago, bannedfromHandV said:

No not really, you're comparing something that happened 7-8 years ago with something happening today, football has moved on considerably during that time. For example, when McLeish was here there was only a 'big 4' of clubs, that's now a 'big 6' for starters so you can't just take the two and put them side by side as if it equates to the exact same value or metrics.

We flirted with relegation all season and finished two points above 18th so I'm not sure you can say 'McLeish got the result', don't forget at that point we hadn't become the laughing stock we were by the time Sherwood/Garde came in either and we'd finished top half the season before.

 

I can't believe we're debating this kind of shit, McLeish was absolutely atrocious all ends up, a car crash waiting to happen from day one.

 

 

So if we can't compare the PL of today to that of 7-8 years ago, why the hell are you comparing the Championship of today to the PL of 7-8 years ago or even 20 years ago in some cases :lol: . Did you forget the list you made?

My whole point was that, there's no point comparing different eras and contexts to which you initially disagreed, and now in a roundabout way are agreeing with. Make up your mind man.

If you insist on making comparisons, the only fair metric I can think of is how the managers performed relative to their remit and the resources they were given to achieve it. Alex McLeish performed adequately in that respect. The goal was to stay up, he was given 15m to do it, and he did. The season before where we finished in the top half as you mentioned, we literally only achieved on the last day, and were in a relegation scrap for 80% of it. So did David O'Leary. Which is why I said I can only really agree with Tim Sherwood and RDM from your list being worse than Bruce if I use this metric (I don't remember Vengloss tbh).

Personally though, I'd put Tim Sherwood in his own class and then all of our other managers of the past 20 years bar Dean Smith and MON together in their own class as they were all varying shades of the same shit. Poor managers managing poor teams under poor ownership, or in the case of Steve Bruce, poor manager managing a good team under good (at the time) ownership. Not sure if that makes him worse,  but whatever.

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