Rank every Villa manager post MON

[VillaFaninLondon]

4 minutes ago, Zatman said:

Fell out with Petrov, Gabby, Dunne, Carew, Collins think was one more. All in about 8 months 

A good manager waits until pre-season to clean up

This is true but several of those players needed some of that. Dunne and Collins were very average CBs who seemed to run the club and couldn’t play out from the back. Gabby was obsessed with bulking up and Petrov and Carew were both getting on. He fell out with more players than he should have but he’s not the first manager to have been ruthless – look at Pep with Hart in particular and also players like Yaya Toure, these were legends at the club before he came.

 

I’m not saying that Houllier is anywhere near Pep’s level by the way, just that you have to ruffle some feathers in order to achieve your objectives in football.

[Stevo985]

8 minutes ago, villalad21 said:

Villa View did an interview with Petrov and the players seemed to like McLeish. But it was never going to worked out him coming straight from the Blues.

It didn't really have anything to do with that. I'm adamant. 

Ok yes it means we'd naturally not take to him, but the biggest issue for Villa fans at the time was that McLeish was awful. He'd spent 3 season in the top flight of English football and been relegated twice. Even north of the border he'd managed to finish 3rd in a two horse race.

The biggest issue Villa fans had with McLeish wasn't that he came from Blues, it was that he was a shit manager. We had just gone through a period of relative success, being a genuinely good team, and were now scraping survival playing utterly dreadful football.

 

Hindsight may have shown us that there was more going on behind the scenes that meant McLeish's performance wasn't as bad as we thought it was at the time. But still, I'm adamant that at the timethe Blues thing was far far less of an issue than his actual ability as a manager.

[Zatman]

12 minutes ago, VillaFaninLondon said:

This is true but several of those players needed some of that. Dunne and Collins were very average CBs who seemed to run the club and couldn’t play out from the back. Gabby was obsessed with bulking up and Petrov and Carew were both getting on. He fell out with more players than he should have but he’s not the first manager to have been ruthless – look at Pep with Hart in particular and also players like Yaya Toure, these were legends at the club before he came. 

But you do it in pre-season not when we were struggling badly and not all of the players at once. Not the first player he fell out with at stupid times

[sparrow1988]

22 minutes ago, Jimzk5 said:

Garde was awful but no one could have turned that shit show round, it was like putting him in charge of the titanic after it hit the iceberg.

Sherwood at least gave us some good memories, the cup semi final, wins over West Brom, unfortunately he's method of management didn't work when we signed a load of no uppers from the French league

Houiller I've said was a big mistake, not the appointment but sacking him, he knew the recognised the shit that mon had left and would've sorted it imo

Under Lambert I've never seen such a erratic continued run of form, beat Chelsea one week then lose 4 in a row then beat Liverpool and lose 4 in a row again. 

McLeish by far the worst, playing 4 right backs against spurs with herd as an auxiliary right back to combat bale, Heskey centre midfield and left wing, signing nzogbia, the fabled 352 Dutch style football. It was just shit from start to finish

To be fair Houllier also played Heskey left wing but that was at Liverpool in his more mobile days shall we say.

[Rodders]

that game with spurs under mcleish, .christ. 

 

I hate sherwood he is such a bellend. However, he did at least give us the semi-final over Liverpool, so to not acknowledge that, even if it was a fluke would be a bit curmudgeonly. 

Garde - had no chance at all, we were down and dead when he came in, and he was given no support. Whether he's a good manager or not, he gets a pass from me for his spell here. 

di Matteo - barely any time  to get going in hindsight. Promising attack but never sorted the defence. Unsure what to think, probably cut short a bit too soon, but I'm not bothered 

Houllier I always liked, maybe tried to do too much too soon, but people were weirdly aggro with him cos of that liverpool match. I mean, who cares honestly. At times we did play some good stuff, though, saw bright spells with Albrighton and Davis in the side. I always wonder what had happened were it not for his health problems. A full pre-season and I think we'd have been in a better place. 

Mccleish - urgh. dour and grim. 

Lambert - good first 12-18 months, bad to terrible ending, but on reflection I am sympathetic with regards to the support he didn't get from Lerner. It was time for him to go as there was only one way we were heading by then, but in the general final few years of him and what came afterwards with perpetual shite I think people forget we had some ok, good times under Lambert. 

Bruce - very nearly achieved what he was hired to do, in some lunatic eyes of binary judgement, it's only a 10/10 or a 0/10 call. It was probably a blessing as we needed the change of ownership and the change of management. He organised us better early on got some resilience into us and we did fine in spells. But the lack of plan B and the low ceiling with his style was always going to cause frustration. Still, his time here was hardly without credit, even if I'm very glad he's gone. 

Black -n/a a couple of caretaker games don't count.

 

Smith

Bruce

Lambert

Houllier

di Matteo

McLeish

Sherwood

Garde

 

 

Edited March 4, 2020 by Rodders

[Villan_of_oz]

Smith

Lambert

Houllier

Bruce

McLeish

Sherwood

Di Matteo

Garde

[Jimzk5]

40 minutes ago, Stevo985 said:

It didn't really have anything to do with that. I'm adamant. 

Ok yes it means we'd naturally not take to him, but the biggest issue for Villa fans at the time was that McLeish was awful. He'd spent 3 season in the top flight of English football and been relegated twice. Even north of the border he'd managed to finish 3rd in a two horse race.

The biggest issue Villa fans had with McLeish wasn't that he came from Blues, it was that he was a shit manager. We had just gone through a period of relative success, being a genuinely good team, and were now scraping survival playing utterly dreadful football.

 

Hindsight may have shown us that there was more going on behind the scenes that meant McLeish's performance wasn't as bad as we thought it was at the time. But still, I'm adamant that at the timethe Blues thing was far far less of an issue than his actual ability as a manager.

Exactly this

a manager who had relegated them twice with a fetish for defensive hoof ball

He also signed jermaine jenas who had an injury record longer than a witches tit, who promptly got injured and wasn't seen again despite us paying his extortionate wages for the season

 

[useless]

Smith

 

Lambert

Houllier

McLeish

Sherwood

Bruce

Doesn't feel right ranking Di Matteo and Garde, Di Matteo didn't get long enough to judge, and Garde was appointed in the most difficult of circumstances I doubt any other manager could have done any better. Bruce gets bottom place because he couldn't get one of the most if not the most expensively assembled championship squads anywhere near top two and ultimately failed to achieve promotion, not only that but played his part in it nearly going out of existence.

[Stevo985]

Bruce lower than Sherwood   

[gwi1890]

Houlier because he finished 9th and we were playing good football by end of the season better than what we played under MON,

Smith , last year he gave us our villa back goals , feel good factor and promotion

 

Bruce , almost got the job done did not enjoy his style of play but , but respect what he did for the club

Lambert if he was given the resources , sherwood was given he would have done a better job 

 

the rest where all totaly rubish!

[TRO]

3 hours ago, terrytini said:

Deano way out in front for me, and I agree we are where we are now because of him....but I’d disagree with your assessment that Bruce was part of our demise.

We were still a basket case of a Club when he took over. In fact we hadn’t reached our lowest. We could’ve sunk without trace.

I think it’d be a shame if his contribution to preventing that got lost.

 

Very balanced assessment, i fully endorse.

[TRO]

I think it is such a diificult thing to do, as the circumstances they operated in was so different, which meant the challenges varied.

Many of them had to operate under very iffy owners, before settling on very encouraging owners we have now.

I have to say looking at the list, does not fill me with any notion of real ambition...far lesser clubs have attracted better.

I reserve my judgement on Dean as its still WIP......I guess if he keeps us up and a respectable Wembley final, has to be welcomed....but I think there is still much work to do to be anything like established in this league.

Dean certainly takes top spot for entertaining football and the spectacle is encouraging, in most games.....if he can add a bit of steel and deny opposing teams any initiative.....He will be out on his own up front.

[Farlz]

1. Smith
2. Lambert
3. Houllier
4. Bruce
5. McLeish
6. Sherwood
7. RDM
8. Garde (His work since leaving us doesn't really prove my point but I still genuinely feel to this day that if the club wasn't such a mess at that time, Garde could've been good for us)

Smith has a healthy gap on the rest in this list for me. 

[Dodgyknees]

8th: Sherwood

7th: Garde

6th: RDM

5th: Bruce

4th: McLeish

3rd: Lambert

2nd: Houllier

1st: Smith

[TRO]

3 hours ago, VillaFaninLondon said:

The thing about Smith compared to most the others is he’s been heavily backed. This makes it an unfair comparison in my view. Yes he had to do a big rebuild but this is still his squad and we’ve spent more under him than any manager since O’Neill.

 

There is a lot of positivity under Dean but the simple fact is we’re battling relegation again and making the same mistakes most weeks and still reliant on one player like we were when we had Benteke for all those years. Whether we went up a year too early or not is irrelevant, and if we go back down again we’ll be back to where we were when we started under him.

I think your point is worth consideration.....what we don't know is how many are signings he would make on his own....and subjective as to how much the money was well spent.

We have to cut him a bit of slack if the players coming in are fait accompli.

I am still in the camp that are single minded about signing the right players as opposed to just being blinded by expensive purchases.....we can look through the league and see many prudent buys.....square pegs and square holes for me.

[KentVillan]

Going off at a tangent slightly, something that bothers me about Villa is that we really destroy managers. Is it because we're seen as an "easier" club to manage than we really are, so it's a lose-lose for any manager?

McLeish was already shite, and a disastrous appointment.

But most of the others were quite highly rated when they joined us, and have never really recovered:

• Lambert - I had a Norwich-supporting colleague at the time who was gutted to be losing him. This is a man with the footballing brain to keep prime Zidane under control in a Champions League final. Now he's regarded as a smalltime headcase with anger management issues.
• Di Matteo - clearly nothing special, but he did a decent enough job at West Brom and Chelsea, and when we got him was regarded as top flight quality. Hasn't managed a club since.
• Garde - a lot of people had high hopes for him, Wenger was a fan. Career has gone into meltdown. I still can't tell if he was an awful manager, or if he was given the shittest job in football.
• Houllier - okay, this one was probably health reasons, but still, did we put him off ever coaching a football team again?
• Sherwood - too obsessed with English players, and undone by his David Brent tendencies, but still, you'd have fancied him to have been at a competitive Championship outfit. Hasn't managed a team since.

The only one who's come out of it with any dignity intact is Steve Bruce, and that's debatable given he's had to go through both his parents dying, a cabbage being thrown at him, being widely despised by Villa and Wednesday fans, and only sneaking back into the Premier League because Mike Ashley is a cynical, tightfisted word removed.

It's a pretty depressing roll call. I really hope Dean Smith doesn't suffer the same fate, even if we end up parting ways with him. He's too good a manager and person.

Edited March 4, 2020 by KentVillan

[mikeyp102]

1. Smith - Got that amazing run of wins, got us promoted, trying to play football whilst rebuilding a full squad. Got us to a cup final.

2. Bruce - Was what we needed at the time. Helped clear out some of the free loaders. Installed belief and respect between players and fans. Installed a work ethic again in the team.

3. Houllier - Was making strides towards a good style of football, really tried to change football ethic. Yes tried too much too soon, but it was coming and was doing it playing the youth. I still think if he’d stayed the following season would’ve been good, and we wouldn’t have lost all our youth in the cheap/free. 
(Yes, I’ve heard the Petrov interview and I get why he was pissed about Houllier, but I also think he was always going to dislike Houllier. Petrov was very much a MON man, following him from Celtic, but I guess that’s a different thread really.)

4. Sherwood - He was a nut job, but at least it was exciting. 
 

5. Lambert - Should probably be above Sherwood, but on a personal level he ruined football for me. The sport Id grew up loving became a chore because of Lambert, such an uninspiring dour man.

6 - McLeish - A manager famed for terrible football, gave us terrible football. Shock.

7 - RDM - He spent a lot of money. Got us playing passing football, but we were woeful at the back. Strange appointment and his lack of jobs since shows what everyone thinks of him.

8. Garde - Well what to say about him. Rubbish. Had no idea 

Edited March 4, 2020 by mikeyp102

[lexicon]

I'd also like to give a special shout out to Paul Faulkner, who played a massive part in making a **** balls of everything he touched. Such a useless **** bellend. 

[kurtsimonw]

1. Lambert - Barely had a penny to spend and managed to keep us up. Gabby, Benteke and Weimann was enjoyable to watch at times.

2. Houllier - Some great football and definitely on the way up, but that was cut short.

3. Smith - Got us promoted, definitely not tactically there though.

4. Sherwood - Kept us up, loss of Benteke was really the killer, again tactically not there as a manager.

5. Bruce - Steadied us in the Championship, had a squad that should've gone up and didn't. Too defensive.

6. McLeish - Had a very tough job. Lost key players, had nothing to spend, then lost Bent to injury half way through the season. Poor manager, but did well to keep us up under the circumstances

9. RDM - Had a squad that should've probably gone up, yet couldn't win a game despite spending a fortune.

10. Garde - Simply not a football manager. No tactics, no inspiration. Everything about him and his persona was negative and dull and put the final nail in our PL coffin.

[VillaFaninLondon]

9 minutes ago, TRO said:

I think your point is worth consideration.....what we don't know is how many are signings he would make on his own....and subjective as to how much the money was well spent.

We have to cut him a bit of slack if the players coming in are fait accompli.

I am still in the camp that are single minded about signing the right players as opposed to just being blinded by expensive purchases.....we can look through the league and see many prudent buys.....square pegs and square holes for me.

Allegedly he wanted Maupay, Webster and Phillips - but I don't think any of those players would really have made us much if any better off than we are now and all their clubs were asking ridiculous fees for them.

 

You're right we don't want to throw money at players willy nilly, we've done that too much over the years and been fleeced. What has disappointed me somewhat is there doesn't seem to be any enticement for bigger name players to come here. We haven't been in a good place for a while of course, but neither had Wolves when Fosun bought them and look at the level of players they've signed. Suso was supposed to help us get those slightly under the radar players with massive potential, but he seems to have done a poor job on the whole.

 

I think when you buy a player they have to have the right quality but also the right attitude and application. SJM had those qualities, but we will do well to get a deal that good again. The best players on the whole in this league have either come through the academy at their clubs like Kane, Rashford and Arnold, or were bought for big money like KDB, Van Dijk and Aubameyang. Dele Alli is the only player I can think of who could be described as 'cheap'. All the teams in the PL seem to be spending lots these days (with the exception maybe of Burnley), so it's not out of place to do that, what we have to do is learn to spend our money much better than we did last summer.