The manager situation

[kidlewis]

If we have a good November it’s fine, if not he’s probably gone.

there’s no one we can get who is way better. 
 

you rock up with Conte Fair enough but who are we replacing him with who can genuinely turn things around sharp and get the squad to the next level 

[maqroll]

I really like Dean and still back him. But if we actually lose six straight games, I'd reluctantly support dropping the axe. Not many managers survive 6 straight losses. And we aren't losing these through bad luck and despite good play. We look awful, completely rudderless. Player dissent is troubling. The manager needs to tighten up the ship when it springs a leak. But the SS Villa is leaking more every week. Two more losses against beatable teams will see us staring into an abyss. 

[Wurzel]

Everything that could go wrong has gone wrong this season, starting with Joe leaving us. Dean hasn't had a full squad to choose from yet, and add to that a rash of stupid and sloppy errors from all the players it culminates into the bad run we have at the moment. The answer to the question is not to get rid now even if you feel he isn't the right person to take us forward, but to wait for the season to end. Personally Dean has plenty in the bank, and he deserves our patience and support. Beware of Christmas past.

[Chindie]

Realistically, any manager losing 6 on the bounce is going to be under extreme pressure. They could have an obscene record before that streak and still would be having questions asked.

Smith doesn't have an excellent record. We've been fairly crap all year. And we've had rough periods throughout his tenure.

I like Smith and I think he's done well for us, but if he loses 2 more on the trot he has to go. We're not secure enough to take being in such poor form, and we can't risk relegation.

[avfc1982am]

I think the overriding thing here is, regardless of the fans feelings towards Dean, the owners are not going to go through another 1st PL season scenario and leave it to see how it plays out. They will act whether fans want them to or not. Rightly so imo considering the financial backing they have provided the last 3 years. Put yourself in their position. Would you stand for it continuing in this manner? 

[VillaChris]

37 minutes ago, kidlewis said:

If we have a good November it’s fine, if not he’s probably gone.

there’s no one we can get who is way better. 
 

you rock up with Conte Fair enough but who are we replacing him with who can genuinely turn things around sharp and get the squad to the next level 

Surely if we have incredible owners and an excellent CEO in Purslow that shouldn't be a worry as to be excellent owners you need to have ability to interview and select a capable manager to take a team up the league (as say Leicester have done in recent times).

Honestly think too many are stuck still thinking it's Lerner and Tom Fox still picking the managers. Let's give it a chance, they ditched Bruce and appointed DS and that proved to be exactly what we needed at the time.

[briny_ear]

I'm not voting on this one because this is an issue that is decided by owners/board's view of our best medium and long term strategic interests. It's not really for fans to say whether a manager should keep his job or not*. 

It does look from the outside as if Smith may have reached the limits of his abilities to manage us effectively in our present phase, particularly now he has lost the good fortune of being able to organise the side around Grealish (which admittedly he did very well). But whether that leads to the sack is a very big decision for the board.

Here are four reasons often quoted for keeping him which seem to be irrelevant:

1. He's a nice guy. Nice guys generally don't make good football managers, sadly

2. He's "one of us". Being a Villa fan is irrelevant to whether you can manage the club!

3. There are no alternatives. Of course there are and a well-run club will constantly be assessing the managerial market and will know who is available.

4. He's brought us so far, he deserves patience/a chance/our loyalty. This issue isn't about the past, it's about how we progress in the future. If Smith can't continue to make progress then his past successes fade away very quickly.

Maybe all sounds very harsh, but there is little room for sentiment in football management.

 

* Having said that, it is interesting to note that only 41% of those who have voted so far unequivocally want to keep him for the foreseeable future. So 59 % would be prepared to see him go before the end of November under certain conditions. Be interesting to see if this changes as more people vote.

Edited November 3, 2021 by briny_ear

[IrishVilla10]

We’re 3 points off bottom 3, and these are the fixtures right into December. We’re in a terrible position wether we sack smith or stick with him. 

[tomsky_11]

Voted back him for foreseeable and honestly don’t get how this is even under discussion, never mind that more than half of the votes are veering towards getting rid.

Two things that are especially bugging me about this discussion: 1) the sense of impending doom from some when we are in 15th ten games into the season, and 2) there seems to be little to no consideration for a whole bunch of factors outside of Smith’s control that have clearly affected the season so far.

On the first point, we are in no danger of relegation right now, we won’t be anytime in the near future, and until this scenario looks at all likely, I don’t get the worry. Are we below where I’d expect us to be? Absolutely. My view preseason was somewhere between decent midtable and a push for 5th-7th. I think this was at the higher end of the predictions on here. But I’m really not worried about where we are right now or the recent performances, because as per my second point, for me there’s a whole bunch of mitigating factors that seem to be getting little consideration from many.

The biggest of these is the player absences meaning we’ve not had a settled XI all season, and we still haven’t seen our best XI play once yet. For comparison, by this time last season we’d had  the same 9 players occupy the same starting positions in every game. This season so far it’s 2 if you count Cash at RB or RWB/RM as one position. The other player is Konsa who misses Friday. I can’t imagine any other teams this season have had such enforced disruption to their line up. For this alone, I actually think we could easily have been worse off than we are.

Add to this:

- we’ve had to try and fill the massive hole left by selling by far and away our best player

- one of the key replacements for him, and IMO the only player we’ve got who can scare the opposition like he could, Bailey, has barely played and probably still isn’t fully fit yet

- turnover of coaching staff

- disruption to preseason, games cancelled, etc.

… and to me it’s not at all surprising we are where we are.

I’m not getting hung up on the last four games either. Spurs game was basically decided by one world class player. I don’t think going 352 helped either but given availability and coming off the back of the Chelsea, Everton and Utd games I get why Smith stuck with it. Wolves I missed but get the impression late injuries forced changes that didn’t help us, and all the their goals were helped by varying degrees of luck. Arsenal first half was terrible and IMO was a lot down to our 352 playing to Arsenal’s strengths, but at least we changed it at half time and looked a lot better. Take away some dodgy reffing and we start the second half only 1-0 down and much better set up for second half.

At this point is probably worth mentioning that the 6 points we got from the 5 game Everton to Arsenal run was within the expectations of over half of those that voted on the last “next 5 games” thread on this forum. 89% thought we’d get 7-9 points or less from those games and we were a 95th minute massively deflected goal away from that. That kind of margin seems fine enough that few could be too surprised by where we were at after the Arsenal game, but apparently not judging by how opinions on the manger were already shifting by this point.

I’m guessing few thought the WHU game would be easy either, even with a full squad. More injuries, both before and early on in the game made it even harder still. Despite this I felt the first half was ok. Chances seemed fairly even by the end of the half and their goals were somewhat fortunate. Red card and some other poor reffing second half made defeat inevitable, but even a man down we looked pretty good until their third. Had it stayed 11v11 we’d have had every chance of taking something from a team who now sit 4th I the table. That to me doesn’t feel like the kind of game people should be coming out of thinking the manager’s time is up. 6 points from 6 games against teams currently occupying the top half of the table, especially with all the issues we’ve had, isn’t even close to sack the manager time for me.

[Tony]

Don’t believe that he should be sacked for foreseeable given the options available. However, believe we should make the necessary change when a good opportunity presents itself, regardless of how well or bad he is performing at the time. 
 

Think he’s had enough time, has done a very good job, however has hit a ceiling. 

[Jareth]

Would have chosen sack him if he loses the next 3 - if it were a choice. We can lose to equal/better teams, but if we don't pick up wins in the next 3 against those around us then we are looking at relegation form and we can't afford to dither. 

[The Fun Factory]

The wolves game really hurt us and we haven't recovered yet. It was a horrible result. Even a point would have been something.

[fightoffyour]

Said it before but we’re still a year ahead of the board’s schedule in terms of our progression thanks almost entirely (the whole squad and one player in particular also did their bits) to Deanho. The following seasons we hit what can only have been the intended targets (survival followed by mid table consolidation). Therefore in my opinion he has this season in credit, as long as we’re not in any real danger of relegation (we’re not yet) and showing signs of improvement into next year when the team settles down, to prove that he can take us further and still be on schedule to seriously challenge for Europe next season.

Edited November 3, 2021 by fightoffyour

[Amsterdam_Neil_D]

If we lose the next 2 then I think a change come what may.  That will be 6 in a row with zero points.  

It can then easily stretch to 7 games,  8 or 9.  Even 6 games is 18 points gone (Almost half of what we need to survive.  We have looked very Championship at times recently I am sorry to say IMO)

We are looking for the 42 points already subconsciously now and it really shouldn't get to that point after the money spent.

[AvfcRigo82]

15 minutes ago, fightoffyour said:

Said it before but we’re still a year ahead of the board’s schedule in terms of our progression thanks almost entirely (the whole squad and one player in particular also did their bits) to Deanho. 

I disagree here mate.

If we were a year ahead we would be sitting on the verge of qualifying for Champions League football, not sitting 3pts above the relegation zone imo.

I don't buy this whole "we're still a year ahead" mantra either, It's up there with "Smith has credit in the bank"  because he got us promoted a few seasons ago which is also being constantly stated.

As many have stated already, that credit is going down game by game and by our recent form, he's down to his last few pennies.

 

 

Edited November 3, 2021 by AvfcRigo82

[tomav84]

the ones that put 'sack him now' puzzle me. have we not seen from newcastle how much worse it can be when you sack a manager with no one lined up?

you can't see who voted for which, but i put back for the foreseeable. he's turned it around before, he'll do it again.

[StefanAVFC]

I like Dean but 6 on the bounce is unsurvivable and I think he knows that. Which is why my vote was the way it was.

[fightoffyour]

4 minutes ago, AvfcRigo82 said:

I disagree here mate.

If we were a year ahead we would be sitting on the verge of qualifying for Champions League football, not sitting 3pts above the relegation zone imo.

I don't buy this whole "we're still a year ahead" mantra either, It's up there with "Smith has credit in the bank"  because he got us promoted a few seasons ago which is also being constantly stated.

As many have stated already, that credit is going down game by game and by our recent form, he's down to his last few pennies.

18/19: Maybe sneak a playoff place but basically just improve. Definitely not an expectation to go up, as has been stated factually by Purslow.

19/20: Get promoted

20/21: Avoid relegation

21/22: Mid table consolidation

22/23: European places

 

I’m really not sure how else you could see the board’s targets unless you think either Purslow lied about promotion in the first season, we should’ve been mid table first year in the PL, or you want us to jump straight from survival to Europe.

[Steero113]

2 minutes ago, StefanAVFC said:

I like Dean but 6 on the bounce is unsurvivable and I think he knows that. Which is why my vote was the way it was.

Exactly my thoughts. 

Most bosses out there would be gone after 6 on the spin if you are a team with any sort of ambition of top 6 / attracting non-dogshit players. 

[avfc1982am]

2 minutes ago, tomav84 said:

the ones that put 'sack him now' puzzle me. have we not seen from newcastle how much worse it can be when you sack a manager with no one lined up?

you can't see who voted for which, but i put back for the foreseeable. he's turned it around before, he'll do it again.

How do you know nobody is lined up to take over if it goes south in the next few games? Lot of presuming going on.