Steven Gerrard

[Monkeypuzzle]

I've had a day to calm down and with a fresh head I can more seriously say " Get Gerrard out!"

I'm not gonna lie, I have never been his biggest supporter, I always felt that Smith was kicked out way too soon and deserved more loyalty from the club. Gerrard was an inexperienced ex-player who had never managed in a competitive league before and any success he had was going to be more by luck than judgement.

His formation doesn't suit the players we have, or had. This is an inexcusable trait in a manager that has been here more than one transfer window and shows a tactical inflexability. It also worried me that he seems so dependent on his staff to actually run things for him. He seems too hands off.

He has always attacked our own players publicly, which is terrible from a manager and does not seem to respond tactically to different situations during games. His treatment of the squad as a whole, as well as individuals like Tyrone Mings is appalling.

The ONE positive that I can say about him is that he has attracted some great players to the club, but now that they are here, he can go. Let a proper man manager take over now.

The last top, top manager we had, who brought any sort of success at the top level to Villa was Martin O'Neil. He was a fantastic man manager, and the last person to make Villa players play above the level expected of them! His weakness was in the transfer market! With Lange he could have cracked the top 4 as it was back then!

The manager who reminds me of O'Neil's management skills the most is Mauricio Pochettino. Forget that he is currently available, even if he wasn't, he still has some of the best man management skills in the game. Look at what he achieved at Southampton and later at Spurs! For those saying he would never come here, I say "why wouldn't he?" Huge financial backing, big club on the verge of breaking back into Europe, great ambition from the owners and the chance to be part of a growing franchise! It's less of a jump than the likes of Ancelotti going to Everton.

Now I know, sadly, that Gerrard won't be going anytime soon, at least not soon enough, but hopefully when he does go (as much as I would love success at Villa Park, I don't see it coming under his leadership) I hope that we get someone with top management skills, who gets the best out of the very talented players that we have at the club. You can feel the rot starting to spread in the squad and he is the one responsible. He gets the plaudits if we succeed and he takes the blame if we fail. We have been failing for half a year now!

 

Rant over, sorry!

[sharkyvilla]

18 minutes ago, Xela said:

I'm still in 'Gerrard In' camp but my fuse is getting shorter. 

Need big performances and results in the next 2 games for starters. 

Out of interest what makes you 'Gerrard In'?  I'm genuinely interested, not being arsey, I'm just wondering what people feel the pros are.  I understand people rated him very highly as a player and feel his kind of personality would hopefully rub off on our players, especially the fans who have been following us since before the PL era.  Is there more?

[TRO]

1 hour ago, El-Reacho said:

Arrigo Sacchi put it best when he described Gerrard as a great footballer but not a great football player.

More or less saying he had all the physical and technical ability but lacked the brain to go with it. His physical and technical talents are no use to him as a manager.

I don't think it would take a great tactician, to see the problems we encountered yesterday.....a guy/gal at their first match would see that....who has suggested SG is a footballing confucius....He is learning, we all know he is, there should be no confusion with that, he is NOT an elite manager

are you suggesting Scott Parker is the new Rinus Michels?

I am as miffed as you by that showing....but I also think, a bit of over dramatic muck slinging is going on now.

[romavillan]

3 minutes ago, sharkyvilla said:

Out of interest what makes you 'Gerrard In'?  I'm genuinely interested, not being arsey, I'm just wondering what people feel the pros are.  I understand people rated him very highly as a player and feel his kind of personality would hopefully rub off on our players, especially the fans who have been following us since before the PL era.  Is there more?

I know you're not asking me but mainly because he's the manager, he's clearly been working on stuff all summer and we can't seriously be calling for our season to be derailed looking for a new head coach after the first game. 

He's got some time to get it all to work, and if it doesn't I doubt the board will hesitate in pulling the trigger after what we saw with Smith who had done a lot more for us than Gerrard has managed so far.

[Monkeypuzzle]

A good ex players personality rubbing off on players? I just have horror flash backs to Roy Keane's time at Villa.

[Xela]

4 minutes ago, sharkyvilla said:

Out of interest what makes you 'Gerrard In'?  I'm genuinely interested, not being arsey, I'm just wondering what people feel the pros are.  I understand people rated him very highly as a player and feel his kind of personality would hopefully rub off on our players, especially the fans who have been following us since before the PL era.  Is there more?

I like to give managers time. Perhaps that makes me different from a lot of posters, but calling for a managers head after one game of a new season is too soon for me. 

I think we were ok in patches last year, some games we played very well, others poorly and we ended up roughly where we should have after the dismal start to the season we had. It wasn't pretty at times but he did ok and definitely deserved to be in charge at the start of this season. I think he did a good job at Rangers. People talk about a 2 horse race but Celtic were well ahead when he took over and he did go the season undefeated, which is a big ask in any league. He also did well in Europe for them 

A full pre-season, more signings and I went into this season very optimistic. We'll learn more after the next 4 or 5 games to see whether the opening game is a sign of things to come.  

[Tomaszk]

12 minutes ago, TRO said:

He won't go after that, we would be the laughing stock of football, should it happen.....but he can't preside over much of that.

People have been saying this for six months. Why would anyone care if other team's think it's funny we improve on our manager?

Couldn't give a monkeys what anyone else thinks.

You know what they'll find funny? A squad that has a top 8 wage bill being in a relegation battle.

[Davkaus]

I don't really understand the preseason optimism. The signings looked good, of course, and we won some friendlies, but the 3 or 4 matches I watched were absolutely appalling.

People were called melodramatic for highlighting the same problems as last season, and laughed at for commenting on how poor we looked, because what an overreaction, "it's only pre season", well, it's not funny any more is it?

Edited August 7, 2022 by Davkaus

[Stevo985]

5 hours ago, El-Reacho said:

I disagree with this. Communication is a massive part of being a manager - the best managers have always commanded respect by how well they communicate with the squad and also the media. If the players hear the manager come across as muddled or inconsistent, or in SG’s case full of meaningless macho soundbites, it undermines their authority massively.

Communicating with the players is a whole different thing. I wasn’t talking about that.

I was talking about what they say to the media.

Every single manager we have, MON, Lambert, Garde, Bruce, Smith whoever. They come in and give an interview or two and everyone loves them. Hangs on every word.

Then when the fan base turn they give the same kind of interviews to the media, saying the same things, and everyone hates it

[nepal_villan]

1 hour ago, PeterSw said:

If there is no improvement by the WC break he should be sacked. Problem is, will Purslow sack his mate?

Hopefully the owners will step up and insist that he goes. They do appear to be quite ruthless 

Don't think they are proper mates.  In the intro press conference it was mentioned that they only had some fleeting interactions at Liverpool.

[supermon]

It's fair to say pre season didn't really inspire anybody. But we did see flashes of good performances usually in the second half when the teams were changed. It's quite to stay positive at this point as there are quite a lot of red flags. 

Let's hope he can turn it around. I really hope he isn't that stubborn to stick with McGinn or at least has the balls to sub him and get Sanson on the pitch.

Fair to say though a lot of us have been looking forward to the footy after the summer break but it's gone very bleak very quickly. 

Let's see what Everton brings, I fear things will get toxic if we lose or even draw.

[avfc1982am]

There can occur instances whereby so called professionalism can actually be interpreted as narcissism. I have wondered if the players are actually treated as men or schoolkids since Gerrard has been here. Firstly the statements of how professional things were and moving up levels. Why isn't this translating onto the pitch? Better players, more professional, moving up levels.... Something doesn't add up and it isn't with the players imo. 

[DakotaVilla]

Where is the evidence re Gerrard not communicating effectively with the players? He’s been brutally honest with them re his thoughts by all accounts and only resorted to publicly calling it out because it was everything we saw as well. And apparently these same players that failed smith and failed Gerrard last season are some sacred cows that can’t be questioned?

And as for using his supposed “treatment”of the likes of targett, Ghazi, Sanson, Traore etc as a stick to beat him with… it’s just totally and utterly ridiculous.

[Davkaus]

9 minutes ago, avfc1982am said:

 I have wondered if the players are actually treated as men or schoolkids since Gerrard has been here. Firstly the statements of how professional things were and moving up levels. Why isn't this translating onto the pitch? Better players, more professional, moving up levels...

Mystery to me too, I thought the ketchup ban would have been good for at least an extra 9 points over the season  

[DCJonah]

22 minutes ago, Davkaus said:

I don't really understand the preseason optimism. The signings looked good, of course, and we won some friendlies, but the 3 or 4 matches I watched were absolutely appalling.

People were called melodramatic for highlighting the same problems as last season, and laughed at for commenting on how poor we looked, because what an overreaction, "it's only pre season", well, it's not funny any more is it?

Yeah I didn't get it. We added 2 starting players to a team that finished 14th and every game showed the same issues and concerns that we had last season. 

[KangarooVillan]

From Australia, please excuse my ignorance.

Is it normal in football for managers to not have the core theoretical expertise/tactical nous and essentially subcontract this function out to assistants/others?

Was concerned about this at the beginning but figured it was normal. Although can’t think of other examples where this is the case.

[Zatman]

8 minutes ago, KangarooVillan said:

From Australia, please excuse my ignorance.

Is it normal in football for managers to not have the core theoretical expertise/tactical nous and essentially subcontract this function out to assistants/others?

Was concerned about this at the beginning but figured it was normal. Although can’t think of other examples where this is the case.

Training is usually delegated by managers but coaches would usually have opinions but tactics are usually done by the manager unless Steve Bruce who doesnt believe in tactics

Usually a manager like an actual manager like Klopp would have a set system they implement very early on

[MotoMkali]

3 hours ago, daft said:

Obviously fans have turned on him. Any chance of him winning them back?

To win me back he'd have to go back on his decision to strip Mings of the captaincy which will not happen

[KangarooVillan]

1 minute ago, Zatman said:

Training is usually delegated by managers but coaches would usually have opinions but tactics are usually done by the manager unless Steve Bruce who doesnt believe in tactics

Usually a manager like an actual manager like Klopp would have a set system they implement very early on

Thanks, that’s about the same as what I would have thought.

Pretty darn concerned that Beal was always billed as the brains behind the operation and Gerrard seems to lack any tactical nous which seems to match up with what’s shown on game day.

[JAMAICAN-VILLAN]

You know what's frustrating?

I don't even think some of our issues are even that difficult to fix.

I think he could help himself massively by dropping Coutinho for one.

He hasn't been performing, and he very much seems like a confidence player, bring him off the bench in a game we are coasting for him to get his swagger back.

Start Chambers or Mings with Carlos, hell, i'd have even taken Kourtney Hause yesterday, he'd have cleared alot of those crosses and high balls into the box.

Move the ball quicker! We have skillful players with some pace, pedestrian paced passing nullifies them.

Sign a strong, solid partner for Kamara ( Or play one of our existing ones beside him - Luiz / Sanson ? ), or he will just become another incredible talent we murder at VP.

As a matter of fact, when I think about it again, I think most of our problems could be solved by simply moving the ball around quicker!

To be fair, I think this is an issue we have had even before SG, slow and predictable, then sometimes from somewhere it's like we wake up, and start passing and moving quickly, and look instantly dangerous, then revert to type, i don't get it.