Gary McAllister - Assistant Head Coach

[Kuwabatake Sanjuro]

18 minutes ago, MessiWillSignForVilla said:

I'll never forgive those three for how they acted after O'Neill left, especially after finding out why Dunne was so upset at Houllier.

Apparently Houllier, a Frenchman, had the gall to celebrate France beating Ireland in the 2010 World Cup playoff as he left the stadium and that's why Dunne never gave him a chance at Villa. He says it was because he was a "UEFA official" and should've been neutral about it, which; 1) he's still French, let him celebrate France getting to the World Cup, and 2) he was a **** advisor to the FFF at the time! Collins just went along with it because Dunne hated him and I wouldn't be surprised if Gabby was the same. Or maybe he just disliked putting effort in to training.

 

All three of them are words removed.

 

[briny_ear]

Really surprised he doesn’t have a thread from the last time he was with us - he even took over as manager for some key end of season games when Houllier was taken ill and helped steer us to safety.

I guess it shows we now have a much sharper perception of the importance of the whole coaching team and the individual contributions they make.There’s even as thread now for the set piece coach.

[The Fun Factory]

On 13/11/2021 at 22:28, Spoony said:

He can’t be judged by anything that happened when he was here before. He was here when we were in the pits. 

The pits meaning the season we came 9th?

[Davkaus]

9 hours ago, Kuwabatake Sanjuro said:

 

I can understand being a bit angry about that in the moment, but it seems petty, and frankly a bit thick, to be angry about it in the cold light of days weeks/months later. Still habouring a grudge a decade later is just pathetic. 

[The Fun Factory]

Have we ever had returning assistant managers before? John Gregory was a coach with Little and then came back as manager, and Little coached the youth team after he retired early. Can't think of many examples.

[VillaChris]

10 hours ago, The Fun Factory said:

The pits meaning the season we came 9th?

It was one of the strangest seasons I remember straight from O'Neill walking out 5 days before the start. Remember that game we outplayed Man. United with basically kids in midfield? That was a good performance under Houllier but there were some really really poor ones aswell and have to remember expectations were so much higher then given the annual 6th place finishes.

Reality was we were battling relegation for most of that season and think we only secured safety on 37th game (around that time we also lost 2-1 to 10 men West Brom which was their first win over us in decades).

Somehow finished 9th due to ridiculous sequence of results on last day. Think we gained 7-8 fewer points than last season aswell so low points total that season to finish top half.

With Gary Mac last time he was main assistant to Houllier while this time he's just another coach and think Beale is the key one on training ground so interesting how his role develops. I think given he acted as a mentor to Gerrard when he first broke through at Liverpool, I imagine he'll focus on helping the young players we have on our bench most weeks as he obviously helped likes of Hogg, Bannan and Albrighton last time he was here.

[lexicon]

I actually thought at the time that we'd give GMac the job permanently, as he seemed to be doing reasonably well at the time. Mad thing is that he didn't get a job for years after and we hired **** McLeish instead. 

[StanBalaban]

12 hours ago, Kuwabatake Sanjuro said:

 

This to me shows us why there is a very clear distinction between the role of the manager and that of the coaches.

Being the man in charge means often handling nonsense from a bunch of very wealthy, poorly-educated, fully-grown kids and all the issues that come with it. 

[Wezbid]

Dunne looks either pissed up or absolutely hungover to shit there. What a mess. 

He's such an oaf he probably thinks he's coming across well/funny for trying to explain this. 

[Zatman]

1 hour ago, VillaChris said:

It was one of the strangest seasons I remember straight from O'Neill walking out 5 days before the start. Remember that game we outplayed Man. United with basically kids in midfield? That was a good performance under Houllier but there were some really really poor ones aswell and have to remember expectations were so much higher then given the annual 6th place finishes.

Reality was we were battling relegation for most of that season and think we only secured safety on 37th game (around that time we also lost 2-1 to 10 men West Brom which was their first win over us in decades).

Somehow finished 9th due to ridiculous sequence of results on last day. Think we gained 7-8 fewer points than last season aswell so low points total that season to finish top half.

With Gary Mac last time he was main assistant to Houllier while this time he's just another coach and think Beale is the key one on training ground so interesting how his role develops. I think given he acted as a mentor to Gerrard when he first broke through at Liverpool, I imagine he'll focus on helping the young players we have on our bench most weeks as he obviously helped likes of Hogg, Bannan and Albrighton last time he was here.

Struggling to beat Blackpool reserves was a very low point. They even got fined for it

[John]

4 hours ago, The Fun Factory said:

Have we ever had returning assistant managers before? John Gregory was a coach with Little and then came back as manager, and Little coached the youth team after he retired early. Can't think of many examples.

He was there already, but always merits a mention. 

Edited November 15, 2021 by John

[El-Reacho]

7 hours ago, Davkaus said:

I can understand being a bit angry about that in the moment, but it seems petty, and frankly a bit thick, to be angry about it in the cold light of days weeks/months later. Still habouring a grudge a decade later is just pathetic. 

There's basic self-pride and professionalism. Downing tools and hoping the manager gets sacked (and putting your club in a relegation battle) does not look good on your CV. 

For some reason I'm listening to Talksport in the mornings and Gabby Agbonlahor has somehow managed to get a job as a pundit there. He is utterly brainless - but his attitude when talking about his own career is pretty pathetic. No manager would've stood a chance with idiots like him in the dressing room.

[The Fun Factory]

I think MON harboured a somewhat unprofessional approach and the likes of Dunne, Collins and Gabby fell out when a different approach was required with a new manager.  Perhaps that was why we were always knackered by about March and fell away. Strangely Petrov also fell out with him  but I would rate him a bit higher in the professional stakes.   That clip was before Houllier died  but most people in the football world knew he wasn't a well man so some respect should have been given.

Edited November 15, 2021 by The Fun Factory

[Kuwabatake Sanjuro]

51 minutes ago, The Fun Factory said:

I think MON harboured a somewhat unprofessional approach and the likes of Dunne, Collins and Gabby fell out when a different approach was required with a new manager.  Perhaps that was why we were always knackered by about March and fell away. Strangely Petrov also fell out with him  but I would rate him a bit higher in the professional stakes.   That clip was before Houllier died  but most people in the football world knew he wasn't a well man so some respect should have been given.

The recent Stewart Downing interview gives a good insight into the culture under O'Neill and Houllier. Worth a listen.

 

[DaveAV1]

1 hour ago, El-Reacho said:

There's basic self-pride and professionalism. Downing tools and hoping the manager gets sacked (and putting your club in a relegation battle) does not look good on your CV. 

For some reason I'm listening to Talksport in the mornings and Gabby Agbonlahor has somehow managed to get a job as a pundit there. He is utterly brainless - but his attitude when talking about his own career is pretty pathetic. No manager would've stood a chance with idiots like him in the dressing room.

Ron Saunders would have slaughtered the lot of them. None of them would have lasted 5 minutes. 

[Davkaus]

1 hour ago, Kuwabatake Sanjuro said:

The recent Stewart Downing interview gives a good insight into the culture under O'Neill and Houllier. Worth a listen.

 

Really good watch, that is. Houllier though, at 1:07:30 what a prick. 

[Kuwabatake Sanjuro]

12 minutes ago, Davkaus said:

Really good watch, that is. Houllier though, at 1:07:30 what a prick. 

The lack of respect he had for the club was a disgrace. To be fair to Downing he was completely right to move at the time though given how much a shambles things were becoming, he comes across as a decent sort there. 

[villakram]

48 minutes ago, Davkaus said:

Really good watch, that is. Houllier though, at 1:07:30 what a prick. 

The way he shafted Fowler out of pool... no idea how he is held in such high regard.

McAllister is a great add. Hopefully, we can get a bit of luck the first few weeks and really get to see what these lads can do. 

Edited November 15, 2021 by villakram

[The Fun Factory]

37 minutes ago, Kuwabatake Sanjuro said:

The lack of respect he had for the club was a disgrace. To be fair to Downing he was completely right to move at the time though given how much a shambles things were becoming, he comes across as a decent sort there. 

Honest talk from Downing. He didn't have an association with the club and moved for the manager. He could see the decline so jumped ship. I wasn't pleased at the time but we got the better of Liverpool for both his and Benteke's transfers. Was never really long enough at Villa to become a favourite though.

[VillaChris]

Funny as Downing to me played miles better under Houllier than MON. Indeed I actually though him moving on was partly as a result of Houllier leaving although he'd have probably fecked off regardless. Was very good for most of 2010/11 anyway and outperformed Young.