The, he's finally GONE! Tell us your thoughts Thread

[Voinjama]

Those Hleb quotes are priceless.

"At Birmingham, the team played the long-ball game, practically bypassing midfield. To get into the game you had to play up front or linger at the back with the defenders to get hold of the ball, which more often than not flew right past me."

"The day before a game he would come onto the pitch and show us what to do: 'You stand here, the goalkeeper will give you the ball here, kick it as far as you can and don't pass to anyone nearby. And we all run."

Imagine trying to play under this clown.

Yeah, what a foookin idiot. Clueless tw*t.

Those players he had at Brum must have been world beaters to get to 9th in the PL playing under this clown. I mean, the consistency of performance required to do that, their highest ever PL finish, in spite of such farcically bad tactics. Those players must surely have gone onto far far bigger and better things afterwards .....

Sarcasm noted, but these were all players that he bought... so what's your point? He's a tactical mastermind who gets the best out of the shit players he buys? Somehow I don't see it.

My Bluenose mate tells me that the unbeaten run they had was down to McLeish caving into fan pressure to play 4-4-2. Once he switched the tactics they started picking up results.

Once he went back to 4-5-1 with an isolated striker they fell apart.

Hleb's comments are quality though. McLeish and Grant are utterly clueless.

Your bluenose friend is chatting **** that is not the reason why they picked up results for part of the 09/10 season.

[TRS-T]

By mid-January 2010, he had guided them to a 12-game unbeaten run, a club record in the top division, set a Premier League record by selecting the same starting eleven for nine consecutive games, and been named Premier League Manager of the Month for December 2009, the first Birmingham manager to receive the award. By the end of the season McLeish had led Birmingham to ninth place, their highest finish for more than 50 years.

How did he do it?

[parisvilla]

Those Hleb quotes are priceless.

"At Birmingham, the team played the long-ball game, practically bypassing midfield. To get into the game you had to play up front or linger at the back with the defenders to get hold of the ball, which more often than not flew right past me."

"The day before a game he would come onto the pitch and show us what to do: 'You stand here, the goalkeeper will give you the ball here, kick it as far as you can and don't pass to anyone nearby. And we all run."

Imagine trying to play under this clown.

Yeah, what a foookin idiot. Clueless tw*t.

Those players he had at Brum must have been world beaters to get to 9th in the PL playing under this clown. I mean, the consistency of performance required to do that, their highest ever PL finish, in spite of such farcically bad tactics. Those players must surely have gone onto far far bigger and better things afterwards .....

Sarcasm noted, but these were all players that he bought... so what's your point? He's a tactical mastermind who gets the best out of the shit players he buys? Somehow I don't see it.

My Bluenose mate tells me that the unbeaten run they had was down to McLeish caving into fan pressure to play 4-4-2. Once he switched the tactics they started picking up results.

Once he went back to 4-5-1 with an isolated striker they fell apart.

Hleb's comments are quality though. McLeish and Grant are utterly clueless.

That unbeaten run was one of the most farcical things I've ever witnessed in football. I think it was 9 unbeaten in the league or something, but it seemed in every other game Joe Hart would play an absolute blinder whilst at the other end a ball would deflect in off Jerome's backside to get them a result.

They were also incredibly fortunate last season, especially down the stretch. Benefited from a ridiculous number of poor refereeing decisions (allowing offside goals, pennos etc) and own goals/horrendous errors from the opposition which kept them out of the relegation zone until right up until the final weekend. Were lucky to come as close as they did to staying up.

[TRS-T]

2009-10 Premier League

Longest unbeaten run (Birmingham City)

9th place

Birmingham City

13 wins

11 draws

14 defeats

38 goals scored

47 goals conceded

-9 goal difference

50 points

December 2009 Manager of the Month - Alex McLeish

PFA Goalkeeper of the Year - Joe Hart

[Voinjama]

By mid-January 2010, he had guided them to a 12-game unbeaten run, a club record in the top division, set a Premier League record by selecting the same starting eleven for nine consecutive games, and been named Premier League Manager of the Month for December 2009, the first Birmingham manager to receive the award. By the end of the season McLeish had led Birmingham to ninth place, their highest finish for more than 50 years.

How did he do it?

Joe Hart, Scott Dann and Roger Johnson all seemed to have a purple patch around the same time, and basically carried the team. It was actually during that period when I realised Joe Hart is the best English goalkeeper since Seaman.

[Hanky]

How did he do it?

PFA Goalkeeper of the Year - Joe Hart

Helped a bit.

[mjmooney]

They had:

(a) a very good goalkeeper

( an effective partnership in central defence (Dann and Johnson)

We have (a), but we don't have (.

[Demitri_C]

and they had a lot of luck, remember when they beat chelsea 1-0 at the sty? one of the most one sided game sin history. i think chelsea had 26 shots and blose had 1

[switters]

2009-10 Premier League

Longest unbeaten run (Birmingham City)

9th place

Birmingham City

13 wins

11 draws

14 defeats

38 goals scored

47 goals conceded

-9 goal difference

50 points

December 2009 Manager of the Month - Alex McLeish

PFA Goalkeeper of the Year - Joe Hart

The most telling thing is that even in this exceptional season (for them), he still averaged precisely 1 goal per game. Which is generally relegation level of goalscoring..

In that whole season they didn't win a single match by more than 1 goal. They scored 3 goals only once.

They ended the season with 1 win in 10.

In fact, McLeish specializes in ending the season badly. 2 wins in the last 13 last season. 3 wins in his last 18 in his previous relegation.

And here we are with 2 wins out of our last 14.

Sadly our board probably didn't even look at these things, they saw 9th place and a Carling Cup and that's it.

[pacbuddies]

Did anyone else think when they got there ST pack through the post that it was weird that AM wasnt in any photos that featured in the booklet.

Very Intersting - Hardly a vote of confidence - 2 possible reasons:-

1.Hes not a selling point

2.He may not be here !

3) He is not very photogenic!

[Dodgyknees]

**** off McLeish.

[foreveryoung]

All this paper talk about some spokes person saying he is here for the long term is bollocks. Due to contractual reasons, they could never say his job is on the line cause McLeish would have more than a right to sue if they then fired him. Its all speculation, no one would know anything till the end of the season.

[VillanousOne]

when we had Keane, Bent, playing and Zog and Ireland involved we started to play ok - not great mind but ok.

The trouble is now we have no consistency, how many times have we put out the same team this season?

if you look at potentially the optimum team we could play in terms of skill and experience at the start of the season - (how many times have we been able to do that?)

Gabby, Bent

Zog - Ireland - Petrov - Albrighton

Warnock - Dunne - Collins - Hutton

Now the chances of McCleish playing the above are quite unlikely as two wide men and a creative midfielder is an impossibility under him. But you have to say there should have been enough quality above to keep us mid table from Christmas onwards when Ireland had started to come good and if the injuries hadn't racked up.

The trouble is there is no spine to the team anymore.

who in the current line up would get in another prem team, who in the current line up would look out of place in the Championship?

Given, Zog, Ireland, - who else would you actually want in your starting 11 if you were a Prem manager? Youngsters should be risked as attacking options not as holding midfielders and defenders, for those roles it helps to have guile and experience - especially if like Herd, Baker and Clark you aren't technically and positionally that astute.

I am not defending McCleish, he is just a responsible as the fact we have lost 80% of the talent we had, but is it really any wonder we are terrible?

[mykeyb]

Every place we drop in the league costs us £800,000 and since Paul Faulkner has stated we were aiming for europe ie 6th that means if we finish where we are currently we are £7.2 million down on revenue.

If we use last season as a benchmark (9th) we are £4.8 million down on revenue.

Now perhaps Randolp Lerner would like to tell us why with falling attendances, poor season ticket sales and lost prize money, he thinks McLeish is the man for the job!!

[pacbuddies]

It's quite depressing when even a Bluenose, writing in today's Birmingham Mail 'Your Shout' column sends his sympathy to Villa fans because we are stuck with McLeish.

[Mantis]

I don't think he is going anywhere sadly.

I don't think it either, but I am cautiously hopeful. I think the closer we sail to the wind this season, the more likely it is to happen. Plus, the premature season ticket calls suggest the finance dept. are well aware of his allure, so that bodes well too. The board will naturally be 100% behind their man right up until the point where they're not.

The cost of sacking him and replacing him is far higher than the lost revenue of the season tickets.

If he keeps us up he will keep his job in my opinion.

I just don't see Randy and/or Faulkner admitting their mistakes and paying for them.

Yeah, but perhaps Randy and Faulkner will realise that if McLeish stays then we will surely be relegated next season?

I doubt they're that wise

[Moorski]

Not long till we get to 1000 pages still pleading for him to be sacked and no chance of it happening because our non existant owner & his accomplice ceo Faulkner think they know how to run a Football Club.

[VillaRoy]

I still don't understand why we appointed this guy, he is not a Premiership quality manager. I know Randy wanted Premier League experience, but surely he would have wanted good Premier League experience and not bad Premier League experience. Terry Connor, Phil Brown, Ian Dowie, Avram Grant, Alan Shearer have got Premier League experience too. Go away McLeish, jog the feck on! Being a nice bloke shouldn't be a good enough reason to appoint a manager.

[Mantis]

I don't know why we didn't just keep McAllister. Would've been far cheaper, created less of a fan backlash and I'm confident he'd be doing no worse than McLeish currently is.

[Denis_B]

Now perhaps Randolp Lerner would like to tell us why with falling attendances, poor season ticket sales and lost prize money, he thinks McLeish is the man for the job!!

To do that he would have to actually speak to Villa fans which is something he has managed to avoid for all this time so why would he change - COWARD!