Khaldoon End Of Season Interview Thread

[80s Shorts]

Fantastic video. Not seen it for a while.

 

[OB1]

Playing Fernando and Milner as a midfield 2 against Barcelona is not the actions of a proper, good or competent man, let alone manager.

Football managers make lots of decisions, some decisions are good, some are poor but if a manager keeps his team in the top two, he will have made far more good decisions than bad; and that is strong evidence that he is a good manager.

 

[Shaelumstash]

Just out of interest mate.
What were your views on pellegrini last year? You know, the year we won the double and scored 102 goals in the league. Did you rate him then or is it just recently you've decided not to like him??

Good question. I was a vocal critic of Pellegrini's tactical acumen from pretty early on. Playing Lescott and Garcia at centre back in a high line away at Cardiff was an early red flag. I think that was the worst tactical decision I'd seen since Pearce put David James up front.

There were other alarming decisions that season, 442 at home to Chelsea and Bayern being two masterclasses in fuckwittery. Also showhorning Dzeko and Negredo as a partnership was bizarre to say the least.

I'm not Davey Hopkins though, so when we won the league I came out and congratulated him on a job well done. I was genuinely pleased for him as he seems like a nice fella, and obviously I was delighted we won the league.

My concern was that it was the quality of the players that won us that league. Players that were a far better squad than the competition. Players with a point to prove while trying to impress a new manager. That when the 'new manager' 'happy camp' period fell away, the manager wasn't astute enough to get us through and win trophies.

So to last season, all of my initial fears borne out over a whole season. De motivated players, sticking to the same shape no matter how many times he was out thought by the likes of Alladyce. Square pegs, round holes, stubborness, inability to change games when it wasn't going well.

Playing Fernando and Milner as a midfield two against Barca was just the end of the line for me. I stopped being angry and just became indifferent.

There seemed to be a sea change around February/ March time where most sensible posters on here realised the Emporer was sat there butt naked. There were one or two exceptions who didn't accept that, and disappeared from the Pellegrini thread for a few months.

Finishing second papered over the cracks. We were out of the running for every trophy by March. As Khaldoon said, that's not what this club is built for anymore.

 

[bluemurray]

I was a little underwhelmed... while I appreciate that we do have some quality people running our club these days and the plans we daily see coming to fruition are amazing, by the same token I thought really the chairman said not-a-lot really, and certainly nothing you wouldn't expect him to say... still head and shoulders above the days of Peter Swales talking up the 'benefits' of life under Peter Reid or the joys of being (staying!)in the first division, but still... maybe if he had announced a name for the new stand or made reference to the promised but-as-yet undelivered memorial to Bert Trautmann then all well and good, but really this was much ado about nothing very much...

 

[Kippax.]

Good question. I was a vocal critic of Pellegrini's tactical acumen from pretty early on. Playing Lescott and Garcia at centre back in a high line away at Cardiff was an early red flag. I think that was the worst tactical decision I'd seen since Pearce put David James up front.

There were other alarming decisions that season, 442 at home to Chelsea and Bayern being two masterclasses in fuckwittery. Also showhorning Dzeko and Negredo as a partnership was bizarre to say the least.

I'm not Davey Hopkins though, so when we won the league I came out and congratulated him on a job well done. I was genuinely pleased for him as he seems like a nice fella, and obviously I was delighted we won the league.

My concern was that it was the quality of the players that won us that league. Players that were a far better squad than the competition. Players with a point to prove while trying to impress a new manager. That when the 'new manager' 'happy camp' period fell away, the manager wasn't astute enough to get us through and win trophies.

So to last season, all of my initial fears borne out over a whole season. De motivated players, sticking to the same shape no matter how many times he was out thought by the likes of Alladyce. Square pegs, round holes, stubborness, inability to change games when it wasn't going well.

Playing Fernando and Milner as a midfield two against Barca was just the end of the line for me. I stopped being angry and just became indifferent.

There seemed to be a sea change around February/ March time where most sensible posters on here realised the Emporer was sat there butt naked. There were one or two exceptions who didn't accept that, and disappeared from the Pellegrini thread for a few months.

Finishing second papered over the cracks. We were out of the running for every trophy by March. As Khaldoon said, that's not what this club is built for anymore.

Wow where have you been hiding? Great post.

 

[Chris in London]

Football managers make lots of decisions, some decisions are good, some are poor but if a manager keeps his team in the top two, he will have made far more good decisions than bad; and that is strong evidence that he is a good manager.

We're fucked though. The death of Christopher Lee means there is a vacancy at Elstree Studios only one man can fill.

 

[cleavers]

when we won the league I came out and congratulated him on a job well done. I was genuinely pleased for him as he seems like a nice fella, and obviously I was delighted we won the league.

We did in fact win a double, a rare event in english football, so well done on saying well done on winning the league, though you forgot to mention that we only won it because Liverpool threw it away.

 

[morleyswife]

It's not fair to judge him on today's standards. Things were different back then. A toupee like that would hardly have been noticed. Presumably because people's vision was a lot worse back then, due to Thatcher's twin policies of starving the north, and mandatory pollution for all schoolchildren.

He was a blue,

 

[Shaelumstash]

Wow where have you been hiding? Great post.

Thanks Blue, I appreciate that.

 

[Shaelumstash]

We did in fact win a double, a rare event in english football, so well done on saying well done on winning the league, though you forgot to mention that we only won it because Liverpool threw it away.

Of course he deserves credit for the Capital One Cup too. However, I think the final demonstrated perhaps more than any other game that the quality of the players dragged us through rather than the tactical acumen of the manager.

I disagree about Liverpool throwing it away. The best team always wins the league. Liverpool won 14 on the bounce, and if they'd carried that on until the end of the season it would have set a new English top flight record.

We had the best squad and that season it was par to win the league in my view. Still a great achievement, but it would have been below expectations if we didn't win it with the swuad we had compared to our rivals.

The season just gone, Chelsea were a fine side so it's no disgace to finish second. It was the manner in which we finished second which was disappointing. I also feel if we'd swapped managers with Chelsea the league positiond would be reversed. That's the difference a top manager makes.