Exhaustive Search For New Manager

From our friends at the Guardian. Interesting.

http://www.theguardian.com/football/2014/sep/19/fulham-owner-shahid-khan-manager-search-kit-symons

 

Interesting indeed, the big talking point will be the sources of his 'counsel'.

You would think he's (as I said in another thread) seen his previous advice as being flawed, which -with 20/20 hindsight - you would have to say is probably true, despite Magath's record. But then until we see who he appoints and how he gets on the sources and the actual advice is by the by, really.

Good to hear Kit will get a fair crack. The thing we've lacked under Kahn is any kind of interim period (Jol and Rene were sacked and their successors moved straight in) so it will be interesting to see how we get on.

COYW

 

Why would your search for a new manager be exhaustive? Tony Pulis is out of work so for me, your shortlist of manager should be one long... why hang around when the guy won't just secure safety for Fulham this season, he'll put you back in the mix for promotion? I'd go out and get him today if I were your chairman. .

 

Would you want to watch Pulis football every week at your club, flaspur? If so, Spurs' standards have dropped a long way since Bill Nicholson's glory days; if not, don't be so patronising in assuming that our fans deserve what you wouldn't put up with yourself.

 

Tony Pulis at Fulham - I'd rather play in League 1 !!
OK, I await the obvious replies, but short-term fixes are just that.

COYW

 

With all due respect, there's no patronising intent in my comments at all. If Spurs were bottom of the Championship, I would be crying out for a manager of Pulis' ilk today. The fact is, if a club like yours (or ours) has literally plummeted to the bottom of league one as fast as yours has in the space of months, I wouldn't be bothered by how pretty the football is because I would want to secure the clubs future going forward. What good is attractive football if you go home empty handed week in week out? A manager isn't a permanent fixture, just a means to an end which the appointment of Magath was clearly about but back fired severely which i will come to shorty. So if putting up with a bit of guile, guts and fight (which frankly both our teams could do with on recent results) is what it takes then so be it.

GeraScores, are you seriously suggesting, you'd prefer to play in League One than the Premier League for the sake of one, maybe two seasons of grafting over passing?

Magath had no English league managerial experience, was a massive gamble yet was brought in based on his no nonsense German football management approach as a dead cert to sort your mess out. Guess what? It didn't work out. So where do you go from here? In my humble opinion, I'd suggest getting a manager with a proven track record in English football of getting results and getting promotion. That guy is Pulis and he will cost you zilch as he's a free agent. Just watch the Crystal Palace match v Liverpool last season - that sums him up and that's what any struggling team needs.

 

Steve lomas is still available. Got loads of experience last season with the Wallies flapping about at the bottom of the table. Could be perfect for you

 

Bloody hell Eire, that's even worse than suggesting David Hockaday.

 

A tad worried about Ali Mac having any say in the selection process going by his past record.
For me no more Dutchmen, if after a decent period of time Kit does not pass muster lets go for a British manager/coach.
Hoddle, Sherwood, Murphy, or even revolving door Keegan
We have the infrastructure to equate to WBA, Burnley, CP, QPR, Hull, Leicester Swansea, and possibly a few more, so come
on you Cottagers stop wallowing in failure, and start rejoicing in success, lets see us in a safe position by Christmas.

 

That's just a list of clubs that don't really belong in the Premier League, so if you put yourselves on a parr with them, I don't understand what you're all worrying about? Right where you should be!

 

Saw on Twitter that Clarke, McDermott and Hughton have interviews at the club coming up.

 

QUOTE=Bidley;7103084]Saw on Twitter that Clarke, McDermott and Hughton have interviews at the club coming up.[/QUOTE]

McDermott will make Felix look like Pep Guardiola. He only achieved at Reading because he inherited a good team. Nice bloke, but his football is years behind the modern game.

 

We should let Kit manage the team for at least 5-6 games...

 

McDermott will make Felix look like Pep Guardiola. He only achieved at Reading because he inherited a good team. Nice bloke, but his football is years behind the modern game.[/QUOTE]
The one plus is hell be good to buy the odd supporter a drink or two. Wait till he starts reciting all his Reading exploits to the adoring Fulham fans

 

I'm sure you didn't mean to patronise, but many fans of clubs who aspire to Champions League qualification tend to apply double standards to smaller clubs, often without realising how patronising that is. You wouldn't put up with Pulis' football, even for a few months, I'm sure. As for whether it's worth a couple of seasons of 'grafting over passing' (as if it's impossible to combine both) to get back into the Premier League, I'll refer to the philosophy of your own Bill Nicholson, who I mentioned in my previous comment:

'The great fallacy is that the game is first and foremost about winning. It is nothing of the kind. The game is about glory. It is about doing things in style, with a flourish, about going out and beating the other lot, not waiting for them to die of boredom.'

While we've never racked up the silverware, Fulham have, for the vast majority of our past, always been a team who have tried to play football. That's part of our heritage just as much as it is Spurs (albeit with vastly different results over the years!) Some of us wouldn't want to trade that, to surrender the identity of the club, just for the sake of climbing back onto the Premier League gravy train. Yes, I'd like to see us back up there and no I don't want to go down to league 1, but like GeraScores, I'd take another relegation over putting the future of our club into the hands of someone with no intention of honouring our traditions. We want to be entertained when we go to the Cottage, to see good football. It helps if you're winning, of course it does, but I'm not at all sure that anyone wants to see month after month, year after year, of grinding out results rather than thrilling the fans with flair, verve and skill.

 

That's my shout too. We shouldn't be in any rush just yet.

Yeah McDermott doesn't do much for me either. Cheers for that.

 

Not a criticism or a disagreement, but fans of every club say that, don't they? Nobody says "our great club is built on a rich foundation of touch and tonk".

Just a musing.

 

There's no such thing as a club who doesn't belong in the Premier League: it's a meritocracy - you get there by earning your place, winning promotion, then finishing above the others. We deserved our place for the time we were there, and we deserved to lose it last season. Teams (and fans) with a sense of entitlement based on past status need to wake up to the fact that you don't get into the Premier League just because you used to be good. Just because your lot have spent years failing to live up to your past glories, there's no need to take it out on the list of teams who are, currently, better than you (and us) and in a higher league on merit.

 

Pulis said once that he didn't think Stoke fans would 'put up with' playing the Arsenal way. There are clubs who define themselves more in terms of steel and fight than flair and style. But I take your point, everybody believes their club is built on good football, it's just that we don't all agree on what constitutes good football.

Arsenal are one of the few clubs I can think of to completely transform their tradition. Before Wenger they were known as the miserly, defensive side who ground out results George Graham may have seemed the personification of that, but it went back long before his day. I think I'm right in saying that it was 1930s Arsenal, under Herbert Chapman, who introduced the third defender when most clubs played with two, and it may well have been them who led the move from three to four. When I was a lad '1-0 to the Arsenal' (implying 'we've nicked a goal, now we're going to defend it and win') was one of Arsenal fans' favourite songs. It makes me laugh when Arsenal fans talk about 'the Arsenal way', meaning the exact opposite of what it used to mean. Fair play to Wenger for transforming that though.

 

You are quite right Captain. When I was a kid, which was a while before you were, Arsenal were not a flair side. They were very defensive and you have the chant quite right 1-0 to the Ar-se-nal was the refrain. To quote the Doc "if they were playing in my front garden, I'd draw the curtains", although not said about Arsenal to be fair.

In fact, in the gap between 30's glory days and the installation of Wenger as manager Arsenal were quite often a mediocre side. I remember back in the mid 70's one year they finished 16th & the next 17th and were almost relegated.