I don't think Vardy would leave because we have 4 strikers, he offers something completely different to the rest of them, he would be an impact sub
not sure of all the concerns to be honest! The transfer signings have clearly been handled via a panel with input From Mssrs Rudkin, Walsh, Shakespeare and Neville. Rudkin as director of football is still in place and I believe that this position deals with transfers. I think the reason for signing Austin would be self evident apart from Ulloa how many goals did our forwards score last year! A forward coming in would see one of the current forwards leaving. But you need options and you need goals Austin would increase our goal scoring options. In my eyes he would be competition with Ulloa for the "up top" player as vardy, nuge and kramaric played more off a front man which I think would be the same for Okazaki. I am baffled by the vitriol of QPR fans thinking Austin could do better. None of the top four will want him and look at the teams linked with him WBA who barely finished above Leicester, Newcastle who haven't spent any money for years and finished below Leicester! West Ham maybe but I'd hardly put them in another bracket to Leicester. We are a well run club with good owners a good fan base and a good infrastructure. Regarding the loss of Pearson I was disappointed but still optimistic for the season the squad was already strong and I feel we have reinforced the right area's another couple of midfielders and a bonus signing like Austin would raise my optimism further!
He's better than any of our current strikers so I'd take him, but it does seem a strange pursuit. We've got plenty of striking options and can only imagine this happening if at least one is leaving.
... Kramaric. is a full Croatian international and I suspect he will achieve more in the game than Charlie will IMHO
Id be tempted to keep Nugent for 1 more year - even if he only plays about 5 games when times are hard he is a good option to bring in as the team around him can play better
... why? ... we've strengthened the squad and are making serious approaches to managers of the calibre of Gus Hiddink ... do you honestly think that most neutrals will view the appointment of a manager of that calibre as actually weakening our survival chances compared to Nigel Pearson still being in charge ? ... you must know some very different neutrals to the ones I know ... I work close to London and the general feel from other fans I work with, whilst they think the sacking was strange in terms of it's timing, is that we appear to be very ambitious and that once the dust has settled, if we do recruit somebody from the top echelon of the likely candidates, we will improve on last season ... instead of suffering the dreaded (if irrational) second season syndrome that many of them were quoting at me before Nigel's dismissal ...
You only have to look at last season 2 of the three promoted sides went down and I hardly see the teams that finished below us making signings that worry me or massively improve them The Huth signing alone improved us
.. there is a load of irrational rubbish written on the Drama's board .... no point getting bothered by it ... they will have their derby at Brentford next year as consolation... that will be the highlight of the Championship season by the way ... not because the game will have any footballing significance .. but because it is in London!
Like Southampton when they lost their manager and sold all their talent? Our managers gone, but the squad improves, it will all depend for me on who the next manager is imo. If its someone who knows top level football (Hiddink, Big Sam, Laudrup etc) i'd be thinking we can get a comfortable 10th-14th place with no worry of relegation, whereas if its an unknown talent at this level (Lennon, Coterill, Dyche etc) i'd see us in a relegation scrap, floating in and out of the relegation zone. The teams that came up last season didn't exactly walk the Championship either, so they will need to make a few good acquisitions this summer. Just as an FYI i included Dyche in the unknown list as you can't really count last season for him, their squad was championship level and their owners were unwilling to roll the dice to buy players to keep them in the division, yet they still battled well. Even top managers would have struggled to keep them in the league.
??????!!!!! Baffled by this We have an extremely talented squad of players. I expect us to at least match 14th place again regardless of who are manager is. Everything g is in place for the new boss
One word. Instability. It's the biggest killer in football. I've said elsewhere what I think about our approach for Hiddink.
I agree with all this. It is all about the next appointment. We will either emulate Southampton or Palace, or we'll go down. It's 50/50 for me; I think many neutrals will think the same.
.what like at Chelsea, Man City, Southampton,Swansea? ... there are as many successes after managerial change ... our owners are seeking stability as far as I can see?
We are not comparable to Chelsea or Man City in any realistic way. Swansea and Southampton weren't involved in relegation scraps the season before either. Sacking successful managers is not seeking stability. It's leaping from the safe into the unknown.
Successful? In a number of football realms maybe - at a push. As a face of the football club, probably not. Success in as much that there have been 2 promotions and the club have progressed with back room staff etc and you can only deal with what is put in front of you. Success for me will be with what somebody is able to do in the Premiership. There have been a lot of rumours about why he was sacked but the truth is that nobody knows the truth and probably never will. Your support of him is admirable LG, but he has gone, and again, whoever gets the job will have my support as I am first and foremost a LCFC fan, as you are.
There's only two barometers of success in football. Where you finish in the league and what you win. Personality as literally nothing to do with success. Therefore Pearson is the most successful manager we've had in a decade and a half. That is a LONG time, whether some posters can remember further back than that or not is utterly irrelevant. And incidentally, how many of those managers being compared favourably to Pearson were sacked? I'm guessing around 0. How do you think reaction would have been back then if they were? I think I'd have instigated rioting myself if O'Neill had been sacked. I "support him" because I believe he was the best thing for our club and I think replacing him with someone of equal or superior quality is going to be very, very tough. I sincerely hope it happens, but I have massive doubts.
