If you don't concede, you can't lose Both are sides of the same coin, but the implications of the way a manager thinks tends towards A) exciting attacking football with passion and desire to have the ball or get it back quickly B) dour workmanlike football aimed at preventing the opposition from playing interesting football while having little ambition to do so too. I have always tended towards the attacking play. Kevin Keegan took it too far and it became synonymous with reckless and not bothering to defend In recent years David O'LEARY is the only one to have achieved it at lufc, or got close. And he achieved it prior to spending all the money too. Football under George Graham was dire, but Wilko achieved it too. It's not happened for us since and that is down to the short term attitude of the club and the fans. We always demand success and promotion now, this season. When we got relegated from the Premiership, Swansea were in the 4th division. But they built from within by employing a long term strategist and look what has happened - they are so far ahead of us it is criminal. We will not be promoted by continuing with this short term view. We need to take a 5 year plan and put it into action now. Stop the short term nonsense.
Grayson's side played some great football between October '10-February '11, but they consequently ran out of steam because Bates had refused to allow the side to be strengthened in January like the other teams around us were doing, which prevented fatigue, injuries, low morale and suspensions from taking their toll in the same way they did with us in the 'slump'. Warnock's side has also played good football at times - The two 'Boros away, Southampton, West Ham and Everton at home. The occasion and crowd do seem to determine their performance levels though, which is why Bates needs to **** off so badly, so we can get the 12th man back at a bouncing Elland Road. The only way we'll get it consistent is through a balance of flair and grit. Grayson had the former, but not the latter. Warnock, vice-versa. Football's all about money these days, and we need to spend the appropriate amount in order to get that balance, and get that playing style which will drive us on to good results and promotion.
I tend to agree exodus that Grayson played good football. But I still hate when people entirely blame Bates. Grayson was still largely at fault for his sacking as he wasn't performing to what was expected of him and in truth my expectations as a leeds fan wasn't being met as well as Bates'
I disagree. He was 3 points off playoffs with a team that had recently sold 2 of its best 3 players and its captain and was given no funds to replace either adequately. One Simon Grayson!
Yes, agree that sales didn't help, but Grayson was also tactically naive, he never seemed to have a Plan B and seemed incapable of influencing a game when things started to go wrong, which is why there were so many spectacular disasters during his time. Also think players lost faith in SG (maybe his philandering cost him respect as well). Still, he got us out of Lge One and I will always thank him for that.
Funny that cos warnocks tactics of late have been naive and at times embarrassing. And the argument that SG couldn't change things when things were going wrong is just a myth. We picked up many points from losing positions in 2010/11 season which proves he could change things. Warnock however has picked up only 2 points from losing positions...
Logi....methinks you argue just for the hell of it. If he got his tactics right we wouldn't have been in losing positions against poor Lge One teams where pure determination got us points.
Well when Grayson arrived in the 2008/09 League One season he only rescued 3 pts from losing positions. That is because in general results were first class 11 wins at Elland Road in a row, plenty of clean sheets and taking the lead in every one of the Elland Road wins. The next season we rescued 16 pts from losing positions. This the season where we set a new record for consecutive wins at Elland Road continuing from the previous season, won the first 8 in all competitions, didn't lose our first match until 24th October, following this up with 5 straight wins keeping clean sheets in all 5, outplayed Liverpool, beat scum and drew at Spurs. What a ****ing season from the great man
Get over that, that happened over a year before he got sacked. You can't keep a manager for something he did over a year ago. The following season he wasn't performing, his captain was injured anyway and was unlikely to return before the end of the season (he did so happen to return before that but thats not the point). His players being sold was annoying for him obviously but I'm more concerned with poor tactics He gave us a couple great seasons but all in all it was definitely the right decision to sack him. It was not the right decision to replace him with who they did though imo
We won more points from losing positions than any other team in 2010/11, so the "no Plan B" thing is a myth. We were 3 points off the play-offs when Grayson was sacked, so far under Warnock (as good a manager as I think he is) we've struggled to even get that close. I've always found it amazing that often the same people who were slagging SG every time we got close to slipping out of the top 6 still praise Colin to the heavens when we'd be doing well to even get in. And the most embarrassing result of recent times (at least in my opinion) was also under Warnock. I still think Bates is the main culprit for both managers problems but I still think it's double standards to blame Bates for all our problems under Colin and not give Larry the same privilege.
I'll concede that, got my threads mixed up. Even still, we were not performing for a while under Grayson and really playing poorly for a fair few games before his sacking. Sending offs made the results look far better and while I have always said, the timing was poor from Bates, it was still the right decision for the long term. I think I saw enough of Grayson to realise he was never going to get Leeds United promoted from championship especially considering there was a small budget to work with, he's not the type of manager, so bring in a manager who can (I do not claim Warnock is that man either)
I think I probably give 40%-50% blame to Bates for both. If anything, less blame on Bates for Colin as he has had a little more freedom
Grayson did well, because all the best players were already here, bar gradel. Should have been sacked a year before, horrible manager
