Ok, if we sort out our defence then Anita/Colback will be dropped and Gini will be pushed in to the centre and Thauvin will be on the wing! The reason we can't do this presently is the defence is so ****!
He also said... 'Some of their players are internationals, some play for their national team'. 'Managing in a foreign country is a once-in-a-lifetime experience, that doesn't come around very often' 'He is inexperienced but he's experienced in terms of what he's been through' 'It was difficult in the beginning, in the middle and at the end' Take away the obvious bias, I have absolutely no time for people who are as thick as him. He should never have been employed again on the back of some of those comments. He's a ****ing idiot pal.
It's been too long since we could have a good lynching, so I'm looking forward to the end of January. Whatever hope the pro-McLaren camp are holding onto will surely be long gone. It's not a question of who to replace him with, however, as Ashley doesn't sack managers.
The main problem is I'm not sure many care that much, we just get disappointment everywhere we turn. We've seen what happened when we wanted Pardew out - nothing, for about 18 months, then he left of his own accord! Charnley then decided we had to wait for 6 months to either offer the job to John Carver or Steve McClaren. Let that sink in for a moment - richest league in the world, millions and millions at stake, we have an assistance financial controller in charge and he, with a geriatric scout, felt one of these two were the best options. Ashley, for his sins, trusts these clowns. Dwell on that - billionaire Mike Ashley is so limited in his head he actually keeps faith with Lee fecking Charnley. Try another one on for size - John Irving, Finance Director, hasn't been replaced yet. He left in May 2015. Stoke City have a dozen or so people involved in running the club - we have Charnley, Moncur, Carr and McClaren himself. We have very few people in senior positions taking care of the commercial or financial aspects of the club, because it's in the totalitarian grip of Mike Ashley and his puppet(s). The fat man won't wise up - too arrogant, perhaps too dimwitted. Charnley won't suddenly become a competent MD. McClaren, similarly, isn't going to suddenly become a good manager. And whilst they're all sat behind closed doors with internet/media/public access banned, nothing will change. It is a hopeless, pointless situation and we will all, at some point, give up. I don't know why we can't all just say "right, this thing, whatever it is, is not my football club. This failed business model, this pointless, soulless commercial vehicle for SD is not Newcastle United. It's Wonga FC, it's Sports Direct Athletic, it's FC MASH, but whilst it wears a familiar strip and plays at a familiar ground, it cannot be Newcastle United. So I'm not watching this stand-in club until OUR club is found, most likely hiding behind a fat billionaire, and comes out from his immense and oppressive shadow." Can we not say that and still maintain our integrity?
We are now the lower league minnow every game. Hoping to hang in there for 90 minutes and catch the big team on the break for an unlikely win!!! This is us now, FACT.!!
If our wretched team were an animal we would have been diagnosed as rabid and cancerous, taken behind the shed and mercy killed with a shotgun blast to the face.
Yeah. We should have treat him better and give him the support financially mcclaren has had. He is a great man.
I honestly didn't mind him considering the circumstances he was having to work under. The way a certain section of the fan base carried on was a disgrace. You'll never hear them admitting they were wrong though.
All joking aside I think he did a good job here under difficult circumstances. Looking at what has happened since we "upgraded" and gave his successor a massive war chest - well he is looking great right now. I must say I think he'd be getting more out of this squad but would be hamstrung by the same defensive issues and graham Carr being obsessed with french c team players. Having said that maybe if Pardew had the same transfer role, we'd have bought cabaye, puncheon, and a few English players etc etc. Who knows, all what ifs. What I do know is mcclaren has us in deep **** despite support and influence. He has no excuses really.
Puncheon, Zaha and Bolasie were all already at Palace, were they not? Let's hang back and see where they are in 2016/17. Pardew is a bang average, as was proven at West Ham and Southampton. Arguably he's not even bang average. However, his journey has seen him back at HIS club now, this is the best he's going to have it, and he's doing alright. Fair play to him for surviving the geordie backlash. We, as fans, were right to not want him continuing his appalling football - lest we not forget who steered us to 5 straight Sunderland defeats, who oversaw 0-6 at home to Liverpool, the Reading match, Brighton defeats, the headbutt, and so on - it's a LOOOOOOONG list. That said, we should all to a man recognise his role as symptom, not cause, of the grand malaise that blights the club. He was restricted and at times did some ok things, but fundamentally he should never have been at the club. He should never have been reporting to a Casino manager, he should never have been told "here's your players" by a comedian's dad. The structure is so poor, so inexplicably bad, that he is not alone. But let's not anyone suggest he was particularly good either. Still better than McClaren, mind.
He wanted puncheon here. And zaha. We can argue all day about his time here. What is not in dispute is the constraints he was working under. He maintained pl football on the worst budgets in the league - indeed budgets that were not even to championship sides. For the bad games, you can name other great ones. He had a very good record at Southampton and did plenty for them. It would be ill judged to call it anything other than a success. Lambert, fonte and puncheon were superb signings. He kickstarted the revolution there. West Ham started well but then the crazy Icelandic folk got involved and it all went tits up. Reading did great job. Charlton was a struggle but nothing much changed after he left suggesting they may have just been punching above their weight for years. Managers have bad spells too - even Jose. His record is better than average. His record here was better than average. When given a team here with ba, cabaye, a pomp colo, a thin hba, a tiote who could pass, he did very well. I'd rather have seen him given 50m and seen what happened. I reckon we'd be watching canny football and sitting in the top half.
So Ashley/Llambias were/are visionaries who could appoint such a good manager in the knowledge he'd do much better than anyone else? They binned Hughton thinking - hold the phone, I've heard League One legend Pards is available, quick get him in before someone else snaps him up?! Maybe there's nothing actually in football management at all and we should all get off McClaren's back. I'm not being facetious either. Maybe it's more or less ALL in the players.
Keegan always argued this tbf. Some managers are obviously better than others, though, and you'd like to think we could do better than either Pardew or McLaren.
