Aston Villa News 24/7Well there you go, another dire game, another awful result to put 2010 to bed. The anti-Houllier voices now reaching full crescendo; maybe they’ll get their wish and we can look forward to our 4th manager in a matter of months. That’s generally worked out well for clubs that have tried it in the past.
I hate to single him out, but Eric Lichaj had a shocking opening eight minutes – nothing seemed to work for him – capped with a gift wrapped penalty to Man City, adjudged to have brought Mario Balotelli down. Probably the right decision, but one of those that many referees wouldn’t blow up for. 1-0.
Five minutes later, Joleon Lescott headed to the far post largely unchallenged and Barry Bannan’s headed clearance on the line was adjudged to be nothing of the sort by the linesman. Superhuman eyesight apparently, no hesitation. All of the ball crossed all of the line in his opinion. 2-0.
Balotelli got his 2nd with simple tap in on 27 minutes, probably from an offside position, but Lichaj won’t want to see the replay again. 3-0.
No changes at half time, back out with a bit more spirit and determination. Unfortunately, Marc Albrighton, who was due to be substituted – Fabian Delph and Nathan Delfouneso ready to come on – tripped Adam Johnson in the box and Balotelli was presented with the opportunity to grab a hat-trick from the spot. He stutter stepped Friedel onto the wrong foot once again. 4-0.
Delph and Delfouneso came on immediately after, Albrighton and Bannan making way. Little changed, no one particularly interested in a dead rubber with 35 minutes left on the clock. Pires came on Reo-Coker for the last five minutes, but it limped out to the final whistle with hunched shoulders wherever you looked among the Villa side.
Utterly destroyed, confidence at an all time low.
And now we look ahead to starting 2011 at Stamford Bridge, the venue of our most humiliating loss in recent memory and arguably when it all began to unravel for us – you’ll recall the MON quit rumours emerged shortly after that result.
Many, many fans are vociferously opposed to giving Houllier the opportunity to utilize his first transfer window now, others see as much risk – if not, more – in handing over the team to someone new just in time to splash some cash.
It’s a tricky one for Randy Lerner. He’s among a small group of people who know the full extent of the mess Houllier inherited and can have a true feel for how well or badly he’s done in the last few months with what he’s had to deal with.
My personal feeling is that bringing in someone new will more than likely send us into a death spiral unless we get the right manager, but why would that be any more likely now than it was three months ago? Sticking with Houllier might well lead to the same fate. Stick or twist?
I hate to look at things in such a defeatist way; but we’re halfway to the perceived safety of 40 points and halfway through the season with Wigan to play twice. Stick or twist? I’m inclined to stick myself, but then I don’t know if I’m holding 17 or 14.
Randy does though and he’s no mug.
Aston Villa Starting XI: Friedel, Lichaj, Cuellar, Collins, Warnock, Albrighton, Reo-Coker, Petrov, Bannan, Downing, Agbonlahor. Subs: Guzan, Clark, Hogg, Delph, Delfouneso, Pires, Herd.
Man City Starting XI: Hart, Richards, Zabaleta, Lescott, Kompany, de Jong, Vieira, Yaya Toure, Johnson, Silva, Balotelli. Subs: Given, Boateng, Brdige, Barry, Milner, Tevez, Silva.
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34 Comments to “Man City 4 Aston Villa 0: Another beating to close out 2010, now stick or twist for 2011?”
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Lerner has gotten this choice wrong for years with the Cleveland Browns. The constant turmoil keep the Browns at the bottom of the NFL. I’m inclined to think RL will give GH some cash in the transfer window. He expects men with track records to see it through.
there are two reason why i’m generally reluctant to look to randy’s track record in NFL for clues to his approach with villa:-
1. he inherited the browns, he chose to buy villa.
2. the business models are almost diametrically opposed – relegation/promotion casts a vastly different light on things.
he’s definitely got some big decisions to make right now though and getting them wrong will be disastrous.
agree with your points re: NFL. I guess I was trying to say the following:
1. Only until recently has RL decided to go with experience. His coaching hires with the Browns have all been guys getting the job for the first time. Hence why I believe he chose GH – experience – and won’t make a move just to change.
2. Recognizing relegation is far worse than finishing last – he will be forced to invest now. I’m inclined to believe GH and RL have a vision and are putting it in motion. But after teasing the top 4 the past few seasons, this is brutal to watch.
yeah, i’m with you. sorry, just immediately pull back from NFL, apples/oranges and all that.
i think you’re right, they’re trying to put the right framework in place, but results have piled so much pressure on and silly PR gaffes haven’t helped the cause.
I wish we were told truthfully why o neill left but this will never happen. What i do know is that things will not get much better under gh and it will be touch and go whether we avoid relegation with him at the helm
i’m of the mind that we stick it out and we’ll make it to the end of the season, but then i suppose it would be more difficult to shift him if that was still the right thing to do.
my biggest fear is that it almost never works out when you blow through a bunch of managers in quick succession.
hobson’s choice i guess.
I agree with you Dan.
What a state we’re in and what a choice to have to make.
You already know what I think about this manager, but I’m not convinced binning him now is the way to go, myself.
Trouble is, it’s obvious to me that we need massive change, as it’s just not working.
So it’s either a big squad clearout or the manager goes.
Deperate times, as I can see us going down if it continues.
One question keeps nagging me though.
What has Gary McAllister EVER done sucessfully, off the pitch?
it’s interesting. games and seasons and life hinge on defining moments.
i think the wheels began to fall off after chelsea last season, but in truth that may well have been a symptom of things behind the scenes and it began much further back.
someone on twitter pondered whether our season might look different now if carew hadn’t blasted that penalty over the bar at st james’ and i think that’s a very good point.
obviously we’ve lost games on silly moments this season, but the wigan postponement hurt too i think. this run of spurs, city & chelsea was something i’ve had my eye on all season, we really could have done with a result at wigan coming into it.
by the time we get to play that one, we’ll have played city twice. so many things going against us, most of it beyond houllier’s control.
but he hasn’t helped himself and we’re no doubt in a big mess right now. but i’m still not as concerned as a lot of fans because i don’t see that truly dysfunctional behaviour i’d associate with clubs of our stature that end up going down.
my biggest concern is that cutting and running with a new manager *is* indicative of a club in turmoil, running around like a headless chook, and those clubs do tend to get what’s coming to them.
I don’t get this reference to the mess we were in under MON.
The way I saw things was, some fans were getting greedy and expected too much. Randy may or may not have become edgy with MON as a result. MON was used to being loved by the public and didn’t like the hostility. He and Randy discussed how to solve it. MON said it needed more money for more players and bigger salaries to keep the likes of Milner. Randy said that wasn’t happening. MON couldn’t handle the situation and ran away.
Make no mistake, MON could have made this team play. GH cannot. It matters very little whether we get rid of him or not, we are now on the slide and that cannot be stopped. The good years are over.
All that remains is for time to dull or erase the memories of success. Before you know it, we’ll all be dancing around celebrating promotion or last day reprieves from relegation.
Just to really kick shit in our faces, who are the new darlings of the league? Spuds. As far as I can see they are playing Villa/MON counter attacking football with fast wingers. Only exception is that one quality player (Van der Fart) that we all knew Villa needed to make us very very good. It should have been us………
my view is based on the 08/09 accounts, nan. top of my head: ~£70m wages to £84m turnover. wait until we get a glimpse at 09/10 which will include dunne, collins, warnock, beye & downing.
conjecture on my part, but i think that batch of players was one last gamble on getting champions league. having failed, without the extra income that would bring to offset the cost, something had to give.
why MON couldn’t do the decent thing and step aside in the summer if he didn’t fancy it instead of entering into another 12 month contract in may, only he knows.
personally, i really don’t think he did fancy it any more. the writing was on the wall last season, he was incredulous at the rising discontent among the fans. this season would have been a nightmare for him. he knew that full well and chose to protect his record as best he could.
I’m now drinking heavily and plan to watch your MON ‘Yes we can’ video on loop until I pass out. Thanks. Night.
watched that the other day. seems like a *very* long time ago now.
Houlier’s first game in charge was a 2-1 away day victory at the ‘custard bowl’, a game that saw Collins and Cuellar defend admirably. Neither put a foot wrong, particularly the Spaniard, but Gerrard saw fit to drop Carlos, reinstate Dunne for the White Hart Lane fixture. Dunne lunged recklessly to allow Van der Vaart the opportunity to net in a 2-1 reverse and only a spat betwen Dunne and Houlier allowed Carlos a way back in.
Including the Wolves game we’ve played 15 Prem games under Houlier, winning just three, drawing four and being defeated eight times – 13 points from a possible 45. Over a 38-game season this average yields 33-points which would have seen us finish fourth from bottom last campaign but second from bottom the two seasons previous).
What worries me is that under Houlier we’ve shipped 27-goals in 15-games. We can argue about the difference losing Milner has made but defensively our personel is unchanged. Gerrard has somehow transformed MON’s very same defensive unit from conceding no more than a ‘goal a game’ to nudging two each performance.
Look at the Spurs game. Houlier fielded a midfiled of Hogg, Downing, Albrighton and Delph – no physical presence and/or defensive virtue (against Bale, Modric, Palacios, Vand der Varrt and Lennon it was madness particularly with NRC benched).
Then, there’s Houlier’s penchant for playing Gabby as a lone striker. Now I’m aware he’s been working out in the gym but he’s no line leader and asking him to play with his back to play negates his real strength. At Anfield (with Carew on the bench) Houlier adopted this tactic and frankly we were toothless. Then again today at Man City, Gerrard went with Gab as a lone striker and it was no surprise that Joe Hart didn’t trouble the kit man.
But why?
Well since joining Villa the Frencman has fell out with a whole host of players. While I’ve criticised Dunne, he hasn’t become a poor defender all of a sudden but due to the aforementioned spat we’re robbed of the option to sue his services. Then there’s Carew, never any great shakes but certainly a safer and more effective bet to lead a line solo than Gabby. Again though, he isn’t even on the bench because of Houlier’s undoubted (IMHO) belligerance. What of Ireland? What would ‘Arry do with the pint-sized Irishman? I feel Redknapp would have cuddled and cajouled Ireland into at least showing willing but yet he’s another out in the cold.
In short, Houlier has been tactically left wanting and his man management skills have deserted him. I’ve also found him apathetic to defeats or at worse (Anfield) he was sentimental towards his former charges.
I never wanted Houlier. I felt that he was out of touch and that the penalty for failure was dangerously non existent to a man who could slope off home to France with his pay-off. Being honest, far from changing my mind, his management has greatly heightened my sense of concern and I want him out BEFORE the January transfer window. Letting him blow what little funds Lerner would be a travesty.
I admire the scores of ‘utv’ on Twitter and those fans who say let’s get behind the lads and see what Houlier can do in January but I’m sorry, they’re misguided. The January transfer window is a nonesense so let’s keep what we have and appoint a manager capable of ensuring survival and offering us a platform for next season’s campaign.
pedant alert: it’s 14 games, not 15, but i take you point.
carlos has been injured a couple of times, but you’re right that dunne had some seniority. he’s had it since he arrived, collins too, hence why i think cuellar played at RB under MON. something he wasn’t thrilled about btw, but he likes to play.
who missed out because of that? luke young.
however, having finally sat dunne on his arse, as he should have done and MON never would have, how’s that gone down? yeah, cheerio richard, thanks for coming you petulant dick.
btw, dunne was piss poor right from pre-season and seems to have reported back overweight, unfit and with an attitude problem. hardly houllier’s fault. my view is that he played last season with a point to prove to city, but this year he just can’t be arsed.
the tactics thing is multi layered and, of course, quite complex. i agree with a lot of your assessment, but there are underlying reasons for some of it, some part of houllier’s vision, some beyond his control being forced, as he was, to work with what he had.
some of it might be regarded as a mistake, some is just a case of what else was he supposed to do? i accept your point about playing gabby as lone front man, but the only alternative was putting fonz on in place of a midfielder.
what that means is a variant at best of 4-4-2, something MON was maligned for persistently. he also played gabby as lone front man for some time while carew was out with a back injury and the fans were upset when he stopped and brought carew back, forcing a switch from 4-5-1 to 4-4-2.
would reknapp have put an arm round ireland’s shoulder? maybe, if he wanted to. maybe he’d have treated him like bentley and keane. the general consensus is that ireland is a basket case, quite why anyone would side with him is beyond me.
‘arry labelled kaboul “stupid” for his sending off today. blown out of proportion no doubt, but probably not incorrect and i doubt any spurs fans will be offended as some villa fans are at GH describing lichaj as having a nightmare today.
lichaj *did* have a nightmare btw, he was awful. i say that as a big fan, but he was atrocious before the penalty and didn’t do much to atone until the final throes of the match.
anyway, i’m not a houllier fan or apologist, i’m just a villa fan and he seemed the best available candidate to me at the time – out of sven & curbs – and pushing him out the door now will make matters worse unless we have the ideal replacement.
maybe that man is jol. maybe it isn’t, i don’t know, but randy needs to be damned sure before he replaces houllier if he wants to stay in this league.
i take the point of extrapolating houllier’s form over the rest of the season, but he hasn’t had the full squad at his disposal and yet we’ve shown many signs of not being far away nevertheless.
as far as the transfer window goes, fans put too much emphasis on it and tend to focus on the negatives more than the positives. with MON, it was forget ashley young, what about marlon harewood?
people love to focus on houllier’s poor signings in his 2nd period with liverpool, but dismiss the fact that 7 of the starting XI that won the champions league under rafa were houllier signings.
i’d quite fancy 7 signings capable of even playing in the champions league in our team, let alone winning it. if he managed that, he could sign all the wayne routledges and moustapha salifous he likes.
No worries on the ‘pendant’ front, it wouldn’t be one of my posts without a numerical inaccuracy (I still like the 5-6-0 formation though)…seems I threw the Burnley Carling Cup game in with the match count…anyway…
Regarding ‘arry’s cuddly side undoubtedly he’s isolated players but there again, with Spurs depth of squad Redknapp can afford to lose one or two sulkers. For me, it seems that Houlier wanted to shake things up immedaitely and was not prepared to bide time until January before losing players. A more common sense approach would have been keeps things cordial enough to at least have the option to call upon certain individuals.
Strange really, for a man so keen to impose his will on things why did he take an age to seize the reigns?
Dunne has been very poor granted, Ireland’s time in our shirt has been nothing short of disasterous and Carew’s now persona non gratis. Yet at certain junctures this season it would have been nice to have an option to call upon them. (also, an interesting caveat is what has their exclusion done to their market value?).
Back to tactics. You know that I’m a proponent of 4-5-0 when absolute need warrants this unorthodox approach. If Heskey or Carew can’t/won’t play then I’d sooner play a five man midfield without a recognised striker, in fact I’d go so far as to suggest that it would be my preferred strategy.
There are defensive advantages with having a five man midfield and with Villa’s abundance of pace we could actually enhance our strengths in an attacking capacity, more so than isolating Gabby/Fonz in a futile, energy sapping role.
Extrapolation becomes very important if Houlier fails to secure meaningful signinings throughout January. I understand that he’s rarely had a full compliment of first team members to choose from, but there again look at Ian Holloway at Blackpool. The Bloomfield Road outfit went to Sunderland yesterday (without Charlie Adam) and came away victors 2-0, that after an away day win at Stoke (1-0) prior to Christmas. My point? Can you see Villa’s ‘on paper’ strong defensive unit going to the SoL or the Brittainia and keeping clean sheets?
In mentioning Blackpool I’m not proposing that we hire Holloway (as much as I like him and enjoy his idiosyncrancies, there’s always the danger of him imploding and/or doing something bizarre). What I’m sayingthough is that spirit and application can compensate for other inadequacies. Right now, our Gallic leader seems incapable of engendering anything that approaches a compensatory spirit and when you’re in (what he himself has called) a ‘relegation dogfight’ mindset counts for an awful lot.
In a nutshell Houlier could have handled dissenting players better, he should have been more tactically adroit and we’re a much better team than his stewardship indicates, injuries or not.
lots there, little to disagree with. in short, besides the results, houllier could have done a lot better, he hasn’t helped himself in many ways, but i still feel that of the candidates that were available, he was the best, and chopping him now will yield no better results than keeping him.
that said, i hear curbs is still available.
i do want to mention holloway though. it’s relevant of course because MON extracted a lot more effort than skill from players and it was effective. mostly. except when it wasn’t.
holloway has done a great job, he’s built his side, he’s brought them up, they’ve installed a siege-like mentality; “us against the world”, they have nothing to lose, they’ll go out swinging and doing it their own way.
great stuff. brilliant. a bit patronising maybe, but makes me smile nonetheless.
reminds me a lot of hull when they first came up, it will end in a similar way i suspect. very entertaining, very refreshing, but unsustainable at this level.
unlike brown though, holloway is likable, although i fear he risks over exposure with this rent-a-gob routine he seems to have taken up. alright in small doses if you ask me.
but the key point being that he’s the sort of personality that can get players to “play for him”. it’s a perfectly fair point, but i’ve got to be honest, the idea that these guys are picking up seven figure salaries but might not be putting in 100% because the gaffer isn’t one of those exuberant sorts really pisses me off.
that’s our money paying their wages.
nevertheless, MON built a team in his image, it probably shouldn’t be surprising that it’s not one that responds to a different type of personality.
i had hoped that houllier would be able to build on the good points from MON’s legacy, but it’s looking less likely every day. fortunately the youngsters seem to like him and they’ll be more receptive to ideas in any case.
the older ones will be replaced with new players more inline with houllier’s philosophy i guess. big shame it couldn’t have been a smoother transition and i agree that houllier should have used a more gentle approach.
one thing to consider though; many of the signings over the past few years specifically said they were sold on coming to villa to work with MON, how big a factor has that been and would any other manager have struggled in houllier’s shoes?
i’ve pondered that a lot lately, i think it may well be a significant factor.
Season is, and always was a write off the day MON left. We may not have seen it then, but consider this, MON left giving whoever the new manager was any time to pick a team, bring in players that suit his play-style and get a solid pre-season with new tactics under the teams belt. Houllier still should be given a chance. I don’t like how the team has been handled of late, but given the differing attitude to play from MON, it was always going to be a struggle to see MON’s team play under Houlliers mentality.
The main problems we see are poor defence and not enough moving the ball forward, the passing is frequent, and almost always sideways, passing sidewise doesn’t move a team forward, instead it lets your opposition get 10 men behind the ball. Play one striker with such a mentality and you are almost bound to see an empty net. Not only do sideways passes tend to stagnate any attack but they are more often than not the most intercepted, providing the opponents a free run at goals, catching our defence on the back foot, and often resulting in the ball in our own goal.
It’s hard to criticise Villa’s attack, as they have hardly had the chance this season, but as for defence and possession at the back, its been wasteful. Our problems come from the middle of the park and the back of the park, right now we have the worst defence in the league, Friedel is looking out of sorts in goal, and I don’t know if we have a back line, or a back shambles. The shambles in the back was probably hidden under MON as our centre backs were told to play more direct and hoof the long ball, relying on the speed of our wingers and strikers to make the difference. It might be ugly football, but at least it moved the ball forward.
Give GH another season (provided we don’t get relegated) to bring in some of his own players, I think then you can assess his role as manager after he makes some signings that actually matter
i agree. the question is how many of this team can play the houllier way?
i was hoping for more of an evolution than a revolution and it seems to me that houllier has tried to impose too many changes, too fast considering all the injuries he’s had to deal with.
longer term, that might prove to have been the right way and the benefits will be felt later, only time will tell.
if he gets the chance.
he hasn’t helped himself with some of the PR gaffes, but i think our media guys at the club need to be a bit more savvy. the return to anfield was a disaster waiting to happen, someone should have managed that.
but none of that matters if you get the results. without the results, anyone who wasn’t keen in the first place will leap on every loose word.
i mentioned above, redknapp called kaboul “stupid” for his sending off today, he’s probably right (i didn’t see the incident) and i doubt there will be much fall out. houller described lichaj as having a nightmare today and there’s all kinds of faux indignation from fans wanting to protect the delicate flower’s confidence.
gimme a break, he’s a well paid professional athlete in his early 20′s playing in the premier league, probably thinks his shit doesn’t stink.
still, it’s a convenient rock to bash someone on the head with if you don’t like them very much.
Ha, you’re showing a bit of passion there Dan.
I like it
Personally, I think Stuart makes some very good points, which you counter quite well.
Whatever, it all adds credence to my (somewhat joking originally) theory (posted on other sites) that GH is under orders to deliberately undermine/upset players, purely to get rid of them.
In which case, he’s doing a super job.
stuart, as always, makes some excellent points, it’s nice to be able to break out of the 140 character constraints of twitter.
as i say, i’m not trying to be a houllier apologist, i just think most of the complaints levelled at him could equally be pointed at MON, and often were, but what separates them is results.
it proves what we all knew all along; we’re in the results business, entertainment is secondary. we frequently joked in the past to mock complaints about MON’s brand of football that we could play attractive football like west brom and get relegated.
that’s actually a false dichotomy, but then here we are. but we’re not here solely because houllier is trying to install a different brand of football, that’s just something that hasn’t helped an already dire situation.
as i say, i think he might have been better served introducing his changes more gradually, especially given the mess he inherited, but it’s possible that it will be proven the right path to travel in the long run.
he may not be given that long run to prove himself, but i know he was hired by randy as part of a long term vision. not he as manager, obviously, but i think he’s trying to install a framework which will serve us well for the future.
as you suggest, some of what he’s done may well be part of that grand plan, we don’t know.
“…especially given the mess he inherited…”
Dan,
With all due respect, he inherited a team that finished 6th last season. Same squad as last year, except from Milner who was not sold by O’Neill.
We were doing fine, until Lerner decided to start doing things his own way.
very fair point, but somewhat simplistic.
regardless of blame, and i suspect there’s plenty to go round all the main protagonists, the fact remains that houllier walked into a team that had been managed by a caretaker for six weeks or so without any of the key coaches MON took with him.
the injury list, the ireland situation, the horrific wage bill which absolutely *must* have a hatchet taken to it; it’s one big mess IMO and houllier’s the one left to sort it out.
in many way, where we finished last season became irrelevant the moment MON spat the dummy. but when you consider the amount we’ve had to rely on albrighton, bannan, clark, hogg, delfouneso and lichaj, and even give a squad number to daniel johnson, the U18s cpt, just to fill the bench, it’s not exactly the team that finished 6th last year.
I’m reading a lot of good points both for and against. To be honest, I was a big supporter of GH when he was hired — nice passing football, scouting for players beyond England and all that — but this all assumes that we are still playing in the PL.
I think Randy Lerner made a common outsider mistake and hired based on a CV and not on a “plan”. A new manager needs not only the experience but he needs to know what he has to work with and have a plan to move the team to the next level. GH’s plan seems to be to tell the team to “pass more” and then criticise when this doesn’t work out. Granted, injuries have been an issue but the players look lost.
Perhaps as Badger says, the game plan is for a clear-out but I find that unlikely. I know Randy wanted to get the deadwood off the payroll but I don’t think he had any desire to bankroll a complete revamp of the team.
As to your question, Dan. Stick or twist? I just don’t know. GH hasn’t lost the plot, I just don’t think there ever was one to begin with — at least beyond bringing in new players. We don’t have the time to wait for a squad revamp and the players look unwilling to play for GH. Personally, I would be considering a parachute manager like Chelsea did with Hiddink. Big Sam for the remainder of the season? (I can’t believe I just wrote that, but there it is…)
my understanding is that randy, the board and GH have absolutely entered into this with the long term in mind, which is why houllier is highly unlikely to be fired any time soon so far as i can gather.
but then, as i said, randy’s in this too deep to risk championship football.
regardless though, the way i look at things, we completed pre-season under MON, went 5 league games plus europe under KMac, now 14 league games plus cups under GH, bringing in another manager before the end of the season is effectively blowing through four managers in a year.
the chances of that having a happy ending are remote to say the least. unless we can parachute in someone special, but realistically who?
I think you are right that Lerner and the board were thinking long-term but I never got any indication that the idea was a complete upheaval. Just a few months ago the thought process was to add a striker and a center-mid and we’d be back on track. I think the game plan was always to evolve into a better team. Shipping out players on high-wages is difficult — I think Randy is in for a hit to his pocket-book one way or the other. Either he funds a clear-out and rebuild of the team under Houllier or he pays to replace him.
On the parachute option, I don’t know if Sam Allardyce would go for it (and he is not my favorite) but he could take the current scraps and turn them into a battling, if one-dimensional, side. If all we care about is staying up, give him the 2nd half of the season. Or how about Benetiz, I hear he is available. He has PL experience (won some things with Liverpool) and he has proven experience as a follow-on to Hollier!
Here is a theoretical question for those of you with far more history than me. It seems that all too often a club gets built around a manager “personality” (like Dan mentions above). This team is built in MON’s image. Is this a requirement? For longevity of a club are we better off building a style and type of play that is representative of Aston Villa and not a particular manager?
This may be overly simplistic but it seems that we selected a manager that was the exact opposite of the management style previously in place. This means upheaval and almost always a set-back. If, as we all hoped, the new manager would build on the best parts of MON’s style then was any consideration given to finding someone who could do this? Maybe a manager would meshed well with the us-against-the-world approach but perhaps integrated more passing.
I don’t know but it seems that too much weight is given to CVs and “premier league” experience when it is the transition and building upon an existing foundation that matters more (as we are starting to realize).
Blimey Idaho, that’s a massive question.
I never wanted GH and made it known, as my major worry was that he wouldn’t suit us.
But I don’t profess to have known exactly why (it’s why I don’t get paid £40k a week to manage a footy club) at the time.
Call it 40 yrs of watching Villa instinctiveness, if you like.
I don’t think it’s a requirement that a club gets built around a personality, it’s more that it’s a natural thing.
And the previous manager’s attitude was “I expect plenty of covering up, with digs in the ribs, when they’re off their guard”.
Which is exactly what we got.
Effective, but it’ll never win you a boxing title, because it lacks that “extra”.
Of course, that opens up the whole “where can we reasonably expect to finish without the money?” thing, but hopefully you see my rubbish analogy.
The point I’m trying to make is, GH is more a thinking manager.
And my money says he’ll never suit the tools he has available to him, probably because the team isn’t anything like his image.
And a couple of players in Jan isn’t going to save us.
For him to do any good, we need the majority of our top, say, 15 players out.
And we don’t have time for that, imo.
If by some fluke, we manage to survive this season, then I’d be more tempted to keep for another season.
I haven’t really answered your question have I?
In short, I think the players being 100% behind you, whatever your footballing philosophy, is the most important thing.
Hence, yes, the team are in the manager’s image imo.
Idaho, a point I forgot about was that West Ham and Spurs have both been known as clubs where the players have been expected to play football the “right way” through all of my experience of watching footy.
Look at the current contrasting fortunes.
That’s what I meant about it being a massive question mate
Badger thanks for the brave attempt. I know it is a question that covers a lot of ground — your answer is helpful.
My biggest concern, and the reason for the question, is that we have decided to overhaul a team from a group of gritty brawlers into a “thinking man’s” footballing team. Okay, I’m all for it – I like nice footy as much as the next guy, but I wonder if anyone thought through what it would take to make such a transformation. Given the funds available it seems that Lerner expected GH to just teach the current slate of players and add a few bargains from the continent. Ambitious to say the least, more likely naive.
My concern is that we keep Houllier around and give him 2 transfer windows and tens of millions of pounds. Then if it doesn’t work out we shift to another manager, another strategy, another playing style and another set of players (each manager needs to bring in “his” men). When does this end? As you say, on a gut level it makes sense why teams like Arsenal, ManU and even Everton can stay at or near the top — the addition of new players is to plug holes and improve the team not shift the entire dressing room constantly from one set of skills (or mental approach) to the next. The only top team that seems to be an exception is Chelsea who go through Managers on a regular basis but then they cover for it by spending buckets of money. My guess is that Man City will be in the Chelsea mould but Villa clearly cannot do the same.
This is a long-winded way of saying that without significant resources we need to really think about maintaining consistency among the management staff. Randy was brought up in American Football and the NFL goes through coaches as fast as the Premier League but they have a salary cap and a draft process. The monetary impact isn’t the same. Stick or twist — it isn’t as easy a decision as many fans think.
great question. i think it’s something i’ll write about as an actual post sometime as it’s part of what i was hoping to see houllier laying the foundations for, but it’s a vision that needs to extend into decades more than years.
a couple of clubs that spring to mind that have or had a definite ethos about them is barcelona and liverpool. liverpool more so in the past, barcelona currently reaping the rewards.
when you look at what is clearly the best team in world right now fielding 7 or 8 starters from the academy with an ex-player on the sidelines, an academy product himself and cruyff protege, playing the mesmerizing brand of football they do, that just has to be a model worth trying to emulate.
wouldn’t want to emulate their financial model, but the benefits of tangible club philosophy are obvious.
I’d love to read the post Dan. Now that you mention Barca and the academy, I really think that AV has an opportunity to build a similar ethos. We might not reach the heights that Barca has but I would love to see it happen for our team with the academy grads coming up through the ranks. It builds on itself — produce successful grads (that play at AV, not just get sold-on) and you will attract more and better academy players. You see that in college football in the US — kids can go to any school so the best choose programs that are strong and have a sense of history.
Maybe the way we will cut wage bills is through relegation :p Jokes, If that happened I would be one sad Villan, however right now I still fill less disappointed as a Villan as a Liverpool supporter would be. Losing to Wolves at home, that’s pretty bad
Aussie…., to me, we reek of relegation.
Whereas Pool don’t, even if they’re struggling.
That said, better dead than Red for me
And perhaps GH, by some miracle, can turn it round.
I’d currently take a draw at home against Wolves this season.
And to think I was actually disgusted that we could only draw with them twice last season
We will be relegated.
There is no way they can create a new team in Jan. The more I hear about the training ground atmosphere, the more certain relegation appears.
The trouble is, most of our players do not have a reputation that relegation will damage. They were already ‘broken’ footballers who MON tinkered with and helped to mend.