I think if he brings in the loans he wants in the next week or so give him up to and including the Southampton game as that is a big 6 pointer if he loses that or there is no sign of getting out of the bottom 3 then come in Alan your time is up.
I think it is becoming pretty clear that the Board have opted not to sack Pardew and they are hoping that he can scrape a draw here or there, with the odd win, which keeps us in contention with the other bottom six clubs.
The decision to bring in some loan signings smacks of total short-termism to me. Yes, it might work if the right players come in but we would then have a team in which four or five of the key contributors did not belong to us.
The catch with that is if these players do well, they are then much more likely to get recalled and suddenly in come Moo2, Youga, Varney, Cranie etc etc.
We have seen, in my opinion, over the past two years what it means to lose a manager who was the perfect fit for our club and who, at the time, was one of the top three or four managers in the UK.
Results declined, our league position declined and the squad’s ability and quality declined. And here we are.
The same can be said at Board level in my opinion.
I think very warmly about Richard Murray, Bob Whitehand and Peter Varney but it has to be said, take away the success on the pitch which was provided by Curbs, and some of our directorial decisions look rather more ordinary.
For example, can we say that what we have had to do to reduce our debt levels is any different to any other club that falls out of the Premier League?
We have had several more years of Sky money than West Bromwich Albion, as a case in point, and yet they still retained the Geras, Greenings of this world and even forked out good money on the likes of Chris Brunt as they set about trying to regain their Premier League spot.
To be fair, we DID spend good money last season, but Pardew wasted each and every penny of it, which didn’t help, and so this summer it created a radical fire sale not dissimilar to the most desperate of clubs. This is what has surprised me the most.
Jerome Thomas may not have been the most popular of players but effectively handing him to Portsmouth for a token fee to simply get him off the wage bill is pretty grim.
What happened to our alleged sensible husbandry during our Premier League years? In the end, we spunked loads of money on dross via Dowie and AP and, consequently, I don’t see any difference between our plight and countless our other teams who allegedly didn’t watch their purse strings during the good times.
But, when will Pardew go? If we lose today he might go tonight. If we lose at Brum, he might go then. Who truly knows.
But my gut feeling is the Board are pinning their hopes on spending 100K or 200K on inflated wages for two or three loans over a few months rather than commit to a 2M pound clean sweep of our coaching team - as they can no longer afford it.
I might be wrong, and I hope I am, as I feel Pardew needs to go now. My fear is that we get a few false dawns which promise much but the combination of having no control over 40% of our eleven, as it is being ‘borrowed’ from other teams, alongside the fact that Pardew appears to have gone backwards as a coach, will see us looking over our shoulders all season.
Remember also that even if we can kick on and retain some useful loan players and eventually knock on the door of the top ten, can we call that success?
When Pardew was appointed his remit was to save us from relegation, if he possibly could, or, failing that, get us back up into the top flight inside two years before the Sky money runs out. It is looking likely he will fail to achieve his two year plan. Richard Murray described our 12th place last season as a ‘failure’ and he said Pardew was regretful of some of his decisions and had subsequently learned his lessons.
Has he? Does he have the ability to do that?
My own opinion is that if we take one point from our next two games, the Board’s decision to stick with him smacks of desperation and the sooner a buyer comes in the better – if we can find one who can make a real difference.
Incidentally, my heart goes out to Richard Murray regarding the Zabeel deal. He felt he had an amazing deal lined up for the Club and for us, as supporters, it was cruelly snatched away. He has dedicated many years to this club and it would have been a wonderful way to pass on the baton.
Everybody rushed to put their name to the 'we support the board' thread - including me.
But one's general support for the board as good chaps trying to do the right thing is not incompatible with believing they have got some major decisions spectacularly and woefully wrong over the past 2-3 years.
I am particularly resistant to the popular notion, which you identify , that we have somehow had it harder than other relegated teams or , indeed, championship sides in general. We haven't and I sometimes feel this notion is deliberately promoted in order to excuse our failure.
I believe in several cases we have had it worse than other teams that have been relegated.
We were an established premiership club before the season we got relegated. We therefore had the wage bill of an established premiership club, and signed players on contracts of an established premiership club.
In order to try and attract the players to push us on to "the next level" we had to spend more on wages. In fact, just to compete we had to spend more on wages. That Dowie was given more money than we could really afford didn't help matters, but we had a new manager to back, and with the new prem deal coming into effect the following season it was essential we were in the premiership to reap the benefits.
Therefore when we got relegated we were stuck with players on big contracts, with a massive shortfall to cover. We had to sell the likes of D Bent, Young etc to stay afloat as we needed the money from sales, and to reduce the wage bill. Other clubs such as west brom who did not stay in the premiership long enough to be looking towards moving on "to the next level" coud afford to keep their players as we were able to when we got relegated in 99.
On hindsight, our strategy to get us back up into the prem was not the correct one (spending lots of money on players who have since underperformed), however a balance had to be made between being financially stable, and being ambitious enough to get back up at the first attempt. That this has failed means that we have had to go through the fire sale that we did through the summer. I believe that this has caused us a disadvantage to other clubs in the championship. Clubs such as Burnley, Preston, Bristol City have built their squads, and team over a number of seasons. There is more unity, more fluidity and more style to their play than ours, because we have been disrupted for the last 2 summers. Add a manager who never knows his strongest 11, or 16, and who's answer to any problem results in bringing in more players, and more disruption ensues.
I'm not saying that these problems are not of our own making - in many cases they are - but in a league where hard work, togetherness and spirit gets you a long way, its not hard to see why we are having difficulty in it, compared to what would have been inferior clubs and teams just a few years ago.
I think that Tricky has it right. I always say that teams who come down after a long stay in The Prem have a harder job to do.
I generally like Pardew but the thing that annoys me most is that he still seems to see loan players as the answer. So in that respect I also like Sailor's points.
I didn`t know that but I have in fact done a bit of teaching for my job so I can now at least feel fully justified in my CL name. Did you know Jim Melrose was ginger !!!!!!!!! ?
[cite]Posted By: ShootersHillGuru[/cite]I didn`t know that but I have in fact done a bit of teaching for my job so I can now at least feel fully justified in my CL name. Did you know Jim Melrose was ginger !!!!!!!!! ?
Eeeerm - guru - you seem to forget that those other posts were whispers - people are going to be well confused when they read this thread now.
How do you know that I'm not Ginger? Come to that, how do we know that the real JM was not a Buddhist?
D`oh, Realised the whisper thing after I had pressed the button. As for confusing others.......Is my face bovvered. ;-) You really ginger ? Jim Melrose was a catholic. Played for Celtic didn`t he ? or if not a protestant who played for rangers.
Comments
A decent bloody winger or midfielder wouldn't go a miss
The decision to bring in some loan signings smacks of total short-termism to me. Yes, it might work if the right players come in but we would then have a team in which four or five of the key contributors did not belong to us.
The catch with that is if these players do well, they are then much more likely to get recalled and suddenly in come Moo2, Youga, Varney, Cranie etc etc.
We have seen, in my opinion, over the past two years what it means to lose a manager who was the perfect fit for our club and who, at the time, was one of the top three or four managers in the UK.
Results declined, our league position declined and the squad’s ability and quality declined. And here we are.
The same can be said at Board level in my opinion.
I think very warmly about Richard Murray, Bob Whitehand and Peter Varney but it has to be said, take away the success on the pitch which was provided by Curbs, and some of our directorial decisions look rather more ordinary.
For example, can we say that what we have had to do to reduce our debt levels is any different to any other club that falls out of the Premier League?
We have had several more years of Sky money than West Bromwich Albion, as a case in point, and yet they still retained the Geras, Greenings of this world and even forked out good money on the likes of Chris Brunt as they set about trying to regain their Premier League spot.
To be fair, we DID spend good money last season, but Pardew wasted each and every penny of it, which didn’t help, and so this summer it created a radical fire sale not dissimilar to the most desperate of clubs. This is what has surprised me the most.
Jerome Thomas may not have been the most popular of players but effectively handing him to Portsmouth for a token fee to simply get him off the wage bill is pretty grim.
What happened to our alleged sensible husbandry during our Premier League years? In the end, we spunked loads of money on dross via Dowie and AP and, consequently, I don’t see any difference between our plight and countless our other teams who allegedly didn’t watch their purse strings during the good times.
But, when will Pardew go? If we lose today he might go tonight. If we lose at Brum, he might go then. Who truly knows.
But my gut feeling is the Board are pinning their hopes on spending 100K or 200K on inflated wages for two or three loans over a few months rather than commit to a 2M pound clean sweep of our coaching team - as they can no longer afford it.
I might be wrong, and I hope I am, as I feel Pardew needs to go now. My fear is that we get a few false dawns which promise much but the combination of having no control over 40% of our eleven, as it is being ‘borrowed’ from other teams, alongside the fact that Pardew appears to have gone backwards as a coach, will see us looking over our shoulders all season.
Remember also that even if we can kick on and retain some useful loan players and eventually knock on the door of the top ten, can we call that success?
When Pardew was appointed his remit was to save us from relegation, if he possibly could, or, failing that, get us back up into the top flight inside two years before the Sky money runs out. It is looking likely he will fail to achieve his two year plan. Richard Murray described our 12th place last season as a ‘failure’ and he said Pardew was regretful of some of his decisions and had subsequently learned his lessons.
Has he? Does he have the ability to do that?
My own opinion is that if we take one point from our next two games, the Board’s decision to stick with him smacks of desperation and the sooner a buyer comes in the better – if we can find one who can make a real difference.
Incidentally, my heart goes out to Richard Murray regarding the Zabeel deal. He felt he had an amazing deal lined up for the Club and for us, as supporters, it was cruelly snatched away. He has dedicated many years to this club and it would have been a wonderful way to pass on the baton.
Everybody rushed to put their name to the 'we support the board' thread - including me.
But one's general support for the board as good chaps trying to do the right thing is not incompatible with believing they have got some major decisions spectacularly and woefully wrong over the past 2-3 years.
I am particularly resistant to the popular notion, which you identify , that we have somehow had it harder than other relegated teams or , indeed, championship sides in general. We haven't and I sometimes feel this notion is deliberately promoted in order to excuse our failure.
We were an established premiership club before the season we got relegated. We therefore had the wage bill of an established premiership club, and signed players on contracts of an established premiership club.
In order to try and attract the players to push us on to "the next level" we had to spend more on wages. In fact, just to compete we had to spend more on wages. That Dowie was given more money than we could really afford didn't help matters, but we had a new manager to back, and with the new prem deal coming into effect the following season it was essential we were in the premiership to reap the benefits.
Therefore when we got relegated we were stuck with players on big contracts, with a massive shortfall to cover. We had to sell the likes of D Bent, Young etc to stay afloat as we needed the money from sales, and to reduce the wage bill. Other clubs such as west brom who did not stay in the premiership long enough to be looking towards moving on "to the next level" coud afford to keep their players as we were able to when we got relegated in 99.
On hindsight, our strategy to get us back up into the prem was not the correct one (spending lots of money on players who have since underperformed), however a balance had to be made between being financially stable, and being ambitious enough to get back up at the first attempt. That this has failed means that we have had to go through the fire sale that we did through the summer. I believe that this has caused us a disadvantage to other clubs in the championship. Clubs such as Burnley, Preston, Bristol City have built their squads, and team over a number of seasons. There is more unity, more fluidity and more style to their play than ours, because we have been disrupted for the last 2 summers. Add a manager who never knows his strongest 11, or 16, and who's answer to any problem results in bringing in more players, and more disruption ensues.
I'm not saying that these problems are not of our own making - in many cases they are - but in a league where hard work, togetherness and spirit gets you a long way, its not hard to see why we are having difficulty in it, compared to what would have been inferior clubs and teams just a few years ago.
I think that Tricky has it right. I always say that teams who come down after a long stay in The Prem have a harder job to do.
I generally like Pardew but the thing that annoys me most is that he still seems to see loan players as the answer. So in that respect I also like Sailor's points.
Eeeerm - guru - you seem to forget that those other posts were whispers - people are going to be well confused when they read this thread now.
How do you know that I'm not Ginger? Come to that, how do we know that the real JM was not a Buddhist?
Clyde?