Got to be honest i can't stand Mick. He did a fantastic job here in those first few years no doubting that but by the end i couldn't stand him and when i hear him now it's exactly like that. He says some entertaining things but most of the time it's just outdated, narrow minded stubborn bollocks. Here's hoping Nuno guides us to our first victory over him since he left.
I said he did a fantastic job in the first few years but i just never warmed to him as a person. I know our fanbase can be dicks and were at times but i always thought he looked to bait them which wasn't needed. We did play well at times in the Premier League but again i was never convinced and even back then i was crying out for a manager that would attempt to do what Nuno has done. To be fair i've thought that with every manager since apart from Jackett for a period but he lost it too.
even back then i was crying out for a manager that would attempt to do what Nuno has done. To be fair i've thought that with every manager since apart from Jackett for a period but he lost it too.
The type of football we play now is pretty close what I've always ever wanted, within reason.
You've got to apply context to it, it simply wasn't realistic in our circumstances to be expecting a manager to rock up and play aesthetically beautiful yet incisive stuff with those tools.
I'm not sure what people expect, as if we've been blessed with amazing managers for the last 35 years. Mick has never pretended to be anything he isn't, we all know what you get from his teams. I would say in this league we were broadly positive and his promotion winning team didn't cost that much really:
Hennessey (£0, and the guts to stick with a 20 year old kid when he first came in)
Foley (£750k)
Stearman (£1.6m)
Berra (£2.3m)
Ward (£150k, there's a bloke pulled from the League of Ireland who has made a PL and international career and has Mick to thank for the bulk of it)
Kightly (£50k, nuff said, we could see he was worth literally 100x that inside weeks)
Henry (£100k)
Jones (£1m)
Jarvis (£750k, moved for £10m five years later)
Iwelumo (£400k)
Ebanks-Blake (£1.5m)
Under £9m there if my late night maths is right. And I could easily swap out Berra if I wanted being as he didn't even get here until late January and include Craddock (inherited) or Collins (£150k).
There are definitely aspects of his PL management you could criticise but to say you "couldn't stand him" is warped to me.
That Swansea game was when he lost a large core of the home support. If he'd said he'd picked the wrong side, he'd have got away with it, but trying to claim his substitutions were tactical genius and effectively calling the fans out meant his departure was a case of if not when. It's when I would have pushed the button as it was a week after being tactically outsmarted by QPR and Colin at home.