Paul Lambert confirmed as new manager!

[Lycan]

Iorfa I'll give you, but really he's only been good for half a season. For me, Hause has never shown anything more than a lower league centre half.

Hause looks like somebody somewhere has told him he's this composed ball-playing centre half but he doesn't quite believe it himself.

 

[Langers]

I am quite surprised how many people won't take into consideration that footballers are prone to loss of form and confidence and the current poor form of the likes of Batth and Iorfa in particular really shouldn't be the barometer by which their true level/ability is.

Iorfa will be a quality player. We've seen what he can do, he has bags of potential.

I don't think Danny Batth will ever be a premier league defender but he is good enough for where we currently are. Yes, he may well need someone better alongside him and for our medium/long term aspirations, he would need replacing.

I would drop both of them due to their current poor form which is costing us goals and points but I do find it disappointing how quick people are to criticise them and not take into consideration that it's their current form rather than their overall abilities that mean they need to be dropped for their own good.

And justifying booing Batth during games? I'm absolutely gobsmacked TBH.

 

[Premier Quality]

Agree with everything you've said there langers.

 

[Johnny75]

Last sentence is bang on. What I find most concerning is that Iorfa and Hause both seem to have deteriorated over the last year. As someone said on Saturday, Christie for Derby was everything we hoped Iorfa would be. I sincerely hope Lambert questions every single person on our backroom staff: I don't want anyone to be considered safe

I'd go one step further and bin them all. All aspects of our play have been badly coached especially keeping and defending.

I expect Lambert to come in with his own staff at some point and bring that level of management he had at Norwich with a technical #10 and exciting runners off the ball.

 

[Boozad]

A couple of extra decent first team coaches would probably make a fucking world of difference. Our coaching staff is threadbare.

 

[Jamwolf]

Classic stuff. Bring in 12 players when 5 would have done for now.
Then, new manager comes in and says the squad is too big and there'll be a cull, all before signing new players.
You can't beat continuity !
We are lucky to have Fosun. Hopefully, as a sensible fellow, Lambert will be able to cut the madness, and get a tighter squad.
The only real pity is that our best signing, Costa, is only on loan. We should certainly put a bid for him in the transfer window, otherwise we'll lose him.

 

[Penk Wolf]

Classic stuff? I can't remember too many other clubs bringing in 12 players, but there again my memory isn't what it used to be.

 

[Paddingtonwolf]

If it means he culls the dead wood that has been polluting the place for years I am all for it.

 

[Siggy]

A cull list for me might look like.....

Saville
Wallace
Batth - Never going to happen but I would bin him
Gladon - Why on earth we signed him I will never know
Ikeme
Williamson - Cancel contract??

To come in,

1 x 1st team GK - I suggest Emi
1-2 x experienced CB (British and knows championship)
1 x CM (box to box Colin Cameron style)
1 x Striker (an out and out goalscorer)

I am very much looking forward to JG getting back to fitness I think he will make a big difference.

 

[Quirkafleeg]

Ikeme can stay for me, however as back up keeper..

 

[Langers]

It's ridiculous how many people don't understand what a 12 month rolling contract is, when we've had pretty much all our managers since McCarthy on such a deal (I think Zenga was the only exception?)

Lots of comments about this being a 'short term appointment as he's only signed for a year'.

 

[Deutsch Wolf]

We gave Hoddle an initial deal to the end of 2004/5 and then he was on a rolling one year contract after that too.

If people don't understand after 11 and a half years then they're never going to.

 

[lemonjelly]

At least he has some agreement with perspectives of some of the recent football we've seen:

[“I came here with Norwich (in the Premier League and we had a great game, 2-2,” he said. “Then with Blackburn (last season) it was one of the most boring nil-nils...it was dreadful.

“No it wasn’t as good as dreadful, it was rotten.”

 

[Kenny]

It's ridiculous how many people don't understand what a 12 month rolling contract is, when we've had pretty much all our managers since McCarthy on such a deal (I think Zenga was the only exception?)

Lots of comments about this being a 'short term appointment as he's only signed for a year'.

Its the new Sell on fee.

How much did we lose out on again with all the times Keane was sold for big money?.....

 

[FrankMunro-371]

Its the new Sell on fee.

How much did we lose out on again with all the times Keane was sold for big money?.....

That is something I never have, and probably never will understand.

 

[pr0sl0]

We gave Hoddle an initial deal to the end of 2004/5 and then he was on a rolling one year contract after that too.

If people don't understand after 11 and a half years then they're never going to.

Same as people still not understanding how a head coach/director of football system works - kept seeing people interpret it as some kind of weird power play between Jackett and Thelwell (doing dirty work on behalf of Moxey, of course), and not simply a system change to one with a few more people involved in identifying and signing players.

 

[Tredman]

At least he has some agreement with perspectives of some of the recent football we've seen:

Good on him, that game was chuffing awful.

 

[pr0sl0]

Tbh I don't think January is going to be particularly busy in terms of transfers, because we have so many players out of contract in the summer it makes sense to start seriously rebuilding then. Batth's the only player in the final year of their contract to be given a new one so far, but we have *loads* of others in their final year.

Costa, John, Borthwick-Jackson, Stearman and Teixeira are on season-long loans; Edwards, Henry, Williamson, Ikeme, Saville, Evans, Price, Silvio and Ebanks-Landell are all free agents come June if nothing changes. That's 13 in total.

Of those we might try and get a permanent bid in for one of the loanees (Costa and/or Teixeira, judging from the season so far) but wouldn't be surprising to see them all go back. And of the players who are ours, Ikeme's worth keeping hold of, wouldn't be surprised to see Edwards wrangling another year extension, and Silvio's been decent so far, but otherwise it's a perfect chance to dump the Jackett-era midfield and start from scratch.

We might try and sell some of the unwanted players in January, but chances are they'll end up on loan somewhere (like Henry is now) until they find somewhere new.

 

[Tony Towner]

I wouldn't say our squad is more than a couple of players too big per se. It was wafer thin at the end of last season so needed both volume and quality. The problem we have is there's just a lot of averageness there. You can put Gladon, John, Wallace, Saville, Price and a number of others on the bench and they aren't really going to have an affect on the game. It's unbalanced though, a striker or two short, centre midfielder or two top heavy.

We also need to decide what we want from our youngsters. The club talk a lot and have again with the appointment of Lambert about their development and being the future, but they are being held back by both the averageness above and the new loan rules.

I'm not in favour of playing kids who aren't ready, but the likes of Ronan and Bright were in and around the first team squad in August 2015 but don't get a sniff now. What's the plan for them and who is better to be on the bench one of the aforementioned group of averageness or the likes of these?

 

[Deutsch Wolf]

I've said it a couple of times now, one of Ronan or Herc should really be on the bench ahead of Saville. We'd also have been much better off not bothering with Gladon at all and using Bright, Ennis or Wilson as back up for the first team.

Not sure anyone else is that close to being ready, although I'm pretty sure Flatt couldn't have performed much worse than Lonergan did for the majority of Saturday's game.