goodymatt

Last season Vieira inherited a team with loads of ending contracts and players leaving the club. He oversaw a complete rebuild of that team and I thought Palace had a great season. We have a huge rebuild coming up this summer. This season he had his best player injured towards the end of his tenure and was managing the hardest fixture run. It’s easy to focus on no wins in 12 or 3 games with no shots on target, that is worrying in isolation. Hodgson comes in for the easiest run of fixtures and looks a genius. Pretty sure Koeman went 11 without a win or something similar in the season we finished 6th. Factoring in this will be a championship job, I don’t see anyone ‘higher profile’ that is realistically achievable. I wonder if Vieira one of Lavia’s heroes? 😉 I’m sure he’s leaving regardless!

Couldn’t agree more.

It’s frustrating that we could have had Eddie Howe or De Scerbi but got the timing of sacking Ralph so wrong. I stand by my earlier comment that is is possible to attract a PL quality manager at championship level. Fulham did it with Marco Silva. Newcastle kept Benitez at this level and Burnley kept Dyche the last time around. All 3 got their teams promoted at the first attempt. My opinion is that we need an experienced manager considering the significant amount of change we are about to undergo on both playing and organisational structure levels. The best option is one that had been successful at PL level but then recently had a failure (just as Marco Silva had). The only recent options I can think of that meet that criteria are: Brendan Rodgers - did so well for so long at Leicester. Close to title with Liverpool. Great football at Swansea too. For me this is actually the most logical appointment, despite his derisory comments about us being ‘on course to be a CL club’ and is having a ‘choice’ leading to us all pantomime hating on him. Rafa Benitez - this guy has all the experience in the world, including getting Newcastle promoted. Everton have been a shower and I would afford him a free pass on that. Patrick Vieira - not as successful as the others, sacked at last 2 clubs. However he did pretty well at rebuilding that palace team with young players and last season I thought they were a great watch. Even if that was down to palace recruiters he made it work until that tough run of fixtures when he was harshly sacked. All 3 of these would command more respect and give me more confidence than the ‘up and coming’ options muted. Like others, I see Potters failure at Chelsea being too big a drop to managing us in the championship next, especially with his financial situation post sacking.

Fulham managed to attract Marco Silva whilst in the championship. It is possible with the expected budget we will have that we can attract a manager that’s been good at PL level previously. I actually think our ‘strategy’ to look for up and coming managers will be the reason we don’t, rather than it being impossible.

Just to put an end to any further comments regarding bringing back our Nige

On one hand, the new owners managerial decisions to date have been disastrous (that’s being kind) and that gives you very little hope they can find the right guy. If we are competing against Leeds and Everton for example, it’s going to be even harder than usual to get out of the Championship too. On the other hand, we are likely to sell £150m+ worth of talent. All to clubs that will be in PL or equivalent you’d think. Some of the recruitment (mainly Lavia and ABK) were really good finds. Others I’d expect will be much more impactful at the championship level (Edozie and Sulemana should be very dangerous). It could be that at the Championship level we could have a lot more success with player recruitment. I’m holding out hope that should the sales be fully available then it’s an exciting challenge for a new manager to build a team in his image.

Interesting stats based view on how Saints are underperforming this season. 2nd worst in PL behind WHU.

I’ve still got a ticket available (senior concession).

Leeds have a lot of pace, so I’d rather see Salisu back in for Bednarek if fit to start. KWP is one of our best players so again should come in at RB. Otherwise I’m happy for consistency.

I have 1x Senior concession ticket for this game if anyone wants it at face value (£29)? Can meet at the ground. Pretty sure the ticket scanners are automatic so don’t think they actually check but worth noting.

Would you rather have Ruben Selles or Javi Gracia as your manager for these next 15 games? Interesting question ahead of this weekend. On one hand Ruben knows our teams well and the players clearly love him. On the other hand Javi Gracia has more experience as a manager and has kept Watford up and reached a cup final before. Personally it feels right to let Ruben have a go given his relationship with the players but I can’t help but think we are taking the bigger risk.

It was 100% this.

An Everton season ticket holder was saying to me yesterday at work that he’s very confident they stay up now with Dyche and that Saints spent a fair amount on ‘bargain basement signings’ and that’s why Everton chose not to buy them. He was obviously referring to Tall Paul and Kamal. Fitting the stereotype.

So what are we thinking about Javi Gracia looking likely to be Leeds manager for this game? I think I read that we beat his Watford team 1-0 when he managed them for the first time? I would have preferred to be facing a managerless Leeds, Gracia’s record is mid table (and a cup final), but seems to average 1 year at a club and has a mixed bag elsewhere.

Marsch was the logical appointment, this is the cheap one. I was impressed with how he spoke too but we need to see positive on field changes before we can suggest this is an acceptable option for 16 PL games, IMO. I’ll get behind him and the team as that’s what we need to do but I remain pretty skeptical that this is the right decision, especially as I think we could have got Marsch with the right offer.

I hope it is just for now and we are actually planning on replacing him ASAP.