POLL: Our manager next season

[93vintage 16]

1

[Row D Seat 7 0]

Really pleased that there is still so much support for AN. Remember how Ranieri was written off? Not saying we''ll win the PL anytime soon but things can change quickly in this game.

[Branston Pickle 3,636]

...it is a little odd/ironic that this thread, which shows the vast majority of us back AN, seems to be sharing the limelight today with another entitled ''If we get relegated Alex Neil needs to be sacked''!

[Green and Yellow 0]

2

[Van wink 2,994]

1.5

[If wed only kept Howie.. 3]

1

[Lord Horn (again) 129]

Late arrival here but definitely (1), given what he achieved in the Championship last time out. If we''d have managed to get someone like Klose in last Summer we would be mid-table so the Board needs to look at itself and its recruitment policy!!!

[Row D Seat 7 0]

If we are relegated this season, I do put the blame largely at the boards door for poor recruitment and poor timing of our recruitment. It will be yet another avoidable relegation all over again, two in three years. Alex Neil has made mistakes this season but the board just didn''t back him last summer, and that''s where the problem lies.

[Murphy and the Bricks 0]

1 for me

[hogesar 9,618]

[quote user="Row D Seat 7"]If we are relegated this season, I do put the blame largely at the boards door for poor recruitment and poor timing of our recruitment. It will be yet another avoidable relegation all over again, two in three years. Alex Neil has made mistakes this season but the board just didn''t back him last summer, and that''s where the problem lies.[/quote]

I don''t think that''s fair, as it was quite clear we made bids on a few high profile targets. The only thing you could criticise the board for is maybe not having adequate back-up transfer targets which we''d have more chance of landing. Even then, we don''t know that wasn''t the case.

[Newport Canaries 0]

(1)

[Feedthewolf 4,844]

[quote user="hogesar"][quote user="Row D Seat 7"]If we are relegated this season, I do put the blame largely at the boards door for poor recruitment and poor timing of our recruitment. It will be yet another avoidable relegation all over again, two in three years. Alex Neil has made mistakes this season but the board just didn''t back him last summer, and that''s where the problem lies.[/quote]

I don''t think that''s fair, as it was quite clear we made bids on a few high profile targets. The only thing you could criticise the board for is maybe not having adequate back-up transfer targets which we''d have more chance of landing. Even then, we don''t know that wasn''t the case.

[/quote]Totally agree with this hogesar, and I said the same at the time. It''s unfair to blame either Neil or the board completely, but it isn''t as simple as him not being backed. Imagine you''re an agent, and one of your players has an offer in June from a new Premier League club with the smallest wage budget in the division, an extremely inexperienced manager and playing in a small, unfashionable city in the countryside. Take off the yellow-and-green specs and put yourself in that agent''s position – what would you do? You''d tell him to hold fire and wait for better offers. Someone of Klose''s proven top-flight and international pedigree was never going to sign for us early in the window unless we blew our wage structure out of the window, which would have had the knock-on effect of either demoralising existing players within that structure, or costing us a not-so-small fortune in wage hikes.I know this opens the old can of worms about prudence versus ambition, but with things as they were last summer, if we were going to sign a player of Klose''s calibre it was always going to go down to the wire. We tried and we failed, due the the combination of factors mentioned at the start of my post.

[norfolkbroadslim 223]

[quote user="Branston Pickle"]...it is a little odd/ironic that this thread, which shows the vast majority of us back AN, seems to be sharing the limelight today with another entitled ''If we get relegated Alex Neil needs to be sacked''![/quote]If you read the other thread you will see that this thread spawned as a result of the other.  Oh and btw bor, don''t vote for me, there''s a good lad.

[93vintage 16]

[quote user="Feedthewolf"][quote user="hogesar"][quote user="Row D Seat 7"]If we are relegated this season, I do put the blame largely at the boards door for poor recruitment and poor timing of our recruitment. It will be yet another avoidable relegation all over again, two in three years. Alex Neil has made mistakes this season but the board just didn''t back him last summer, and that''s where the problem lies.[/quote]

I don''t think that''s fair, as it was quite clear we made bids on a few high profile targets. The only thing you could criticise the board for is maybe not having adequate back-up transfer targets which we''d have more chance of landing. Even then, we don''t know that wasn''t the case.

[/quote]Totally agree with this hogesar, and I said the same at the time. It''s unfair to blame either Neil or the board completely, but it isn''t as simple as him not being backed. Imagine you''re an agent, and one of your players has an offer in June from a new Premier League club with the smallest wage budget in the division, an extremely inexperienced manager and playing in a small, unfashionable city in the countryside. Take off the yellow-and-green specs and put yourself in that agent''s position – what would you do? You''d tell him to hold fire and wait for better offers. Someone of Klose''s proven top-flight and international pedigree was never going to sign for us early in the window unless we blew our wage structure out of the window, which would have had the knock-on effect of either demoralising existing players within that structure, or costing us a not-so-small fortune in wage hikes.I know this opens the old can of worms about prudence versus ambition, but with things as they were last summer, if we were going to sign a player of Klose''s calibre it was always going to go down to the wire. We tried and we failed, due the the combination of factors mentioned at the start of my post.[/quote]What you''re saying is that we lack money and are hence struggling to compete. I think most posters'' solution to this is to spend more money or hope that a new manager can achieve more on the same budget.

[Van wink 2,994]

We lack money to compete, what would help here is if we invested in a top quality recruitment team to give us the best opertunity in the transfer market.

What we did though was to enter the summer market ill prepared and hence we fell well short of what was needed, you can''t blame the manager for that, the finger has to be pointed at the "football board" ( or whatever it''s called) or the people that were supposed to oversee its activity.

[93vintage 16]

[quote user="Vanwink"]We lack money to compete, what would help here is if we invested in a top quality recruitment team to give us the best opertunity in the transfer market.

What we did though was to enter the summer market ill prepared and hence we fell well short of what was needed, you can''t blame the manager for that, the finger has to be pointed at the "football board" ( or whatever it''s called) or the people that were supposed to oversee its activity.[/quote]The recruitment team fiasco didn''t help, but even if this had been done properly I''m not so sure we''d have been much better off. It''s an obvious error, hence its significance tends to get elevated.

[Feedthewolf 4,844]

[quote user="93vintage"]What you''re saying is that we lack money and are hence struggling to compete. I think most posters'' solution to this is to spend more money or hope that a new manager can achieve more on the same budget.[/quote]Yes, I am saying we lack money and are hence struggling to compete. Most posters hope a new manager can achieve more on the same budget? I see no evidence to support that, as around 90% of posters who responded to Bor''s thread said they wanted to stick with Neil. Do most posters see the solution as spending more money? You''d have to ask them. I would imagine we already stretched the ceiling of our wage structure to accommodate Klose and Naismith, and spending even more on wages and transfers would leave us open to financial difficulties in the event of relegation. I get that this is a circular argument, but having just dragged ourselves out of financial oblivion in the last five years, I''m probably more cautious than you in how much we should gamble to win big on Premiership survival (for one more season, at least).[quote user="Vanwink"]We lack money to compete, what would help here is if we invested in a

top quality recruitment team to give us the best opertunity in the

transfer market.

What we did though was to enter the summer market ill prepared and

hence we fell well short of what was needed, you can''t blame the manager

for that, the finger has to be pointed at the "football board" ( or

whatever it''s called) or the people that were supposed to oversee its

activity.[/quote]What do you actually know about the recruitment team, its history, its constituent parts and its modus operandi? I know we appointed Lee Darnbrough, who had previously presided over a poor window with Burnley, but I believe Burnley were hindered by the same lack of budget we have, which would at least give him some knowledge of working with limited resources?As I said in my previous post, a combination of the lowest budget in the league, a very inexperienced manager and an unfashionable club/location were the causes of our failure to strengthen significantly enough last summer. Most people agree we should stick with the manager, the location we cannot change, which leaves only the question of budget. Unless we decide to attract additional/external investment, simply spending more money is a risk that the board will not sanction (and rightly so in my opinion, for what it''s worth).

[Van wink 2,994]

Ftw

"What do you actually know about the recruitment team, its history, its constituent parts and its modus operandi? I know we appointed Lee Darnbrough, who had previously presided over a poor window with Burnley, but I believe Burnley were hindered by the same lack of budget we have, which would at least give him some knowledge of working with limited resources?"

I know that AN has publicly stated that we didn''t have a proper recruitment team in place for the summer window. A shocking admission that confirmed what many of us judged as a shambolic and poorly conducted window.

[andy cousins 9]

1

[Hissing Sid 154]

1

[93vintage 16]

I''d agree with all that FTW. I''d say that all things remaining equal we need to stick with the manager and try and be more canny in the transfer market (as I''ve posted elsewhere).If and when we do change manager, continuity via the football board, Colney staff, playing style and transfer strategy would be sensible. Switching manager on a whim is bad enough, but breaking continuity would be worse.

[Feedthewolf 4,844]

[quote user="93vintage"]I''d agree with all that FTW. I''d say that all things remaining equal we need to stick with the manager and try and be more canny in the transfer market (as I''ve posted elsewhere).If and when we do change manager, continuity via the football board, Colney staff, playing style and transfer strategy would be sensible. Switching manager on a whim is bad enough, but breaking continuity would be worse.[/quote]Trouble with that, is that any manager who comes in will invariably have his own ideas about backroom staff, playing style, strategy etcetera. Unless you just end up appointing a ''yes man'' who won''t challenge the status quo, and that doesn''t bode well for harmony and progress. Therefore I think it''s vitally important that we keep Neil unless our chances of going back up have evaporated completely (assuming we go down, of course, which is still far from guaranteed). Also, if we do go down, Neil will have to cut his cloth accordingly and most likely sign players with a lower reputation from lower leagues - I think he would do really well with this, in the same way that Lambert took the likes of Tierney, Crofts, Morison et al and actually made them capable of playing in the top flight. Remember last time we were in the Championship he had pretty much no transfer input at all (Dorrans on loan and Tony Andreu, was there anyone else signed last January?). Given a bit of budget from the inevitable player sales, I think he could work wonders with young, upwardly mobile players who have yet to experience the top flight. He already has one promotion to the Prem under his belt, plus a lot of charisma and self-belief. I simply cannot see him failing hard next season, whichever division we''re in.[quote user="Vanwink"]I know that AN has publicly stated that we didn''t have a proper

recruitment team in place for the summer window. A shocking admission

that confirmed what many of us judged as a shambolic and poorly

conducted window.[/quote]Can you find a link to that statement? I''m not second guessing you, just wanted to refresh my memory on what exactly he said on the subject.

[Clever Farke 64]

1.

[morty 0]

[quote user="Feedthewolf"][quote user="93vintage"]I''d agree with all that FTW. I''d say that all things remaining equal we need to stick with the manager and try and be more canny in the transfer market (as I''ve posted elsewhere).If and when we do change manager, continuity via the football board, Colney staff, playing style and transfer strategy would be sensible. Switching manager on a whim is bad enough, but breaking continuity would be worse.[/quote]Trouble with that, is that any manager who comes in will invariably have his own ideas about backroom staff, playing style, strategy etcetera. Unless you just end up appointing a ''yes man'' who won''t challenge the status quo, and that doesn''t bode well for harmony and progress. Therefore I think it''s vitally important that we keep Neil unless our chances of going back up have evaporated completely (assuming we go down, of course, which is still far from guaranteed). Also, if we do go down, Neil will have to cut his cloth accordingly and most likely sign players with a lower reputation from lower leagues - I think he would do really well with this, in the same way that Lambert took the likes of Tierney, Crofts, Morison et al and actually made them capable of playing in the top flight. Remember last time we were in the Championship he had pretty much no transfer input at all (Dorrans on loan and Tony Andreu, was there anyone else signed last January?). Given a bit of budget from the inevitable player sales, I think he could work wonders with young, upwardly mobile players who have yet to experience the top flight. He already has one promotion to the Prem under his belt, plus a lot of charisma and self-belief. I simply cannot see him failing hard next season, whichever division we''re in.[quote user="Vanwink"]I know that AN has publicly stated that we didn''t have a proper

recruitment team in place for the summer window. A shocking admission

that confirmed what many of us judged as a shambolic and poorly

conducted window.[/quote]Can you find a link to that statement? I''m not second guessing you, just wanted to refresh my memory on what exactly he said on the subject.[/quote]I could be wrong, but I don''t think I remember it being worded quite like that.

[westcoastcanary 173]

Vanwink wrote: "I know that AN has publicly stated that we didn''t have a proper recruitment team in place for the summer window. A shocking admission that confirmed what many of us judged as a shambolic and poorly conducted window. "

I don''t find it a "shocking admission" at all; on the contrary I find it completely understandable. How do you think a club which is relegated from the EPL and in one stroke has its income reduced by a minimum of 50%, and which furthermore is completely reliant on its income (as opposed to also having the buffer of owner funds available), is going to afford to maintain, let alone expand and improve, its football infrastructure while at the same time giving priority to retaining as strong a squad as possible to give us the best chance of an immediate return to the EPL?

To all of which can be added the fact that, when we first arrived back in the EPL under Lambert, there was very little of the necessary infrastructure in place because of the dire financial situation in the preceding several seasons. It costs a lot of money to build up and maintain a scouting network, a good physio department, an analytics and performance group, and so on, especially when you have given priority to having a Class 1 Academy.

Exacerbating all that was the fact that such progress as had been made in these respects was largely down to Chris Hughton, who knew what was needed in these respects and whose experience and contacts helped in making a start on the rebuilding process (not to mention his managing to keep us up in his first season, an achievement which transformed the club''s financial position). This is just another respect in which blindness to anything other than the quality of the football has left a trail of damage from which we are far from recovered.

[Chippy Minton 10]

(1)

[Badger 2,405]

1.He has a 100% record of achieving promotion from the championship.

[PurpleCanary 5,554]

[quote user="westcoastcanary"]

Exacerbating all that was the fact that such progress as had been made in these respects was largely down to Chris Hughton, who knew what was needed in these respects and whose experience and contacts helped in making a start on the rebuilding process (not to mention his managing to keep us up in his first season, an achievement which transformed the club''s financial position). This is just another respect in which blindness to anything other than the quality of the football has left a trail of damage from which we are far from recovered.

[/quote]Hughton took over a squad that had (under Lambert) finished on 47 points in the Premier League. The next season, despite supposed strengthening with the likes of Snodgrass, Tettey and Bassong, he dropped to 44 points, and the season after, despite being given a record (by a large margin)  amount of money to spend, he dropped to 33 points.* The Hughton "achievement" that transformed our financial position was getting us relegated, which saw our income fall off really quite a steep cliff.---*Actually that is being generous to Hughton. Adams outperformed Hughton by getting a point in those last five games. Based on the reverse fixtures earlier in the season we would have lost all five and finished on 32 points.

[kentcanary 0]

1

[Hank shoots Skyler 2,094]

good posts FTW