Who Are Those Who Would Keep Hughton?

[flying high up in the sky! 1]

Yes, keep.

[Chip20 69]

Like many of the Hughton Outers, I have concerns about some aspects of our play and a few questions I would love to ask the guy about his tactics/choice of personnel on occasions. However, I am not a gambler by nature and, for me, that is exactly what a change of manager would be. I look back over the last 20 years or so of supporting my beloved club and balance how many times changing the manager has actually worked against how many times it hasn''t. Looking at it that way, the odds don''t appear that favourable to me. Personally, I think it would be madness to sack the guy who has a track record (regardless of how short it may be) of keeping his teams in their respective division (how many relegations does he actually have on his managerial CV?) and take a total shot in the dark in the hope of unearthing another Lambert or, dare I say it, Worthington.

No matter how frustrated I get with some of our performances and how much I disagree with his choice of tactics/personnel, the situation would have to be fairly desperate for me to gamble the future of my club and the people who run it on a roll of the dice (which is effectively what you are asking the Board/owners to do). I do not necessarily think Chris Hughton is the dog''s danglies, but I am not comfortable with the chances of his successor being any better. I know it has worked for others (Swansea, Southampton), at least in the short term, but it does not necessarily follow that it will for us. I would rather stick with the guy who is still keeping us afloat than the unknown quantity who promises greater things but who is not by any means guaranteed to deliver.

I know people talk about cutting out the rot before it sets in too deeply (and I can appreciate the logic), but I don''t think we have reached that point yet. Yes, heavy losses are deeply unpleasant to endure but the guy kept us in the Premier League last year and a third of the way into this season sees us out of the bottom three and (statistically) on course for survival (take a look at the projected season''s tally on statto.com). Every team has some seasons better than others; why should we be any different? When Newcastle replaced Hughton with Pardew it looked like a master stroke for the first season but the next they were struggling against the drop every bit as much as we were. They appear to be doing alright again now but can any one of you guarantee they can sustain it for the rest of the season?

Yes, I share the disappointment many people feel in some of our performances, given the players we invested in over the summer. But I have also been following football long enough to appreciate that performances will not always/consustently reflect the amount of money spent and that there will be peaks and troughs throughout any given season and over any given period of time. There have been very few teams who have been promoted into the Premier League since its inception and subsequently enjoyed nothing but a continued upwards trajectory as some of our fans appear to expect. In fact, I can''t think of a single one. Why some of our fans expect us to be so different where almost every other team has failed baffles me.

I agree with what Ricardo wrote above as well. None of us can directly influence who manages our club. We can whinge and whine and stamp our feet all we like, but the only way we can influence the thinking of the people who matter is by not paying for tickets anymore. If enough people do that, they will be forced to alter their strategy. Some posters on here come across as being full of their own self-importance; demanding that the people running the club listen to, and respond to, their wishes. We can register our dissatisfaction with mindless boos and message board rants, but none of that will carry any weight whatsoever and I think it is naïve to believe otherwise. Change will be made when the Board choose to make it, not when we ask them to. They are fans too and can see as clearly as the rest of us what is happening on the pitch. Furthermore, they have a vested interest that the rest of us don’t in giving the team the best chance of remaining in the Premier League. They will act when, in their view, it is expedient to; not just because a group of fans (no matter how large) express disapproval.

I’ve seen glimpses of some encouraging signs in some of our play this season and am heartened that some of our more positive results don’t look too shabby given how the table is panning out at the moment. I am a patient individual and I despair sometimes at the lack of patience exhibited by others, who aggressively demand change as soon as anything isn’t meeting their expectations. I’ve seen enough in my life to know that the grass isn’t always (or even usually) greener on the other side. We are no more entitled to an uninterrupted upward trajectory than any of the other 19 teams in this division; some seasons we will finish lower than others. I can’t make it be any different and nor can any of you, so why waste your energies stamping/booking/marching/protesting or whatever way you choose to express your disapproval?

The bottom line for me...is the risk of keeping Hughton (despite any of his apparent failings) greater than the risk of taking a punt on somebody else? For me that is currently a big, fat no.