The Official Dean Smith Thread | Page 521 | Vital Football

The Official Dean Smith Thread

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Every managerial appointment is a gamble to a certain extent. The stars have to align to find the right man, for the right price and who can work with the players he has (or have the resources and support to bring in his own). We only need to look at the likes of ManUre and Spuds in the past five years to see evidence of clubs with massive resources being unable to get things right. Nobody would have thought that Moyes, VanGaal and Mourinho would be seen as managerial failures, given their prior success. Chelski, for all their trophies have been decidedly hit and miss (Villas-Boas, Benitez, DiMatteo for example). Even Guardiola had to spend a quarter of a billion pounds to try and get his defence right.
Then you look at Villa down the years. Who thought that John Gregory would be the right man? Journeyman utility player with very little managerial experience, plucked from Wycombe. Whereas O'Leary and Lambert were both viewed by many as the ideal candidates....
 
gmvillan said:
Every managerial appointment is a gamble to a certain extent. The stars have to align to find the right man, for the right price and who can work with the players he has (or have the resources and support to bring in his own). We only need to look at the likes of ManUre and Spuds in the past five years to see evidence of clubs with massive resources being unable to get things right. Nobody would have thought that Moyes, VanGaal and Mourinho would be seen as managerial failures, given their prior success. Chelski, for all their trophies have been decidedly hit and miss (Villas-Boas, Benitez, DiMatteo for example). Even Guardiola had to spend a quarter of a billion pounds to try and get his defence right.
Then you look at Villa down the years. Who thought that John Gregory would be the right man? Journeyman utility player with very little managerial experience, plucked from Wycombe. Whereas O'Leary and Lambert were both viewed by many as the ideal candidates....
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But Manure don't let the manager buy the players, or even have much of a say in it, and Spuds don't buy players if they can possibly help it.

I think you could say that Dean has had all the support here he could wish for, and the next manager probably will as well. Rafa wasn't a miss at Chelski; it was always a short term appointment.
 
Silhillvilla said:
No. Not falling into that trap. We've already covered this. Facts are smith is now an absolute liability and has to go.
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That's a cop out.

I 'll quote Ron Saunders in his programme notes for the home game v Southampton in 1981 after we had been beaten 2-0 by Spurs the week before and got loads of criticism and had been written off by the press.

Confucius said

"When you hark to the voice of the knocker
And listen to his hammer fall
Remember the fact
That the knockers act
Requires no brains at all"
 
sirdennis said:
That's a cop out.

I 'll quote Ron Saunders in his programme notes for the home game v Southampton in 1981 after we had been beaten 2-0 by Spurs the week before and got loads of criticism and had been written off by the press.

Confucius said

"When you hark to the voice of the knocker
And listen to his hammer fall
Remember the fact
That the knockers act
Requires no brains at all"
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Really not a good comparison, genuinely.
2021 , 35 games. Facts.
 
Dumble said:
The noises the club have made since NSWE took over, in terms of ambition, I would expect us to at least try for the very best managers we can realistically get. (Or even unrealistically, tbh)

We have to sell the shit out of the project.

And if we fail to get any of them, well at least we tried, and we then look at whoever is on our “tier 2” list of candidates.

Shall not be happy if we go straight in for a Terry, Potter etc. (Neither of which I would consider “tier 2”)
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It's starting to look more like 'noise' to be honest. The did great to get us out of the shit but last summer wasn't an exhibition of serious ambition at all.

IMO the task to genuinely crack the top 4-6 consistently is too big for us. It will take enormous spending consistently. It will take a lot of time to build the club up commercially to secure the profits required to spend so big.

I'd be quite surprised if the owners interest in the club will be sustained for the time this project will really take. I hope I'm wrong, but the task seems too big given where football has gone.
 
Pangloss said:
It's starting to look more like 'noise' to be honest. The did great to get us out of the shit but last summer wasn't an exhibition of serious ambition at all.

IMO the task to genuinely crack the top 4-6 consistently is too big for us. It will take enormous spending consistently. It will take a lot of time to build the club up commercially to secure the profits required to spend so big.

I'd be quite surprised if the owners interest in the club will be sustained for the time this project will really take. I hope I'm wrong, but the task seems too big given where football has gone.
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I’m starting to question this a bit bit lately, perhaps with how Lerner ended.

There’s no emotional connection, it’s not like they are fans. Lerner fudged a way to make out he’s a fan, however these categorically aren’t (and that’s fine with me). It could be egotistical to want to own a footy club but they don’t come across in that way.

So it must be either be commercial, or a toy. I doubt it’s a toy, they aren’t oligarchs or Arabs. If it is commercial, I haven’t seen any synergy with other clubs or brands they own. It’s not like we have Adidas making our kit which is where I believe one of them has a significant shareholding.

We aren’t trying to crack America from what I can see, perhaps that’s covid driven not allowing pre-season travel across the pond.

Then you factor in the inability to keep YKW and perhaps that’s the penny dropping this is a much bigger task than they imagined. You need to be a billionaire just to stand still, as we could invest hundred of millions as Everton have done, just to fluctuate between 8th and 12th.

You add into the mix clubs who do it the other way such as Leicester and West Ham who creep into those positions and you have to credit them for that, it’s a very diluted league table below the top 3.

On paper they’re fabulous owners, I like how professionally we are run versus what we have seen in the past. I just hope they are in it for the long run, and every now and again I’d like to hear from them or see them at games. I couldn’t tell you if they attend or not, I’ve no idea.
 
One if the things that's worried me about the last couple of games especially is that we're still playing as if we've Grealish out on the left. Everything is going down that side which is not the end of the world when you've one of the Premier leagues best players there but we don't have that anymore. Bailey may well turn out to be a very good player but even if he does his skill set is different to Grealish.

It sort of reinforces the accusation that we've run out of ideas. We look clueless going forward. A new manager would hopefully be able to look at what we've got and work out what the best way if playing is with the current squad instead of trying to replicate what we did with Grealish because that won't work.
 
Fucking hell he's gone. No messing about there.

Thanks for everything Deano. You've given me some memories that I'll cherish and help set this club back on the right path. I know he'll be hurting at this as this was his dream job but hopefully he knows how highly he's thought of. If he's ever in the opposition dug out at Villa Park I'm sure he'll get a great reception.
 
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