I accept that if the only way he could have been exceptional to your eyes would have been winning the Europa League / winning almost every league game, then OK, that’s your prerogative.
But personally, yes I see it differently.
Winning the EL would certainly have been exceptional, but he didn't.
But it wouldn't have taken all that much to have an "exceptional" end to the season
Don't lose to Liverpool +1
Beat Fulham +2
Beat Newcastle +2
Beat Bournemouth +2
That would have taken us to 12th/13th. None of those results are outrageous. Achieving something like that would have been "staying up with aplomb"
When he came in morale was on the floor on and off the pitch (reports of staff at the training ground etc being miserable too). He lifted everyone, brought bomb squad players back into the fold, and got us scoring more goals than we had all season.
His remit was to keep us up and win the Europa League.
He kept us with aplomb and took us all the way to a memorable semi-final first leg win against Villa, only to fall when half the starting XI were injured at a rowdy Villa park.
It feels extremely unfair to blame almost any manager for losing that one? We could have had Pep in charge and I would have still felt we were really up against it with MGW, Sangaré et al out of the fixture.
I don't dispute any of that. I am not sure where you have gotten this idea that I blame him for not winning the Europa League. I have never said that. Getting to the semi was far better than I ever expected and I applaud him for that. Not sure Marinakis does though.
Yes, he lifted some players psychologically and that is important. If you look at what I'm saying though- my concern is that this is often a short term impact. New players will come in who don't need to be lifted, players who didn't hate the previous manager and so won't bounce a bit at his leaving.
This could well be why he lasts such a short time at most clubs - perhaps the psychological impact he has is short-lived?
I don’t really understand your fascination with home wins. He got the wins he needed to get. And you have to really strain here to find fault in his stats.
My fascination is because I have a season ticket and go to home games.
I think it's ludicrous that there are people on this forum who don't think that's important
You have to send your home fans happy. That's number 1.
I heavily criticised Nuno for exactly the same in his first half season here.
I have not seen us win a Premier League game at home since December. I have seen us win 3 home PL games since March 2025.
So yeah, it's important to me. Your home games are your bread and butter. You can potentially beat a good spurs or Chelsea side at home- you can't keep hoping those clubs will be basket cases when you happen to play them away.
It’s as if you’re saying ‘OK how can I discount his total wins somehow, and how can I make him look as bad as possible.’
I don't think I am even trying to make Pereira look bad. I'm not having a go at him.
I am merely responding to people who are, in my opinion, exaggerating his record with us. You can feel as sad at his sacking as you like, I won't tell you that you're wrong to feel that way.
You took umbrage when posters would point to decline under Dyche - eg ‘look at this patch of fixtures where we didn’t win in 5’ - as missing the bigger picture.
I think you are doing the same here.
I mean, Dyche’s wins were front-loaded weren’t they? We did ok at the start then broadly descended to the point players wanted him out.
Not really?
We had one really bad spell around Christmas, but apart from that it was regular one win in three, pretty much. He was sacked not all that long after beating West Ham and Brentford away. I think he was sacked within about 3 games of the latter
Pereira was kind of the reverse. After an indifferent start in the league we built momentum right up until we were safe, scoring a lot of goals along the way.
A lot of goals in two games. Two halves, to be fair.
But he was also playing these games at the most high pressure point of the season? Week after week where it really was a case of, if we don’t get the points, WH or Spurs will overtake us. An absolute crucible.
Fair point, I don't deny that. But how is that exceptional?
Had De Zerbi been exceptional? He won 3 games I think, one of which the other team threw, one against a dismal relegated side, one against a team that didn't give a toss.
Very similar over a smaller number of games. Would you call him exceptional?
It feels a bit unfair to dismiss Spurs and Chelsea as basket cases or Burnley as an easy win.
Winning those games 3-0, 3-1 and 4-1 is very impressive in any season?
There are always times when it is good to play a team and when it is bad to play a team
Play Chelsea away in September and does Forest, even with Pereira, take a 3-0 lead? I doubt it. We came up to that game at a perfect time.
Go to Spurs under De Zerbi when they are fighting for their lives, and do forest win 3-0? I doubt it. We played them at the perfect time.
That is not to say the results don't deserve praise- of course they do. But luck was on our side with timing.
We were safe in the league and out of the Europa League?
We were not safe for the Newcastle game. Not at all.
We also had injuries to CHO, Murillo? His side performed really well at crunch time. Again it feels like you’re looking for excuses to criticise him here because the job was already done by the time we faced Man U, Bournemouth etc.
What is this mentality? The job already done?
Do you really think that just keeping this team up, which finished 7th last year, is an exceptional achievement? A team that hadn't been in the relegation zone since October?
And even in those games, we were robbed against Man U by a goal that shouldn’t have stood
Yes, but we never looked like winning the game. We deserved a draw, fully agree. But no shock was on the cards.
and we drew against a Bournemouth side chasing Europe in Iraola’s last game with key players out. That to me is a great result?
But we were 1-0 up at home, and to be honest lucky to leave that game with the draw.
Villa away we’ve covered. Brighton away was low point.
As for those Europa games, I mean I don’t really think it matters because we got the job done against both sides?
It matters if you are in the ground and paid for your ticket mate
That Fenerbahce game was the fucking pits
This is one area where we’ll never agree I guess because for me, the Dyche performance against Braga was one of the worst I’ve ever seen. Whereas for you that was just an unlucky defeat.
Have I actually said it was an unlucky defeat?
I wasn't there so generally don't comment. I have commented on the games I attended.
I think you’ll probably find more supporters who share my view on that but OK, we were both watching the same games and your opinion is your opinion.
No I wouldn’t. But again, I feel you’re stretching really hard to criticise the guy here. In what world does a poorer half of football even matter if you win the game 4-1 or 5-0?
It’s very, very normal for sides to take their foot off the gas after battering the opposition in one half because the game is already won.
Look at the number of times a City or a Chelsea will be 4-0 up first half. They don’t tend to go onto win 8-0. They tend to just see out the game professionally, as we did.
Yeah, I get that. I have said that myself. But that works if you are talking about performances, when I was answering a point about goalscoring.
When someone is saying "we scored more goals than Man City" or something like that, context is important. About half of those goals were in two half game blitzes. It wasn't the norm and it wasn't typical. We were scoring more, yeah- but the hyperbole on stats is based on two outlier halves.
