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The effect og sacking you manager in Premier League this season on 18:03 - Apr 8 by Shaky
I'll grant you there is some truth to the claim that performances have improved following Laudrup's sacking, but I think it is at least equally plausible this has been due to the injury list substantially clearing up and considerably fewer fixtures following our ignoble exit from a couple of cup competitions, rather than any Monk affect.
In my view people also completely fail to grasp that getting the large influx of new personnel this year to gel is something that takes time, especially when integrating a new star striker.
However, the point I want to make is this; in my view sacking Laudrup was a highly questionable decision but it was at least debatable. Something that reasonable people can disagree on.
But appointing Monk was objectively speaking f* cking nuts, given widespread jitters about prem survival and his total lack of any experience whatsoever -- Sheer madness as far as I can see.
Now a a substantial number of people are espousing the view that it's time to move on and back the club, which is all very well but I believe people should be held accountable for their actions where possible, and looking at the major decisions I have witnessed during the relatively brief time I have supported Swansea I am not impressed.
Sponsorship deal last summer - Cock-up Stadium expansion - fail Ki recall terms - farcical and embarrassing Ticketing blunder - numerous Manager appointment - WTF?
Can anybody think of anything positive off-field that has been achieved in the last 18 months? Anybody?
Clearly the board has done a lot for the club since they took control, but as a quid pro quo do people really propose to allow them unlimited leeway in cocking up without starting to ask hard questions?
"Can anybody think of anything positive off-field that has been achieved in the last 18 months? Anybody?"
Hmm... you may have a point there Shaky... Oh hang-on... 1: Completion of the new centre of excellence training complex at Landore. 2: Completion of the clubs new training complex at Fairwood. 3: Sacking Laudrup 4: Like others have said, stock rotation of the refrigerated pate.
It's just the internet, init.
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The effect og sacking you manager in Premier League this season on 12:12 - Apr 9 with 1310 views
The effect og sacking you manager in Premier League this season on 11:15 - Apr 9 by Starsky
"Can anybody think of anything positive off-field that has been achieved in the last 18 months? Anybody?"
Hmm... you may have a point there Shaky... Oh hang-on... 1: Completion of the new centre of excellence training complex at Landore. 2: Completion of the clubs new training complex at Fairwood. 3: Sacking Laudrup 4: Like others have said, stock rotation of the refrigerated pate.
Correct me if I'm wrong here Starsky, but unless you're implying that Chairman Jenkins split his time between sites to personally ensure construction proceeded off the front foot and at a high tempo, I think you'll find that the decisions to build those facilities was taken sometime before my 18month deadline.
And not before time, from what I can gather of the prevailing mood
Indeed if you really think the decision to build adequate, modern training facilities for a professional football club is an indication of management achievement, let's just say we have substantially differing views on how to set targets .
The effect og sacking you manager in Premier League this season on 12:12 - Apr 9 by Shaky
Correct me if I'm wrong here Starsky, but unless you're implying that Chairman Jenkins split his time between sites to personally ensure construction proceeded off the front foot and at a high tempo, I think you'll find that the decisions to build those facilities was taken sometime before my 18month deadline.
And not before time, from what I can gather of the prevailing mood
Indeed if you really think the decision to build adequate, modern training facilities for a professional football club is an indication of management achievement, let's just say we have substantially differing views on how to set targets .
Do you ever go to the Liberty?
The first ever recipient of a Planet Swans Lifetime Achievement Award.
The effect og sacking you manager in Premier League this season on 12:12 - Apr 9 by Shaky
Correct me if I'm wrong here Starsky, but unless you're implying that Chairman Jenkins split his time between sites to personally ensure construction proceeded off the front foot and at a high tempo, I think you'll find that the decisions to build those facilities was taken sometime before my 18month deadline.
And not before time, from what I can gather of the prevailing mood
Indeed if you really think the decision to build adequate, modern training facilities for a professional football club is an indication of management achievement, let's just say we have substantially differing views on how to set targets .
Typical response from someone who loses the argument and then changes the goal posts, you asked for evidence, Starsky provided it.
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The effect og sacking you manager in Premier League this season on 15:44 - Apr 9 with 1242 views
The effect og sacking you manager in Premier League this season on 02:54 - Apr 9 by Catullus
So the club allowed the situation to fester? Spratty, are you saying we should've sacked Laudrup sooner? And being pragmatic, our performances were getting worse and our manager kept talking us down. I'd long since had enough of his negativity.
"So the club allowed the situation to fester? Spratty, are you saying we should've sacked Laudrup sooner? "
Yes Cat that is precisely one of my options. What gave it away? Was it my comment (below) made earlier in the thread. Or all the other times I have mentioned it. Oh no you thought I had slipped up ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Why was this not sorted out earlier. Why did we even embark on this season at all with Laudrup if relationships were bad. The stats and returning fitness says there is no way we were going down so why not wait to the end of the season save souring a golden period in the clubs history and potential benefits of future relationships - not to mention potential compo and lost compo from ML moving on. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Certainly an option given Huw seemed to want to communcate with ML by national press. A grudge like that was always going to hurt our club. We then could have brought in a suitably qualified manager from the start.
However a much more viable and cost effective solution would have been to put that behind them and sort any differences out for the benefit of the club and move forward with the Chairman supporting the manager (rather than, as it seems, renegade players keen to further their own agenda). Again we could have then parted amicably at the end of the year, possibly picking up a few million compo (rather than have to pay it, in what is the compo equivalent of losing a 6 pointer).
"And being pragmatic, our performances were getting worse and our manager kept talking us down. I'd long since had enough of his negativity."
What is hard to understand that we are not going to always play sparkling football with 50% more fixtures and massive key injuries (up to 6 1st pick players and both Bony and Michu for one period). What logic exists comparing that with a fully fit team and much more time between games. I also imagine it is hard to manage with a couple of knives in your back. As I said the stats show that Laudrup was on course to comfortably keep us up even with the major key injuries and massively crowded schedule. So why p!ss away millions just as the team is coming back to full fitness. Could have gone to the end of the season and parted amicably.
As for always putting the team down - Chelsea should sack Mourinho then. ML was widely admired and coveted for his honesty and class
Contrast and compare openly slagging past managers off. Ripping into Angel for cowardice on national TV.
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The effect og sacking you manager in Premier League this season on 16:04 - Apr 9 with 1229 views
Works for some teams but not for others. I have a lot of time for Gary monk but we were exposed against palace and WBA by more experienced managers and I am concerned about mourinho 's tactical nous.
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The effect og sacking you manager in Premier League this season on 16:33 - Apr 9 with 1220 views
The effect og sacking you manager in Premier League this season on 15:44 - Apr 9 by Spratty
"So the club allowed the situation to fester? Spratty, are you saying we should've sacked Laudrup sooner? "
Yes Cat that is precisely one of my options. What gave it away? Was it my comment (below) made earlier in the thread. Or all the other times I have mentioned it. Oh no you thought I had slipped up ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- Why was this not sorted out earlier. Why did we even embark on this season at all with Laudrup if relationships were bad. The stats and returning fitness says there is no way we were going down so why not wait to the end of the season save souring a golden period in the clubs history and potential benefits of future relationships - not to mention potential compo and lost compo from ML moving on. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Certainly an option given Huw seemed to want to communcate with ML by national press. A grudge like that was always going to hurt our club. We then could have brought in a suitably qualified manager from the start.
However a much more viable and cost effective solution would have been to put that behind them and sort any differences out for the benefit of the club and move forward with the Chairman supporting the manager (rather than, as it seems, renegade players keen to further their own agenda). Again we could have then parted amicably at the end of the year, possibly picking up a few million compo (rather than have to pay it, in what is the compo equivalent of losing a 6 pointer).
"And being pragmatic, our performances were getting worse and our manager kept talking us down. I'd long since had enough of his negativity."
What is hard to understand that we are not going to always play sparkling football with 50% more fixtures and massive key injuries (up to 6 1st pick players and both Bony and Michu for one period). What logic exists comparing that with a fully fit team and much more time between games. I also imagine it is hard to manage with a couple of knives in your back. As I said the stats show that Laudrup was on course to comfortably keep us up even with the major key injuries and massively crowded schedule. So why p!ss away millions just as the team is coming back to full fitness. Could have gone to the end of the season and parted amicably.
As for always putting the team down - Chelsea should sack Mourinho then. ML was widely admired and coveted for his honesty and class
Contrast and compare openly slagging past managers off. Ripping into Angel for cowardice on national TV.
The bulk of your argument here though is based on supposition. You've no evidence that "a much more viable and cost effective solution would have been to put that behind them and sort any differences out for the benefit of the club". We have no idea what the relationship was like behind the scenes. How do you know this was a viable option?
The board said things had reached a head and so acted. Some people will agree with this decision, others won't. But none of us know what things were really like behind the scenes.
I'm not sure there's even a justifiable link between number of games and acceptable quality of football. We played 55 competitive games in our promotion season without an obvious deterioration in quality. We're on course for playing 54 this season. We played far fewer games last season, yet performances and results were still poor after the CCC final. So I don't think you can explain away the drop in quality of football solely by the number of games we've had to play. More a case that the players weren't fit enough to play those games, and that is an issue with conditioning (one of the areas the board publicly criticised).
The effect og sacking you manager in Premier League this season on 16:49 - Apr 9 by LeonisGod
The bulk of your argument here though is based on supposition. You've no evidence that "a much more viable and cost effective solution would have been to put that behind them and sort any differences out for the benefit of the club". We have no idea what the relationship was like behind the scenes. How do you know this was a viable option?
The board said things had reached a head and so acted. Some people will agree with this decision, others won't. But none of us know what things were really like behind the scenes.
I'm not sure there's even a justifiable link between number of games and acceptable quality of football. We played 55 competitive games in our promotion season without an obvious deterioration in quality. We're on course for playing 54 this season. We played far fewer games last season, yet performances and results were still poor after the CCC final. So I don't think you can explain away the drop in quality of football solely by the number of games we've had to play. More a case that the players weren't fit enough to play those games, and that is an issue with conditioning (one of the areas the board publicly criticised).
Supposition — I think not ………………………..
“You've no evidence that "a much more viable and cost effective solution would have been to put that behind them and sort any differences out for the benefit of the club" ”
I think you will find it is a universally accepted truth that it’s better to work together than against each other — Thus more viable for our club — more cost effective in avoiding bleeding millions from our club in compo. Would maintain a relationship that could have future benefit
“We have no idea what the relationship was like behind the scenes”
I think we have — at least some of us — this has been continually reported on here Objectively: Observing them together and complete lack of any interaction — don’t have to be a behavioural psychologist to spot that one. Huws national newspaper article on the morning of Cardiff away, ripping into ML’s approach (which I referred to evidentially)
“How do you know this was a viable option?”
It was a “much more” viable (capable of working successfully) option because failure to communicate and resolve issues never moves things forward and inevitably ends in failure (as it did) and failure is the opposite of success. Not least is the millions it is likely to cost us
“I'm not sure there's even a justifiable link between number of games and acceptable quality of football. We played 55 competitive games in our promotion season without an obvious deterioration in quality.”
Your figures make no sense. How can we have played 55 competitive games in our promotion season? 38 PL games, 1 Carling Cup game (lost to Shewsbury), 2 FA Cup (beat Barnsley — absolutely freezing, lost to Bolton) — that is 41 games. So that argument is totally invalid.
Given we are looking at the period ML was in charge (start of season to 1st Feb), we are comparing just 26 games in our 1st season to 37 this season - That is over 40% more games in the same period (further exacerbated by 5 of the games involving European travel - Sweden, Romania, Spain, Russia, Switzerland)
The main point I was making was the density of fixtures. This is obviously very important in terms of recovery / preparation time.
As an example of the extent of the month on month fixture loading: This year between 1st Dec and 1st Jan we played 9 games (50% more than the same period in our 1st season). These games included Man City twice, Chelsea and Everton. Three of the other games were within 6 days (and the middle of those 3 was in Switzerland). Just days after the end of this period we had to play Manchester United twice (both away) in less than a week.
To say such a punishing schedule over a period of 6 months would not have a significant effect on fitness levels and preparation it just plain wrong.
“We played far fewer games last season, yet performances and results were still poor after the CCC final.”
In the last 11 games after the COC we had a higher win ratio than Garry has achieved so far. We only achieved 9 points out of 11 games however. But the games were much more difficult, compare:
Last Year — last 11 (post COC games) All top 5 teams played. Only 1 game (which we won) was against the bottom 6
This Year — last 11 (also March on) 3 top 5 teams (only I of those against top 3) 3 games are against the bottom 6
The mid level games cancel each other in terms of position played. This leaves comparing playing the 1st and 3rd position teams last year to the 16th and 20th position teams this year.
Playing at a reasonable mid, lower/mid table standard we should be getting wins against the bottom 5 and lucky to get a point from 2 top 3 games. Therefore this decrease in difficulty in the last 11 from last year to this should be worth an extra 4-6 points.
This would change our 9 points in the last 11 last year to a minimum of 13 points — and give comfortable PL finish form (regardless of the poor loss to Fulham and the point denied at WBA from the goal incorrectly disallowed). However despite this Laudrup is blamed for losing interest last year and for relegation performance
Yet if monk replicates this year the points earned in the last 11 last year (even without the extra 4-6 points he should be getting from the much easier games), he will be hailed the messiah for keeping us up.
Of course this shows the weakness of taking base points per game rather than factoring in the difficulty of the team.
Positionally we were also very stable last year. Amazingly we never dropped below 11th but in fact our position was most stable from Jan when we never dropped below 9th. if not denied our good goal at WBA away we would have finished 8th. Of course the last game of the season was a very disappointing end to a brilliant season. We were in a post Cup win period which is well recognised for a drop in performance especially when position is safe and consistent and there is little to be achieved (Liverpool too far ahead with Suarez firing).
So I don't think you can explain away the drop in quality of football solely by the number of games we've had to play “
well besides the stats behind your argument being massively incorrect such that for the relevant period it was not less but over 40% more fixtures; and me explaining that it was not just the number of fixtures but the density of them. I certainly was not only trying to explain the drop in quality by the 50% higher fixture density (compared with that currently) as major an effect that in itself would have on fitness and preparation time. My other main point which you have totally omitted to take into consideration was THE MASSIVE KEY INJURIES OVER MONTHS. As I said:
“What is hard to understand that we are not going to always play sparkling football with 50% more fixtures and massive key injuries (up to 6 1st pick players and both Bony and Michu for one period). What logic exists comparing that with a fully fit team and much more time between games”
As I have said before in the circumstances it was a damn near miracle that not only was ML coping with this and managing to keep us in Europe and the FA Cup but he was also well on track to keep us up achieving 96% of PL points from like for like fixtures - which would have given us a strong mid table finish.
However with the added benefit of a fully fit team and less fixtures I would have expected us to equal or exceed last season’s points, giving us the possibility to finish top half. Worst case scenario the chances of relegation were negligible and have increased under GM — given the poor results in the easiest home games (for comparison Garry achieving PL points at less than 65% of last years like for like games).
There was no way we were going down under ML and even given the lost points against the easier teams I still have a good degree of confidence that we will stay up (even though scraping through will be a very poor result for our team quality).
Let’s not forget we also still played some lovely football under ML despite the circumstances. Although the West Ham game was poor, they had manager of the month beating every team by 2 goals in Feb including Southampton. They only conceded 1 goal all month and had already held Chelsea away 0-0 the game before ours. I also dread to think what was going on behind the scenes at that time. The lowest point for me was losing to West Brom at home when they were in such massively poor form. Especially as they are a team we have played some of our most beautiful football against.
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The effect og sacking you manager in Premier League this season on 12:16 - Apr 11 with 1152 views
I see Spratty is trying to get the last word on this thread by burying everyone in a mountain of text.
Just one thing though Spratty. You've written a lot about no matter exactly what happened behind the scenes, the club and ML should have been able to work together until the end of the season.
What if what actually happened was that ML walked into a board meeting, dropped trou and left a steaming turd on the middle of the table? Or he walked into Huw's office to find Huw banging Laudrup's wife over his desk?
Could they still have put it behind them and worked together in that kind of scenario? Just curious.
You know, Hobbes, some days even my lucky rocket ship underpants don't help.
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The effect og sacking you manager in Premier League this season on 12:21 - Apr 11 with 1143 views
The effect og sacking you manager in Premier League this season on 12:16 - Apr 11 by JackSomething
I see Spratty is trying to get the last word on this thread by burying everyone in a mountain of text.
Just one thing though Spratty. You've written a lot about no matter exactly what happened behind the scenes, the club and ML should have been able to work together until the end of the season.
What if what actually happened was that ML walked into a board meeting, dropped trou and left a steaming turd on the middle of the table? Or he walked into Huw's office to find Huw banging Laudrup's wife over his desk?
Could they still have put it behind them and worked together in that kind of scenario? Just curious.
Weird one isn't it,I've actually had a PM saying "he's gotta be a Scummer on a wind up"
The first ever recipient of a Planet Swans Lifetime Achievement Award.
Also anyone who thinks the performance against WBA at home was more disappointing than the non-performance away to West Ham has lost all credibility.
The game against West Brom saw us score early and dominate the first half without scoring a second goal. They came after us early in the second, we conceeded the equaliser and couldn't get back on track. Certainly blame can be apportioned to Monk for not changing things effectively in the second half. The game was very similar to Norwich though, except we didn't get the second goal and conceeded early in the second half. Had Norwich scored with their early second half pressure, it could have been a similar story.
The game against West Ham showed us a team that simply didn't show up, as if they had gone past caring. Their subsequent performances have shown that isn't the case, so we have to put it down to the manager being completely unable to motivate them.
I also don't think we were getting relegated under ML, but if performances had continued in that vein, where would we have picked up any points?
You know, Hobbes, some days even my lucky rocket ship underpants don't help.
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The effect og sacking you manager in Premier League this season on 14:24 - Apr 11 with 1100 views
The effect og sacking you manager in Premier League this season on 12:16 - Apr 11 by JackSomething
I see Spratty is trying to get the last word on this thread by burying everyone in a mountain of text.
Just one thing though Spratty. You've written a lot about no matter exactly what happened behind the scenes, the club and ML should have been able to work together until the end of the season.
What if what actually happened was that ML walked into a board meeting, dropped trou and left a steaming turd on the middle of the table? Or he walked into Huw's office to find Huw banging Laudrup's wife over his desk?
Could they still have put it behind them and worked together in that kind of scenario? Just curious.
It was given as a “much more viable option” not a cure all for deskshatting or wifeabuse
Think my other comment then applies (regardless of stage of season) “Why did we even embark on this season at all with Laudrup if relationships were bad”. Didn’t I already say if he had done the football equivalent of buggering the Burser he had to go. Unlikely though
Loved the imagery. In the latter case I imagine if it seemed consensual ML would politely excuse himself
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The effect og sacking you manager in Premier League this season on 14:29 - Apr 11 with 1095 views
The effect og sacking you manager in Premier League this season on 12:23 - Apr 11 by JackSomething
Also anyone who thinks the performance against WBA at home was more disappointing than the non-performance away to West Ham has lost all credibility.
The game against West Brom saw us score early and dominate the first half without scoring a second goal. They came after us early in the second, we conceeded the equaliser and couldn't get back on track. Certainly blame can be apportioned to Monk for not changing things effectively in the second half. The game was very similar to Norwich though, except we didn't get the second goal and conceeded early in the second half. Had Norwich scored with their early second half pressure, it could have been a similar story.
The game against West Ham showed us a team that simply didn't show up, as if they had gone past caring. Their subsequent performances have shown that isn't the case, so we have to put it down to the manager being completely unable to motivate them.
I also don't think we were getting relegated under ML, but if performances had continued in that vein, where would we have picked up any points?
Results wise it was massively better - given likelihood of beating either team
You think the players were not picking up on what was going on. What was the brick incident about?
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The effect og sacking you manager in Premier League this season on 14:30 - Apr 11 with 1092 views
The effect og sacking you manager in Premier League this season on 14:24 - Apr 11 by Spratty
It was given as a “much more viable option” not a cure all for deskshatting or wifeabuse
Think my other comment then applies (regardless of stage of season) “Why did we even embark on this season at all with Laudrup if relationships were bad”. Didn’t I already say if he had done the football equivalent of buggering the Burser he had to go. Unlikely though
Loved the imagery. In the latter case I imagine if it seemed consensual ML would politely excuse himself
Ha! Fair play, that last line made me chuckle.
You know, Hobbes, some days even my lucky rocket ship underpants don't help.
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