[Archived] Hughes V Souness

[broadsword]

Let's get this straight, last time out we had a dire season.

There was no redeeming aspect to it, it was godawful from start to finish.

[MCMC1875]

Of course people remember the last part of his reign where things went wrong- lot of injuries mixed in with bizarre team selections and playing people out of position.

That's a key difference (as well as fitness). Under Hughes we are beginning to see a settled team. I am expecting to see certain players in certain positions eg Emerton and Reid.

It wasn't like this last year. You couldn't hope to guess his selection (or who he'd fall out with next, for that matter)

[Tris]

John, people have long memories. Even with Duff we were dire. It went on for more than one year as well.

The season when we finished 6th, do you remember the last home game of the season against West Brom? Let me remind you - at the final whistle, half of the fans had gone home. The team had been booed off and the "lap of honour" , was the best referrence to Rovers performances that the board could have got.

Unfortunately, they couldn't see the wood for the trees. they were astonished that ST sales dropped by 10%, not many of the fans were.

They should have acted then.

Den, say the board had "acted then"

Rovers would have been a laughing stock. What do you do when your unfashionable northern team beats a host of bigger rivals to grab a place in Europe, having done the double over Arsenal and beaten Man Utd on the way, with a cup run into the last 4 to boot.

Sack the manager ??

Yeah right - which lunatic would be enticed to a club run along those lines to take over??!! Any candidate is going to assume they have to get in the Champions League and WIN a cup to keep the job for more than a season!

The fact that many of the Ewood faithful had left the stadium before the end of the final home match says more about them than anything else. There were no Rovers fans leaving White Hart Lane early 8 days later.

And having finished in that 6th place the board were perfectly entitled not to expect ST sales to collapse.

Take your point to the extreme. If you want to see swashbuckling victories every week at Ewood, then let's drop a couple of divisions and take on the likes of Blackpool or Kidderminster.

If you want to see top division football, then let's educate the Blackburn public that it's not going to be pretty. Many of the last 10 games have been dire, but Hughes will get a honeymoon period with the fans just as Souness did.

However, if in 12 months time we are still 15th, drawing 7/10 games and scraping a couple of narrow wins, then the same people who turned on Souness will have turned on Hughes.

[MCMC1875]

Well they are only 7 points infront of us, however they have more quality as souness has not had much chance to ruin this yet.

He's making a good job of it now.

[John]

I cant believe some of the things I am reading. I am talking about the WHOLE of Souness's time with us. Not just the last year when everything was poor granted.

Well I doubt we could have improved on 6th to be honest unless we kept our best player and bought on top of that- what the hell do people expect?? Constant progession is near impossible- in terms of league positions. Get real guys. I always remember an article in the LET before last season when Souness said we would struggle because of the departures and he was doubtful if we had the individual talent to beat teams- it ended up a horrible season and a fight to stay in the league, much worse than he probably ever imagined.

In terms of attractive football- I remember playing our way out of the Nationwide and apart from last season we did play a good brand of football under the man you all despise now. We were lucky things worked out the way we did- Souness's shelf life was up and now we have one of Britains promising young managers.

[MCMC1875]

We are indeed fortunate..........

.............but that's the point of this thread.

Many Rovers fans had written off the club to be relegated, but I believed we could, not only survive, but also finish above the man who abandoned us.

[den]

Tris - the board couldn't understand why, when finishing 6th, that ST sales dropped by 10%. They chose to put the blame for that on the Blackburn public. We all know the real reason was the dismally poor product on offer. Any reasonably perceptive board would have seen through that. They continued to back him while at the same time allowing player/management problems to weaken the squad considerably. They allowed the 6th placed finish to cloud their judgement of what was ACTUALLY happening to the club.

John - We're talking of TWO years of diabolical home performances. During those two years, we've lost 25% of our season ticket sales.

Yes, Souness was the right man at the right time for Blackburn Rovers, but the board went along with him for too long, they couldn't see that the supporters were voting with their feet and of course, hindsight is a wonderful thing, but once the fans were leaving in their droves, the board should have acted immediately.

[Darwen Rover]

I cant believe some of the things I am reading. I am talking about the WHOLE of Souness's time with us. Not just the last year when everything was poor granted.

Well I doubt we could have improved on 6th to be honest unless we kept our best player and bought on top of that- what the hell do people expect?? Constant progession is near impossible- in terms of league positions. Get real guys. I always remember an article in the LET before last season when Souness said we would struggle because of the departures and he was doubtful if we had the individual talent to beat teams- it ended up a horrible season and a fight to stay in the league, much worse than he probably ever imagined.

In terms of attractive football- I remember playing our way out of the Nationwide and apart from last season we did play a good brand of football under the man you all despise now. We were lucky things worked out the way we did- Souness's shelf life was up and now we have one of Britains promising young managers.

Could not have summed it up better myself John I completely agree, oh and about the fans, are we creating fans by offering youngsters special rates, maybe arranging school patnerships, we probably are... am not sure just posing the question???

[thenodrog]

Tris - the board couldn't understand why, when finishing 6th, that ST sales dropped by 10%. They chose to put the blame for that on the Blackburn public. We all know the real reason was the dismally poor product on offer. .

Oh good, thats alright. Those lost season ticket sales had absolutely nothing to do with the (unavoidable) sale of our own academy produced, true God given talent, crowd favourite, World Cup 'select XI' star, modest and unassuming blond destroyer and wing wizard, Damien Duff then?

[roversmum]

Souness's poor reception was due in part to the fact that he mis-timed his appearance by turning up just as the referee was being booed for not red-carding Elliott for tipping up Jon Stead when he was through on goal! He couldn't have come out at a worse time!

[Claytons Left Boot]

The apparition that NUFC is a massive club, much more so that BRFC is a misconception. Okay we dont have 50k crowds, we dont have superstar players, we dont fill our stadium or have waiting lists for seasons tickets. One thing we do have is a club that runs itself efficiently, from the top dog to the tea ladies. If only Newcastle could be like that then they might just have that chance of being a really massive club.

Agreed. Nor do we have a trophy cabinet full of dust!

[Tris]

Tris - the board couldn't understand why, when finishing 6th, that ST sales dropped by 10%. They chose to put the blame for that on the Blackburn public. We all know the real reason was the dismally poor product on offer. Any reasonably perceptive board would have seen through that. They continued to back him while at the same time allowing player/management problems to weaken the squad considerably. They allowed the 6th placed finish to cloud their judgement of what was ACTUALLY happening to the club.

But Den, the only places where the "dismally poor" product was any better can be counted on the digits of one hand - Liverpool, Chelsea, Newcastle, Arsenal and Man United.

What sort of product did you want that season ???

What's the board supposed to say to the manager and team ? "For flips sake you lot, stop winning away and improve the home form"?

It's not the fault of the club that Blackburn is such a small place, or that the public is the most fickle and spoilt in the 4 leagues. You cannot run a football club on the basis of what you think ticket sales might be if you make certain decisions. Look at Milton Keynes.

And the only "player / management problem" departure that summer was Dunn. Who has since played just 17 out of a possible 58 full PL games at his new club (could be 17 / 76 come the summer), lost his England place, and confirmed all our worst fears about his problems - which Souness spent his entire time at Blackburn trying to help him overcome.

Edited December 29, 2004 by Tris

[Scotty]

Argueing about when Souness should have gone is pointless now. I'm just delighted he left before he ruined us completely - at least now we've got a chance of staying up, we'd have had no chance imo if Souness had stayed much longer. Thankfully, he's Newcastle's problem now.

To get back to the original question, Hughes has shown so far that he's a vast improvement on Souness in terms of getting the players fit and instilling a work ethic into them. The next (and biggest) test though is what Hughes can do in the transfer market. Time will tell.

[Scotty]

It's not the fault of the club that Blackburn is such a small place, or that the public is the most fickle and spoilt in the 4 leagues.

Ah, the old Blackburn fans are the root of all evil argument again. I thought we'd not seen that for a while.

[den]

Tris - the board couldn't understand why, when finishing 6th, that ST sales dropped by 10%. They chose to put the blame for that on the Blackburn public. We all know the real reason was the dismally poor product on offer. .

Oh good, thats alright. Those lost season ticket sales had absolutely nothing to do with the (unavoidable) sale of our own academy produced, true God given talent, crowd favourite, World Cup 'select XI' star, modest and unassuming blond destroyer and wing wizard, Damien Duff then?

Duff left while the rest of the players were on pre-season in the good ol' USA. ST sales were pretty much over by then.

So, no it was nothing to do with that. It was the awful home form.

poodly tip:)

[John]

I am not sure of the stats but if the home form was a problem throughout Souness's time here then fair enough. I can understand people having enough of it. You pay your money you deserve entertainment. I always thought we played nice, attractive football apart from last season when we lost our best player, had key injuries for a small squad and our manager started to lose the plot.

So people will never go to Ewood again? Unless they are convinced of us winning the title possibly? Tris does have a point, some of our fans are spolit pri*ks. Hopefully now those who demand us nearer the top can see we have a bright manager who I think is destined in time for great things.

Edited December 29, 2004 by John

[thenodrog]

Tris - the board couldn't understand why, when finishing 6th, that ST sales dropped by 10%. They chose to put the blame for that on the Blackburn public. We all know the real reason was the dismally poor product on offer. .

Oh good, thats alright. Those lost season ticket sales had absolutely nothing to do with the (unavoidable) sale of our own academy produced, true God given talent, crowd favourite, World Cup 'select XI' star, modest and unassuming blond destroyer and wing wizard, Damien Duff then?

Duff left while the rest of the players were on pre-season in the good ol' USA. ST sales were pretty much over by then.

So, no it was nothing to do with that. It was the awful home form.

poodly tip:)

Its got to have had an influence it had all the hallmarks of the 'last minute when all the ST's have been sold' Shearer episode.

Star player in a major international tournament comes home the darling of the press and TV and is touted in every media outlet to be a target for MU, Lpool, Chelsea etc, all accompanied by endless insincere denials from Duffer and the club. Come on Den.

[American]

You know what might lend your arguement some credence Den? If people hadn't posted about all of their ex-season ticket holding friends who wouldn't go back to watch on the bring a friend for a tenner promotion, even when the poster offered to pay for it themselves.

[rover6]

I believe the board would have sacked Souness if our results hadn't improved over the next handful of games from the date he left.

Quite simply things were going from bad to worse. Vratislav Gresko playing in midfield after ONE MEASLY decent performance there in preseason?!!!!

Souness did not even use preseason to work out his best starting eleven, hence the problems once the season got going. For some inexplicable reason, only known to himself, not once in preseason did he try to put out his best team, instead he mixed and matched all the way through and continued to do so once the real stuff began.

All I say is thank God for Fat Freddy Shepherd.

Edited December 29, 2004 by rover6

[Tris]

So, no it was nothing to do with that. It was the awful home form.

poodly tip:)

So would these fans who walked away have stayed for better home form at the cost of 6th place?

Aston Villa had better home form than Rovers that season, but they finished 16th not 6th. (And with 5 million quid less prize money - that's a hell of a lot of season tickets).

As did Southampton, Fulham, Boro and Everton. But we were in Europe, and they weren't.

Our home form was 11th out of 20, second season back from the dead. That is hardly awful. It's mid-table respectability, with a win against the champions as an enjoyable bonus. And still the fans deserted in the summer.

You cannot blame anyone for the lost sales other than those fans who chose not to return. And they prob had good reasons.

You certainly cannot blame the club or the results.

Edited December 29, 2004 by Tris

[Parasyte]

It's not the fault of the club that Blackburn is such a small place, or that the public is the most fickle and spoilt in the 4 leagues.

Ah, the old Blackburn fans are the root of all evil argument again. I thought we'd not seen that for a while.

I know, its complete BS.

Dean Saunders is the root of all evil, and last seen dorwning orphans in the Tyne.

However, if in 12 months time we are still 15th, drawing 7/10 games and scraping a couple of narrow wins, then the same people who turned on Souness will have turned on Hughes.

And rightly so. I am chuffed to bits so far with Hughes, but if after two periods of getting his own players and making it his team, we are still in a relegation fight like we are, it shows a complete lack of progress.

[SouthAussieRover]

Souness' losing streak continues

He could go down as being responsible for helping to relegate two clubs in one season.

As for Newcastle being a big club..in the words of the chap off the Royle family..."my arse".

Edited December 29, 2004 by SouthAussieRover

[Tris]

It's not the fault of the club that Blackburn is such a small place, or that the public is the most fickle and spoilt in the 4 leagues.

Ah, the old Blackburn fans are the root of all evil argument again. I thought we'd not seen that for a while.

Is that the best you can offer to this discussion?

Speaks volumes.

[USABlue]

And rightly so. I am chuffed to bits so far with Hughes, but if after two periods of getting his own players and making it his team, we are still in a relegation fight like we are, it shows a complete lack of progress.

So am I, I was dead set against this appointment but the turnaround in this team is nothing short of miraculous. I feel pride again. If he can do the job after being allowed to bring in a few players that he has done so far he will be a success. I have not yet ate my words about his appointment but I am currently chewing them.

[waggy]

i was very anti souey,but could not bring myself to boo him on boxing day,i actually like him as a man,but his managerial decisions were baffling too say the least.

the root off the problem was that no one at ewood in the hierarchy had the ball's too face him