[Archived] Nicko's Thread Part 3

[percy]

  nicko said:

Candidate Y - HAS applied and has been considered. Premier League experience, young, loud-ish, shocking football.

Aidy Boothroyd?

[Mc Love]

  nicko said:

Keeping cash in pocket right now.

There is obviously a lot of competition so.....

[ihtd]

If we go for the cheap option, i doubt i'll be visiting Ewood next season, i'll go to away games but my ST will not be renewed. The club has just got 5million compo for MH, thats a lot of money for losing a manager, we should be looking at investing every penny of that in getting a top-class manager to drive us forward. We need proven and hungry, not inexperienced and hungry. I do not count McClown in either of them catergories. I think the club is being very tight on the purse strings when now is the time to loosen them and use what we've been given, its not like the club would have to outlay money they do not have, Man Citeh paid upfront for MH.

[leftfooter]

  nicko said:

Candidate Y - HAS applied and has been considered. Premier League experience, young, loud-ish, shocking football.

Candidate Z - is really novel, no Prem experience but may be a top boss in the future. Just a shock to hear he has had a mention.

No, it's not Coyley...

Gary Johnson or Simon Grayson; hazarding a guess, I'd say the latter.

Took Blackpool up and kept them in the Championship, now that's 'punching above your weight'! His 'pulling power' is another matter.

[leftfooter]

  Wiggy said:

I don't think we should underestimate Rovers pulling power .We play in the richest club competition in the world as regards TV money and if we were to play in the so called El Dorado of Serie A we would have the eighth biggest crowds...Italian Attendances.

We've been knocked into submission by some ignorant journalists, in reality, we're a pretty big player on the world football scene.

Whilst certainly not advocating higher prices, I'd wager that gate receipts from 25,000 in England, produces quite a bit more than in some of the decrepid Italian Serie A grounds.

[bringdunnback]

Candidate Z - is really novel, no Prem experience but may be a top boss in the future. Just a shock to hear he has had a mention. - Roberto Martinez?

[tony gale's mic]

  Ciren Rover said:

Stuart Pearce

I'd go along with this...hope not though.

If Candidate Z is Gary Johnson I would much rather see him at Rovers than any of the other British candidates mentioned...

[ihtd]

I think you may be right with candidate Z leftfooter, it does sound a bit like Johnson or Grayson. Wouldn't want Grayson, he couldn't really bring in top signings off the back of his name. Same with Johnson really.

[Bobby G]

Id be sickened if someone like Pearce, Grayson, Boothroyd, Billy Davies got the job.

Or David Platt! :s

[Tim Southampton Rover]

Darren Ferguson.

[brian_gallagher85]

  percy said:

Aidy Boothroyd?

Have to say that was my first thought on all three terms there :S

[LeChuck]

  Tim Southampton Rover said:

Darren Ferguson.

Good shout for Candidate Z, I'd like to think he's in with a chance, in fact I'd take him ahead of Paul Ince.

[gumboots]

Are these names being put out so we'll accept Allardyce?

[mjs]

  Tim Southampton Rover said:

Darren Ferguson.

He was my first thought too as Candidate Z, not that he is ready for us.

[nicko]

  gumboots said:

Are these names being put out so we'll accept Allardyce?

No...it's something I have come up with...it's no club spin.

[tony gale's mic]

  ihtd said:

I think you may be right with candidate Z leftfooter, it does sound a bit like Johnson or Grayson. Wouldn't want Grayson, he couldn't really bring in top signings off the back of his name. Same with Johnson really.

I'd rather have a manager like Johnson with experience than a big name like Shearer with no experience.

Any player with half a footballing brain will realise that a big name player doesnt automatically mean a big name manager. They wouldn't come to us because of how famous our manager was, they'd want to come to us because of our place in the league, because of our facilities, because of the players already at the club etc.

Besides, the personality of the manager is bound to matter at least as much - if we had a smallish name but he was convincing, I'm sure most players would go for that over an ex-big player who was up his own backside.

Would definitely prefer Johnson over Shearer, McLaren, Big Sam and Ince.

[Tim Southampton Rover]

  LeChuck said:

Good shout for Candidate Z, I'd like to think he's in with a chance, in fact I'd take him ahead of Paul Ince.

If he does become manager, let's hope he convinces daddy to loan us a few back up players. Without sounding greedy, i'll take Ronaldo & Vidic.

[Florida Rover]

Nicko,

If you were chairman for the day and got to appoint our next gaffer,who would be your choice and why?

(Can you answer this question at this time?)

[bats]

Surely Gary Johnson couldln't attract big names and keep roque and bentley!!!

[brian_gallagher85]

I hope you'll be buying him a drink if he pulls that off Tim

[tony gale's mic]

  bats said:

Surely Gary Johnson couldln't attract big names and keep roque and bentley!!!

If Gary Johnson comes in, repeats the form of his last few jobs, does a good job with us and keeps us a top half club, he's far more likely to attract big names than if Shearer comes in and we drop like a stone.

If the manager does a good job the rest will fall into place. The only thing we should be considering is how good the new man might be, not how good a player he used to be.

[Alex Rover]

  Florida Rover said:

Nicko,

If you were chairman for the day and got to appoint our next gaffer,who would be your choice and why?

(Can you answer this question at this time?)

It's a difficult question as are you basing it on the fantasy candidate from the heart or a realistic candidate from the head? I had the same dilemma in voting on the next manager poll on this site.

[Tim Southampton Rover]

  tony gale said:

I'd rather have a manager like Johnson with experience than a big name like Shearer with no experience.

Any player with half a footballing brain will realise that a big name player doesnt automatically mean a big name manager. They wouldn't come to us because of how famous our manager was, they'd want to come to us because of our place in the league, because of our facilities, because of the players already at the club etc.

Besides, the personality of the manager is bound to matter at least as much - if we had a smallish name but he was convincing, I'm sure most players would go for that over an ex-big player who was up his own backside.

Would definitely prefer Johnson over Shearer, McLaren, Big Sam and Ince.

Just to give Shearer some support, you could say that although Shearer doesn't have managerial experience, he does have experience of playing in Europe, captaining his club & country, being able to handle pressure, worked under some great managers both domestically and internationally. He's probably sat through 600+ team talks and thousands of days worth of training to have a rough idea of whats right and wrong.

What is experience these days? Does managerial experience at a lower league club mean they will be able to cope with the pressures of managing a premier league club with the big named players (take Sturrock at Saints as an example of how it went wrong), the daily media presence and the ability to attract the right players to the club?

If we look at Shearer we know that he will be able to command the respect of any player whether they are considered a big time charlie or not. He has a presence about him, especially at Blackburn where he is a legend. He has great contacts within football and more importantly he is a winner. He has admitted that he's selfish because he wants to be the best. Only special people have what Shearer has and that is the will to win whilst having the intelligence to know how to win which is the difference between good and great.

Personally I believe Blackburn will take a step back if we employ a lower league manager with experience because he won't have the right experience for us. We need someone to attract players to the club, we need someone who can put the winning belief into our players and we need someone who knows how to go about being a winner.

Give me Shearer any day of the week.

[leftfooter]

  ihtd said:

I think you may be right with candidate Z leftfooter, it does sound a bit like Johnson or Grayson. Wouldn't want Grayson, he couldn't really bring in top signings off the back of his name. Same with Johnson really.

The thing that's being overlooked is the thought process in which the Board/Trustees go about appointing a new manager. There are different ways how a successful candidate might impress the board/trustees as to his strategy for running Rovers as a successful business model.

Hughes's strategy (& you can't knock it for the 4 years he operated it) was to find a smallish nucleus of players who were very loyal to him and pay them big wages that only the very top clubs would be able to compete with. The quid pro quo for the chosen ones' was a virtually certain starting place, even when their form dipped. This meant on occasion some 'form' players who were only on the fringes of the manager's inner circle were overlooked, which might explain some of the appallingly dour performances for patches of the season.. Hughes I guess knew over the long term his very heavy investment in wages and trust would pay dividends by the end of the season.

The above model has obviously been working, but my question is; do the trustees see it as being financially viable in the long term?

A new man at the helm with new ideas could see us re-modeling ourselves as a mini Northern version of Arsenal (or dare I say a seventies style BFC mark II); Nurture young talent, paying less than the average and resign yourself to defeat and feigning disappointment at the players' lack of loyalty once a bigger or even similar size club comes knocking offering higher wages. The upside according to this model is lower wages and a potentially more dynamic selection policy; the downside would mean a higher turnover of playing staff and the subsequent volatility this might cause.

If one of the none A-B candidates can convince the Board/Trustees that a less wage heavy investment can reap similar success to the Hughes business model, then that candidate will clearly have an edge over his rivals.

[tony gale's mic]

  Tim Southampton Rover said:

Just to give Shearer some support, you could say that although Shearer doesn't have managerial experience, he does have experience of playing in Europe, captaining his club & country, being able to handle pressure, worked under some great managers both domestically and internationally. He's probably sat through 600+ team talks and thousands of days worth of training to have a rough idea of whats right and wrong.

What is experience these days? Does managerial experience at a lower league club mean they will be able to cope with the pressures of managing a premier league club with the big named players (take Sturrock at Saints as an example of how it went wrong), the daily media presence and the ability to attract the right players to the club?

If we look at Shearer we know that he will be able to command the respect of any player whether they are considered a big time charlie or not. He has a presence about him, especially at Blackburn where he is a legend. He has great contacts within football and more importantly he is a winner. He has admitted that he's selfish because he wants to be the best. Only special people have what Shearer has and that is the will to win whilst having the intelligence to know how to win which is the difference between good and great.

Personally I believe Blackburn will take a step back if we employ a lower league manager with experience because he won't have the right experience for us. We need someone to attract players to the club, we need someone who can put the winning belief into our players and we need someone who knows how to go about being a winner.

Give me Shearer any day of the week.

Most great players have all those attributes you listed in the first paragraph. All players who have played a full career have sat through 600+ team talks most probably. But all those things you listed mean absolutely nothing at all when you consider most of the great managers in the world today had very few of those things you listed. Sure there's a handful of great players who went onto become great managers but theres certainly no real correlation to draw between the two.

What is experience? Are you serious?! Experience means he's done the countless tasks that a manager has had to do. Experience means he's made mistakes and learned from them, that he's made good decisions and known to stick by them. Funny you pick one bad example of how it went wrong, pretty much every great manager has had to make the step up from smaller club to bigger club at some point and Bristol are hardly a tiny club. Or at least they're not now their current manager nearly achieved two successive promotions with them.

blah blah blah he's a winner...do you want me to list the countless number of great players who've flopped in management? Graeme Souness was the definition of a winner in his playing days...and he's hardly the worst example I can give, at least he did a half decent job at a few clubs. Including ours. Bobby Charlton, Alan Ball etc etc....there's plenty more where those names came from of great players who didnt make great managers.

  Quote

Only special people have what Shearer has and that is the will to win whilst having the intelligence to know how to win which is the difference between good and great.

What does that even mean?! Would you have said the opposite about a young Alex Ferguson who had an average playing career? Or Arsene Wenger? I could go on and on...

Special people? I'm beginning to think only "special" people can make arguments for his candidature..

Was Moyes a step back for Everton? Johnson has achieved great things in his management career, got invaluable experience and has earned a shot at the highest level. Shearer has sat on his arse on MOTD, making inane comments, refusing to be number 2 to anyone despite his lack of coaching experience and expects to waltz straight into a Premier League job!

I know who I'd rather have..