[Archived] Souness Vs Hughes Vs Ince Vs Allardyce

[mellison24]

Bellamy? How did he get in there?

Cast off at his club. And he was 25 when we got him wasn't he? Not YOUTH, but certainly a good age to get a striker in. Esp one of his quality. Bentley and Samba were my main points.

[den]

Cast off at his club. And he was 25 when we got him wasn't he? Not YOUTH, but certainly a good age to get a striker in. Esp one of his quality. Bentley and Samba were my main points.

Cast off because of differences of opinions - not because of his playing ability.

Anyhow, we diverge.

[Iceman]

where is Souness at the moment? is he completely out of management?

[braddock]

hughes >> souness >>>> allardyce >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> ince

Hughes - the stablity and man management of allardyce and the progression of souness. took us from the relegation zone to europe initially using grit and then adding skill. very good in the transfer market, especially finding bargains.

Souness - took us from the chumpionship to europe with some good football. passionate. not as safe as hughes or allardyce and relegation was a possiblilty with him towards the end. also prone to upsetting his players (not necessarily a bad thing but he didn't have much tact)

Allardyce - mr safe. perhaps bound to his route one football (though i have seen changes in the last two months or so which shows he can adapt to different styles when need be). not sure if he has what it takes to ensure the club progresses to a top half of the table team, though this is mainly due to circumstances out of his control. hit and miss with transfers.

Ince - job came too early for him.

[Amo]

where is Souness at the moment? is he completely out of management?

Back to punditry. He was analysing Man.Utd's game on Sky the other night.

[Majiball]

Cole slipped my mind. Sukur I hadn't heard of. I was only 11/12.

Of course you hadn't heard of him your deaf!!!!

Sorry just couldn't resist.

[S15]

People forget that prior to Souness coming in, we had just played Stockport away, winning 1-0 thanks to a McAteer goal.

After the game, substitutes Duff and Dunn handed in transfer requests in order to get first team football, as Parkes wasn't using them.

Parkes had already agreed in principle to sell Jansen to Rangers in the summer.

Souness was then bought in, and the rest is history. It really cannot be underestimated what a phenomenal job Souness did, albeit benefitting probably from the very last of Jacks cash.

[JC4LAB]

Each have their own qualities better than the others...For getting promotion in the first place developing youngsters =Souness..Bargain buying=Hughes..For Surviving a relegation dog fight with no money = Big Sam

[Hughesy]

Jim we have been lucky that all the teams below us are just as rubbish as we are and cant pick up points. We have picked up 7 points recently and none of those teams have had such form, and its not even breathtaking form.

They say luck evens itself out.

You could argue that other teams had luck earlier in the season...like Sunderland Home & Away we could have got more, West Ham @ Home, Brum away (last min), Liverpool at home etc....

We could quite easily of picked up another 8-12 points if we had taken our chances.

Talking about Lucky - Sunderland got lucky when Kalinic missed some sitters, and the goal that hit the beachball...otherwise they would be right in the thick of it!

[CrazyIvan]

They say luck evens itself out.

You could argue that other teams had luck earlier in the season...like Sunderland Home & Away we could have got more, West Ham @ Home, Brum away (last min), Liverpool at home etc....

We could quite easily of picked up another 8-12 points if we had taken our chances.

Talking about Lucky - Sunderland got lucky when Kalinic missed some sitters, and the goal that hit the beachball...otherwise they would be right in the thick of it!

Sorry Hughesy but it's really starting to annoy now... 'Have' not 'of'. We could quite easily HAVE picked up etc...

I agree with you though.

[thenodrog]

Souness did well initially mainly cos he had inherited some really top players who were way too good for the 2nd Div. Unfortunately I can still detect a whiff of corruption over a few of his dealings. Ultimately but he lost it big time and would have been sacked within a couple of weeks but for the very timely intervention of NUFC. If he had not gone I'm certain we'd have been relegated even though it was still early in the season. Ever grateful for signing Brad and Tugay but imo Souness left a poor squad.

Hughes. About 40-50 million reasons points to the most successful manager being Mark Hughes and by an absolute country mile. Professional football is business first and sport second. When it is placed in the wrong order we see the examples of LUFC / Portsmouth etc. Hughes inherited an awful squad and left a very valuable one. Also his never-say-die approach and his dogs of war attitude had his players overperforming and the supporters walking with a swagger to Ewood on match days.

Ince ..FFS!! Thick as a bar top. Somebody somewhere screwed up big time in even thinking that that clown possessed any managerial and leadership qualities. For me it was like watching a car crash in slow motion.

Allardyce. Still early days but given that the board has seen fit to cash in on our better players he has to be the safest pair of hands in the business to keep the club in the Prem. It may not be as pretty as we would like but it's a case of needs must at the moment.

[John]

Souness was great for us - however, no doubt it did end sour for him here but worked out really well for the club (as got money through compensation and Sparky joined!).

Hughes was superb and was exceptional at buying players. We will never see his like again in the transfer market IMO, his dealings and value for money were sensational. Namely: Bellamy, Benni McCarthy, David Bentley, Ryan Nelsen, Stephen Warnock, Santa Cruz, Samba....

Sam - I still really appreciate/respect the job he did last season, saving us (which some seem to have forgotten). We were really in the mire, looking down and out. This season, he has done OK in what is a very difficult job. If we could tidy up our away form, we would be in a decent league league position.

Overall, I have very fond memories of both tenures, therefore find it really difficult to split Hughes & Souness - they both did fanstastic jobs for Rovers.

And Ince.....before he joined, I had nightmares about him being our manager, just about getting over it now.

[mellison24]

Allardyce. Still early days but given that the board has seen fit to cash in on our better players he has to be the safest pair of hands in the business to keep the club in the Prem. It may not be as pretty as we would like but it's a case of needs must at the moment.

And it's actually getting gradually better too. Other than that tiny critique, I agree fully with your post (incl the bits i didn't quote).

[47er]

Souness did well initially mainly cos he had inherited some really top players who were way too good for the 2nd Div. Unfortunately I can still detect a whiff of corruption over a few of his dealings. Ultimately but he lost it big time and would have been sacked within a couple of weeks but for the very timely intervention of NUFC. If he had not gone I'm certain we'd have been relegated even though it was still early in the season. Ever grateful for signing Brad and Tugay but imo Souness left a poor squad.

Hughes. About 40-50 million reasons points to the most successful manager being Mark Hughes and by an absolute country mile. Professional football is business first and sport second. When it is placed in the wrong order we see the examples of LUFC / Portsmouth etc. Hughes inherited an awful squad and left a very valuable one. Also his never-say-die approach and his dogs of war attitude had his players overperforming and the supporters walking with a swagger to Ewood on match days.

Ince ..FFS!! Thick as a bar top. Somebody somewhere screwed up big time in even thinking that that clown possessed any managerial and leadership qualities. For me it was like watching a car crash in slow motion.

Allardyce. Still early days but given that the board has seen fit to cash in on our better players he has to be the safest pair of hands in the business to keep the club in the Prem. It may not be as pretty as we would like but it's a case of needs must at the moment.

Yep--agree with all that.

[Iceman]

Does anybody know, whether Paul Ince has got his badges yet? For me Big Sam, is doing well at the moment. Any particular reason, why Souey is no longer in management? Obviously, im an idiot for not knowing why he is no longer in management.

[1864roverite]

For me I loved the Souness years. Promotion at Nobend, a good finish in the PL then the League Cup Final victory. The signings of BF and Tugay were immense, Cole was awesome and he got the best out of the youngsters such as dunny, duff and jansen. Things turned sour with the older brigade and nufc took him from us.

Hughes at Ewood was another fine period. We regularly upset the big clubs and went to semi after semi. Took us through europe with some great games. Again things soured for whatever rason when we couldnt seem to nail the central player we so desperately needed.

Ince - complete waste of time, effort and money. Almost sunk the club singlehandedly.

Sam - rescued a sunken ship and steadied the rudderless club. Noone can fault what he has done to Rovers but it hasnt been pretty. Not a pot of money has been made available as he streamlined the club. Finance wise it is all good and things on the pitch are coming together. If he could only remedy the away day blues.

Sam has the opportunity now to take Rovers further. A bigger pot of money is available next year, rumour is it will up our overall income by £10m. Just half of that with some tinkering could see our squad vastly improved and with a younger average age.

With the likes of ollson, kalinic and possibly Junior, we have stars emerging. di santo could easilhy be another who could make the grade with us.

It looks a lot rosier now than it has for a long while.

[jonv]

Taken from F365

Statistically Speaking

Paul Ince discussing MK Dons' 3-0 home defeat to Southampton:

"The stats will show they had four shots to our nine. We were excellent today."

What the stats actually showed:

Saints had 10 shots to MK Dons' 10.

Saints had 58% possession.

Saints won 3-0.

[S15]

He must a bloody whizz with Photoshop.

[gumboots]

It's not really a fair comparison is it? The Souness era was fun, because particularly the year we got promoted we really were class in that league and fun to watch. Then the first year we were back in the prem we won the cup and it was still, apart from the initial worries about relegation fun time. There wasn't a lot of fun at the start of Hughes's reign but we did see some quality players again in the blue and white halves. And then there's no money and we're in a mess and the remedy has been some pretty dire football, but looks a bit brighter if things continue to improve. Depends what we're judging those managers on I suppose. For me Souness shades it just because it coincided with a particular time of my life I think.

[magicalmortensleftpeg]

Souness's time is always tainted with the fact that he left us with arguably the poorest squad we've had since getting promoted. The team he left Hughes was shocking and so for Sparky to have spent what little money he had on class players and turn us into top 6 material was outstanding.

He gets my vote as our best manager of recent times.

Allardyce is now on track, its his team and they're playing some good stuff. We will lose from time to time but Sam is dependable and is doing a very good job in the circumstances. Not many managers could have kept us up so comfortably this season and its a testiment to Sam that we have.

The Ince regime shows how easy it is to get these things wrong.

[Exiled_Rover]

Souness'd dick them all. Proper hard man.

[thenodrog]

Souness'd dick them all. Proper hard man.

I've a feeling he dicked the clubs coffers too.

I might have voted for Souness if he'd been headhunted after we beat Spurs 4-0 (4-1?) at WHL or after the Worthy Cup final. Fact is after that he lost it big time though and his last two seasons were a mare.

Personally I can never forgive him for treating BRFC's trips to Europe with barely concealed contempt and treat them as a complete waste of time. BRFC in Europe is a rarity and imo precious. It was a real source of pride for me personally, and it meant the world to most fans. Compare that to Sparky's tenure and imo Souness wasn't fit to breathe the same air.

I'm suprised how some peoples memories are so poor.

[Exiled_Rover]

Oh is this not who'd win in a fight?

In all seriousness, Hughes and his backroom staff were the best of the four.