[Archived] Steve Kean

[John]

Who knows he is an injury nightmare no matter where he goes, it's unsettling

True - not sure if he is carrying something and is playing through it at the moment - thought he looked decent in his first couple of appearances but since then has not really looked good at all.

[Guest linganzi]

Back again. Whipping it up

[chris]

True - not sure if he is carrying something and is playing through it at the moment - thought he looked decent in his first couple of appearances but since then has not really looked good at all.

I remember Sir Alex saying that a players injury record is a big consideration when signing a player.

Look at Beckham (although we was developed) if he got injured he was almost in tear, hell he was in tear even if it was 6 week out.

Getting injured to Santa Cruz is like brushing his teeth, routine.

[Mercer]

There is a fair amount of anger within the club about the sniping that has been going on. Would suggest, if speculation is correct, that there's a fair amount of anger in the club that Kean's even the manager.

Many of the rumours put about have been downright lies and spread by people with an agenda. Our new owners are a paragon of virtue then ?

Pardon me for giving him a chance. In the opinion of many, he had done nothing to merit the chance. Compare his track record as a coach / assistant manager to say Steve Clarke. Kean's CV / track record is very, very thin.

Totally bizarre.

Same tools as Sam plus significantly more money - result, no win in ten (more than a quarter of the season) and staring into the abyss.

[Kelbo]

Totally bizarre.

Same tools as Sam plus significantly more money - result, no win in ten (more than a quarter of the season) and staring into the abyss.

Funny you should say that, I tried my hand at DIY building a shed roof, made a real hash of it, mate came round, a joiner, did it easily, same tools but someone who was capable of using the tools, an amateur as opposed to a proffessional!

[John]

I think Kean feels the need to play Cruz and also Dunn even if they are not fully fit.

[Fife Rover]

I must admit nicko, that I wasn't happy when Kean was appointed. His links with Anderson and his early statements that seemed to imply that he could do better with this squad than the previous manager simply didn't sit right with me. I believed that Allardyce, who rescued Kean's career when he had got the push from Coventry, deserved a little more loyalty from Kean. He was simply too quick to job into the job and too quick to bypass the previous chairman and get his feet under the table in Pune. If that's an agenda, then fair enough I have an agenda - perhaps some would say I also have out of date ideas about loyalty.

Whilst one hoped he would make a decent job of it, I'll be honest and admit that for the reasons outlined above, I am never going warm to him - no matter how successful he might be.

Every manager is judged on results and I find it staggering that he complains about being harshly treated. When he took over from Sam he had an excellent base, in terms of points total, on which to build. He had a January transfer window and the promise of money ahead of him. Yet, four months later we have a wafer thin squad and are in the midst of a relegation battle, a battle which many predict we will lose.

I notice that today he is complaining about refereeing decisions - always the last refuge of a desperate manager. Yes, we have had some shocking decisions go against us, but we have also had some go the other way - the Jermaine Jones tackle that should have been a penalty for WBA and wasn't given.

Kean has made some pretty poor decisions thus far. The January window was totally wasted with £3.5 million being spent on a player who will seemingly make no contribution before next season. Rochina, a decent prospect, is still extremely raw, as was shown at Goodison last week, and will again make only a limited impact this season. The decision to let El-Hadji Diouf go, simply because of the media storm following the QPR game, was another poor decision in my opinion. With limited resouces available, to allow a player who had been constantly one of our top performers in the first half of the campaign to leave on loan has proved to be another own goal. If Kean got rid because he couldn't handle him it merely underlines his limited man-management abilities.

A run of ten games without a win is always going to put the manager under pressure. That's not being harsh but simply a fact of life in professional sport. The result is what matters. If you can entertain along the way, all the better. However, at the end of the day it's the result that counts. So far Kean has been unable to results and, apart from a handful of games, the enterainment value has been poor.

My only agenda is for the Rovers to do well. I simply don't believe that Kean is the man for the job and, as of yet, I haven't seen anything to persuade me otherwise.

I don't disagree with a single word of that post. BUT (and this is my ONLY agenda) I do think that with just five games to go we simply HAVE to stick with the present manager if we are to have even the remotest chance of surving the drop. At this stage the ONLY chance we have is to show 100% solidarity with the club, the manager, and the players. All this mass hysteria that has been shown by the majority of people on this MB and elswhere is just like a lynch mob mentality, and is absolutely NOT what is needed right now.

What is needed is for everyone to put aside whatever feelings of anger or prejudice that they hold from now until the end of the season and to just concentrate with every bit of energy they can muster on supporting the efforts by the players and the management to avoid the drop. What real aternative is there at thos stage?

[tony gale's mic]

Somebody said you wanted an answer to this.

Fair enough.

So plenty of people - without having any knowledge of the guy - felt he wasn't worth a chance.

The 'very good manager' you are refering to is presumably Sam Allardyce.

Can I just ask...what striker did he think would be the answer to your prayers in January?

You need to prove yourself at some sort of level before you take the reins of what is arguably one of the tougher jobs in the Premier League. To get thrown into a difficult job with limited players with absolutely no previous experience is a recipe for disaster.

In any other field, someone who was elevated to a very high position of responsibility with absolutely no experience whatsoever would have plenty of people saying they weren't worth the chance. And rightly so.

Like I've said plenty of times, under Sam we were the 10th best team in the league the season after he took over from Ince, 10th in the league last season and started the first 17 games of this season in a manner which would've seen us 9th right now. Pretty much all done without a decent striker.

The lack of a striker isn't the biggest issue here, no matter how much you keep on bringing it up. I'm pretty sure Sam wouldnt have dropped someone who'd scored 4 in his previous 6 games though.

[John]

Like I've said plenty of times, under Sam we were the 10th best team in the league the season after he took over from Ince, 10th in the league last season and started the first 17 games of this season in a manner which would've seen us 9th right now. Pretty much all done without a decent striker.

Plus Sam, like Sparky, believe their teams get better in the 2nd half of the season.

[tony gale's mic]

Plus Sam, like Sparky, believe their teams get better in the 2nd half of the season.

Yep, shortly after Sam got sacked we had a great run of fixtures I think we wouldve done well from. Apart from the Man U match and the second half of the Bolton game we'd been playing pretty well before the sacking.

[92er]

I don't disagree with a single word of that post. BUT (and this is my ONLY agenda) I do think that with just five games to go we simply HAVE to stick with the present manager if we are to have even the remotest chance of surving the drop. At this stage the ONLY chance we have is to show 100% solidarity with the club, the manager, and the players. All this mass hysteria that has been shown by the majority of people on this MB and elswhere is just like a lynch mob mentality, and is absolutely NOT what is needed right now.

What is needed is for everyone to put aside whatever feelings of anger or prejudice that they hold from now until the end of the season and to just concentrate with every bit of energy they can muster on supporting the efforts by the players and the management to avoid the drop. What real aternative is there at thos stage?

I hope deep down all the fans get behind the team from the start to the end of the Manchester City game.

However, I really don't understand on what basis any fan thinks Kean will produce a good performance and get a result.

I understand fans could hope he will do it.

But his record so far, including many bewildering substitutions, gives no real basis for believing he will do it.

I hope he will do it. I don't believe he will.

[FourLaneBlue]

Can I just ask...what striker did he think would be the answer to your prayers in January?

Funny how we didn't need to pray until a competent Premiership manager was sacked and was replaced by a coach with no managerial experience at any level whatsoever.

We didn't have this mythical stiking God you think we need last season either but we made a semi-final and even scraped into the top half of the world's richest league.

[FourLaneBlue]

I don't disagree with a single word of that post. BUT (and this is my ONLY agenda) I do think that with just five games to go we simply HAVE to stick with the present manager if we are to have even the remotest chance of surving the drop.

The manager isn't going anywhere regardless of what anyone on hear thinks. Personally, I can't see how sacking Kean and putting the tea lady in charge could possibly be any worse. We haven't won in three months anyway, and he has only managed victories over teams in turmoil (WBA,Pool) and about to jettison their manager. Gerrard even did the decent thing and skied his penalty to aid this.

Still, we have to get behind the team as best as we can until we survive by the skin of our teeth/get deservedly relegated due to our "form" over the second half of the season.

[John]

I never got carried away after the Liverpool game - always good to beat one of the "big clubs" however they were in a complete mess at the time of the game, even Wolves beat them at Anfield just before we played them to highlight how bad things were going. On the night they gave us so much space and defended atrociously, something was fundamentally wrong hence why they sacked Hodgson shortly afterwards.

[Stuart]

Jeez, there must be loads of posts being removed at the moment. The next unread post button hasn't worked for ages!

I don't envy the mods at the minute.

[Andy]

I don't buy into this 'Kean's going nowhere, fact' stuff, regardless of what the Venkys have told the press.

If we get battered on Monday and our fans make the majority's feelings known, including some kind of protest after the match, Mr Good Presser (whose 'pressers' are actually pretty awful, out of touch and cringeworthy) will be in the dole queue by the end of next week.

[broadsword]

With these buffoons in charge of the club, all things are possible.

But I'd wager that they don't get shot of him even if we do get relegated. What perhaps might happen is the fans give him so much dog's abuse that he leaves the job of his own accord.

Actually, having said that, he's so shameless that he may not even do that (plus he wouldn't get any compansation).

Of course, it may well be that we sign a decent striker for £15 million quid next season and Kean gets us into Europe. We'd also be travelling to away games on the back of flying pigs.

[John]

Just watched Kean's Rovers Player interview - he looks pretty fired up, bit edgy too.

Says we need to look back to the Liverpool game for inspiration for Monday's match - need to put our stamp on the game from the first whistle and get our foot on the ball - says the players have been hurt by the criticism in the press (and want to prove a point).

[Mc Love]

He aint going anywhere as he said in his presser - that all the negativity is driving him on to try and do better

[Iceman]

Sam was ready to spend in excess of 10mill, but was supposedly sacked when the owners saw his transfer targets. It was never about results or style of play, but Sam spending far too much money which the owners didnt like. Targets such as Kenwyn Jones, Charles Nzogbia, Crouch, Ireland, Raul, Guti and Bentley would all have made a huge difference. Instead, the owners went the cheap route, and as a result we are where we are today.

[rebelmswar]

Sam was ready to spend in excess of 10mill, but was supposedly sacked when the owners saw his transfer targets. It was never about results or style of play, but Sam spending far too much money which the owners didnt like. Targets such as Kenwyn Jones, Charles Nzogbia, Crouch, Ireland, Raul, Guti and Bentley would all have made a huge difference. Instead, the owners went the cheap route, and as a result we are where we are today.

To be fair they did spend half of that on two prospects, one of whom seems very good.

[tashor]

Kean has made some pretty poor decisions thus far. The January window was totally wasted with £3.5 million being spent on a player who will seemingly make no contribution before next season. Rochina, a decent prospect, is still extremely raw, as was shown at Goodison last week, and will again make only a limited impact this season. The decision to let El-Hadji Diouf go, simply because of the media storm following the QPR game, was another poor decision in my opinion. With limited resouces available, to allow a player who had been constantly one of our top performers in the first half of the campaign to leave on loan has proved to be another own goal. If Kean got rid because he couldn't handle him it merely underlines his limited man-management abilities.

Therein lies the nub............

All of Kean's thinking up to this week has been based on the certainty of being a premier league club next season...

He obviously didn't even consider the possibility of relegation having inherited a stable, relatively successful side.

And that has been his biggest error............

His employers still do not seem to realise the predicament we are in

If we stay up then maybe we will be in the best of all possible worlds....

If not then Hell will inhabit the moral high ground

[Amo]

Sam was ready to spend in excess of 10mill, but was supposedly sacked when the owners saw his transfer targets. It was never about results or style of play, but Sam spending far too much money which the owners didnt like. Targets such as Kenwyn Jones, Charles Nzogbia, Crouch, Ireland, Raul, Guti and Bentley would all have made a huge difference. Instead, the owners went the cheap route, and as a result we are where we are today.

You don't honestly believe that, do you?

You make it sound like Sam would cut his own cheques.

If anything, sacking him wasn't the cheap option.

[chris]

He aint going anywhere as he said in his presser - that all the negativity is driving him on to try and do better

If your wages increase from probably 15k a month to 30k a week would you quit

Ok that's a guess but I would not, even if you all suffer relegation my kids need new shoes.

[bob fleming]

As the Grand Master of Garbage on the owners, their advisers and any scare stories you could possibly come up with...I salute you.

You can please yourself sunshine.

Do you think our fantastic new owners will take a game in before the end of the season? You know, it's quite important to us Rovers fans now. Could you make some enquiries perhaps? You must have some contacts nicko?

'Cause from where I'm sat, with mortgages, parachure payments, potentially a cut from Kentaro's transfer dealings and the potential to carry out a fire sale in the summer, I'm afraid I've got that nagging doubt in the back of my mind that they don't actually give a flying feck. Why should I think otherwise?

What with the non sacking of Kean, his ridiculous appointment in the first place on a long term contract, the removal of Williams, the admission that they don't know amything about football. It goes on and on.

Thanks.