Souness must go ?

[tcj_jones]

jim mk2 Posted on Jan. 31 2004, 20:53

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Quote (tcj_jones @ Jan. 31 2004, 13:08)

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rover6

Premier League

Group: Members

Posts: 546

Joined: Oct. 2003  Posted: Oct. 20 2003, 22:52  

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People who have read my previous comments (all of whom have been critical of Souness) will know that this is not a knee-jerk reaction following the Charlton defeat.

I do admire one of Souness' strengths - fight. But did that fight reflect itself in the team against Charlton? Or Fulham, Liverpool, Man City etc.? Souness' fight is waning and his ability to instill confidence in his players is following suit.

Tactically, he is primative. Anyone can tell you that Tommo can't play left midfield. We have zero width when that happens. Any half-wit could have told you that Charlton were without Bartlett and Lisbie - their in form strikers. Surely the objective therefore, is to attack at home, not start with ONE striker and 3 defensive midfielders.

Nevertheless, tactics doesn't always win games. Ask Kevin Keegan. But what has Keegan got that Souness hasn't? The ability to give confidence and support his players. OK, Grabbi misses sitters against Genclerbiligi - what do you do? Put him on the bench to confirm your support for him OR chuck him out of the team altogether and let him rot - all £7million of him.

Souness claimed before the match that confidence was not a problem - which is why Tiny looked terrified on the ball. Ferguson avoided the ball, Flitty likewise, Tommo looked uncertain and Emerton non-existant.

WHy is Souness lying to the fans? Because he has to hide his blatent inability to help the players in their moment of crisis. No doubt Souness will blame the defeat on missed chances - why are we missing chances. Because the players are low on confidence and their manager isn't helping.

Last time we were this low under Souness, he went and bought Cole (during our first year back) and last season DUff came back to form. Souness can't buy anyone now, we don't have Duff - what is he going to do. The money was blown on failed signings - the biggest one being Barry Ferguson. A good player but not worth £7 million. Nowhere near as good as Scott Parker, Koumas, Michael Brown or Carrick.

We need to get rid to give a new man a chance to avert this crisis before it becomes disastrous. A new man will not bring with him SOuness' idiotic beliefs. Alan Mahon is not a rabid player who'll infect our players if he plays. Flitcroft isn't infallible because he's the skipper - need I go on. We need a shake up and heads must roll - Souness'.

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Souness must resign to give Blackburn a hope of avoiding relegation, administration and a Sheff Wed-like demise.

We need Plymouth boss Paul Sturrock  

when i read this post my heart sank.i find it appaulingly inaccurate in so many ways. firstly, how can a premiership manager and a manager with SO many years of experience in football and all over europe have "primitive" tactics?! i have watched blackburn play on numerous instances since the charlton match and we have looked superb minus the hurrendous mistakes of individual players and a lack of touch up front. you speak of lack of confidence... mayb that isnt souness fault but the fault of a group of incredibly talented players that simply arent cutting it on the pitch. souness has been involved in team building exercises an such an the defenders of ewood showed a good team spirit. as for the left wing - anyone will tell u that the sale of duff will leave u a huge void. admittedly tommo aint the best suited player to that position but with so little money given to spend and the lack of players available that fall into our wage structure, he is still a decent repacement. reid is a young player and was a good signing but hasnt quite settled and has been rocked by injury. who would u suggest we buy/put out on the left? as for grabbi, grabbi was a proven goalscorer but 7million was just too much and he was a flop - one of souness few mistakes as manager. if he cant cut it, then get him out! my criticsm is not that he withdrew him from the bench but that he didnt sell him ages ago, admit defeat an such. as for lying to the fans... thats ****, he will use excuses which i find to be commical genius; if it isnt the referee, its the pitch, or the opposition fans or the weather or a bird that flew a little too close to the players... but as u speak of confidence, would saying that players were **** EVERY match raise their confidence??!!! NO! any decent manager would know that. as for ferguson.... WHAT R U THINKING?! ferguson = deal of the season (if he hadnt have gotten injured) seeing as parker went for 10million an has performed on only a few instances and is relatively new to the scene, ferguson was a bargain being scotland captain and rangers captain and a true performer. at rovers he was slow to start, but MY GOD when he got going he ran the game! he was amazing. one of the best cm's iv seen this season in the premiership! newcastle for eg, he ran the game, got injured and it started to slip away from us until we got a lucky handball goal. we have missed him and havent been the same since his injury. alan mahon is not a good player - hence why division one clubs r after him. souness is not the problem! finances and players playing badly is our problem!!! i think more fans should stick up for our manager that has done so much for us.

sorry for the essay and im sure im going to displease the moderators... sorry! but that post was incredibly wrong in so many ways.

Have you heard of punctuation and paragraphs?

No doubt you have made some very good points in your post but I can't be bothered to read it because it looks so awful.  

im sorry, maybe i should add little pictures and arrows to aid in your reading...

[bob fleming]

This is as intelligent and reasoned an interview you are likely to get from a football manager and it happens to have been given by Souness.

I would be fascinated to know just what particular incident or observation prompted each of Jan, jim and 6 to become so rabidly anti-Souness.

Nice one philipl (again).

He swore!! It wouldn't happen on here.

[joey_big_nose]

Souness is hardly tactically naive, if anything he is too much of a purist. He is trying to establish a team that can compete with the big teams in terms of style and ability and he managed that last term. This has however come with the sacrifice of the 'killer instinct'. We would of been in the Champions league last season with a top goal scorer, whether it was Cole living up to his billing or even Robbie Keane. We are suffering because we arnt competing- in terms of talent in the squad we are easily in the same bracket or better than Charlton or Fulham. We have been unlucky with injuries to our most creative players, something you cannnot blame Souness for.

Ask yourself this, at the start of the season who would of not swapped their manager for our Graeme? Only the top three and arguably Charlton, Newcastle and Southampton- even Liverpool would of taken him back......

[tcj_jones]

joey_big_nose

Premier League

Group: Members

Posts: 158

Joined: July 2003  Posted: Feb. 01 2004, 12:14  

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Souness is hardly tactically naive, if anything he is too much of a purist. He is trying to establish a team that can compete with the big teams in terms of style and ability and he managed that last term. This has however come with the sacrifice of the 'killer instinct'. We would of been in the Champions league last season with a top goal scorer, whether it was Cole living up to his billing or even Robbie Keane. We are suffering because we arnt competing- in terms of talent in the squad we are easily in the same bracket or better than Charlton or Fulham. We have been unlucky with injuries to our most creative players, something you cannnot blame Souness for.

Ask yourself this, at the start of the season who would of not swapped their manager for our Graeme? Only the top three and arguably Charlton, Newcastle and Southampton- even Liverpool would of taken him back......

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Formerly dunnieforengland, damn that pie eating &*(^$$.  

u got it right there mate. souness is a phenominal manager and i honestly thought wed do just as well as we did last season. if we had a top goalscorer and didnt have the injuries wed be right up there.last season souness was billed as one of the managers of the season with moyes an that. why all of a sudden does he "have to go'??!!!

[tcj_jones]

what i want is for rover6 to come an explain himself....

[chris]

what i want is for rover6 to come an explain himself....

you are on your own there!

[jim mk2]

This is as intelligent and reasoned an interview you are likely to get from a football manager and it happens to have been given by Souness.

I would be fascinated to know just what particular incident or observation prompted each of Jan, jim and 6 to become so rabidly anti-Souness.

I agree that Souness talks intelligently on football and usually has something interesting to say. If he were not a manager, no doubt he would make a living as a full-time pundit on TV.

There's nothing in particular that makes me anti-Souness (though no doubt USA Blue will drag up the usual story), but I have felt for some time that his time is up at Ewood.

Every manager has a natural shelf life and Souness seems to have run out of ideas and inspiration.  He has made dreadful mistakes in the transfer market over the past year, his selections often defy common sense and his tactics are, to put it mildly, questionable.

Worst of all, he seems unable to motivate a well-paid squad that has no fight, guts, will-to-win, or stomach for the relegation battle. The defence has been a problem since the start of the season, which Souness continues to acknowledge yet shows no signs of being able to sort out.

In short, the club is in a shambles, probably as bad as it was under Bryan Kidd when a similarly under-motivated team was relegated.

It was interesting to see that Dean Richards, who led Leicester rugby club to unprecedented success over the past few years, was shown the door today after it was deemed that he had "lost the dressing room and was out of touch with his players".

Hard decisions have to be sometimes and Leicester made theirs. The Rovers board should have done the same months ago.

[Clive]

The problem is that we'd probably have the exciting choice of Peter Reid, Glenn Hoddle, George Graham or Howard Wilkinson   .

[Radagast]

In short, the club is in a shambles, probably as bad as it was under Bryan Kidd when a similarly under-motivated team was relegated.

If Rovers were in the same shamble they were under Kidd we would be deep in and not above the relegation zone and Souness would have been sacked long ago. The players we have now are infinitely superior to the ones we had then. The spirit of the team is also far, far higher - noone could fault us for effort and commitment against Chelsea. A well timed substitiution by the manager got us deservedly back onto level terms only for a typically gift wrapped goal to prove our undoing. There is nothing a manager can do about that kind of moronic 'defending' by players that are far better than that sort of mistake makes them seem.

[Jan]

Philipl

My dislike of Souness stems back to watching him sauntering around the field with no fight, or evidence of caring AT ALL for Scotland when he played for us in the 70s- I think it was,(playing much the same way his team's playing now) contrasted with the effort he put in for Liverpool.

[jim mk2]

In short, the club is in a shambles, probably as bad as it was under Bryan Kidd when a similarly under-motivated team was relegated.

If Rovers were in the same shamble they were under Kidd we would be deep in and not above the relegation zone and Souness would have been sacked long ago. The players we have now are infinitely superior to the ones we had then. The spirit of the team is also far, far higher - noone could fault us for effort and commitment against Chelsea. A well timed substitiution by the manager got us deservedly back onto level terms only for a typically gift wrapped goal to prove our undoing. There is nothing a manager can do about that kind of moronic 'defending' by players that are far better than that sort of mistake makes them seem.

I'm not sure that the players are "superior". They may have a better pedigree but their attitude to me is just as bad as those under Kidd, if not worse. I'm sorry but I just did not see in the Chelsea match the commitment required to get us out of trouble. We need the old Everton "dogs of war attitude".

[Tris]

Philipl

My dislike of Souness stems back to watching him sauntering around the field with no fight, or evidence of caring AT ALL for Scotland when he played for us in the 70s- I think it was,(playing much the same way his team's playing now) contrasted with the effort he put in for Liverpool.

Forgive and forget hey Jan ??

Maybe after 30 odd years, when he's won your beloved second club some silverware and you've been able to enjoy trips to Sofia and Ankara, you could forgive him ?

[Tris]

I'm sorry but I just did not see in the Chelsea match the commitment required to get us out of trouble. We need the old Everton "dogs of war attitude".

Would you care to indicate a single team in the league which has this, either below or above us ?

Times have moved on.

[tcj_jones]

jim mk2 Posted on Feb. 02 2004, 22:14

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Quote (philipl @ Jan. 31 2004, 22:03)

This is as intelligent and reasoned an interview you are likely to get from a football manager and it happens to have been given by Souness.

I would be fascinated to know just what particular incident or observation prompted each of Jan, jim and 6 to become so rabidly anti-Souness.

I agree that Souness talks intelligently on football and usually has something interesting to say. If he were not a manager, no doubt he would make a living as a full-time pundit on TV.

There's nothing in particular that makes me anti-Souness (though no doubt USA Blue will drag up the usual story), but I have felt for some time that his time is up at Ewood.

Every manager has a natural shelf life and Souness seems to have run out of ideas and inspiration.  He has made dreadful mistakes in the transfer market over the past year, his selections often defy common sense and his tactics are, to put it mildly, questionable.

Worst of all, he seems unable to motivate a well-paid squad that has no fight, guts, will-to-win, or stomach for the relegation battle. The defence has been a problem since the start of the season, which Souness continues to acknowledge yet shows no signs of being able to sort out.

In short, the club is in a shambles, probably as bad as it was under Bryan Kidd when a similarly under-motivated team was relegated.

It was interesting to see that Dean Richards, who led Leicester rugby club to unprecedented success over the past few years, was shown the door today after it was deemed that he had "lost the dressing room and was out of touch with his players".

Hard decisions have to be sometimes and Leicester made theirs. The Rovers board should have done the same months ago.

u speak intelligently, you clearly know what you're talking about unlike rover6...

however, you have spoken of dreadful signings this season. personally i cannot think of one signing that has been bad, let alone dreadful and frankly signing ferguson was a HUGE signing for this club.as long as hes back to the VERY high standards that he was playing at in the run up to injury, he will guide us into the top 8 next season im sure.

secondly, souness has not had a particularly long spell at ewood - nothing like say peter reid at sunderland and to believe his time has been up for some time makes me wonder if you've forgotten how he took us into the premiership and acheived a shock 6th place for us last season.

motivation of the team is not just souness job; due to injury we have switched captains more times then i can count and undoubtedly that has affected team spirit. the players arent cutting it and i dont think that is the managers fault - souness even appears to have chilled out somewhat from last season yet we came 6th last time around... the will to win is there - the amount of times we have taken the lead till the close of the game only to make ridiculously stupid defensive mistakes.

he is ready to admit that we have defensive problems, but we have been rocked by injuries and gresko has been AWFUl this season. i remember the games leading up to fergusons injury - the full backs were pushing up nicely delivering quality balls and we had an amazing quality to our play. but because of our out of touch strikers and utterly appauling mistakes at the back, we have lost. he has used a number of combinations at the back but none seem to work. without short we are not rock solid as we were last season. next season, providing we are in the division and we have the same squad we do now, we WILL be top half of the league and i hope itl be souness that leads us there. i cannot think of many managers in the league that are more experienced or more successful and there are none that are available that even come close to the brilliance of souness

[roversWASmylife]

An honest interview from Souness.

I agree with jim mk2, partly. I do believe that Souness has run out of ideas and inspirations. If you look closely at his interviews over the past few weeks, he looks a deflated man. He looks as if he`s given up.  I don`t think this as we`ve been c***. But the luck that has come with it, losing Barry, Thommo,Amo etc. Souness said that we`ve conceded to many careless goals, which we have. Take the last two home games, scored 5 and conceded 7. Really, teams coming to your home ground shouldn`t be scoring that amount. The 3rd goal for Chelsea should have been dealt with, Souness was correct on one of the after-match interviews saying in a p***** off attitude, "we are where we are, because we deserve to be."

[tcj_jones]

i dont believe souness is out of inspirations in all honesty - each game we look impressive. infact i think souness shows strength of character appearing each and every week for post match interviews and shows so much passion on the sideline. i feel more and more empathy for souness; a man that has done so much for the club, as he looks more and more dejected each time we lose. i think any one in his position would look the same.

[daviemac]

Souness has been tremendous for Rovers, up until Christmas gone.

I feel that the consequences of his heart condition and his medicine regime [granted I am not privvy to the exact details] have combined to null the edge of his passion.

So many times we here from players present, and recently departed, about how the "boss has mellowed blah, blah , blah". I want the Souness back who was offering out Journo's in the car park when he first came. Again its only my opinion, but players today can  only be 'scared' into performing by good old physical threats! Money fines cannot hurt them alone, but a good chinning, fined and a month in the stiffs might, just might get those with no personal pride to up their work rates.

This does not mean that I want TP to hide the bosses pill's; but maybe Souey could move upstairs and back up a younger, hungrier,angrier manager......................

Get Speedie in to work under/with Souness

A loud call maybe, but at least Fevre and his crew will earn their corn a bit more    

[RoverDrake]

Did someone really say Souey has 'given-up?'

Sorry but Graeme isn't the type of man to give-up. If we were 20th and 15points behind the 17th placed team then yes I kind of wouldn't blame him that much... But Souness is a fighter but he is just frustrated...

I mean just as Barry Ferguson was settling in he gets a major injury...also Reid, Thommo & Amo all out injured and a lot of players not fufilling their potential.. Wouldn't that frustrate you? Or make you seem a little down?

Souey's signings haven't been bad this season. But I think we didn't replace Duff at all and we also didn't sign a good striker.

My only faults I find with Souness are:

1. His faith in Yorke & Cole partnership.

2. The times he played certain players out of position *cough* Thommo *cough*

[Jan]

Tris

I was asked what STARTED my animosity to Souness.  The balance is still very heavily weighted against him in the things he's done since.

The balance is getting better- or was till this season, but he'd need to be beatified at least to get to even in my book.

[jim mk2]

I'm sorry but I just did not see in the Chelsea match the commitment required to get us out of trouble. We need the old Everton "dogs of war attitude".

Would you care to indicate a single team in the league which has this, either below or above us ?

Times have moved on.

If we're talking about honest commitment:

Above us, in no particular order:

Arsenal, ManU, Chelsea, Newcastle, Liverpool, Charlton, Bolton, Southampton, Tottenham, Aston Villa, Birmingham, Middlesbrough, Fulham, Portsmouth, Everton, Man City.

Below us:

Leicester, Wolves, Leeds.

Did I leave anyone out? Same of them may be poor teams, but at least they play as if they care.

This Rovers team is not honest. They are cheats, to themselves, the club and, worst of all, to the supporters, the paying public.

[Grimshaw]

This Rovers team is not honest. They are cheats, to themselves, the club and, worst of all, to the supporters, the paying public.

Sob sniff

He's a miserable @#/? but its true!

[Tris]

I'm sorry but I just did not see in the Chelsea match the commitment required to get us out of trouble. We need the old Everton "dogs of war attitude".

Would you care to indicate a single team in the league which has this, either below or above us ?

Times have moved on.

If we're talking about honest commitment:

Above us, in no particular order:

Arsenal, ManU, Chelsea, Newcastle, Liverpool, Charlton, Bolton, Southampton, Tottenham, Aston Villa, Birmingham, Middlesbrough, Fulham, Portsmouth, Everton, Man City.

Below us:

Leicester, Wolves, Leeds.

Did I leave anyone out? Same of them may be poor teams, but at least they play as if they care.

This Rovers team is not honest. They are cheats, to themselves, the club and, worst of all, to the supporters, the paying public.

There's a world of difference between honest commitment and the "Everton dogs of war" style you were harping on about.

In fact the closest to "dogs of war" you could get in this league is probably Ince and Rae at Wolves, lots of good it's doing them.

[Samuel Dingle]

you've forgotten how he took us into the premiership and acheived a shock 6th place for us last season.

Shock???

He had the sixth highest wage bill in the Premiership and had a good few quid to blow in the transfer market... and at that stage he still hadn't had to sell off the players he had the good fortune to inherit.

Sixth is the least the board could have expected, just as promotion was before that.

This season is the first when one or two problems can no longer be solved with a desperate brandishing of the cheque book. And he's failing gloriously.

Long may it continue.

[SouthAussieRover]

This Rovers team is not honest. They are cheats, to themselves, the club and, worst of all, to the supporters, the paying public

That statement's going to come back and haunt you.

[Nuclearsox]

Out of interest Sam, how does Bumley's wage bill compare with the rest of division 1. Where can we expect you to finish this season?