Football Focus

[Jah Lush]

kpc Wrote:

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> ???? Wrote:

> --------------------------------------------------

> -----

> > Blackpool, Spuds and Birmingham for me ;-)

>

> Big relegation party at WHL on the last day of the

> season it is then!

IN YOUR DREAMS.

[Mick Mac]

Sports bookmakers have slashed odds on Celtic and Fulham landing Bellamy with Spurs moving out to 2/1, making lilywhites and Glasgow based clubs odds-on favourites to sign the well-travelled forward.

SKY BET ODDS ON CRAIG BELLAMY?S NEXT CLUB:

CELTIC ? 6/4

FULHAM ? 7/4

TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR ? 2/1

[Jah Lush]

I think it's more likely Spurs will get him on loan. At we can afford to pay his wages.

[Mick Mac]

We should be ?10m to the good this week when McGeady confirmed as leaving for Moscow so can also afford his wages. And he has played for the bhoys before, and needless to say - he luved it playing for the hoops.

[Mick Mac]

MARTIN O NEILL has parted company with Villa.........................

[matthew123]

Probably still pissed off he missed out on Liverpool job to Hodgson

[Annasfield]

Thank fuck we filled our vacant position before that happened.

[Mick Mac]

lol Anna. He's not that bad.

[matthew123]

He will be back at Celtic by the autumn the way your new boy has started off - would Celtic fans welcome 2 months of failure for the return of O'Neil ?

[Mick Mac]

No - Lennon will do ok I reckon. Puts a bit of pressure on him though knowing MON is out of work. But O Neill may take a temporary post supporting Lennon in meantime, which would be good, who knows.

[Keef]

My first thought was pretty much what Anna said. At one time I'd have probably been pleased enough, but not now.

[Mick Mac]

Jury out on the Hodgson decison for me - lets see how he gets on. Not sure MON has left himself in a good position tho - the managerial merry go round has come to a stop. He must have been pretty peeved off to leave at this time.

[Annasfield]

Hasn't he thrown his toys out of the pram at Villa before? Seem to remember reports that he'd quit but it all seemed to get resolved.

[kpc]

No real surprise except for timimg. MON has been moaning about lack of money to spend for the past two seasons. However Randy Lerner needs to claw money back on other investments and some of MON's purchases have not been particularly successful.

[Mick Mac]

Annasfield Wrote:

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> Hasn't he thrown his toys out of the pram at Villa

> before? Seem to remember reports that he'd quit

> but it all seemed to get resolved.

Is it not all part of the game managers play to get the funds they need?

Suspect he was made some promises the last time which were not honoured later and he walked.

[kpc]

Mick Mac Wrote:

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>

> Suspect he was made some promises the last time

> which were not honoured later and he walked.

He was told some money would be available but only through the sale of players and not all funds would go back into purchases.

[Mick Mac]

Yes - weaken your team by selling you best players (Barry/Milner) to fund acquisitions of poorer players - sorry but I'm not surprised he was not in agreement with that.

[matthew123]

O'Neil probably feels he has proved himself and worthy of a top job and simply has no appetitie to now being treated like a second class citizen. Not my brand of football but it's good to see a Manager not just talk it but walk the morale high ground.. when he could easily have stuck around engineering his way to a preposterous payoff.

[kpc]

And buy Curtis Davies ?8-10m, Steve Sidwell ?5m, Luke Young ?6m, Nicky Shorey (now off-loaded), Emile Heskey, Stewart Downing ?11m when injured (and not thought highly of by the fans), Habib Beye, Nigel Reo-Coker....Carlos Cuellar ?7.8m!! Ashley Young ?8-9m - very over-rated. Not somebody that you would necessarily trust the judgement of. And on high salaries. Luke Young's transfer to Liverpool fell through because he would have had to take a pay cut and there were similar problems over Shorey's ?40-50k per week in his move to West Brom.

He did well on deals for Friedel, Carew (in exchange for the useless Baros), Dunne, Collins and Milber, who he paid ?12m for, but overall his buying record is not good, recognised by board and fans.

His style of football at Villa is also not universally liked, a tendency to play it long to a big strong centre forward (Agbonlahor/Carew/Heskey), especially since the departure of Barry. That and bizarre decisions to field a youth team (in effect) in a UEFA Cup tie in Moscow when you're only 1-0 down from the first leg.

[Mick Mac]

The dream is to make the Champions League - hence the uefa cup decision - he knew his squad was running out of steam and so it proved.

The prices you quote are the norm for top 4 teams and these are the teams he is competing with. In the end Randy lacked the required ambition or funds, one or the other, to keep MON and he is a very ambitious man, so he said goodbye.

He took a club going nowhere to heights they have not reached for some time, he has done this with virtually every club he has managed.

It will be interesting to see who recruits him next. He will be linked with lesser clubs but is unlikely to take anything that does not have genuine top 4 aspirations.

[kpc]

Telegraph 3 March 2010

An article from earlier this year on Villa's finances - so how much more money do you expect Randy Lerner to put in?

And Martin O'Neill's spell at Leicester left the club with a massive wage bill and player that they took losses on in transfers, partially contributory to the club entering administration not long after he left.

For the record, I like Martin O'Neill and his passionate approach to the game - he was excellent at Wycombe, Leicester and Celtic but has come unstuck at Villa. Given the financial state both of the club and football in general, his leaving is over a very big hissy fit (granted he has not hung around waiting for the pay-off). Surely the moral high ground here would have been to stay on, work with the existing players and the talented players merging through Villa's youth team.

[Mick Mac]

He would see that of a waste of his abilities. He wants to win the Premiership, I imagine, and to eek out a mid table existence at Villa will frustrate him and damage his cv.

Clubs, to get to the top are required to push their finances, player demand wages etc, if a subsequent manager is not up to the job then the club suffers, especially if that manager allows the club to get relagated, like Leicester.

[Bluerevolution]

Man City, ruining football since 2008- Bound to be our fault

[matthew123]

Well he might even have his eye on the Man City job once it becomes available, probably next month

[Bluerevolution]

a lot of Blues agree with you Matthew