Appointing someone with very little achievements, few relegations and financial troubles was just as much of a risk for a team fighting for top 4
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Redknapp
- Thread starter Grays_1890
- Start date
Appointing someone with very little achievements, few relegations and financial troubles was just as much of a risk for a team fighting for top 4
But we weren't fighting for top 4 at the time! We had finished 11th in the previous season, and were bottom when we appointed him. After the Ramos failure, we just needed someone to steady the ship and give the players a bit of confidence in order to make sure we didn't get relegated.
We had two 5th place finishes prior to that. Missed CL by a whisker in the first.
Our season objectives were always Top 4 - something which HR had never dealt with before
We are 6th in the all time PL table
3 points behind Villa. Soon to be 5th which is were we've always been quality wise imv HR has NEVER managed a club
Or our stature and expextations as hr himslef admitted
Our season objectives were always Top 4 - something which HR had never dealt with before
We are 6th in the all time PL table
3 points behind Villa. Soon to be 5th which is were we've always been quality wise imv HR has NEVER managed a club
Or our stature and expextations as hr himslef admitted
milo
Jack L. Jones
Redknapp was appointed to stop us getting relegated but we had been looking at him for some time. The rumour at the time was that Kemsley had been pushing Levy to replace Jol with Redknapp.
I doubt we would have been relegated.
So replace a manager who managed two 5th places on the trot with a wheeler deeler who had up to then managed some bottom feeders and signed players on massive wages where we all know what follwed - carried no risk? - which is the argument here btw
milo
Jack L. Jones
We'll never know whether we would have been relegated. We had a badly balanced side that season and Ramos had lost the dressing room, he needed replacing.
Any managerial appointment carries risks. I wasn't particularly enamoured with Redknapp coming in at the time and thought that he was probably a short term appointment. I was wrong, he's done very well.
We didn't replace Jol with Redknapp, we replaced him with Ramos. That was a huge risk - replacing a (very popular) manager who managed two 5th places on the trot with a guy who'd never managed in the Premier League and could barely speak English. And the risk backfired badly.
And I think you're underestimating the severity of our situation at the time. It's easy to say in hindsight that you doubt we would have been relegated, but at the time we had 2 points after almost a quarter of the season (in case Redknapp hadn't told you this before!
) The fact that we are now 6th in the all-time PL table is irrelevant. Our season objective at the time we appointed Harry was not top 4! Come on! It was to avoid relegation.Again, I think you're guilty of looking at the past with rose-tinted specs, saying 'back to challenging for the top 4' as if that was the norm.
We had ONE season where we challenged for the top 4 - Jol's first full season in charge (05/06). In the five seasons before that we finished 9th, 14th, 10th, 9th and 12th.
The season after that we did finish 5th again, but we were never 'challenging the top 4'. After 6 games we were 18th. After 14 we were 11th. After 24 we were 10th. After 35 we were 9th. Finally we finished 5th, but 8 points behind Arsenal in 4th.
The next season we finished 11th, 27 points off 4th.
The next season Harry took over after 8 games when we were bottom on 2 points, having sold 4 of our most important players since our one top-4-challenging season (Carrick, Berbatov, Keane and Defoe). To say that the following season the expectation was to be 'back to challenging the top 4' is completely not in line with the club's situation at that time and in the years previous to that.
And to compare our situation at that time to our situation now is ridiculous.
I think you re confusing season objectives with our finishing position.
Our objectives would have been to challenge for CL football - from Jol s first 5th place till today (possibly even couple of seasons back)
To do that with someone of Arry s level back then (after making sure we avoid relegation) was as much of a risk as some of the names thrown around now bar AVB who is ahead in that list, imv
Our objectives would have been to challenge for CL football - from Jol s first 5th place till today (possibly even couple of seasons back)
To do that with someone of Arry s level back then (after making sure we avoid relegation) was as much of a risk as some of the names thrown around now bar AVB who is ahead in that list, imv
I give up. To compare our objectives / expectations now to our objectives / expectations when we appointed Harry is ridicluous. Do you honestly think the situations are similar?!
i don't think Levy would have been expecting Redknapp to get us 4th tbh - was most likely a stop gap and the following season he would have probably been looking to appoint a successor (had we not done so well)
but i see what you are saying Arc - if Redknapp hadn't had looked like getting us 4th in his second season then he would have been replaced because we would not be near our aim of top 4
but i see what you are saying Arc - if Redknapp hadn't had looked like getting us 4th in his second season then he would have been replaced because we would not be near our aim of top 4
parklane1
Tony Galvin
Can not agree with that, everyone i knew and those i travel to games with thought it was a big risk, one trophy in over 30 years and a couple of relegations. As i have said all managerial appointments carry a risk and Redknapp's was no different.
Does anyone else ever wonder why they waste so much of their life on this forum?! 36 pages, and has anyone really changed their mind based on another poster's argument?
I was about to write more, but I can't be arsed. If you can't see / admit that our situation and expectations when we hired Harry were very, very different to our situation / expectations now, then there's no point carrying on with this discussion.
mick cooper
Neil Sullivan
Trust me, I know you know your football, unlike some of the half wits who shout and rail against HR.
I also know that the players are not entirely to blame, and that the slide that occurred happened for the reason that everyone recognises, but I don't hold with the myth that it is all down to HR taking his eye off the ball. Primarily because it hardly sits well with any employer to see a potential employee setting fire to the castle they leave, either out of spite or indolence, so for that reason I believe he would not have "not given a fudge" or "shown his arse" to anyone in the period.
My personal belief is that the reason is because of the speculation, and it was a combination of the uncertainty in the team - at the prospect of losing a talismanic and charismatic manager, as well as a certain amount of laissez faire, but not the total ambivalence that is suggested.
You know as well as I do, that any great manager inspires a team, but when you walk out onto the pitch, its the collective will and cohesion of the 11 men out there that wins the game, so to absolve the players is a sign of ignorance of playing the game, or a wilful desire to pin the blame on the man they didn't like from the start.
Statistics, meh - can't stand them, but in the face of the gloating half wits who trot them out on a repetitious basis, I simply fought back with a few that stand in HRs favour, strangely they are largely ignored, but any amount of stats that fit the bill of condemning him are paraded in large font and repeated metronomically.
To suggest that I ignore the effect a manager can have, would mean that I would have to suggest that Ferguson had nothing to do with 20 years of manure dominance, or Busby, Wenger, Shankly or even our own Bill Nick and their place in the history of their respective clubs. The effect of those managers was to inspire their players, in some cases to be a better team than the sum of their collective parts, something that I believe is HRs greatest asset.
He is condemned for his indecision, poor tactical nous, lack of ambition, loyalty, honesty, integrity and every damn human and professional failing under the sun. People scour records and consult the great GHod OPTA and offer every manager under the sun as a viable alternative. Why?, so they can justify their own particular prejudice, and to substantiate their own personal belief that they know more about football than he does - or me, or you.
I have stood up for HR, because I don't believe in all of the crap that comes out in the media, and I don't care about the prejudices of football fans, or take violently against the personalities of people that I don't know. I also don't think I know everything that there is to know about football, but I do know that I have been watching it for long enough to know good football when I see it, and have played enough of it to recognise good players when I see them.
The period when our game fell apart hurt me just as much as anyone else, but I don't feel the need to do a fudging autopsy on it, all day and every day. I also don't feel the need to find the guilty and have them punished, because fundamentally, we have got the basis for a bloody good team, and a bloody good squad, under an inspirational and effective manager. It makes more sense to me to remove the wasters and the "past it" from our squad (and maybe even the management team - which seems to be rather large..........another discussion) and get in the players that we need to strengthen the overall squad.
Someone produced a list of players and started pushing the word marginalised against players, as if it were some unfair mark of cain, painted on the heads of the innocent by a cruel and despotic leader. The people that don't get to play for the team are the ones who aren't good enough to make the team and the system work, that the manager wants to play - if they are not good enough, they need to play better, if they can't, then others get to play. Marginalised my arse.
AVB - I was convinced he would fail and said so before he arrived, and in my mind I knew it would be because he can't inspire players, which RDM obviously can, but doesn't perhaps have the technical nous to make them better than some dour, obdurate defensive machine. Personally I hope he gets the job. He'll be sacked by January and that should disrupt their season.
Maybe some kind of arrangement with AVB, working with Harry might produce a merger that gives us the technical and tactical edge, and HR provides the leadership, man management and inspiration that the vapid AVB doesn't seem to possess. If we got rid of Bond and replaced him with AVB, then kept HR on for a season or 2 before phasing AVB into the hotseat and HR into a DOF type role, or retirement, that might work for everyone, AVB isn't stupid and he would learn from HR on what makes footballers tick, the players would accept him, and the manager that emerged would finally become one to run a PL team.
My reservations about AVB were always about him being accepted by the players, not about his technical knowledge of the game. Have you ever worked for a manager with lots of academic qualifications but no practical knowledge to fall back on? If you get one with no charisma or personality as well, then you know life is going to be unpleasant.
So for all of the crowing posters who have dug up stats about RDM vs AVB, - well done you.
The Moonlit Knight
Banned
The Moonlit Knight
Banned
Yes it certainly was different. As you rightfully point out, we were bottom of the table and we needed a Manager to come in and basically save us from relegation. I don't think even Levy probably thought that Redknapp would turn around our fortunes so quickly! It is true we had two 5th places in the previous three seasons but we had only challenged top four on one occasion.
I've always believed Harry has been a victim of his own success. From a purely logical perspective the demands would be :
1st Year : Save us from relegation (we actually finished 9th!)
2nd Year : Consolidate our safety, i.e. mid-table and at no point in the relegation dogfight (we finished 4th)
3rd Year : With the solid base built in year 2, now push for top six. Expectations aren't that we get it, but that we seriously challenge for it (we finished 5th)
4th Year : Get top six without necessarily challenging for top four (we finished 4th)
5th Year : Challenge for top four, and get top six.
People have to realise at the point we finished 5th twice, that was the exception.....not the rule. At the point of Jol's sacking, let alone Ramos's, we were no longer a top six team.
africanspurs
Justin Edinburgh
=D>