Liverpool keeping close eye on McLeish contract talks

[coop]

For the people on this thread turning their noses up to the likes of McLeish because of his track record (I am not saying he would be my first choice like should our manager leave in the summer but all the same I wouldn't be totally against the idea either) would do well to remember that we have a manager with much more resources than him and much better players who has them playing beneath themselves.

 

McLeish has his players playing way above themselves in a squad mainly of Championship players and has bought two good solid centre halfs for a pittance really and our manager hasn't beaten McLeish in 180 minutes of football this season.

 

We have also only put real daylight between us and Birmingham over the past month or so as well.

 

Arsene Wenger didn't have a ''track record'' as far as I know and look at the success he has had.

 

The thing is John if the manager of Liverpool signed two centre halfs for pittance from the lower leagues this place would go into meltdown.

 

The expectations put on been the manager of Liverpool compared to the manager of Birmingham are massive.

 

I do agree though regards the 'track record' and in our current state we are not in a position to chasing after the worlds so called 'elite' managers but i personally would prefer to be looking at the Laurent Blanc kind of manager who has his teams playing good, attacking football.

[Guest the boy]

it does'nt need a manager with a reputation, we need a manager thats hungry and a winning mentality, if Mc Leish is that man I'll welcome him, because Rafa is the polar opposite of it.

 

Benitez has won so much in such a young managerial career that he having a winning mentality is unquestionable. Whether Liverpool and Benitez remain compatible is the dilema. There have been so many fissures between club and manager, and manager and fans, over the past three seasons that overcoming them may be beyond him now. I do think that this current team has gone as far as it can, and that big changes must be made in the summer. I think the list of managers with the proven calibre of Benitez, available or not, is extremely short: La Liga, UEFA Cup, European Cup, FA Cup winning managers aren't in the habit of lying around. I think that any new appointment, then, will inevitably be a lurch into the dark; Mourinho would be an aside, but an unrealistic one at that.

 

No domestic candidate can offer the style which people yearn and the promise of success to go with it. The closest semblance to British managers who have had their teams playing decent football are Hodgson and Redknapp, neither of whom have ever had any sort of sustained success. Looking to Moyes across the park, and O'Neil at Villa: these are managers who have stumbled when the bar has been raised and resurfaced once expectations have receded. To my mind we struck lucky with the appointment of Benitez at the time: a young manager who already had a track record of both domestic and European success with a relatively restrained budget, the closest to whom now would be a Laurent Blanc.

 

 

Whatever happens, the environment in which the Liverpool manager works needs to be mended. It broke Houllier. Most would say from the way he carries himself during and after the game that it's now broken Benitez. Expecting the incredible under the current conditions cannot go on regardless of who is manager.

[Juan Galonso]

The thing is John if the manager of Liverpool signed two centre halfs for pittance from the lower leagues this place would go into meltdown.

 

The expectations put on been the manager of Liverpool compared to the manager of Birmingham are massive.

 

I do agree though regards the 'track record' and in our current state we are not in a position to chasing after the worlds so called 'elite' managers but i personally would prefer to be looking at the Laurent Blanc kind of manager who has his teams playing good, attacking football.

 

I agree with you regarding the track records coop as it shouldn't be the be all and end all. I am all for giving a young hungry manager with fresh ideas a chance to make his own track record.

 

I disagree with you however where you say if Rafa signed two centre halfs from the lower leagues this place would go into meltdown. That is exactly the type of business looking more at players in the lower leagues we should be looking at doing more often rather than letting Macia run riot with his Italian agents.

 

Wigan paid was it 1m for that McCarthy kid as a case in point. We spent best part of 20m on Aquilani and 6-7m on Lucas. Who got the better deal?

[WaltonRed]

I agree with you regarding the track records coop as it shouldn't be the be all and end all. I am all for giving a young hungry manager with fresh ideas a chance to make his own track record.

 

I disagree with you however where you say if Rafa signed two centre halfs from the lower leagues this place would go into meltdown. That is exactly the type of business looking more at players in the lower leagues we should be looking at doing more often rather than letting Macia run riot with his Italian agents.

 

Wigan paid was it 1m for that McCarthy kid as a case in point. We spent best part of 20m on Aquilani and 6-7m on Lucas. Who got the better deal?

 

Spot on John.

 

I'd rather have a manager willing to gamble on some kids from the lower league than absolute gash like Dossena for 7m (that list could go on)

[Faustus]

Spot on John.

 

I'd rather have a manager willing to gamble on some kids from the lower league than absolute gash like Dossena for 7m (that list could go on)

 

Deffo. I've said before on here that it's something we should be looking at.

 

I fucking hate the cunt, but you've got to hand it Moyes how he has a habit of spotting cut-price talent from the lower leagues and developing them into Premier League players. Cahill at £1.5m has to be one of the best bargains of the past decade.

[George Costanza]

Dorrans at West Brom looks a top prospect.

[WaltonRed]

Deffo. I've said before on here that it's something we should be looking at.

 

I fucking hate the cunt, but you've got to hand it Moyes how he has a habit of spotting cut-price talent from the lower leagues and developing them into Premier League players. Cahill at £1.5m has to be one of the best bargains of the past decade.

 

Great shout.

 

There are some cracking players in the lower league's who could do it.

 

I'd rather us punt on Darren fucking Beckford than the Serb for example.

[Red-Ed]

Deffo. I've said before on here that it's something we should be looking at.

 

I fucking hate the cunt, but you've got to hand it Moyes how he has a habit of spotting cut-price talent from the lower leagues and developing them into Premier League players. Cahill at £1.5m has to be one of the best bargains of the past decade.

 

I went to the Tranmere vs Millwall game years ago when cahill was playing for them. He was head and shoulders better than anybody else on the pitch. it's not rocket science to pick these players out and get them for pittance.

 

The problem is then giving them the game time to develop into the players they are today.

 

It's much easier for everton, villa, wolves, wigan to give younger players opportunities as they are out of the spot light and mistakes aren't highlighted as much.

 

We have so little room for error, in terms of dropping points, that it's very difficult to give them a chance.

 

Having said that the expensive foreign signings we've made could easily have been switched for good young British players - Riera at £7M or Adam Johnson at £6M. I know which I would prefer. The same goes for Ramsey, Ashley Young and more. These are players you can get for £6M or £7M but we don't.

 

It's funny as we paid that for Lucas, which I actually support as he is the young type of player we should be in for, but don't seem to want to do it locally.

[hamstrung]

In their desperation to find a new manager peoples standards have gone to shit.

[coop]

I agree with you regarding the track records coop as it shouldn't be the be all and end all. I am all for giving a young hungry manager with fresh ideas a chance to make his own track record.

 

I disagree with you however where you say if Rafa signed two centre halfs from the lower leagues this place would go into meltdown. That is exactly the type of business looking more at players in the lower leagues we should be looking at doing more often rather than letting Macia run riot with his Italian agents.

 

Wigan paid was it 1m for that McCarthy kid as a case in point. We spent best part of 20m on Aquilani and 6-7m on Lucas. Who got the better deal?

 

Without a doubt John looking at lower leagues but players such as McCarthy turned us down to as they didn't fancy their chances of getting into the team.

 

Personally i think looking at a young up and coming manager is what we will need to look at and like yourself John i have no problem at all with that.

[WaltonRed]

Young and up coming? Like who though?

 

We've gambled on our managers for too long, Houllier and Benitez were both left field appointments.

 

I want an established man.

[hamstrung]

Benitez wasn't particularly left field. He was one of the most highly rated young managers in Europe

[Red-Ed]

Young and up coming? Like who though?

 

We've gambled on our managers for too long, Houllier and Benitez were both left field appointments.

 

I want an established man.

 

For a while I thought Simon Grayson might be a good shout but Leeds have gone seriously off the boil recently. Paul Lambert is doing a good job at Norwich and has experience playing football abroad so might be a good shout.

 

Not to sure on who is over performing in the lower leagues though.

[Captain]

Moyes? Are my eyes deceiving me, or are people actually touting that bog-eyed cunt as our next manager?

 

I'm lost for words.

[WaltonRed]

Who's touted Moyes?

 

Faustus was only saying he's proved you can buy lower league players on the cheap and they'll do a good job.

[Captain]

Who's touted Moyes?

 

Faustus was only saying he's proved you can buy lower league players on the cheap and they'll do a good job.

 

Hopefully I got it wrong, then.

[WaltonRed]

You did.

[straight_red]

I think whoever comes in is going to have a massive job on their hands. The squad needs a clear out, tactics need to be shaken up and the players who stay need to start believing in themselves again. I don't think this is the kind of job that can be done by a youthful manager. We need someone who commands respect from the most experienced of players and has experience of coping with huge amounts of pressure. Not sure we can afford someone of that nature though...

[rondeco]

Hamstrung on the money

[Guest Numero Veinticinco]

Young and up coming? Like who though?

 

We've gambled on our managers for too long, Houllier and Benitez were both left field appointments.

 

I want an established man.

 

Rafa wasn't a left field appointment. He was the top man in Spain. Rafa was the right choice, in my opinion. That has played out to be a good move, well, 'til this season anyway. From winning the European Cup in his first season, through winning the FA Cup and taking us to another European finals, right up until last season where we finished second with a few points from the title.

[WaltonRed]

I remember the fanzine with all the pictures on and Benitez was the one man most people couldnt name.

 

He was left field in terms of not being a house hold name.

[ScouseJim]

O'Neill is on a one year rolling deal at Villa unless I'm mistaken. Next year it's unlikely we'll be in the Champions League, why not offer O'Neill or McLeish a similar contract with us. They'd be likely to want to take a big job like ours. If they impress in the league, extend it.

 

Some might argue that on that premise Rafa would have got an extended contract after 'Number 5' but if you think back on that campaign we were gash in the league, domestic cups and even in the CL we had to rely on some fantastic comebacks and pure grit in performances. How much of that was down to Rafa?

 

Even in the final he was forced to being Didi on for Stevie Finnan as he was injured. When else can anyone remember him having the balls to change his tactics at half time without injuries to players. He might have once but for life of me I can't remember when.

[Brownie]

I was making the same point during the massive debate we had on here regarding the length of Rafa's new contract. Offering ANY manager a long-term deal is asking for trouble in the current climate.

 

A lot of managers work to these rolling contracts and just get on with it; it's totally different to the player situation.

[Code]

McLeish has got almost compltetly the same points pr game ratio in the PL as T.Pulis, for their current teams the likes of Allardyce, Hodgson, Moyes, Redknapp and O`Neill together with Mancini, Rafa, Wenger, Ancelotti and Ferguson all haved better records.

 

McLeish have 17 wins, 19 draws and 21 losses under his belt so far, not much to write home about really.

[hamstrung]

I remember the fanzine with all the pictures on and Benitez was the one man most people couldnt name.

 

He was left field in terms of not being a house hold name.

 

That's down to peoples general ignorance, not his qualifications for the job. Putting aside what has happened now, he was a really smart appointment at the time.

 

The opposite of what appointing someone like McLeish would be, basically.