Last weekend, two Premier League managers were sacked, Steve Clarke of West Brom and Andre Villas-boas of Tottenham. Many Aston Villa fans are slowly beginning to get fed up with Lambert’s tactics and may have already assessed Aston Villa in the hands of a new manager. Obviously if Randy Lerner has had enough, he would sack Lambert before January. However, historically, Lerner is yet to sack a manager mid-season. But based on results and current standings, we are 11th place, which isn’t too bad. In-fact we are in range of our expectation of mid-table.
But lets say that Lambert does get sacked today, who would Lerner replace him with? Would Lerner go with an international manager? Or one with Premier League experience? I say the second option seems the more viable, so who are our candidates: Roberto Di Matteo, Steve Clarke, Andre Villas-boas, Gareth Southgate, and Steve Holloway. What about some of our former players: Dwight Yorke and Martin Laursen.
The list I’ve just put together has some decent candidates, I personally rate Di Matteo, he can organise the team well, however the style of football may be similar to Lambert’s and could become uninteresting very quickly. I don’t think Lerner would make the same mistake by hiring a rival clubs manager, so Clarke is off the list. Villas-boas is over-rated and will cost a fortune and Holloway is a mad man, both of the list as well. The only manager who remains on the list, and the manager that I believe has a similar philosophy as Lambert in terms of youth policy is Gareth Southgate. Boy, would I love to have Southgate manage Aston Villa. He is a former player, he now has lots of experience, he is young and I reckon he’d do a terrific job for Aston Villa.
But before I get carried away I do want to step back for a second, I don’t think Lambert deserves to get sacked, yet! I’d seriously give him January to buy an attacking midfielder and I seriously believe it’ll make the difference. Maybe even sign an experienced defender on loan as well? I still believe that to build and maintain success at a football club, there needs to be continuity. Believe it or not, Lambert lies 6th place in the Premier League manager tenure table. The top 3 are Wenger, Pardew and Allardyce. Lambert’s first season was tough, and this season he is fill in the spots. Injuries have hampered his success especially in defence with both Okore and Vlaar out injured, arguably our two best defenders.
Lambert will get it right, if he doesn’t he won’t be given a new contract and we’ll move on a different manager. But right now, I’m not pressing the panic button. January is just around the corner and it’s an opportunity for Lambert to get that much needed attacking midfielder. I reckon that’ll save his job in the future.
I think if we finish thirteenth or higher Lambert will definatly stay and i think we will cos of all the other shite in the league,. some of the football ive seen even with the top teams has been so so poor
ANDREW if you say is right then would you trust Lamberk with say a £100 million.Think that if Lerner is going to have one last chance at glory Lamberk must go sooner rather than later as there was talk in some quarters before Lerner gave in to certain fans demands for Lamberk to be appointed he was already scouting the continent for a young manager possibly from Spain.But he gave them whom they wanted and now it;s all going pear shaped the Lemmings as i fondly nick named them are still coming out to defend him although it;s plain to see he will never make it as a top manager tactics and style of football is the worst i have ever seen in all my years as a Villa fan and that,s been 65 yrs.
Well that goes to show if true (I knew he was looking around but didn’t know in places like Spain) that Lerner knows more about football than a lot of the fans and a lot of people actually give him credit for. He can think for himself, he should make the choice himself on who’s next. I don’t think it would matter who Villa played in the last game of last season, Villa would have cheered and called for just about anyone and Lambert was and still is a terrible choice.
So here are some interesting stats.
http://i40.tinypic.com/8zdzq0.png
Villa average the least crosses per game with Crystal Palace.
Tied for the least amount of through balls per game.
Tied for the most long balls per game.
Have the 2nd lowest short passes per game.
But yes, we are definitely getting better and improving.
Lads a few interesting but good manager names mention..
What about Sami Hyppia?… doing a decent job..
Anyway doesn’t matter who we get in.. is that knob Lerner going to give a decent kitty and even more importantly pay decent wages.. 30-40K min….
So he spent 20m over the summer, while Villa made 5m from transfers so he spent 17m, he spent 2m in January, Villa sold no one and then he spent 25m the summer before that and Villa made 3.5m from transfers. So he spent 47m, Villa made 8.5m back. I’m sorry but how is Lerner not giving a decent kitty? Wages are a different matter at the moment, but in terms of giving Lambert more than enough money for 2 summers, he definitely has. He’s on the way, if given time, to spend as much as O’Neill did.