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Neil Warnock.....The League's very own Mourinho on 21:01 - Apr 25 by CHUBBS
Look,sacking JFH would be ludicrous as he's got a hell of a job on just keeping us competive. NW also took over our club in arguably a worse mess yet took us somewhere we just never believed possible. When promoted we were woefully under prepared on and off the pitch with no real plan of attack due to the late takeover. If we'd completed our original transfer plan NW earmarked we'd have had a good season I've no doubt however we ended up with the dregs and none of those signings were a success. Yes some of the blame can be attributed to NW however he was under pressure to make signings from new owners with no idea how to run a football club. MH came in and was no better than NW spending an absolute fortune just to stay up on the final day after Bolton blew it. We'd have been better off keeping NW for all the money spent hiring the hapless MH and we actually got worse. The real problems at our club have been making the wrong decisions at the wrong time and we all know who that's down to.
Thanks for replying. From what you said there, we don't disagree on much, just a couple of points - but they are big 'uns!
"We'd have been better off keeping NW for all the money spent hiring the hapless MH and we actually got worse."
That's an easily arguable point, and one that I basically agree with, but it is ascertainable only with the 20/20 vision of hindsight. Fernandes was being very astute and business-like (read: 'heartless bastard') when he decided that Warnock was most likely leading the club towards relegation, and that the timing was opportune to cut Warnock adrift and bring in a new manager, thereby giving him the best chance to try to fix team deficiencies and avoid going down.
"The real problems at our club have been making the wrong decisions at the wrong time and we all know who that's down to."
I am reading your statement as a criticism of Fernandes. As I've said above (and also said quite openly when it happened), sacking Warnock was the right decision, and at the right time. Appointing Hughes was the wrong decision, but it took a while to realise that. Clive argues that there were systemic faults with the structure of the club that meant no manager could have reasonably succeeded (please correct me, Clive, if I have misrepresented you). I disagree with that, but would be happy to be part of that examination. I want to examine Fernandes' role and determine when he went wrong, and how culpable he is for that.
"Even with hindsight, it's very hard to say when Fernandes' urgent good intentions became an irresponsible lack of prudence."
I posted that on this thread at 16:26 - April 25. I italicised it in the original because after I wrote it, I realised that it opened up to me a profound truth. Fernandes acted basically consistently pretty much throughout the whole episode from the purchase of the club in August 2011 and ending with the appointment of Ferdinand as DoF and the denial of funds to Redknapp in January 2015.
Let me expand on that. The late completion of the purchase agreement of the club left Warnock with little time and fewer options than if the process had been completed earlier. This fact is Warnock's best defence. But the decision of who to feature from the promotion squad, who to purchase and how much to pay for (and to) them was Warnock's. You could argue that it was Beard or Fernandes doing the negotiating, but ultimately it would have to be Warnock who would say 'That player is or is not worth that much to me'. The criticism of Fernandes is that we've always paid too much for, and to, players who were not worth it. This was true under Hughes and Redknapp, and it clearly started under Warnock. What Fernandes did was consistently back his managers with funds as requested. He'd bought and paid for a Premier League club, and he wasn't about to skimp when his best advice was to spend to protect that status. "In for a penny, in for a pound."
We have to thank Ferdinand (whose appointment, since proven to be absolutely critical, was, I agree with Clive, most likely a public relations sop by Fernandes) for stopping the madness. I think the appointment of Ramsey as first interim-, then permanent-, manager was a key acceptance that the model the club was following was broken, but I don't want to derail this discussion. The key point is that Fernandes' misguided and appallingly wasteful policy started with his very laudable, urgent and generous backing of Warnock in August 2011.
Reading that article,it sounds like Warnock admits he's not really cut out for premier league management. He's a great championship manager though. The players he bought when we got promoted wasn't necessarily bad players, they were Warnocks 2nd choice though. What undid all the good work of the promotion side was probably the contracts that got negotiated. Having players on lower championship wages playing next to players on big contracts split the team Imo. I'm not sure Warnock did the negotiations.
Occasional providers of half decent House music.
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Neil Warnock.....The League's very own Mourinho on 09:00 - Apr 26 with 2300 views
Neil Warnock.....The League's very own Mourinho on 07:46 - Apr 26 by PunteR
Reading that article,it sounds like Warnock admits he's not really cut out for premier league management. He's a great championship manager though. The players he bought when we got promoted wasn't necessarily bad players, they were Warnocks 2nd choice though. What undid all the good work of the promotion side was probably the contracts that got negotiated. Having players on lower championship wages playing next to players on big contracts split the team Imo. I'm not sure Warnock did the negotiations.
From what I heard Mr Warnock definitely had an interest in some contracts!
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Neil Warnock.....The League's very own Mourinho on 09:42 - Apr 26 with 2264 views
Neil Warnock.....The League's very own Mourinho on 07:46 - Apr 26 by PunteR
Reading that article,it sounds like Warnock admits he's not really cut out for premier league management. He's a great championship manager though. The players he bought when we got promoted wasn't necessarily bad players, they were Warnocks 2nd choice though. What undid all the good work of the promotion side was probably the contracts that got negotiated. Having players on lower championship wages playing next to players on big contracts split the team Imo. I'm not sure Warnock did the negotiations.
I think it's most likely that he didn't.
You'd have to think that they must have worked through Warnock's prioritised wish list, scrubbed through the no-longer-availables, and then started negotiations with the next-best choices. At some point, they'd have gone back to Warnock and said "X is available from his club for this much transfer" or "Y is available on a free" and then the crunch question: "He wants this amount, wages and contract, is he worth it or do we go after some-one else?"
I can't believe that Warnock wasn't at least giving feed-back to the negotiation process to determine value for money and to keep directing the search and negotiations to his preferred players and/or positions. Then you have to say that if he knew of and gave tacit approval to these contracts, then he has to accept a high degree of responsibility for the tensions and distortions that those contracts caused in his squad.
Blame Fernandes and/or Beard if you like, but I'm saying that Warnock was, at best, only partially removed from the negotiations.
But to come back to my overall point, Warnock gave Fernandes a shopping list, which, to his credit, he did his best to secure. Fernandes continued pandering to his manager's wishes (or 'best advice', depending how you want to read it) with Hughes and Redknapp, but the whole sorry process started in August 2011 with Warnock.
Neil Warnock.....The League's very own Mourinho on 09:00 - Apr 26 by BazzaInTheLoft
From what I heard Mr Warnock definitely had an interest in some contracts!
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so you say , funny how you have never backed this up with facts
And Bowles is onside, Swinburne has come rushing out of his goal , what can Bowles do here , onto the left foot no, on to the right foot
That’s there that’s two, and that’s Bowles
Brian Moore
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Neil Warnock.....The League's very own Mourinho on 12:11 - Apr 26 with 2209 views
Neil Warnock.....The League's very own Mourinho on 16:41 - Apr 25 by isawqpratwcity
"Bizarre", really?
My view is that Warnock had gone from a man who basically could do no wrong to an ineffectual, isolated leader-in-name-only of a broken team in just half a season. That's a helluva criticism, but I stand by every word of it and, honestly, do you disagree?
[Post edited 25 Apr 2016 16:43]
Yeah I do disagree. I agree with a lot of your points, but I think you're harsh there. Look at Watford's second half of the season this year. It's been appalling. And Palace's. Bad runs in the Prem, especially for smaller clubs, are regular occurrences. At the end of Nov, after a fine win at Stoke, things looked bright, but things did begin to fall apart afterwards. When you look more critically, though, it was hardly Warnock being ineffectual. We lost to Arsenal, Man U, Liverpool - all narrowly, in scoreline at least. Decent if dull draw at Swansea. The Barton-inspired defeat to Norwich, a game we certainly would've won if it wasn't for Barton's reaction. I agree he was struggling. I agree some players, led by Barton, were revolting. But for me he'd done enough to stay in charge until the end of the season. If we'd stayed up - great. If we'd gone down (which, at that stage, would have been nothing like the disaster it was made out to be - it was far, far worse, financially, that we went down a year later) he would have left, and we could have started to rebuild from there, still with a decent, not quite yet overblown squad intact. I do agree Warnock was in trouble, but describing us being above the relegation zone in our first year back in the Prem at Christmas after a 16 year absence as 'astonishingly poor' I just can't get with. You were 'astonished' that we were 17th? I know there's more to it than results, but I thought we were performing at about the level I expected: sometimes - Chelsea, Wolves, Stoke,Man City playing really well. Sometimes, Man U at home, Fulham away etc, being extremely poor. And a lot of the time scraping by. Some signings were poor, I agree, I think there were some mitigating factors, but they weren't as big as Warnock has made out and there's nothing to suggest that Dany Graham, for example, would have been anything other than a poor signing either. But I don't view that period as astonishingly poor. The last month was bad, no doubt about it, but personally I think Warnock may - just - have kept us up.
Bare bones.
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Neil Warnock.....The League's very own Mourinho on 12:34 - Apr 26 with 2185 views
NW , would have kept us up , he got more away wins than Hughes & Harry did put together NW inherited a real mess when he first took over , we were going down anyone who went to Peterborough a couple of weeks before will tell you that we were a club on the slide , well NW changed things I went to the WBA game (his first game) who were 2nd in the league and we routed them, the difference was night & day to that Peterborough debacle, he changed things that pre season, we were fit & organised and we got the final piece of the jigsaw in Adel , "fans" who have a pop at NW over" that" transfer window forget that the season before he was allowed to bring in his own men at the right budget , we got Derry, Hill, Kenny, Mackie, Adel , Walker topped up in jan with Miller & Routledge , imagine if he was allowed to bring in his own targets a year later he won a championship with the most difficult owners and the faurlin debacle we were solid, exciting and we had some pride Poor old NW was stitched up in the pre season big time it was tragic all of his targets would have made us better , we got Dyer, Perone, Campbell and boothroyd instead but we still got wins at Everton & Stoke we still were competitive , he gave us that game against Chelsea , 15 years we had waited for that kia jorbachin got in TF ear about Hughes we tried to walk before we could run and again poor old NW was stitched up yes NW wasn't perfect and yes we had our bad days but Christ on a bike he was miles a head of Hughes, Harry & Ramsey the man should have had a job for life but he was let down, he came back because he loved the club and still had it in him to do a job , that says a huge amount about him how he copped the vile stick on here is beyond me, crook, dinosaur, or how he never emailed me back etc , utter sh1t im glad Rotherham took him and im glad he is getting the media coverage he deserves the man is a dying breed of football managers and he is a fan of football our loss at the end of the day we had him and all the good things we had were lost the day we sacked him
And Bowles is onside, Swinburne has come rushing out of his goal , what can Bowles do here , onto the left foot no, on to the right foot
That’s there that’s two, and that’s Bowles
Brian Moore
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Neil Warnock.....The League's very own Mourinho on 13:10 - Apr 26 with 2150 views
Neil Warnock.....The League's very own Mourinho on 12:34 - Apr 26 by paulparker
NW , would have kept us up , he got more away wins than Hughes & Harry did put together NW inherited a real mess when he first took over , we were going down anyone who went to Peterborough a couple of weeks before will tell you that we were a club on the slide , well NW changed things I went to the WBA game (his first game) who were 2nd in the league and we routed them, the difference was night & day to that Peterborough debacle, he changed things that pre season, we were fit & organised and we got the final piece of the jigsaw in Adel , "fans" who have a pop at NW over" that" transfer window forget that the season before he was allowed to bring in his own men at the right budget , we got Derry, Hill, Kenny, Mackie, Adel , Walker topped up in jan with Miller & Routledge , imagine if he was allowed to bring in his own targets a year later he won a championship with the most difficult owners and the faurlin debacle we were solid, exciting and we had some pride Poor old NW was stitched up in the pre season big time it was tragic all of his targets would have made us better , we got Dyer, Perone, Campbell and boothroyd instead but we still got wins at Everton & Stoke we still were competitive , he gave us that game against Chelsea , 15 years we had waited for that kia jorbachin got in TF ear about Hughes we tried to walk before we could run and again poor old NW was stitched up yes NW wasn't perfect and yes we had our bad days but Christ on a bike he was miles a head of Hughes, Harry & Ramsey the man should have had a job for life but he was let down, he came back because he loved the club and still had it in him to do a job , that says a huge amount about him how he copped the vile stick on here is beyond me, crook, dinosaur, or how he never emailed me back etc , utter sh1t im glad Rotherham took him and im glad he is getting the media coverage he deserves the man is a dying breed of football managers and he is a fan of football our loss at the end of the day we had him and all the good things we had were lost the day we sacked him
I don't think saying that he got it wrong after we went up in anyway demeans what he did before that. The job he did in turning round a team that was going down from the Championship and made us Champions within a year was sensational and no one has forgotten it.
Yes we'd have been better if he got his initial targets but the same could be said of Hughes who wanted Dawson rather than Mbia and Butland rather than Green. The players he ended up signing like Dyer, Perone etc were poor and the big money ones were even worse. He'd have been better off sticking with what he had and i'm sure he'd admit that himself now. It was a mistake, not the worse mistake made at QPR in recent years by any means but one that eventually cost him his job.
When he went I didn't think results were that bad but the crowd was turning on him which never ends well.
I'm not sure if he would have kept us up mainly due to Fernandes wanting big names who wouldn't respect him rather than his own ability but we'll never know.
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Neil Warnock.....The League's very own Mourinho on 13:13 - Apr 26 with 2140 views
Neil Warnock.....The League's very own Mourinho on 13:10 - Apr 26 by CiderwithRsie
Really good posts here from Isaw, Chubbs and Antti, excellent debate.
Not sure what Warnock has done to get himself compared to Mourinho in the title thread, though; if I was NW I'd be suing.
I should add that IMO the real villains in the story of our disastrous spell in the Premier League are not Fernandes, Warnock or even Hughes, but Briatore and Ecclestone, who had a premier league club handed to them on a plate by Warnock and then sabotaged preparations for the season by b*ggering about.
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Neil Warnock.....The League's very own Mourinho on 13:49 - Apr 26 with 2113 views
Neil Warnock.....The League's very own Mourinho on 12:11 - Apr 26 by Antti_Heinola
Yeah I do disagree. I agree with a lot of your points, but I think you're harsh there. Look at Watford's second half of the season this year. It's been appalling. And Palace's. Bad runs in the Prem, especially for smaller clubs, are regular occurrences. At the end of Nov, after a fine win at Stoke, things looked bright, but things did begin to fall apart afterwards. When you look more critically, though, it was hardly Warnock being ineffectual. We lost to Arsenal, Man U, Liverpool - all narrowly, in scoreline at least. Decent if dull draw at Swansea. The Barton-inspired defeat to Norwich, a game we certainly would've won if it wasn't for Barton's reaction. I agree he was struggling. I agree some players, led by Barton, were revolting. But for me he'd done enough to stay in charge until the end of the season. If we'd stayed up - great. If we'd gone down (which, at that stage, would have been nothing like the disaster it was made out to be - it was far, far worse, financially, that we went down a year later) he would have left, and we could have started to rebuild from there, still with a decent, not quite yet overblown squad intact. I do agree Warnock was in trouble, but describing us being above the relegation zone in our first year back in the Prem at Christmas after a 16 year absence as 'astonishingly poor' I just can't get with. You were 'astonished' that we were 17th? I know there's more to it than results, but I thought we were performing at about the level I expected: sometimes - Chelsea, Wolves, Stoke,Man City playing really well. Sometimes, Man U at home, Fulham away etc, being extremely poor. And a lot of the time scraping by. Some signings were poor, I agree, I think there were some mitigating factors, but they weren't as big as Warnock has made out and there's nothing to suggest that Dany Graham, for example, would have been anything other than a poor signing either. But I don't view that period as astonishingly poor. The last month was bad, no doubt about it, but personally I think Warnock may - just - have kept us up.
The difference is that you are not holding Warnock accountable for the poor performance of the team, I am, and Fernandes did, too.
Let me give you a couple of quotes from Clive's report of Warnock's last game:-
"It’s the players who walked back when dealing with MK Dons’ numerous counter attacks, and remained stationary and disinterested when the team was in possession, that have cost their manager his employment today. That looked like a lost dressing room if ever I saw one, and once that’s the case it’s irrelevant whether the manager has worked wonders before and a sacking is harsh — it’s the only course of action you can take."
"I turned my back on the team that had turned its back on its manager and left the stadium. An abject, disgraceful, embarrassment of a performance that almost every player should be completely ashamed of."
The match reports for that season are interesting to reread. There's lots of complaints, but the worst are that the players are inconsistent, uncaring and unaccountable. Warnock was unable to plan a team formation because he never knew who was going to turn up and give a performance.
I don't think he was fired just because we were looking like relegation prospects. I think he was fired because the team was performing badly and he just wasn't in a position of any authority anymore.
I've argued in another post that Warnock has to share responsibility for the breakdown of the team. Whether you have any truck with that or not, as manager he was the bloke who had to pull it all together, and he couldn't. He'd hand-built a team eighteen months before, then saw it all fall through his fingers. That's why I described his performance as "astonishingly poor".
Btw, I think it's pointless to speculate whether Warnock would have kept us up. It didn't appear so at the time, and Fernandes was rightly more concerned about maintaining Premier League status than Warnock's legacy.
Let me give you a couple of quotes from Clive's report of Warnock's last game:-
"It’s the players who walked back when dealing with MK Dons’ numerous counter attacks, and remained stationary and disinterested when the team was in possession, that have cost their manager his employment today. That looked like a lost dressing room if ever I saw one, and once that’s the case it’s irrelevant whether the manager has worked wonders before and a sacking is harsh — it’s the only course of action you can take."
"I turned my back on the team that had turned its back on its manager and left the stadium. An abject, disgraceful, embarrassment of a performance that almost every player should be completely ashamed of."
The match reports for that season are interesting to reread. There's lots of complaints, but the worst are that the players are inconsistent, uncaring and unaccountable. Warnock was unable to plan a team formation because he never knew who was going to turn up and give a performance.
I don't think he was fired just because we were looking like relegation prospects. I think he was fired because the team was performing badly and he just wasn't in a position of any authority anymore.
I've argued in another post that Warnock has to share responsibility for the breakdown of the team. Whether you have any truck with that or not, as manager he was the bloke who had to pull it all together, and he couldn't. He'd hand-built a team eighteen months before, then saw it all fall through his fingers. That's why I described his performance as "astonishingly poor".
Btw, I think it's pointless to speculate whether Warnock would have kept us up. It didn't appear so at the time, and Fernandes was rightly more concerned about maintaining Premier League status than Warnock's legacy.
I absolutely do hold him accountable - he was the manager. I just don't think it was that bad, and I believe he *could* have turned it around. I fully agree with Clive's comments - on the day, something was clearly wrong. I remember thinking even as we left it was as if NW - and the team - already knew his fate, which was then confirmed the next day.
Speculating on whether he would have kept us up is not pointless - it's another opinion on the subject, the same as yours. As for the uncaring and unaccountable comments regarding the players - that was the case in some games. But even the loss to Norwich shortly before he was sacked we played pretty well with 11 men. The team certainly cared v Chelsea. And v Man City. and in any number of games until kind of mid-December, when we were in a bit of a slump. 'Not caring' is the most subjective of criticisms, and one of the easiest to make by football fans when 'lacking confidence' doesn't quite assuage their anger as much at a defeat.
Even Joey Barton, who doubtless was at the heart of the anti-Warnock 'movement' in the dressing room, later admitted he was in awe at what Warnock did for the club - and I think felt some remorse in the way he'd acted.
Remove the opening day and the Fulham debacle, and the 'astonishingly poor' guff comes down to about a month of games. And that's why I think you're overstating your point.
Bare bones.
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Neil Warnock.....The League's very own Mourinho on 15:00 - Apr 26 with 2057 views
Neil Warnock.....The League's very own Mourinho on 14:00 - Apr 26 by Antti_Heinola
I absolutely do hold him accountable - he was the manager. I just don't think it was that bad, and I believe he *could* have turned it around. I fully agree with Clive's comments - on the day, something was clearly wrong. I remember thinking even as we left it was as if NW - and the team - already knew his fate, which was then confirmed the next day.
Speculating on whether he would have kept us up is not pointless - it's another opinion on the subject, the same as yours. As for the uncaring and unaccountable comments regarding the players - that was the case in some games. But even the loss to Norwich shortly before he was sacked we played pretty well with 11 men. The team certainly cared v Chelsea. And v Man City. and in any number of games until kind of mid-December, when we were in a bit of a slump. 'Not caring' is the most subjective of criticisms, and one of the easiest to make by football fans when 'lacking confidence' doesn't quite assuage their anger as much at a defeat.
Even Joey Barton, who doubtless was at the heart of the anti-Warnock 'movement' in the dressing room, later admitted he was in awe at what Warnock did for the club - and I think felt some remorse in the way he'd acted.
Remove the opening day and the Fulham debacle, and the 'astonishingly poor' guff comes down to about a month of games. And that's why I think you're overstating your point.
You say "I fully agree with Clive's comments"
I quote Clive saying "It’s the players who walked back when dealing with MK Dons’ numerous counter attacks, and remained stationary and disinterested when the team was in possession..." and then you say "'Not caring' is the most subjective of criticisms, and one of the easiest to make by football fans when 'lacking confidence' doesn't quite assuage their anger as much at a defeat."
Who said anything about 'lacking confidence'? That team did not care, they were not interested. Do you really think they just 'lacked confidence'? And please, spare me your extrapolation of my feelings; I had no anger that needed assuaging. I felt sorry for Warnock. His post-match comments reflected an optimism that had no causal basis. He was out of touch with his team.
The reason why I say it's pointless to speculate on the team's survival under Warnock is because the chance never came up. You may have an opinion, I may have an opinion, but Fernandes had the right to make all those opinions irrelevant, and he exercised it. After that, it's all just "Aunt...balls...Uncle".
Which brings me back to "astonishingly poor", also known to you as "guff". It's not about a few bad games, it's about players you no longer control. It's about the disconnection between manager and team that makes you wonder if he can get it back. I don't think there is a bigger failing between manager and team than that. And to see that after the superb control he had the previous season highlighted the gulf between the two levels of performance. Presumably Fernandes sensed that breakdown too and decided that things weren't going to improve from there.
Neil Warnock.....The League's very own Mourinho on 15:00 - Apr 26 by isawqpratwcity
You say "I fully agree with Clive's comments"
I quote Clive saying "It’s the players who walked back when dealing with MK Dons’ numerous counter attacks, and remained stationary and disinterested when the team was in possession..." and then you say "'Not caring' is the most subjective of criticisms, and one of the easiest to make by football fans when 'lacking confidence' doesn't quite assuage their anger as much at a defeat."
Who said anything about 'lacking confidence'? That team did not care, they were not interested. Do you really think they just 'lacked confidence'? And please, spare me your extrapolation of my feelings; I had no anger that needed assuaging. I felt sorry for Warnock. His post-match comments reflected an optimism that had no causal basis. He was out of touch with his team.
The reason why I say it's pointless to speculate on the team's survival under Warnock is because the chance never came up. You may have an opinion, I may have an opinion, but Fernandes had the right to make all those opinions irrelevant, and he exercised it. After that, it's all just "Aunt...balls...Uncle".
Which brings me back to "astonishingly poor", also known to you as "guff". It's not about a few bad games, it's about players you no longer control. It's about the disconnection between manager and team that makes you wonder if he can get it back. I don't think there is a bigger failing between manager and team than that. And to see that after the superb control he had the previous season highlighted the gulf between the two levels of performance. Presumably Fernandes sensed that breakdown too and decided that things weren't going to improve from there.
Well, at least he got that part right.
I agreed with his comments for that game - and those comments only refer to *that game*. As I explained, everything felt flat - even NW (although we later found out his jaw was wired shut after a dentist's appointment). Clive remembers in this week's match report the horrific week under Olly when we lost to Vauxhall, got thrashed by Notts Co and were battered at home by Cardiff. If ever a manager looked like he was going nowhere with a team at the lowest of possible ebbs, that was it. But we made the play-offs. Bad performances, bad runs, happen in football. Nigel Pearson looked like he'd completely lost his team at one stage last season, but they stayed up. Sometimes managers turn it round. Sometimes they don't. Sometimes they're not given adequate opportunity.
I wasn't really referring to you about the anger comment, sorry if it came out that way.
I don't dispute that the performance v the Dons was utterly dreadful. But that, plus some thunderously sub-par performances in December does not make Warnock's work that season astonishingly poor. It just doesn't. As I said, less than a week earlier we lost to Norwich at home, but we were well in control before Barton's red card. The players certainly cared and were certainly trying just 5 days prior to the MKD game. You could describe the last 5-6 weeks as 'poor' overall but if you found that period astonishing I'd assume you've watched very little football in your life - which clearly isn't the case. So perhaps you're just easily astonished.
The players that played that day at MKD included: Cerny, Hill, Derry, Ale, DJ Campbell, Helguson, Smith and Mackie. Now, they may have all played poorly that day and others before - but the idea thay they didn't care and were not interested is utter nonsense - and far too simplistic. But again, that's not to say they *were* interested in that particular Cup game, clearly many seemed to demonstrate that they weren't - which is infuriating, but hardly unique among QPR sides of the last 20 years.
I'd also agree that Warnock's relationship with the likes of Bothroyd, Barton, Buzsaky and Gabbidon were at a low point. But, again, that's not exactly unusual, especially in a tough relegation battle - which was what that season was always going to be.
I'll give you this: The Macheda signing was astonishingly poor, on a number of levels ;)
Bare bones.
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Neil Warnock.....The League's very own Mourinho on 16:24 - Apr 26 with 1986 views
Warnock made a number of mistakes around that time, chief among them going after Faurlin for the West Brom equaliser when Faurlin could have fouled a man in the build up but let him past. He talks about his reaction to that being a big regret in his book — much of which I took with a pinch of salt but that bit seemed very genuine.
He also wrote about how people like SWP behaved towards him whenever it came to discipline, saying they basically did as they pleased and to hell with the consequences because what's two weeks wages when you're a multi millionaire?
That dressing room was about as united as it's ever been when we won promotion the year before, it rode through all sorts of adversity and won the league. Within six months it had turned into what we saw at MK Dons that day. (Incidentally, 25 yo me was a lot angrier and OTT than 31 yo me is, cringe reading a lot of stuff I wrote back then).
The effect of shovelling five or six massive earners into that dressing room was toxic. It's why I hold Barton in the same contempt as I do SWP and struggle with all this "oh well at least he tried" bullsht his fanboys trot out. He had loads to do with splitting that dressing room and going against Warnock. I remember him lording it over Warnock after he'd been sacked, talking about how much better and more professional things were under Mark Hughes. I remember him going on some music radio show and using the platform to slag off Taarabt, who'd got us promoted the year before. He used an appearance on the QPR Podcast to basically crack on about how badly done to he'd been at Newcastle for 20 minutes.
The one thing that is right in that report is that in the modern era once the dressing room has gone, you have little choice but to dispense with the manager however much you want to keep him — see Chelsea and Mourinho this season. The power is all with the players.
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Neil Warnock.....The League's very own Mourinho on 16:51 - Apr 26 with 1965 views
Neil Warnock.....The League's very own Mourinho on 16:24 - Apr 26 by Northernr
Warnock made a number of mistakes around that time, chief among them going after Faurlin for the West Brom equaliser when Faurlin could have fouled a man in the build up but let him past. He talks about his reaction to that being a big regret in his book — much of which I took with a pinch of salt but that bit seemed very genuine.
He also wrote about how people like SWP behaved towards him whenever it came to discipline, saying they basically did as they pleased and to hell with the consequences because what's two weeks wages when you're a multi millionaire?
That dressing room was about as united as it's ever been when we won promotion the year before, it rode through all sorts of adversity and won the league. Within six months it had turned into what we saw at MK Dons that day. (Incidentally, 25 yo me was a lot angrier and OTT than 31 yo me is, cringe reading a lot of stuff I wrote back then).
The effect of shovelling five or six massive earners into that dressing room was toxic. It's why I hold Barton in the same contempt as I do SWP and struggle with all this "oh well at least he tried" bullsht his fanboys trot out. He had loads to do with splitting that dressing room and going against Warnock. I remember him lording it over Warnock after he'd been sacked, talking about how much better and more professional things were under Mark Hughes. I remember him going on some music radio show and using the platform to slag off Taarabt, who'd got us promoted the year before. He used an appearance on the QPR Podcast to basically crack on about how badly done to he'd been at Newcastle for 20 minutes.
The one thing that is right in that report is that in the modern era once the dressing room has gone, you have little choice but to dispense with the manager however much you want to keep him — see Chelsea and Mourinho this season. The power is all with the players.
Clive, without appearing stalky, I used to see this guy years back going mad at games. I honestly thought he was going to have a heart attack sometimes. Eventually, I found out it was you! Pleased to report, that throbbing vein on your temple is rarely seen in SAR these days (not that I spend the whole game looking in your direction, so maybe it does)...
Bare bones.
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Neil Warnock.....The League's very own Mourinho on 03:14 - Apr 27 with 1844 views
Neil Warnock.....The League's very own Mourinho on 15:52 - Apr 26 by Antti_Heinola
I agreed with his comments for that game - and those comments only refer to *that game*. As I explained, everything felt flat - even NW (although we later found out his jaw was wired shut after a dentist's appointment). Clive remembers in this week's match report the horrific week under Olly when we lost to Vauxhall, got thrashed by Notts Co and were battered at home by Cardiff. If ever a manager looked like he was going nowhere with a team at the lowest of possible ebbs, that was it. But we made the play-offs. Bad performances, bad runs, happen in football. Nigel Pearson looked like he'd completely lost his team at one stage last season, but they stayed up. Sometimes managers turn it round. Sometimes they don't. Sometimes they're not given adequate opportunity.
I wasn't really referring to you about the anger comment, sorry if it came out that way.
I don't dispute that the performance v the Dons was utterly dreadful. But that, plus some thunderously sub-par performances in December does not make Warnock's work that season astonishingly poor. It just doesn't. As I said, less than a week earlier we lost to Norwich at home, but we were well in control before Barton's red card. The players certainly cared and were certainly trying just 5 days prior to the MKD game. You could describe the last 5-6 weeks as 'poor' overall but if you found that period astonishing I'd assume you've watched very little football in your life - which clearly isn't the case. So perhaps you're just easily astonished.
The players that played that day at MKD included: Cerny, Hill, Derry, Ale, DJ Campbell, Helguson, Smith and Mackie. Now, they may have all played poorly that day and others before - but the idea thay they didn't care and were not interested is utter nonsense - and far too simplistic. But again, that's not to say they *were* interested in that particular Cup game, clearly many seemed to demonstrate that they weren't - which is infuriating, but hardly unique among QPR sides of the last 20 years.
I'd also agree that Warnock's relationship with the likes of Bothroyd, Barton, Buzsaky and Gabbidon were at a low point. But, again, that's not exactly unusual, especially in a tough relegation battle - which was what that season was always going to be.
I'll give you this: The Macheda signing was astonishingly poor, on a number of levels ;)
I cannot get you to acknowledge that the performance of the team is due to the disconnect of the manager with the team. You also parade a list of players that seem to be subject to some axiom that "the idea thay [sic] they didn't care and were not interested is utter nonsense - and far too simplistic". So I repeat a quote of Clive's, "An abject, disgraceful, embarrassment of a performance that almost every player should be completely ashamed of." (My italics) Why should the players on your list be immune to the disaffection that that was running through the dressing room like a bush fire? They were the sorts that got us there, and now they watch johnny-come-latelies brought in and paid at Warnock's behest (at rates maybe 5x to 10x what they are on) behaving like complete tossers? Of course it gets to them. This isn't 'QPR Cup-tie' disinterested, this is 'Warnock and the club is treating me like a mug' disinterested.
(Btw, AH, a logical tip: something can be "utter nonsense" or "far too simplistic", it can't be both.)
With your intransigence, despite my quotes, I had to stand back. I believe that your narrative is entirely of your own manufacture, a 'paulparker-like' alternative reality (the LFW poster, not the player), but you have the advantage that you were there, while I am relying on 2nd hand reports. But then, something so good happened, so special, Woody Allen put it in a film...
Neil Warnock.....The League's very own Mourinho on 13:13 - Apr 26 by CiderwithRsie
I should add that IMO the real villains in the story of our disastrous spell in the Premier League are not Fernandes, Warnock or even Hughes, but Briatore and Ecclestone, who had a premier league club handed to them on a plate by Warnock and then sabotaged preparations for the season by b*ggering about.
I have expressed a similar sentiment on many occasions, Cider. But I think the time has come to face the, well, fact is too strong a word, so let's say 'extremely reasonable supposition', that Warnock approved the signings of that largely disastrous August 2011 transfer window and gave at least tacit agreement to the ludicrous contracts those players signed.
And while I'm shovelling culpability on Warnock's very broad shoulders, let me state that the model of Fernandes' behaviour (ie, approval for bringing in mediocre/past their best, old and uncaring players, signed without proper consideration on ridiculously expensive contracts) that has been so roundly criticised by many (including a very large, active clique of current Warnock supporters), was crystallised at the very outset by Warnock in that transfer window.
I have to add a mea culpa here. I have to acknowledge how disastrous Fernandes' open cheque-book policy has been (I'm not blind!), but I've defended it on the basis that it is better to back your manager's judgement than to pretend you know more about football and players than him. The new arrangement with a DoF makes that conflict unnecessary.
Let me state, Warnock is the man OVERWHELMINGLY responsible for our best season in twenty years. I have to make my opinion on that quite clear. Even the stand-out contributor to that season, Taarabt, was a loan made permanent by Warnock, then flattered and supported by him so that Taarabt was able to perform to his best potential. Within months of being appointed as just the next manager through the revolving door, Warnock took a team that was failing, augmented it, and built it into Champions.
Fwiw, I think Warnock quite reasonably looked at 2010-11, and concluded it was a success because he had rising stars like Taarabt and Faurlin tempered by stalwarts like Derry and Hill. Warnock may have assumed that Derry and Hill in the Premier would be a bridge too far, and so he looked outside of his own area of expertise (ie, the Championship) for old hands to steady the ship and unfortunately came up with Barton, Ferdinand and Wright-Philips. The rest is history. As I say, that scenario is entirely a hypothesis, feel free to consider and discard it if you will.
Looking back, it was a perfect storm of circumstances all round for the reckless behaviour that brought us that first wave of transfers. (Which we're only recovering from now.)
To act like NW is blameless and wasn't lapping it up at the time though is... senile. Barton, SWP, moisturizer, veneers - he was absolutely loving the big time. Always had a chip on his shoulder about not being respected enough in the game and now finally with the opportunity to throw some cash around for the first and only time in his career. Unfortunately it all came back to bite him on the arris.... think his recent comments about preferring the Championship say everything.
It's extremely easy to say in retrospect that we should have stuck with him. However I think it's clear that by the time he left things had sadly become rotten to the core - the squad he put together didn't want to know, and he was even throwing Ale under the bus to try and re-assert control. Hughes was polished, professional,, flattered the big egos (remember the players saying how much training had improved?) and crucially with Rigg sold the dream of building the whole club top to bottom. And in fairness he somehow kept us up that season. How were any of us supposed to see how badly we would be suckered at the time?
As isawqpratwcity suggests none of this is to denigrate NW's magnificent achievement with us beforehand. I just don't understand the mentality where he must be canonized, a saint beyond reproach. No wonder he loved it here more than anywhere else - the crafty bugger knew he could always play on our sentiments like a fiddle.
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Neil Warnock.....The League's very own Mourinho on 11:31 - Apr 27 with 1742 views
Neil Warnock.....The League's very own Mourinho on 03:14 - Apr 27 by isawqpratwcity
I cannot get you to acknowledge that the performance of the team is due to the disconnect of the manager with the team. You also parade a list of players that seem to be subject to some axiom that "the idea thay [sic] they didn't care and were not interested is utter nonsense - and far too simplistic". So I repeat a quote of Clive's, "An abject, disgraceful, embarrassment of a performance that almost every player should be completely ashamed of." (My italics) Why should the players on your list be immune to the disaffection that that was running through the dressing room like a bush fire? They were the sorts that got us there, and now they watch johnny-come-latelies brought in and paid at Warnock's behest (at rates maybe 5x to 10x what they are on) behaving like complete tossers? Of course it gets to them. This isn't 'QPR Cup-tie' disinterested, this is 'Warnock and the club is treating me like a mug' disinterested.
(Btw, AH, a logical tip: something can be "utter nonsense" or "far too simplistic", it can't be both.)
With your intransigence, despite my quotes, I had to stand back. I believe that your narrative is entirely of your own manufacture, a 'paulparker-like' alternative reality (the LFW poster, not the player), but you have the advantage that you were there, while I am relying on 2nd hand reports. But then, something so good happened, so special, Woody Allen put it in a film...
Thanks, Clive. The cheque is in the mail!
[Post edited 27 Apr 2016 3:16]
You weren't even there? OK.
Clive has of course eloquently talked about that quote.
You are quite right, in my haste to destroy your alternative reality, I did make a couple of errors. Something can't be utter nonsense and far too simplistic. However, something can be far too simplistic, which in turn makes it utter nonsense. But then, my grammatical shortcomings are not really what we're arguing about, are we?
Or is this all about words after all? I mean, as I said at least twice, I actually agree with you on many points. The one I don't is that Warnock's performance was 'astonishingly poor' - arguing it was neither astonishing, nor particularly poor. At the end of November, after all, we were mid-table.
I think the performance of the team against MKD was due to a whole raft of reasons. It was a cup tie against lower league opposition - a thing we are notoriously bad at dealing with. The team was low on confidence, not just because of morale and some players doubting Warnock, but because of a run of results. Also, it was poor because, yes, there was some disconnect between players and management. I'm sure there was. But there's disconnect between players and management at Man United and they're fifth in the league and in a Cup Final. Disconnect between players and management is not exactly unusual.
I absolutely agree that players like Hill and Derry were not immune to disaffection. But to suggest they had stopped caring or were disinterested is wrong. That's my point. As I said, and I repeat, a week earlier most of the same players were in the side against Norwich in a game we would have won had it not been for Barton's red card - there was plenty of spirit that day. And a few days before that, we deservedly lost, but only narrowly at the Emirates in a game that Mackie almost saved for us in the last minute. The squad just wasn't as far gone as you believe it to be - not in my opinion anyway.
Warnock made a lot of mistakes in a very tough situation. He may have turned it round, he may not. In retrospect, though, Fernandes made the wrong decision. Warnock should have stayed and either kept us up, or sent us down, and left so we could rebuild without incurring the ludicrous losses we made subsequently.
Bare bones.
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Neil Warnock.....The League's very own Mourinho on 13:07 - Apr 27 with 1697 views
Neil Warnock.....The League's very own Mourinho on 11:31 - Apr 27 by Antti_Heinola
You weren't even there? OK.
Clive has of course eloquently talked about that quote.
You are quite right, in my haste to destroy your alternative reality, I did make a couple of errors. Something can't be utter nonsense and far too simplistic. However, something can be far too simplistic, which in turn makes it utter nonsense. But then, my grammatical shortcomings are not really what we're arguing about, are we?
Or is this all about words after all? I mean, as I said at least twice, I actually agree with you on many points. The one I don't is that Warnock's performance was 'astonishingly poor' - arguing it was neither astonishing, nor particularly poor. At the end of November, after all, we were mid-table.
I think the performance of the team against MKD was due to a whole raft of reasons. It was a cup tie against lower league opposition - a thing we are notoriously bad at dealing with. The team was low on confidence, not just because of morale and some players doubting Warnock, but because of a run of results. Also, it was poor because, yes, there was some disconnect between players and management. I'm sure there was. But there's disconnect between players and management at Man United and they're fifth in the league and in a Cup Final. Disconnect between players and management is not exactly unusual.
I absolutely agree that players like Hill and Derry were not immune to disaffection. But to suggest they had stopped caring or were disinterested is wrong. That's my point. As I said, and I repeat, a week earlier most of the same players were in the side against Norwich in a game we would have won had it not been for Barton's red card - there was plenty of spirit that day. And a few days before that, we deservedly lost, but only narrowly at the Emirates in a game that Mackie almost saved for us in the last minute. The squad just wasn't as far gone as you believe it to be - not in my opinion anyway.
Warnock made a lot of mistakes in a very tough situation. He may have turned it round, he may not. In retrospect, though, Fernandes made the wrong decision. Warnock should have stayed and either kept us up, or sent us down, and left so we could rebuild without incurring the ludicrous losses we made subsequently.
In retrospect, though... Fernandes wasn't psychic.
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Neil Warnock.....The League's very own Mourinho on 13:21 - Apr 27 with 1687 views
Neil Warnock.....The League's very own Mourinho on 12:34 - Apr 26 by paulparker
NW , would have kept us up , he got more away wins than Hughes & Harry did put together NW inherited a real mess when he first took over , we were going down anyone who went to Peterborough a couple of weeks before will tell you that we were a club on the slide , well NW changed things I went to the WBA game (his first game) who were 2nd in the league and we routed them, the difference was night & day to that Peterborough debacle, he changed things that pre season, we were fit & organised and we got the final piece of the jigsaw in Adel , "fans" who have a pop at NW over" that" transfer window forget that the season before he was allowed to bring in his own men at the right budget , we got Derry, Hill, Kenny, Mackie, Adel , Walker topped up in jan with Miller & Routledge , imagine if he was allowed to bring in his own targets a year later he won a championship with the most difficult owners and the faurlin debacle we were solid, exciting and we had some pride Poor old NW was stitched up in the pre season big time it was tragic all of his targets would have made us better , we got Dyer, Perone, Campbell and boothroyd instead but we still got wins at Everton & Stoke we still were competitive , he gave us that game against Chelsea , 15 years we had waited for that kia jorbachin got in TF ear about Hughes we tried to walk before we could run and again poor old NW was stitched up yes NW wasn't perfect and yes we had our bad days but Christ on a bike he was miles a head of Hughes, Harry & Ramsey the man should have had a job for life but he was let down, he came back because he loved the club and still had it in him to do a job , that says a huge amount about him how he copped the vile stick on here is beyond me, crook, dinosaur, or how he never emailed me back etc , utter sh1t im glad Rotherham took him and im glad he is getting the media coverage he deserves the man is a dying breed of football managers and he is a fan of football our loss at the end of the day we had him and all the good things we had were lost the day we sacked him
Love this post!
Couldn't have summed up my own personal thoughts any better.
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