Paul Lambert

[sexbelowsound]

So you're unimpressed with results but impressed with what that led to?

That doesn't make much sense.

 

So you can't respect certain aspects about someone whilst also not respecting other aspects about them?

Edited December 6, 2014 by sexbelowsound

[HeyAnty]

This post has been written with full research as best I can find it from transferleague.co.uk so whilst some of the info might be slightly wrong you’d imagine it’s the fairest place to get it all as it’ll be wrong for all teams! It is a long post but the findings are significant.

There has been a lot of talk about transfer spending and net spend and a lot of other information, all with points for and against how to interpret the findings. I suggest we look at things in what seems the fairest way and am going to publish this even if it doesn’t prove my belief that Lambert has, at worst, done an OK job.

A few basic rules; firstly there is no point with me comparing net spends for all teams – if Chelsea had a £500m pound quality squad but have a few seasons not spending, that does not mean we can compete with them if we outspend them for two seasons of spending £5m. So I will only be comparing, season on season, similar clubs to ours. Secondly, loans and frees are very difficult to judge so can’t really be included although I acknowledge they have an impact.

So let’s start with when Lambert took over. Aston Villa had just finished 16^th, sacked McLeish and had a number of high paid players in the squad which he was informed to deal with. Now we can say he was told to ‘bomb’ them or we can say he ‘decided’ to bomb them but that’s another argument.

The teams that had finished around us (but survived in the Premiership) were as follows and their summer spend that year in NET (so to show whether improving squad quality) is in brackets:

17^thQPR (spent £36m)

16^th Aston Villa (spent £23.7m - largely Young and Downing money)

15^thWigan (made £1.9m)

14^th Stoke (spent £21m)

13^th Sunderland (spent £11.6m)

12^th Norwich (spent £9m)

11^th Swansea (made £6.5m)

Also coming up were Reading (spent £7m), Southampton (spent £32m) and West Ham (spent £18m)

As we all know Wigan, Reading and QPR went down. We now finished 15th ahead of Sunderland (we spent more than them so jumped ahead) whilst Stoke, Norwich and Swansea also improved by one position (obviously Norwich and Swansea did very well considering their spends). Newcastle plummeted and Southampton finished a place above us.

So I think you could argue the two teams directly sandwiching us in QPR and Wigan tried differing strategies on transfers but both got relegated and we survived. The other teams matched the one position improvement we made.

On to 2013/14. We have now been trying to improve again and we have to evaluate our new competition down near the foot of the table:

17^th Sunderland (spent £7m)

16^th Newcastle (made £19m – Cabaye)

15^th Aston Villa (spent £16m)

14^th Southampton (spent another £35m)

13^th Stoke (spent £2m)

12^thFulham (spent £20m)

11^thNorwich (spent £22m)

We were also joined by Cardiff (spent £32m), Hull (spent £24m) and Crystal Palace (spent £26m)

So despite trying to improve we actually spent much the same, often less, than most other teams. Yet Cardiff, Fulham and Norwich got relegated who spent more than us and, in Fulham and Norwich’s case, from a better position than us the previous season. We remained 15^th and with the spending you see above, I think treading water is pretty much accurate and not a failure. Stoke were the clear ‘winners’.

So now we’ve just finished a season surrounded by:

17^th West Brom (spent £13m this summer to improve)

16^th Hull (spent £22m this summer)

15^th Aston Villa (spent £5.5m this summer)

14^th Sunderland (spent £11m this summer)

13^th West Ham (spent £23m this summer)

12^th Swansea (made £2m this summer after spending £20m the season before)

11^th Crystal Palace (spent £9m this summer)

We’ve also been joined by Leicester (spent £11m), Burnley (Spent £6.5m) and QPR (spent £19m)

So we have been outspent by everyone other than Swansea who finished above us.

Now, having seen the stats, who can really argue that Lambert has had a ‘real’ chance to improve us? At best he’s had the same funds as managers around us and has either tread water whilst they have been relegated or pretty much matched their progress in a positional basis (improving a position). There are some stand out teams like Southampton but then you realise they spent nearly £70m before this seasons sales/ new purchases. Stoke and Newcastle moved away from trouble - anyone want Pardew(?!) and Villa are currently above Stoke this season so far. This season we have clearly spent less than practically everyone so why are we expecting progress?

I don’t see how this can be interpreted as a ‘twisting’ of the figures – they are there for you all to read. Who of the teams around us when Lambert took over have done significantly better than us with the same funds?

This also does not include wages which I think even the most ardent Lambert haters have to agree plays a role in transfers. I think we can all acknowledge that the likes of Newcastle, QPR, West Ham and even West Brom pay more than we do. Probably most of the other teams bar the likes of Burnley, Leicester and Crystal Palace do too.

Lambert is NOT the problem. I hate the football, I hate where we are but it is the lack of funds that is strangling the life out of Aston Villa not Lambert’s team which has been assembled on what he can get, what he can gamble on and then has to play to their ability rather than how he might prefer to play.

Unfortunately I suspect despite this overwhelming evidence to the contrary, most Lambert haters will still want him out as they blame him just because it’s easy. At least he can be shouted at every week rather than the absent Lerner.

For one final defence (and this is the last time I write in this thread as it irritates me a little to see people twisting stuff and not looking beyond an obvious scape goat) of Lambert THIS season.

If you forget everything that has gone on before, this season Aston Villa are doing better than they did last season against the same opposition. Furthermore, other than last season’s top 6, we have only lost to QPR this season – but we did beat one top 6 team in Liverpool. The style and manner of performances might not be great but you take results before performance and then see what you can do. I’d rather survive playing crap for a few years than be exciting losersin the Championship.

Excellent post. Sums it up for me as well.

[jackbauer24]

Actually one final thing - of the £45m Lambert has spent whilst here, Benteke, Kozak and Okore have been unavailable for huge periods of time: that's nearly half the value of the whole squad.

[Rob182]

If we get to pick and chose, we could have used Hutton from the start and not bought Lowton. We also could have not bought Kozak and used Bent or Helenius as the Benteke back-up (as that position was fairly well stocked already).

That would have made an extra £4m-6m available, in my opinion.

This is very 'current' thinking with all the benefits of hindsight. Who on here would genuinely think Hutton didn't need replacing a few years back when he had played appallingly game after game? Then he was replaced with a very cheap Lowton from a League One side (so unproven and low wages) who went on to be an near ever present and be considered one of the players of the season and score an amazing goal against Stoke that arguably begun our survival bid.

But because he's been dropped for unknown reasons and Hutton has had a rebirth this means Lambert misspent?! It's too easy to pick and chose who we should have bought and when but with ALL the things people beat Lambert with - his transfer record is amongst the better ones in the division with the funds he's had available.

Someone above very astutely mentioned that he's only spent significant funds on a few players (let's say £4m as a guide using transferleague.co.uk for fees)

Carlos Sanchez (£4.7m) - Early but looks like at least a partial success.

Jores Okore (£4m) - Injured within three games but has had a fairly good reintroduction recently.

Libor Kozak (£5m) - Injured, but £5m for a striker is incredibly cheap anyway.

Christian Benteke (£10m) - Success. Saved us several times, will be sold for a lot more than he's worth.

That's it. But maybe we try above £3m players (you know, like broke small teams buy to keep afloat)

Leandro Bacuna (£3m) - I'd say easily worth that - some of the freekicks have been outstanding!!

Matthew Lowton (£3m) - see above but good value

Ron Vlaar (£3.2m) - much like Benteke, but error with contracts - is that Lambert's fault?

Now we have to look at under £3m players... In fact, I'll list the players who can be considered a waste of money since Lambert took over:

Sylla (£2m), Bowery (£0.5m - or 0.25m after sale), Bennett (£2.5m), Tonev (£2.5m), Helenius (£2m), Luna (£2m)

£11m over three seasons. So he could have gambled on two or three (considering our average transfer fee) different players over that time and who knows whether they would have been any better or whether we would have had the squad depth.

Lambert has spent £50.9m on 25 players since he has been in charge (an average of £2m a player) and the documented reduction of wages (and therefore quality) that goes with it.

For all you fantasy football fans, please give me a squad of players (picking and choosing with the benefit of hindsight) from any team in the Premiership with the maximum amount you are allowed to spend being £50m. It's slightly unrealistic because obviously we had players when he took over (but no-one of any value left, or ageing/ over-paid players he didn't want or wasn't allowed to play).

As a rough guide you need to spend £1m on your keepers

Maybe £8m on your four defenders

Say £16m on your four defenders

And the same on your two strikers = £41m

You then have £9m to spend on AT LEAST a competent 5 subs and use youth for the rest of the squad.

And it's not just transfers either - everyone knows our wage cap is crippling and has to be heavily reduced. We couldn't compete with West Brom for Lescott on his wages...

To long. Didn't read. But to answer your first question. I rated Hutton under McLeish and wouldn't have bombed him out (and therefore wouldn't have spent money on Lowton). You also make the point that we've only spent significant funds on a few players, and that backs up the point I was making. Thanks. Kozak cost around £5m (which is a decent chunk, considering the low amounts Lambert's spent on other players), yet we already had Benteke, Bent, Helenius, Gabby, Weimann and Bowery for that position. The point being made was that instead of buying 4 strikers (when we already had 3), Lambert could have used the Kozak money for a different area of the pitch (eg: Attacking Midfielder). (Also, if you read my post, you'll see I actually said the 'Lambert's been fairly successful', when referring to his general transfer dealings, so don't mention the 'stick to beat Lambert with' stuff to me).

[terrytini]

I don't think Lambert HSS had much to spend whichever way you look at it.

And I think Lerner is a problem.

And I think we all agree that injuries don't help a manager.

And that results matter, and that by one reasonable method this years results are an improvement, but by another they are not.

And we probably all agree that another manager is a risk to one degree or another.

So quite a lot of common ground.

I think where I part company with those who would stick with him is that the results and performances are simply not so great that I'm worried about what the next guy would be like...to me results couldn't be much worse than his current average of slightly over a point per game over 100 games...plus cup flops.....and there is nothing that he does with the team that I think would be missed if he went (unfortunately in my view, as I think he did have the ability to mould a decent style but for whatever reason has lost it totally).....

I just don't see any downside to him going that is worth the name.

The football is awful, the points are at a minimum, the style is driving people away there is no consistency or clear progressive method.

Really if he left tomorrow how much would we miss him ?

[Villanun]

I appreciate that Lambert has not had the funds that I'm sure we would all wish for him, and I appreciate that he had had some major injury problems. But regardless of the money, the squad is what it is. So with that in mind and lowering my expectations accordingly, the question becomes: do I think he's getting as much out of this batch of players as he should be? And my opinion is that he's not. We always look so fragile, especially when we take the lead; we hare about all over the place defending, but we can't expect to do that all season without tiring ourselves out; we sit back and hope we can soak up attacks, a tactic that seems guaranteed to invite pressure on the players. There seems to be a defeatism in the way the team is set up. It's a mind set that needs changing, and the impetus for that needs to come from the manager. I want to see some passion from him, and not just when we score, but when we're under the cosh and we need firing up.

Edited December 6, 2014 by Villanun

[P3te]

 

The teams that had finished around us (but survived in the Premiership) were as follows and their summer spend that year in NET (so to show whether improving squad quality) is in brackets:

Net spend shows nothing other than non-footballing income generated investment. FFS can people PLEASE stop using it as some kind of indication of squad or player quality. 

[dont_do_it_doug.]

Lambert and Lerner are a match made in hell for us, they really are.

The incompetent manager can hide behind a lack of spending, so no matter how badly he sets the team up and no matter how much he fails, fans will rally round him as a) he isn't McLeish, and he has no money.

Lerner can hide behind a manager doing poor, and knows if he keeps him on it takes the pressure off. He doesn't need to spend money as the manager continues to back the chairman in interviews. Also, he isn't Doug Ellis.

A match made in hell and it is destroying our club.

You've turned, I mean really really turned. I think Lambert's deficiencies are glaring, I haven't seen evidence that he's learning and I believe we'd perform better under fresh guidence. What I can't agree with is the kind of language seen above, he's not *that* bad. He has his redeeming features (I think he's built a decent squad on peanuts for example) and we are grinding out enough results as things stand. The players are still playing for him.

To liken him to some kind of devil is absurd. I wish people would give it a rest and at least attempt to view things rationally.

[darrenm]

If we get to pick and chose, we could have used Hutton from the start and not bought Lowton. We also could have not bought Kozak and used Bent or Helenius as the Benteke back-up (as that position was fairly well stocked already).

That would have made an extra £4m-6m available, in my opinion.

This is very 'current' thinking with all the benefits of hindsight. Who on here would genuinely think Hutton didn't need replacing a few years back when he had played appallingly game after game? Then he was replaced with a very cheap Lowton from a League One side (so unproven and low wages) who went on to be an near ever present and be considered one of the players of the season and score an amazing goal against Stoke that arguably begun our survival bid.

But because he's been dropped for unknown reasons and Hutton has had a rebirth this means Lambert misspent?! It's too easy to pick and chose who we should have bought and when but with ALL the things people beat Lambert with - his transfer record is amongst the better ones in the division with the funds he's had available.

Someone above very astutely mentioned that he's only spent significant funds on a few players (let's say £4m as a guide using transferleague.co.uk for fees)

Carlos Sanchez (£4.7m) - Early but looks like at least a partial success.

Jores Okore (£4m) - Injured within three games but has had a fairly good reintroduction recently.

Libor Kozak (£5m) - Injured, but £5m for a striker is incredibly cheap anyway.

Christian Benteke (£10m) - Success. Saved us several times, will be sold for a lot more than he's worth.

That's it. But maybe we try above £3m players (you know, like broke small teams buy to keep afloat)

Leandro Bacuna (£3m) - I'd say easily worth that - some of the freekicks have been outstanding!!

Matthew Lowton (£3m) - see above but good value

Ron Vlaar (£3.2m) - much like Benteke, but error with contracts - is that Lambert's fault?

Now we have to look at under £3m players... In fact, I'll list the players who can be considered a waste of money since Lambert took over:

Sylla (£2m), Bowery (£0.5m - or 0.25m after sale), Bennett (£2.5m), Tonev (£2.5m), Helenius (£2m), Luna (£2m)

£11m over three seasons. So he could have gambled on two or three (considering our average transfer fee) different players over that time and who knows whether they would have been any better or whether we would have had the squad depth.

Lambert has spent £50.9m on 25 players since he has been in charge (an average of £2m a player) and the documented reduction of wages (and therefore quality) that goes with it.

For all you fantasy football fans, please give me a squad of players (picking and choosing with the benefit of hindsight) from any team in the Premiership with the maximum amount you are allowed to spend being £50m. It's slightly unrealistic because obviously we had players when he took over (but no-one of any value left, or ageing/ over-paid players he didn't want or wasn't allowed to play).

As a rough guide you need to spend £1m on your keepers

Maybe £8m on your four defenders

Say £16m on your four defenders

And the same on your two strikers = £41m

You then have £9m to spend on AT LEAST a competent 5 subs and use youth for the rest of the squad.

And it's not just transfers either - everyone knows our wage cap is crippling and has to be heavily reduced. We couldn't compete with West Brom for Lescott on his wages...

To long. Didn't read. But to answer your first question. I rated Hutton under McLeish and wouldn't have bombed him out (and therefore wouldn't have spent money on Lowton). You also make the point that we've only spent significant funds on a few players, and that backs up the point I was making. Thanks. Kozak cost around £5m (which is a decent chunk, considering the low amounts Lambert's spent on other players), yet we already had Benteke, Bent, Helenius, Gabby, Weimann and Bowery for that position. The point being made was that instead of buying 4 strikers (when we already had 3), Lambert could have used the Kozak money for a different area of the pitch (eg: Attacking Midfielder). (Also, if you read my post, you'll see I actually said the 'Lambert's been fairly successful', when referring to his general transfer dealings, so don't mention the 'stick to beat Lambert with' stuff to me).

That's a shame. You should. It completely invalidates everything you say there.

[HanoiVillan]

 

 

If we get to pick and chose, we could have used Hutton from the start and not bought Lowton. We also could have not bought Kozak and used Bent or Helenius as the Benteke back-up (as that position was fairly well stocked already).

That would have made an extra £4m-6m available, in my opinion.

This is very 'current' thinking with all the benefits of hindsight. Who on here would genuinely think Hutton didn't need replacing a few years back when he had played appallingly game after game? Then he was replaced with a very cheap Lowton from a League One side (so unproven and low wages) who went on to be an near ever present and be considered one of the players of the season and score an amazing goal against Stoke that arguably begun our survival bid.

But because he's been dropped for unknown reasons and Hutton has had a rebirth this means Lambert misspent?! It's too easy to pick and chose who we should have bought and when but with ALL the things people beat Lambert with - his transfer record is amongst the better ones in the division with the funds he's had available.

Someone above very astutely mentioned that he's only spent significant funds on a few players (let's say £4m as a guide using transferleague.co.uk for fees)

Carlos Sanchez (£4.7m) - Early but looks like at least a partial success.

Jores Okore (£4m) - Injured within three games but has had a fairly good reintroduction recently.

Libor Kozak (£5m) - Injured, but £5m for a striker is incredibly cheap anyway.

Christian Benteke (£10m) - Success. Saved us several times, will be sold for a lot more than he's worth.

That's it. But maybe we try above £3m players (you know, like broke small teams buy to keep afloat)

Leandro Bacuna (£3m) - I'd say easily worth that - some of the freekicks have been outstanding!!

Matthew Lowton (£3m) - see above but good value

Ron Vlaar (£3.2m) - much like Benteke, but error with contracts - is that Lambert's fault?

Now we have to look at under £3m players... In fact, I'll list the players who can be considered a waste of money since Lambert took over:

Sylla (£2m), Bowery (£0.5m - or 0.25m after sale), Bennett (£2.5m), Tonev (£2.5m), Helenius (£2m), Luna (£2m)

£11m over three seasons. So he could have gambled on two or three (considering our average transfer fee) different players over that time and who knows whether they would have been any better or whether we would have had the squad depth.

Lambert has spent £50.9m on 25 players since he has been in charge (an average of £2m a player) and the documented reduction of wages (and therefore quality) that goes with it.

For all you fantasy football fans, please give me a squad of players (picking and choosing with the benefit of hindsight) from any team in the Premiership with the maximum amount you are allowed to spend being £50m. It's slightly unrealistic because obviously we had players when he took over (but no-one of any value left, or ageing/ over-paid players he didn't want or wasn't allowed to play).

As a rough guide you need to spend £1m on your keepers

Maybe £8m on your four defenders

Say £16m on your four defenders

And the same on your two strikers = £41m

You then have £9m to spend on AT LEAST a competent 5 subs and use youth for the rest of the squad.

And it's not just transfers either - everyone knows our wage cap is crippling and has to be heavily reduced. We couldn't compete with West Brom for Lescott on his wages...

 

To long. Didn't read. But to answer your first question. I rated Hutton under McLeish and wouldn't have bombed him out (and therefore wouldn't have spent money on Lowton). You also make the point that we've only spent significant funds on a few players, and that backs up the point I was making. Thanks. Kozak cost around £5m (which is a decent chunk, considering the low amounts Lambert's spent on other players), yet we already had Benteke, Bent, Helenius, Gabby, Weimann and Bowery for that position. The point being made was that instead of buying 4 strikers (when we already had 3), Lambert could have used the Kozak money for a different area of the pitch (eg: Attacking Midfielder). (Also, if you read my post, you'll see I actually said the 'Lambert's been fairly successful', when referring to his general transfer dealings, so don't mention the 'stick to beat Lambert with' stuff to me).

 

 

[Brumstopdogs]

A few basic rules; firstly there is no point with me comparing net spends for all teams – if Chelsea had a £500m pound quality squad but have a few seasons not spending, that does not mean we can compete with them if we outspend them for two seasons of spending £5m. So I will only be comparing, season on season, similar clubs to ours. Secondly, loans and frees are very difficult to judge so can’t really be included although I acknowledge they 

Firstly let me congratulate you on trying to illustrate your perspective and putting it down in a sensible way.

 

However the major flaw in your whole piece is the sentence highlighted above. As I have said previously you have to factor in the squad at the starting point (see back at the earlier Aguero example).

 

As you haven't done that then the rest lacks the context of what squads were in place before these net spends which is pretty key.

Edited December 6, 2014 by Brumstopdogs

[Brumstopdogs]

 

 

The teams that had finished around us (but survived in the Premiership) were as follows and their summer spend that year in NET (so to show whether improving squad quality) is in brackets:

Net spend shows nothing other than non-footballing income generated investment. FFS can people PLEASE stop using it as some kind of indication of squad or player quality. 

 

So selling and buying players in non-footballing income?!

[Rob182]

That's a shame. You should. It completely invalidates everything you say there.

Okay. I've read it now Darren, and I can't see where it invalidates anything I've said. I answered the question asked (if we get to pick and choose, who wouldn't we have signed?), and answered that I wouldn't have bought Lowton. That's not me benefitting from hindsight, by the way. I've always rated Hutton so wouldn't have shipped him out (and wasted 30k p/w wages for 2 seasons). I also mentioned that I think we're fairly stocked in the striker department, so wouldn't have spent that much money on Kozak, when other positions are more pressing. (The improvement of our play when Joe Cole has been available is surely proof that a creative, attacking midfielder would be more benefit to the first team than a sixth striker). Show me where jackbauers essay invalidates those answers to a specific question asked, please?

[romavillan]

 

A few basic rules; firstly there is no point with me comparing net spends for all teams – if Chelsea had a £500m pound quality squad but have a few seasons not spending, that does not mean we can compete with them if we outspend them for two seasons of spending £5m. So I will only be comparing, season on season, similar clubs to ours. Secondly, loans and frees are very difficult to judge so can’t really be included although I acknowledge they 

Firstly let me congratulate you on trying to illustrate your perspective and putting it down in a sensible way.

 

However the major flaw in your whole piece is the sentence highlighted above. As I have said previously you have to factor in the squad at the starting point (see back at the earlier Aguero example).

 

As you haven't done that then the rest lacks the context of what squads were in place before these net spends which is pretty key.

 

 

Um. That's exactly what he said though no?

[briny_ear]

 

Excellent post. Sums it up for me as well.

 

It's a VERY long post and rather confusing, so I don't really think it "sums" anything up. I did notice it used the contentious term "Lambert haters", so I rule it out of serious consideration on those grounds alone.

[Brumstopdogs]

 

 

A few basic rules; firstly there is no point with me comparing net spends for all teams – if Chelsea had a £500m pound quality squad but have a few seasons not spending, that does not mean we can compete with them if we outspend them for two seasons of spending £5m. So I will only be comparing, season on season, similar clubs to ours. Secondly, loans and frees are very difficult to judge so can’t really be included although I acknowledge they 

Firstly let me congratulate you on trying to illustrate your perspective and putting it down in a sensible way.

 

However the major flaw in your whole piece is the sentence highlighted above. As I have said previously you have to factor in the squad at the starting point (see back at the earlier Aguero example).

 

As you haven't done that then the rest lacks the context of what squads were in place before these net spends which is pretty key.

 

 

Um. That's exactly what he said though no?

 

First of all I would say you have to compare the net spend for all 20 teams - so the analysis is complete.

 

Secondly what is a similar club? Southampton were a similar club the year after Lambert took over - are they now?

 

The net spends are shown yearly rather than cumulatively. You have to do it cumulatively to get the correct picture.

 

The point about the squad was partly about the starting point being 16th and that being considered under achieving with the squad under Mcleish.

[darrenm]

 

That's a shame. You should. It completely invalidates everything you say there.

Okay. I've read it now Darren, and I can't see where it invalidates anything I've said. I answered the question asked (if we get to pick and choose, who wouldn't we have signed?), and answered that I wouldn't have bought Lowton. That's not me benefitting from hindsight, by the way. I've always rated Hutton so wouldn't have shipped him out (and wasted 30k p/w wages for 2 seasons). I also mentioned that I think we're fairly stocked in the striker department, so wouldn't have spent that much money on Kozak, when other positions are more pressing. (The improvement of our play when Joe Cole has been available is surely proof that a creative, attacking midfielder would be more benefit to the first team than a sixth striker). Show me where jackbauers essay invalidates those answers to a specific question asked, please?

 

Actually, due to the size of the post I thought you were quoting jackbauer24's other post which is the long one detailing what's been spent when, where and how. 

This was why I thought it invalidated your whole post - arguing about who he should have bought when, or who he should have played more is just noise when compared to the cold hard facts that while spending less than everyone else we've been fighting with, we're doing better than them. Could we be doing better? yes. Could we be doing worse? yes. All debating about buying Lowton or keeping Hutton is utterly pointless compared to the facts (assuming they're correct and fully researched). While I expect that the standard response to that would be 'better close the web site then', I'm not saying people can't debate what they would do instead, but accept what is fantasy and what is reality.

With all respect, everything you say there - you would have not bought Lowton and kept Hutton, you would have bought an AM and not Kozak, is pure fantasy. Whether you say you thought it all along or not, it doesn't matter because no one can decide if you were right or not. Therefore the only metric for whether Lambert is doing a good job or not is if we're improving. Are we? Perhaps. Are we improving in comparison to others at our financial level? Absolutely yes. That trumps every feeling of 'Kozak was a waste of money'. Or 'Bent shouldn't have been put in the bomb squad' (which is fairly obvious to me that it was out of Lambert's hands anyway).

[Rob182]

So I didn't read it, and you didn't read the quoted post either Darren? I don't disagree with many points your saying. I even said in my original post, that jackbauer quoted, that I think Lambert's been successful in the transfer window. I simply answered a question asked, and had some large 'fantasy football fan' reply, as if was making some idiotic, hindsight-driven point. I wasn't. (It's worth mentioning though, that I rate Kozak, but bringing in another striker was generally considered an odd decision by a number of people when he was signed). Regarding Lambert in general, I'm still on the fence. I think he's performed better than expected at times and worse than expected at times. Unfortunately, the lack of progress with regards to our tactical and playing style, is making me lean slightly to the 'he should be doing better' side of the fence.

[darrenm]

Yep, I didn't read either :-)

Personally I think the whole bomb squad thing was purely driven by Lerner and Faulkner. I expect Lambert went along with it due to being able to get all his own players in, albeit cheap ones.

Kozak was absolutely the right decision as far as I'm concerned. He scored goals when benteke was injured, so Lambert's decision that his backup strikers were either too much of a risk or in the bomb squad was right.

[Brumstopdogs]

Yep, I didn't read either :-)

Personally I think the whole bomb squad thing was purely driven by Lerner and Faulkner. I expect Lambert went along with it due to being able to get all his own players in, albeit cheap ones.

Kozak was absolutely the right decision as far as I'm concerned. He scored goals when benteke was injured, so Lambert's decision that his backup strikers were either too much of a risk or in the bomb squad was right.

I'm not so convinced on the bomb squad thing.

 

I can imagine a scenario where when Lambert took the job he was told that the current wage bill was unsustainable and part of his remit was to reduce it so we were eventually compliant with FFP.

 

However, I can't imagine (even with the mistakes Lerner has made!) a situation where Lerner said "Paul, you know what, that striker I paid £18m for a year and a half a go that has scored about 1 in every 2 games for us - stick him on the sidelines. We'll let him rot in the reserves and we'll make sure his value is reduced so we get less for him."

 

I would guess, again this is just my opinion, Lambert would have had the choice on how he reduced the wages and also the speed of how he did it as long as it was close to the wage expectations/guidelines the club had set.

Edited December 6, 2014 by Brumstopdogs