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Post by Olgrligm on May 8, 2021 23:40:17 GMT
So, the season has ended with the most expensively assembled squad in the history of the Championship* finishing below a Luton Town side that has spent less than 10% of that money on transfers since promotion two years ago and has sold all of their best players. More significantly, Luton have done so under the leadership of Nathan 'Mad Nath' Jones, our much maligned former manager. Since leaving us at the bottom of the table, he has: 1) Taken over one of the worst teams that I've ever seen at this level and somehow saved them from relegation. 2) Spent a grand total of £0 on transfers, relying instead of loaning players like Tom Ince on one of the three smallest budgets in the league. 3) Guided said awful team to 12th in the table, two points above us. All this while our players were beating their chests and posting pictures of themselves dancing on his grave. When he left our club, a quick sift through The Oatcake would reveal a widely held view that he was the worst manager in the club's history, an appallingly bad manager in his own right and would probably never manage again. Despite all of that, I don't think that anybody could deny that his work at Luton is anything other than remarkable. If you can stand the archaic layout of their forum, Luton's supporters are ecstatic with their progress 1, 2, 3 and 4. It's not exactly the work of a charlatan or a fraud. It does make you wonder what happened here and why it all went wrong. I originally wrote a long post moaning about the players, the failure to ship out any of the 2022 mob and the lack of a plan beyond 'good manager = good results', but it's just going over old ground. All I can say is that it was an utterly wasted opportunity to do something remarkable. It's something that everybody at the club, from top to bottom, should reflect upon. Perhaps it was just never meant to be. It seemed odd to see Jones, who had spent masses of his own time at Luton fighting against gambling damaging the local community, cavorting around in a tracksuit emblazoned with 'bet365' massive letters**. He does seem to be more at home at Luton. *The total value spent on our current playing squad, including players out on loan, is an extraordinary £125,450,000. **I have an unrelated conspiracy theory that our owners require all of our managers to wear tracksuits so as to increase exposure of the bet365 brand. |
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Post by chamberlain on May 8, 2021 23:47:30 GMT
Mad and useless
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Post by longdistancekiddie on May 8, 2021 23:50:33 GMT
As always, higher management
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Post by bayernoatcake on May 8, 2021 23:51:41 GMT
I genuinely think he was on the verge of or indeed did have a mental breakdown.
He wasn’t a well man.
He just couldn’t cope with the pressure of the job.
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Post by dirtclod on May 8, 2021 23:55:14 GMT
He has a supporting cast at Luton that works.
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Post by Olgrligm on May 9, 2021 0:28:43 GMT
I genuinely think he was on the verge of or indeed did have a mental breakdown. He wasn’t a well man. He just couldn’t cope with the pressure of the job. It was difficult to see towards the end. I think it was the Forest game where he practically resigned in his post match interview. What a bizarre time. He was roundly applauded both before and after the game. |
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Post by Sfance on May 9, 2021 0:29:25 GMT
Luton doesn’t have Scholes.
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Post by Deleted on May 9, 2021 0:34:21 GMT
Will never make it above this level.
His man management was dog poor and with the modern day footballer, that's vital. Exactly why Jose is struggling and why in spite of his lacklustre tactics Ole finds himself getting a tune out of his team.
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Post by datguy on May 9, 2021 0:50:39 GMT
Mad? Insane.
Was incredibly hard to watch towards the end. Both the football and himself.
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Post by heworksardtho on May 9, 2021 4:14:28 GMT
Finished above us so can’t be that mad
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Post by dirtclod on May 9, 2021 4:41:56 GMT
In the end?
Mad as a Hatter.
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Post by wilcopotter on May 9, 2021 5:51:13 GMT
If you listen to his Luton post match interviews, he is still mad.
Indirect knock as us the other day lamenting how his team was above big clubs with better, more costly and experienced squads.
Left to him we would now be in League One.
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Post by J-Roar on May 9, 2021 6:18:17 GMT
A disastrous clash of a squad who think they are better than they are and a manager who thinks he's better than he is.
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Post by theonlooker on May 9, 2021 6:57:55 GMT
He was here at the wrong time of his management experience. He spoke of being a better manager for the experience when he left and his performance at Luton since proves that.
You can't paint his time here as anything other than a disaster though, lets make no mistake.
Like Rowett, the bigger issue is/was why was he here at that time and who thought it was a good idea following on from another two manager's who were wrong for the job in hand?
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Post by Ron on May 9, 2021 7:00:37 GMT
Sometimes a club and a manager are a terrible fit- that was us and Jones. For me he was full of shit and as soon as he made the mess he did of his summer window he was a dead man walking. He promised “young athletic fullbacks” we signed Stephen Ward!
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Post by robwahlmann on May 9, 2021 7:16:10 GMT
He couldn't handle all the big names in our squad at the time. Played a system that he didn't "buy" players for and behaved like a baboon when we finally won a game!  |
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Post by davejohnno1 on May 9, 2021 7:34:16 GMT
He couldn't handle all the big names in our squad at the time. Played a system that he didn't "buy" players for and behaved like a baboon when we finally won a game! Or drew. The chest thumping after a 0-0 draw at Derby was one of the most embarrassing things I've seen supporting Stoke. |
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Post by robwahlmann on May 9, 2021 7:43:37 GMT
He couldn't handle all the big names in our squad at the time. Played a system that he didn't "buy" players for and behaved like a baboon when we finally won a game! Or drew. The chest thumping after a 0-0 draw at Derby was one of the most embarrassing things I've seen supporting Stoke. He really was embarrassing in my opinion too! |
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Post by crapslinger on May 9, 2021 7:43:38 GMT
Sometimes a club and a manager are a terrible fit- that was us and Jones. For me he was full of shit and as soon as he made the mess he did of his summer window he was a dead man walking. He promised “young athletic fullbacks” we signed Stephen Ward! Plus £9m for Sam Vokes  |
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Post by robwahlmann on May 9, 2021 7:45:46 GMT
Sometimes a club and a manager are a terrible fit- that was us and Jones. For me he was full of shit and as soon as he made the mess he did of his summer window he was a dead man walking. He promised “young athletic fullbacks” we signed Stephen Ward! Plus £9m for Sam Vokes Did we pay £9M or £7M for Vokes? I feel both amounts have been named several times! It also matters due to FFP if we can get rid or not.  |
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Post by crapslinger on May 9, 2021 7:59:33 GMT
Plus £9m for Sam Vokes Did we pay £9M or £7M for Vokes? I feel both amounts have been named several times! It also matters due to FFP if we can get rid or not. Same here, could have been £7m plus Crouch or a straight £9m either way a disastrous piece of business to go with all the other disastrous signings made in the past five years, we must have the worst transfer process in football. |
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Post by robwahlmann on May 9, 2021 8:02:44 GMT
Did we pay £9M or £7M for Vokes? I feel both amounts have been named several times! It also matters due to FFP if we can get rid or not. Same here, could have been £7m plus Crouch or a straight £9m either way a disastrous piece of business to go with all the other disastrous signings made in the past five years, we must have the worst transfer process in football. Have we sold a player with profit since Arnie? I don't think we have! |
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Post by loosestools on May 9, 2021 8:03:55 GMT
I thought that he was worth a shot when he was appointed, a nod to fresh ideas, bundles of energy and enthusiasm and he was young. The squad were the problem, they didn't/couldn't buy in to his tactics and the attitude of some of them really stunk, they should be ashamed. Trouble is he had no kudos, wrong place/wrong time and it became disastrous when he bought shit, ran out of ideas and ended up on the edge of an abyss. It happens to a lot of clubs, but I am pleased that he is back on his feet.
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Post by wakeypotter on May 9, 2021 8:13:06 GMT
My son reckons it’s more to do with mick Hartford why he’s doing well at Luton. It was Hartford who got them promoted in the end.
It’s almost like he ment to fuck us over with the shit he bought
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Post by loosestools on May 9, 2021 8:20:31 GMT
My son reckons it’s more to do with mick Hartford why he’s doing well at Luton. It was Hartford who got them promoted in the end. It’s almost like he ment to fuck us over with the shit he bought I read that too, somewhere. Personally I thought that a stale pie had more go in than Hartford when he was here. Reminded me of Uncle Fester. |
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Post by crapslinger on May 9, 2021 8:25:33 GMT
Same here, could have been £7m plus Crouch or a straight £9m either way a disastrous piece of business to go with all the other disastrous signings made in the past five years, we must have the worst transfer process in football. Have we sold a player with profit since Arnie? I don't think we have! Shaq ? not sure whatever we sold him for it felt like a loss, to think we sold Arnie and pissed £18m of his transfer fee on Kevin fucking Wimmer you really couldn't make this shit up. |
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Post by crouchpotato1 on May 9, 2021 8:28:37 GMT
Mad as a box of frogs but I said at the time and I’ll say it again if Mick Hartford had come with him here he’d have done a lot better.He’s the driving force at Luton with him and always has been.
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Post by crapslinger on May 9, 2021 8:29:05 GMT
My son reckons it’s more to do with mick Hartford why he’s doing well at Luton. It was Hartford who got them promoted in the end. It’s almost like he ment to fuck us over with the shit he bought I read that too, somewhere. Personally I thought that a stale pie had more go in than Hartford when he was here. Reminded me of Uncle Fester. I think that was Paul Hart tbf mate. |
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Post by eaststokie on May 9, 2021 8:31:33 GMT
A left of field appointment which could have resulted in us punching above our weight again in the Premiership with a team who were genuinely interested in the community. But he didn't have the experience to handle some of out lazy overpaid wasters, and couldn't get the effort from the whole team he put out. The Luton team definitely work so much harder for him, and I'd love to know who was behind the Vokes transfer fee - but the buck stops with the manager
In the end, it was right for both parties to cut their losses - as Bayern says above he was on the edge of a breakdown. Don't think I've ever known a Stoke manager commit so much to the job before though
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Post by johnnysoul60 on May 9, 2021 8:45:49 GMT
Like Rowett just a bad fit for us at the time ,stems from the people at the top of the club.
Both decent in places that suit them .
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