Sack Race 2017/18

[RandoEFC+]

3 minutes ago, Stan said:

Some YouTuber on Twitter seems to be convinced that he's been told some info by an internal source that Koeman has been sacked today after a meeting with Moshiri and Walsh and having a massive go at Walsh in the process. 

Someone mentioned earlier the lights were still on in the Park End offices late into the evening with someone else adding that Koeman was there with Moshiri negotiating his termination fee. However I'm more inclined to believe that it was the kitchens, not the offices, and that it was the hospitality folks doing the washing up.

Heard another 'ITK' this week said Koeman has the Arsenal and Chelsea games to save his job. Nobody knows who is and isn't reliable though.

When certified journalists or "Sky sources" start reporting things I'll get my hopes up but for now I'm expecting it to be after Chelsea knock us out of the Carabao Cup as well as us being effectively out of Europe and in the relegation zone. Only Wenger can survive taking his team out of two competitions and plummeting down the league table with a dismal defeat in the space of a week. 

[Dan+]

23 minutes ago, RandoEFC said:

What is ridiculous is how the majority of football club owners have made their billions in business through being extremely clever people who know what they can do themselves but also know the value of bringing in people to their team from top to bottom that specialise in being able to maximise resources and deliver the right expertise to be successful. Then they take over football clubs and either think they know enough about it to make all of the key decisions themselves or delegate the running of the club to other business bods that have no expertise related to football. Tony Fernandes was one of the worst for me as he made a fortune with his airlines and became one of the richest men in the world then was stupid enough to completely mismanage both his Formula 1 team and his investment in QPR.

Surely when you pump all that money into a football club you make sure it doesn't go to waste by surrounding yourself with people who know how football clubs should be run, the risks involved with things like changing the wage structure massively and trying to buy or build new stadiums and dealing with agents etc so that you don't have to make uninformed decisions. It just completely baffles me how often people with clearly great business sense are utterly incompetent at applying the same logic to running a football club.

It's staggering. I think Rudkin's played a blinder with us, I think our owners knew themselves they didn't have much of an idea about football so listened to this bloke as their supposed voice of reason. That's the only way he could go from being in charge of an unproductive academy for ten years to overseeing all the footballing side of the club, and what's worse is I worry that the league win is only going to strengthen some of their misplaced faith when ultimately it was because of Pearson, Shakespeare, Walsh and Ranieri primarily.

[RandoEFC+]

1 minute ago, Dan said:

It's staggering. I think Rudkin's played a blinder with us, I think our owners knew themselves they didn't have much of an idea about football so listened to this bloke as their supposed voice of reason. That's the only way he could go from being in charge of an unproductive academy for ten years to overseeing all the footballing side of the club, and what's worse is I worry that the league win is only going to strengthen some of their misplaced faith when ultimately it was because of Pearson, Shakespeare, Walsh and Ranieri primarily.

I don't know much about the Rudkin situation but what you say reminds me of the farcical manner in which Steve Kean was able to promote himself to first team manager at Blackburn because he was enough of a snake to convince Venkys that he knew what he was doing simply by playing on the fact he knew more about football than they did.

[Honey Honey]

20 minutes ago, RandoEFC said:

What is ridiculous is how the majority of football club owners have made their billions in business through being extremely clever people who know what they can do themselves but also know the value of bringing in people to their team from top to bottom that specialise in being able to maximise resources and deliver the right expertise to be successful. Then they take over football clubs and either think they know enough about it to make all of the key decisions themselves or delegate the running of the club to other business bods that have no expertise related to football. Tony Fernandes was one of the worst for me as he made a fortune with his airlines and became one of the richest men in the world then was stupid enough to completely mismanage both his Formula 1 team and his investment in QPR.

Surely when you pump all that money into a football club you make sure it doesn't go to waste by surrounding yourself with people who know how football clubs should be run, the risks involved with things like changing the wage structure massively and trying to buy or build new stadiums and dealing with agents etc so that you don't have to make uninformed decisions. It just completely baffles me how often people with clearly great business sense are utterly incompetent at applying the same logic to running a football club.

Mike Ashley has been exactly like this. He appointed Joe Kinnear after bumping into him in Wetherspoons and Alan Pardew after an encounter on a craps table in a casino. Our current chief executive is an over promoted ticket office administrator.

But we probably shouldn't be surprised. There's a lot of luck involved in getting rich. Many entrepreneurs have a track record of multiple big failures even though they still make it rich. Alan Sugar, Donald Trump, the dragons on dragons den. Its fairly common for successful people to have more failures than success. The key is persistence and luck, there is no magic formula of how to do things to get rich otherwise we'd all be millionaires.

[The Palace Fan]

24 minutes ago, RandoEFC said:

Someone mentioned earlier the lights were still on in the Park End offices late into the evening with someone else adding that Koeman was there with Moshiri negotiating his termination fee. However I'm more inclined to believe that it was the kitchens, not the offices, and that it was the hospitality folks doing the washing up.

 that reminded me of every transfer window when we were in The Championship and people claimed to see David Nugent in The Sainsburys outside Selhurst Park. The amount of nectar points that man must have collected.

We're in a similar position to the Leicester and Newcastle fans by the way. Since making The Premier League we've adopted a transfer policy whereby we wait until the very last minute to make certain deals to save money but the reality is we spend even more on wages and agent fees as a result. Then if it all fails we go half a season without a left back, a goalkeeper, or a striker until January when we pay for a premium. Its hit a point where if we get relegated and go back to seven years ago I wouldn't give a fuck because it was so much easier to get behind that version of this club.

[Dan+]

12 minutes ago, RandoEFC said:

I don't know much about the Rudkin situation but what you say reminds me of the farcical manner in which Steve Kean was able to promote himself to first team manager at Blackburn because he was enough of a snake to convince Venkys that he knew what he was doing simply by playing on the fact he knew more about football than they did.

It's along those kind of lines. Now I don't mind promoting from within providing there is a logical explanation for it, but our academy has needed a shake up for a while so for the man running that to be promoted rings alarm bells. I just can't fathom how he can stay in a job while being largely responsible for how we've struggled. Our midfield's been an absolute joke since Kante left.

It's interesting that the fans have made their feelings known though now. It needed to happen. Give me that over passivity - something I find very dangerous.

[Dan+]

4 minutes ago, Aaroncpfc said:

 that reminded me of every transfer window when we were in The Championship and people claimed to David Nugent in The Sainsburys outside Selhurst Park. The amount of nectar points that man must have collected.

We're in a similar position to the Leicester and Newcastle fans by the way. Since making The Premier League we've adopted a transfer policy whereby we wait until the very last minute to make certain deals to save money but the reality is we spend even more on wages and agent fees as a result. Then if it all fails we go half a season without a left back, a goalkeeper, or a striker until January when we pay for a premium. Its hit a point where if we get relegated and go back to seven years ago I wouldn't give a fuck because it was so much easier to get behind that version of this club.

Yep exactly this. We were in our strongest ever position last summer yet decided we'd play the penny pinching game to avoid being ripped off, only to miss out and consquently get even more ripped off in the process. It's shambolic practice.

[RandoEFC+]

On 06/07/2017 at 0:09 AM, RandoEFC said:

Now that all 20 clubs know who will be in charge when the season gets underway in August, we can start speculating on who's the first to go. Where's your money going?

So looking back at the pre season odds, here's the leaderboard so far.

1. Frank De Boer 12/1. Sacked after just a handful of matches which saw Palace not only go without a single point but also a single goal. 12/1 is a decent price if you got on it but I don't think many people saw this one coming as the first sacking outright, even if he might have fallen into the "gone by Christmas" category for some back in July. Speaking of which...

2. Craig Shakespeare 6/1. A lot of us saw this one as a possible early sacking, as did the bookies with Shakespeare sitting 4th favourite before a ball was kicked. Leicester's form was poor if not drastic at the time, so you might argue that a manager with more of a track record may have had a bit longer to turn things around, but alas, Leicester's assistant-cum-caretaker-cum-permanent manager will go down in TF365 history as Craig "gone by Halloween" Shakespeare.

3. Ronald Koeman ??/1. It looks to me like Ronald Koeman comes directly after Pulis in the list with odds of around 22/1, possibly as long as 33/1. None of the managers of last season's top seven were particularly fancied for the sack, although some reports of player unrest at Chelsea saw some money go on Antonio Conte just before the season started. With a strong first season behind him and heavy investment in Everton's squad, this wouldn't have been in many people's top three, even those most cynical about Lukaku's departure from the club, and to be honest he could even have been gone before Shakespeare.

4. Slaven Bilic 4/1. Bilic today became the first of the joint pre-season favourites to face the chop, and despite West Ham's come back win over Spurs last week, the throwing away of a victory at Crystal Palace and getting turned over at home by Liverpool proved to be more than the Hammers were willing to tolerate.

Current odds for #5 are as follows:

I'm going to ignore Dyche because those odds obviously don't represent the likelihood of him getting sacked, but the market now looks interesting. With some of the early favourites already out of the door, it's interesting to note the contrast between the Bilics of 2017 and those who were also touted as early casualties. While Benitez at 4/1 in July was more a reflection of his likelihood to walk away from a seemingly tenuous relationship with members of the Newcastle hierarchy, a string of impressive results has seen both him and Marco Silva move out from 4/1 to 20/1.

The next pre season favourites Hughton and Wagner have followed Benitez in navigating the opening stages of their newly promoted season in impressive fashion. These 8/1 shots from August now sit well clear of trouble on 33/1 and 28/1 respectively. It is worth noting that there is a real potential here for all three newly promoted clubs to go all season without changing manager. Pearson, Adkins, Phelan and others have been less fortunate in the past.

With most clear candidates either gone or safe, it is interesting that the likes of Pulis, Clement and Hughes could now come under closer scrutiny in the absence of more obvious targets for the media's inquisitions. Conte is also sitting in there at 7/1 in the midst of another overplayed player bust up, but I'm not of a mind to take that too seriously myself.

While Sky Bet will pay out on Dyche as the next manager to leave should he go to Everton, who do we think the next manager to actually be sacked could be? I'm personally interested in the odd on new West Ham boss David Moyes when his appointment is confirmed.

[Dan+]

Would you lot believe me if I told you I had £10 on Shakespeare being the next to go 4 days before he got the boot at 10/1

It became obvious to me at Huddersfield away, and even more so at Bournemouth that he was a dead man walking. Our form results wise wasn't terrible (he actually only lost 1 of his last 5 in all comps) but the football was utterly garbage, and far too reminiscent of how it went under Ranieri. Puel's been a bit of a breath of fresh air so far but I'm a bit wary because that's exactly what Shakespeare was. Puel definitely has a better track record to back himself up though.

I've thought over the weekend about having some on Pulis and Clement but the odds have dropped too much. Swansea look in massive trouble to me, 5 defeats from 6 at home (and all bar one was to a mediocre side) and West Brom are going well under the radar - 2 wins in 20, no wins in 9, 3 defeats on the bounce (including a 1-0 loss to the smallest budget side in the league who had ten men), I doubt he'll take them down but they really have got to aim higher now for me. They've been in the league what, 8 years? What have they got to show for it? They're the biggest nothing side in the league under Pulis.

Pearson got sacked after the season for non-football reasons (a ridiculous scenario which he couldn't really win in) but apparently the rumours of him being sacked in February and re-instated later in the day had some substance. Lineker said it happened and I believe him when it comes to us.

My money's on Clement.

[Toony]

When you look at West Brom's fixtures, their next two fixtures are against Chelsea & Tottenham. When he loses both of those two I think Pulis will be in massive trouble.

But I don't think they'll go down under him, their next appointment would be huge.

[Stan]

Pulis has admitted he's now feeling the pressure as well. Wonder if he's taken West Brom as far as he can (they finished 8th or 9th last year after tailing off around March time if I remember correctly?).

Surprised Hughes' odds are that long. Perhaps the last 2 results have taken the pressure off somewhat but for those who play FM, I'd hazard a guess that he's walking a tight-rope and has had a few board meetings already. Perhaps in the 'insecure' stage.

[Honey Honey]

Pellegrino at 14/1 is not a bad price.

[Stan]

Ironic how Pellegrino is seen to be as boring as Puel is when it comes to how his teams play. And one of the reasons Southampton got rid of Puel is his style of play and lack of goals.

Southampton finding it difficult to score. Failed to score in 4 of their 11 league games and only scored more than once on one occasion.

[Honey Honey]

4 hours ago, Stan said:

Ironic how Pellegrino is seen to be as boring as Puel is when it comes to how his teams play. And one of the reasons Southampton got rid of Puel is his style of play and lack of goals.

Southampton finding it difficult to score. Failed to score in 4 of their 11 league games and only scored more than once on one occasion.

They don't even try to score 

[RandoEFC+]

Moyes available at 66/1 on Sky Bet. Massively unlikely that he'll be first but I'm having a couple quid on at that price.

[Dan+]

6 hours ago, Kitchen Sales said:

Pellegrino at 14/1 is not a bad price.

I was just about to say that. They said on the radio earlier he's yet to face a top six side as well and that they've got a horrible run coming up.

Wouldn't it be ironic if a loss to us next month did it.

[LFCMadLad]

Mourinho has gone from 100/1 to 20/1 overnight. 

[Guest Cannabis]

1 hour ago, LFCMadLad said:

Mourinho has gone from 100/1 to 20/1 overnight. 

Mourinho has his sights set firmly on the PSG job. It would amaze me if he sees out the 2018/19 season.

[Cicero]

3 hours ago, Cannabis said:

Mourinho has his sights set firmly on the PSG job. It would amaze me if he sees out the 2018/19 season.

Absolutely can't see the owners wanting Mourinho. They want to be entertained, not watch Neymar play LWB

[Guest Cannabis]

54 minutes ago, Cicero said:

Absolutely can't see the owners wanting Mourinho. They want to be entertained, not watch Neymar play LWB

I personally can't wait for when PSG draw 1-1 against Angers and Mourinho throws Neymar under a bus.

[Panna King]

All the under pressure managers now have been sacked,  The next under pressure one will surely be Southampton, they have been awful.   IF Arsenal were in the real world,  Wenger should of been the first one gone this season or now the manager focused on to be sacked. 

[Panna King]

On 11/7/2017 at 2:08 AM, Dan said:

Would you lot believe me if I told you I had £10 on Shakespeare being the next to go 4 days before he got the boot at 10/1

It became obvious to me at Huddersfield away, and even more so at Bournemouth that he was a dead man walking. Our form results wise wasn't terrible (he actually only lost 1 of his last 5 in all comps) but the football was utterly garbage, and far too reminiscent of how it went under Ranieri. Puel's been a bit of a breath of fresh air so far but I'm a bit wary because that's exactly what Shakespeare was. Puel definitely has a better track record to back himself up though.

I've thought over the weekend about having some on Pulis and Clement but the odds have dropped too much. Swansea look in massive trouble to me, 5 defeats from 6 at home (and all bar one was to a mediocre side) and West Brom are going well under the radar - 2 wins in 20, no wins in 9, 3 defeats on the bounce (including a 1-0 loss to the smallest budget side in the league who had ten men), I doubt he'll take them down but they really have got to aim higher now for me. They've been in the league what, 8 years? What have they got to show for it? They're the biggest nothing side in the league under Pulis.

Pearson got sacked after the season for non-football reasons (a ridiculous scenario which he couldn't really win in) but apparently the rumours of him being sacked in February and re-instated later in the day had some substance. Lineker said it happened and I believe him when it comes to us.

My money's on Clement.

You are a disgrace! I bet you one of the ones that was ok when Raneri was sacked. 

[The Palace Fan]

Given that Everton are now one win away from being a solid mid table side I do feel that it's still too close for managers to be under threat.

[RandoEFC+]

28 minutes ago, The Palace Fan said:

Given that Everton are now one win away from being a solid mid table side I do feel that it's still too close for managers to be under threat.

Theres always a next one though and now that Dyche is seemingly out of the running for Everton the Next Manager To Leave market on Sky Bet has slipped back into shape. My picks for tasty odds now:

Pulis 7/2

Hughes 11/1

Pellegrino 14/1

Howe 25/1

All managing teams who have been very average or poor under the radar this season. Howe wasn't even in the conversation for Everton or Leicester which goes to show how much his stock has fallen. I think 25/1 is good value there though I can't see Bournemouth parting with him unless they really are in a desperate position.

[Dan+]

4 hours ago, VanPaddy said:

You are a disgrace! I bet you one of the ones that was ok when Raneri was sacked. 

Can't tell if you're being serious or not.