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claret on my shirt 1:36 Tue Jan 23
Bilic on MNF last night

As always he was very honest and very open and you still have to love the guy but some of the things he said were very interesting.

When he was talking about Payet's exit he said that as we know agents are huge in the game now, he went on to say when an agent controls 6 or 7 players at a club then it makes the Managers job very difficult and you almost come under the agents control. Not sure if he was talking about us but it sounded like he maybe was.

He also spoke about how Moyes has done and other new prem managers who get that initial uplift in results, MNF showed a stat where just about all the new managers in the premier initially did better than their predecesser. Bilic explained every new manager that comes in goes back to basics, defensive football and then tries to grow from there (sound familiar?). Bilic said he did exactly this when he took over at West Ham, but after 2 years boards then want better football, more expansive football, next level ( lol we've all heard that one) and that's when it becomes very difficult. Rather than grinding out results you try to play better football and buy more attacking players. Interesting stuff actually. He did praise Moyes and said he was doing a great job.

So reading between the lines i think it's pretty clear the board wanted better football and pushed Bilic to play more attacking football and therefore bring in more attacking minded players. But i also think it's clear they did not give him anywhere near the budget to do it. Lastly i think if it was Moyes in this position he would push back on the board as he is stronger minded, Bilic i think is a softer touch.

I guess as well he is limited in what he can say due to the terms of his pay off but he certainly said a few things that give you food for thought!

longford 8:38 Thu Jan 25
Re: Bilic on MNF last night

heres a link to slav on MNF , he was pretty captivating as it goes ...

enjoy

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GzppRJnIbuY

Buster 3:01 Thu Jan 25
Re: Bilic on MNF last night

What's Tony Henry been doing for the past 12 months anyway? I remember Sullivan banging on about how great he was because he offered him RONALDO when they were ruining Birmingham.

Jaan Kenbrovin 2:49 Thu Jan 25
Re: Bilic on MNF last night

Bilic identified the answer to our midfield weakness so precisely that there was only one player in world football to target.

Buster 2:13 Thu Jan 25
Re: Bilic on MNF last night

'I think the opposite'

You amaze me, V.

Alex V 1:45 Thu Jan 25
Re: Bilic on MNF last night

>>> Bilic to his credit did identify our weakness in midfield and wanted carvalho.

I think the opposite. He let the problems in midfield and defence drag on for two Summers. Carvalho was an afterthought - an opportunity that came up through an agent. We were barely linked with midfielders before that. Gold said we were happy with the midfield and weren't looking.

I also don't believe that players were sold directly on the promise of Carvalho for reasons already stated. Feghouli did leave late but it was a transfer that dragged on throughout the Summer - he was always going.

Mad Dog 11:58 Wed Jan 24
Re: Bilic on MNF last night

You didn't need the 'after 3 defeats" part of that sentence.

He was never going to part with that

chedylan 2 7:33 Wed Jan 24
Re: Bilic on MNF last night

Bilic to his credit did identify our weakness in midfield and wanted carvalho. He was told to free up wages and generate funds so he sold several squad players.

I believe the transfer never happened because Sullivan got cold feet giving bilic 35m to spend after 3 opening defeats.

Yet he wouldn't sack him either. What A cunt.

longford 6:17 Wed Jan 24
Re: Bilic on MNF last night

when bilic ousted morgan amalfitano , i thought he had a bit of steel about him , but i feel he got a bit chummy chummy with the players , obviously its just an opinion that i cant back up with anything factual , but it sruck me that they were playing in such a relaxed manor that led me to think that thing were a bit to relaxed there...

given time i really feel Dm will replicate his Everton "success" with us , and maybe a bit more ... fingers crossed

threesixty 1:14 Wed Jan 24
Re: Bilic on MNF last night

stewie

you're right. I'm embarrassed. But I will live through the pain! :-(

Danbury Hammer 12:35 Wed Jan 24
Re: Bilic on MNF last night

We had a great first season with Bilic. Albeit we were still shipping goals, we had Payet who could magic us a goal or 2 from nowhere.
2nd season at the OS, the football wasn't great. We were still averaging 2 goals a game conceded. Payet wasn't interested and then went on strike and left. Bilic looked a broken man and unable to do anything about the state of the performances. He should have gone at the end of that season but as we know the board wouldnt pay him up.
This season started poorly, we were shipping in goals galore. The right decision was made to end his tenure at the club.
For me Bilic should have resigned before he was sacked. Every one could see that the players weren't playing for him. He stood on the side with his hands in his pockets, clueless as to what he should do next.
I wish him well in his next venture. Whatever people thought of him, he loves West Ham and was a genuine man who tried his best for us.

Northern Sold 12:20 Wed Jan 24
Re: Bilic on MNF last night

So if I am reading this correctly… Bilic playing Antonio at RB is being blamed for us being knocked out of Europe last season… even though he only played him there for one of the legs??



Amazing….

stewie griffin 12:11 Wed Jan 24
Re: Bilic on MNF last night

No. Byram played at right back in the first leg in Romania. Antonio played as a winger, and missed a sitter at 1-0 that would likely have put the tie to bed.

threesixty 12:06 Wed Jan 24
Re: Bilic on MNF last night

stewie

Antonio played the 1st leg as right back where we drew 1-1 right? It's a 2 leg tie, both games matter. We would have been home and dry if Antonio played in his proper position. But I'll carry on "pointlessly making stuff up"...

Eerie Descent 11:09 Wed Jan 24
Re: Bilic on MNF last night

stewie griffin 7:19 Wed Jan 24

And those 3 league games were all at home to 3 shit teams who finished in the bottom 5, or thereabouts.

bruuuno 11:06 Wed Jan 24
Re: Bilic on MNF last night

threesixty 10:05 Wed Jan 24

stewie griffin 11:00 Wed Jan 24
Re: Bilic on MNF last night

"Well, Antonio at right back got us knocked out of Europe"

Sam BYRAM played right back in the 1-0 defeat at the shithole that knocked us out of Europe.

But carry on pointlessly making stuff up, some on here will lap it up

threesixty 10:05 Wed Jan 24
Re: Bilic on MNF last night

The agent thing is interesting. The idea that a disagreement with 1 player can affect your relationship with 6 players at the same time because they have the same agent. I’d like to hear a bit more about the issue and maybe what the FA have to think about that. Doesn’t sound right.

As for his rather “revisionist” outlook... mmmm..

From where I can see he fucked himself over, and over again. Everything is connected like one long chain of events. His biggest problem is his inability to prepare for disasters.

You have a youth team who you don’t look at or care about because you feel they can’t do the job. So you don’t really prepare them to deputise and bomb them out on loan etc.. while your doing well. Okay, disaster happens, no right back. Could have put one of the youth understudies in. But no, you persist in playing Antonio out of position because he filled in once and you took advantage of the guys never say no attitude.

Well, Antonio at right back got us knocked out of Europe, and lost a bunch of games while pissing Antonio off at the same time. Also made payet think what the fuck is this guy doing this team looks shit etc..

And your problems just roll on from there. Poor choices of personnel. Overloading on right sided forwards because you think you’ve found a right back and then realise you haven’t etc.. Turkish league knock offs.

Bilic Just lost control of the whole thing. And it was obvious. I’ve said it a lot of times before but he is great international manager but the club thing he just isn’t set up for mentally. Maybe he’s too chilled out for it. You kind of have to be ruthless as a club manager if you see players everyday otherwise they will take the piss. They’re only human. You also have to plan a head a lot more than in an international situation.

I liked the guys need for offensive football on the floor. And with payet and Lanzini they played some amazing football but you’ve got to keep it up. And he just didn’t.

Alex Bunbury 9:47 Wed Jan 24
Re: Bilic on MNF last night

The Antonio win back thing runs deeper that that. The reason Antonio was tried as a wing back is that we had nobody else to play there. The failing under Bilic was not necessarily to try him there but to fail to get somebody else who could naturally play in that position. Byram came in but I got the impression that Bilic never really trusted him albeit he was often injured. Part of the reason for our recovery last season was Bilic switching to three at the back where we looked more secure although he was forced to play people at wing back to fill in, like Kouyate. Perhaps more of a problem I have with Bilic in this regard was that we went through successive transfer windows not addressing this. Bilic switched back to a back four at the start of this season with Zabaleta as a conventional right back. When this didn’t work and we went back to wing back Zabelata has been forced to fill in when it is not his position. To me it was obvious we needed a right sided player who could play as a wing back but Bilic did not address this.

Tomshardware 9:41 Wed Jan 24
Re: Bilic on MNF last night

Agree with Bilic about the new manager pattern. That's how it seems to work. It's the manager merry-go-round, they come in and turn results around, the fans having had to endure a shit end to the previous manager are happy with the new found upturn in fortunes.

Then go forward a season or 2 and the results dip and performances worsen and the fans are no longer happy, the board want more and so they are sacked.

There's only a few clubs like Burnley and Bournemouth that haven't gone down this route in recent years.

If you look at managers stats they mostly average out at near enough the same at similar sized clubs. Look at the win % of most medium to longer term managerial tenures and it'll be between 30- 40 %.

Westham67 7:43 Wed Jan 24
Re: Bilic on MNF last night

I had lack of motivation to get out of bed at 3am to watch a game when BFS was in charge.I still did though and still do

stewie griffin 7:19 Wed Jan 24
Re: Bilic on MNF last night

ironsofcanada 11:22 Tue Jan 23
Re: Bilic on MNF last night 

There was zero motivation the last 6 months of Allardyce

Opinion. A premier leagie cliche, purported by his fans in the media when his management goes to shit. I prefer to deal in facts. We won 3 of our last 23 league games. We were absolutely shit at everything. And the 'defensive organisation' he inherited shipped 4 against Leicester and Bournemouth in the first two home games of the season. He sorted it out. Not to mention the fact that there were different personnel involved. Or to mention that we were 4th in the league at Christmas so to suggest there was no motivation is utterly preposterous.

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