robbie earns his coin

[Prufrock]

One exceptional player in 20 years........

Teddy Sheringham

Plus, had Blake been a Megson signing, you'd have been on here straight after the game wanking about how Megson is still pulling Coyle out of the shit with his great signings.

You're boring as f*ck Nut.. Honestly, it's pathetic and this is the last time I reply to one of your posts. You're not worth my time or effort

Laurent Blanc.

Speaking of whom, France 0-1 Belarus. Teehee.

[Montreal Wanderer]

'Sokay, bish, the Oxford English Dictionary allows both spellings now, even in England (though it does note that ck is used extensively bu my great neighbour to the south).

I've come to notice, Monty, that if enough people misspell something often enough then the OED, for some reason, decides to include it. I'm not sure it's in a position to 'allow' anything though.

Very true. Common usage does do away with former rules - e.g. the split infinitive (which still grates with me but...). Well done on the the 'misspell' though - still a common error.

[TKIZ!]

Robbie Blake earned us apoint on saturday and justified his signing exactly what he was bought for ,not the latest whizz kid megabucks greedy twa### but a talented grafter of limited but well appreciated abilites good signing by Owen and a good substitution although not appreciated by some .
I might add expect more of the same ,at tight end of match situations gooden

I appreciate his talents, he's a very gifted footballer but he's 34. I thought the days of signing 1 season wonders and giving a player one final pay check where long gone when Big Sam left.

I think with a small team like Bolton we have be use whatever methods are necessary. Who knows maybe Eaves or Ward come good over the next season or two and then the move is great. Even Man U bring in an older player for short term when deemed necessary so why the hell shouldn't we. Seems a pretty cheap deal as far as I am concerned so don't understand the critism. Certainly better than moaning all the time about not having enough players.

Are you talking about the one off Henrik Larsson?

Van Dar Sar.

[Bruce Rioja]

Very true. Common usage does do away with former rules - e.g. the split infinitive (which still grates with me but...). Well done on the the 'misspell' though - still a common error.

To split the infinitve is to wonderfully encourage expression. To glibly allow misspelling is to wilfully allow poor standards. Have a bit o' that.

[Verbal]

Very true. Common usage does do away with former rules - e.g. the split infinitive (which still grates with me but...). Well done on the the 'misspell' though - still a common error.

To split the infinitve is to wonderfully encourage expression. To glibly allow misspelling is to wilfully allow poor standards. Have a bit o' that.

I assume you mean "to positively split the infinitive"

[Bruce Rioja]

Very true. Common usage does do away with former rules - e.g. the split infinitive (which still grates with me but...). Well done on the the 'misspell' though - still a common error.

To split the infinitve is to wonderfully encourage expression. To glibly allow misspelling is to wilfully allow poor standards. Have a bit o' that.

I assume you mean "to positively split the infinitive"

Absolutely.

[CAPSLOCK]

Robbie Blake earned us apoint on saturday and justified his signing exactly what he was bought for ,not the latest whizz kid megabucks greedy twa### but a talented grafter of limited but well appreciated abilites good signing by Owen and a good substitution although not appreciated by some .
I might add expect more of the same ,at tight end of match situations gooden

I appreciate his talents, he's a very gifted footballer but he's 34. I thought the days of signing 1 season wonders and giving a player one final pay check where long gone when Big Sam left.

I think with a small team like Bolton we have be use whatever methods are necessary. Who knows maybe Eaves or Ward come good over the next season or two and then the move is great. Even Man U bring in an older player for short term when deemed necessary so why the hell shouldn't we. Seems a pretty cheap deal as far as I am concerned so don't understand the critism. Certainly better than moaning all the time about not having enough players.

Are you talking about the one off Henrik Larsson?

Van Dar Sar.

I thought the point was stop-gap, one season wonder, signings

[Montreal Wanderer]

Very true. Common usage does do away with former rules - e.g. the split infinitive (which still grates with me but...). Well done on the the 'misspell' though - still a common error.

To split the infinitve is to wonderfully encourage expression. To glibly allow misspelling is to wilfully allow poor standards. Have a bit o' that.

I assume you mean "to positively split the infinitive"

Absolutely.

Personally I blame Star Trek. All that 'to boldly go' malarkey mesmerized several generations.

[thebish]

I thought the point was stop-gap, one season wonder, signings

hmmm.. but that would be to accept Nut's premise - I don't believe any manager signs anyone with the purpose of being a one-season wonder. they may turn out like that - but that's not the same argument.

[TKIZ!]

Ok then, Liverpool signed Jari Litmanen(sp?) for one season

[CAPSLOCK]

To be honest, its all about striking a balance

Allardyce manged that til the last few months

By then, we were sliding down, fast

Theres nowt wrong with old heads, if they're good enough, but when 5 of your best are up against the buffers, you've got some problems

As the manager, it'd be such a challenge you'd perhaps look to leave the job

[sweetas]

I thought the point was stop-gap, one season wonder, signings

hmmm.. but that would be to accept Nut's premise - I don't believe any manager signs anyone with the purpose of being a one-season wonder. they may turn out like that - but that's not the same argument.

Maybe not a wonder or a superstar ,probably a stalwart or a 2 season stalwart ,for sure better value than shittu

[as]

Are you talking about the one off Henrik Larsson?

Does he not count?

One exceptional player in 20 years........

I think I stated when deemed necessary. They are a big club who tradionally have had huge reserves to spend, so shouldn't have to resort to short term fixes very often. Right now though they are struggling as they are having to rely quite heavily on the aging veterans such as Scholes and Giggs. We are not that club not now and will not be in the future so do not have that luxory. I want a manager who builds for the future, but at the same time he had better not ignore the present. I am sure Coyle would have preferred to have 6-8m to spend on another striker but he didn't so instead of moaning he signed what he concidered a short term solution at an affordable price.To ignore the present is a good way to get the axe, and for Bolton to get relegated. None of us want that.

We have just sacked this man.

You're slowly winning me over.

I don't mean I agree with anything you post, but that was a Monday morning chuckle that I needed.

[boltonboris]

To be honest, its all about striking a balance

Allardyce manged that til the last few months

By then, we were sliding down, fast

Theres nowt wrong with old heads, if they're good enough, but when 5 of your best are up against the buffers, you've got some problems

As the manager, it'd be such a challenge you'd perhaps look to leave the job

Allardyce only did it because we didn't have any money to spend at the time. When he was given cash, he signed Anelka. Megson signed Elmander for more. Had Alladyuce been given the same war chest at Megson, I'm positive we'd have been finishing much higher than Megson was

[BWFC_Insane]

To be honest, its all about striking a balance

Allardyce manged that til the last few months

By then, we were sliding down, fast

Theres nowt wrong with old heads, if they're good enough, but when 5 of your best are up against the buffers, you've got some problems

As the manager, it'd be such a challenge you'd perhaps look to leave the job

There is a HUGE difference between Allardyce sinking the whole clubs resources into the likes of Djorkaeff, Okocha, Stelios, Speed, Campo, Hierro etc and ending up with a squad that needed replacing all within two or three seasons to Coyle signing Robbie Blake, presumably for very little in comparison to use as an impact sub.

I don't think Allardyce struck a great balance in that what he achieved was very good, but he didn't have any younger players coming through whatsoever and therefore was left with having to do the impossible and replace some incredibly talented but ageing players without being able to get any fees for them. OC is obviously in the market for the teenagers (no jokes please) and as such IF he has good talent spotters will balance out the signings of Petrov/Klasnic in a way Allardyce never really even tried to, at least on the face of it!

[H. Pedersen]

The criticism of Allardyce here just isn't fair. When he had the resources he went after relatively young players like Anelka and Diouf or even David Dunn. Our academy players had bigger roles under him than they did under Megson.

I mean, do you think Gartside offered him £5 million for a central midfielder and Allardyce said "No thanks, I'll just take David Thompson?"

[H. Pedersen]

To be honest, its all about striking a balance

Allardyce manged that til the last few months

By then, we were sliding down, fast

Theres nowt wrong with old heads, if they're good enough, but when 5 of your best are up against the buffers, you've got some problems

As the manager, it'd be such a challenge you'd perhaps look to leave the job

Newcastle gave him money to work with. Bolton couldn't, or wouldn't. I've never been happy with the way he left Bolton, I thought it was disrespectful and sleazy. That said, I doubt there's anyone in the world who could have done better than Allardyce did with the resources he had.

You want to assign blame for our recent relegation battles, look at the chairman who hired two incompetent managers after Allardyce's departure.

[BWFC_Insane]

The criticism of Allardyce here just isn't fair. When he had the resources he went after relatively young players like Anelka and Diouf or even David Dunn. Our academy players had bigger roles under him than they did under Megson.

I mean, do you think Gartside offered him £5 million for a central midfielder and Allardyce said "No thanks, I'll just take David Thompson?"

Nobody is criticising Allardyce in that he was excellent for us in results terms. Doesn't mean he left a good legacy or a strong club because other than being a premiership side he left us in a state.

Megson signed youngish players on the whole, and consequently when we lose Cahill/Muamba/Lee we should at least have the luxury of replacing them with some cash we get.

That Allardyce was a better manager than Megson is not in question. That he achieved far greater results is again not in question. But his methods were only going to be good for a certain period and when he realised this he started asking for more and more and more money, sums that a club like ours couldn't and rightly wouldn't support not without some necessary trading or as old Arry would like me to say "wheeler dealering".

Allardyce is a still a brilliant man manager and still tactically very strong in results terms. But look at what he's doing at Blackburn, he had rougly 2M to spend this summer (about what Coyle has had to spend though Allardyce wasn't able to increase the wage bill as Coyle has) and he had a few youngerish strikers in Europe on his radar. What he ended up doing however, was signing Benjani (and a loan for Diouf from Utd). Now it appears he chose Benjani over the younger, promising but risky options. However, is Benjani who probably came cheap, going to improve Blackburn? Probably not. And when it comes time to replace him will he get a fee? Almost certainly not. Blackburn WILL be mid table though.

I think what I'm getting at in a very long winded way is that not every fooking thing that happens in football is black and white. Allardyce was a very good manager but it is perfectly reasonable to point out his flaws.

In the same way Megson was a bit shit but did do some very very good things for this club.

Shades of grey not black and white.

[seanworth]

I don't think that much mud is being slung at Big Sam. I think the thread shows the different approaches the three managers used to build the Wanderer squad, and yes we all understand the different constraints in place for each manager.

[TANGODANCER]

You want to assign blame for our recent relegation battles, look at the chairman who hired two incompetent managers after Allardyce's departure.

Would that be Phil Gartside, the same guy everybody was saying just two weeks ago was a top notch chairman and has really done well for the club and its image? Just asking like.