He was sacked for not picking GP’s new toy, Sarr. But the home performances vs Brighton & Spam were worryingly bad.
To clarify, I was referring to the last six games of 2018/19, although you might say the first two weren’t really a collapse though Deeney’s avoidable sending-off certainly played a part in the big dip in form towards the end. We played well against Arsenal and would’ve got at least a draw were it not for that and a Foster error (Success hit the crossbar) and European qualification was still in our hands after we beat Huddersfield. It did unravel then with us conceding within ten seconds in our home game against relegation-threatened Southampton, and the three bad defeats at the end (can’t really hold what happened in the final against him). I didn’t even mention the start of the next season, because while it was alarming, we were slowly improving and I’m one of those who thought/thinks he was sacked far too early. Fair point regarding the players I guess - I had no problem with the other games in that 13-match spell.
He was also very unlucky in the four games we l he did have at the start of the next season! Hughes missed the easiest chance to put us 2-1 up against West Ham and they scored soon after and the Newcastle game (which was a big improvement) their equaliser should've been ruled out for handball according to the rules at the time but VAR was asleep. They'd never have sacked him with 6/4 points from the first four games.
Think Brighton got 2 on the break too when we were pushing at 1-0 down and Haller got 2 from set plays for WH.
And he refused to play the new multi-million pound player we’d spent all summer chasing. I think people may underestimate how petulant GP can be.
He had a good run but I think his achievement was pretty ordinary all things considered. He had a squad more than good enough for autos and achieved it. And then completely bottled the title in the last minute of the last game of the season, when it would have been our biggest honour on the board in our whole history. Can’t forgive him for that.
Forestieri missing 2 feet tap ins against Sheff Wed was the reason we missed out and not conceding a last minute goal in my view .
Betty, certainly in recent years. The team spirit and the way he got run of the mill players to pull together and play out of their skin was incredible. Players who transferred out got worse. For every other manager we've had since Taylor when players have moved on they seemed to have got better.
I don’t think you can blame the last game of the season on him, but I kind of know what you mean about the rest. His managerial record after us has been distinctly poor, with his PPG record gradually getting worse with each team (maybe Fulham play off win aside). Before us he only managed very tinpot outfits as well. It all points towards us having a squad too good for the division and him just doing the right thing to get them pointed in the right direction, Munoz was just another variation of the same thing. We’ll never know, but much like Munoz his record outside of managing us suggests he would’ve massively struggled when suddenly tasked with managing a team that wasn’t better than most of the other teams he was up against. Of course you can argue what he and Munoz did is a skill in itself, but the bigger skill as a manager is getting silk out of a sows ear, and both of their careers outside of us suggest they are incapable of that.
Oh I know! It's a completely emotional and slightly irrational stance to take but then that's half the thing with this sort of question I reckon.
I think with Gracia either sack him at the end of the season or back him longer than four games of the next and we stay up. Appointing QSF was probably the single biggest mistake of the Pozzo era, when you consider it was Iggy who did a lot of the heavy lifting for him in his first spell. As it was, we flushed 10 games down the toilet, ended up in such a desperate situation that Pozzo went against all his previous sensibilities and appointed an old school English manager, everything he previously stood against. I think it shows how lucky a lot of his decisions were, because if he’d also appointed Pearson after sacking Gracia we would’ve probably easily stayed up too, but it was only a decision he could make when absolutely desperate. Appointments like Munoz looked genius at the time but they were just seat of the pants punts.
There's no doubt at all in my mind that getting rid of Gracia was the beginning of the end for the Pozzo era
Shocked by the Gracia revisionism in this thread. A gurning simpleton devoid if ideas who was just fortunate to have a supremely talented set of individuals. Watch the highlights reel of that season. The majority of the goals were worldies that 9 times out of 10 the ball would go nowhere near the goal. Quite literally the luckiest manager in the history of our great club. His spell at Leeds showed his true colours. He should have been bombed out of the club as soon as the whistle was blown at the end of the cup final. Giving him that summer is a huge part of the reason we are where we are now.
Runners up: Joka for his tactical flexibility and impact Silva for our best balance between attack and defence. We were set up so well. Zola for the sexiest football culminating in the Deeney goal Boothroyd for the funnest year of football. Zero expectations, with the perfect mix of ‘passhun’ home grown talent and never knowing when to quit. And Walt for delivering survival so comfortably with a team that had few redeeming features and couldn’t be bothered to work hard. Have a soft spot for the contempt he showed for the worst of our players and fans.
Also for the extra special passive aggressive two digit salute to Gino in the final game by putting two sub keepers on the bench. I know he wasn't loved by the fanbase as a whole, but just for that he gets an extra mark, especially as it was also against our shirkers' nightmare side in Citeh,
I know your posts are parody, but nobody else did any better than Gracia that season. The yanks PPG was virtually identical, the caretaker manager drew one and lost the other two, and BFS drew one and lost three. Obviously he didn’t save them, but nobody else did any better with them that season and they were ultimately relegated regardless.
Can't think of worse. He made a very tough task look utterly impossible. We had a run of pretty meh managers in the 90s but none that left the club in a dramatically worse position from when they joined. Plus a special mention for Edwards of course whose pre-season is the sole reason we are in the state we are today.
No parody. He was dog shyte with teeth like a saucepan full of burnt chips. But tbh I have no idea about his Leeds record but I remember their fans hated him, so just presumed he was garbage.
Just for sheer *********ry it would be Betty. Having a player go down for 6 minutes away at Plymouth, when he hadn't even been tackled, to go off come back on and pull up with cramp a minute later and have to be taken off. Having Doyley take throw ins down the line that never came on to the pitch, so it would have to be re-taken just to time waste, have someone behind in the budling works throw a lost ball over and on to the pitch while the opposition were attacking, just to stop the game. Taking 20 minutes at half time and not coming out when the ref had already gone off the pitch and knocked on the door. The number of mellays we got in to break up play and slow the game. He and the team became masters at being hated. He took a team of unwanted misfits at bargin bucket prices and turned them into a championship force and FA cup semi-finalists. His problem was when we went up and misfits v quality was just a mismatch. We all know the last few years has been crap, but Betty bought fun, entertainment and amusement to football. I'd happily watch his anti football for one more season, just for the laughs it bought.
Lets not forget the genius tactic every kick off:- Hoof the ball as hard and high as possible into the opposition corner for a throw, like we're kicking into touch. Recliner seats would have been a good idea during the majority of Hoofroyd's reign as the ball spent more time in the air than most birds do.
I think people would prefer that to the possession based pass it around the back stuff we get now. So long as it was effective which it was when we had King/Henderson up front but went to pot when they left as Ellington wasn't up to it
Absolutely we played some fantastic attacking football that promotion season. It became pretty horrible in the following 2 seasons but the promotion season was truly great. Would love that right now and hoped that we would have gone a bit more direct under VI, though not as far as he went with barnsley, but alas, no.
Remember that goal at QPR we scored after they’d had a lob come off the cross bar, and we scored from the counter (I think?) and he said we knew it would come off the bar because we’d researched their pitch and knew how bouncy it was, or words to those effect.
I believe they had been practicing that exact move in training. Furlong hit the bar, Young scored I think.
Forgot about most of this. Brilliant. Also the last Watford manager to win at the Kennel, which we achieved by timewasting to a level I have never seen before or since. Their vile mutant supporters were absolutely frothing. Great memories.
Also the Leeds PO final was great, he had us pumped up and in their faces straight from the tunnel, whereas they shat their pants over the fireworks and looked scared to even be there.
I was so confident before that final and I'm normally the complete opposite. I love that video of the tunnel before the game. As you say, we look bang up for it and they look sh1t scared. Pretty much transferred on to the pitch as well. Great days
Relive.... https://www.watfordfc.com/video/bac...highlights-leeds-united-0-3-watford-2006#play The 0-3 demolition of PO favourites CP in the SF was also a fantastic watch.
