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What was your expectations when McMenemy first took charge?

just seen this post match interview with Lawrie Mc - and educated man... :lol: i suppose he was years ahead of Cantona for talking bollox & highsight is a wonderful thing when he predicts only great things ahead...


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contrarian said:
It was quite the coup at the time
Ended up the managerial equivalent of Rodwell
Baffles me he did so well at Southampton
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It was. IIRC, he'd won the FA Cup in '76, lost a League Cup final, qualified for the UEFA Cup three times and finished 2nd to Liverpool in 84. Man United offered him the job when they sacked Dave Sexton a couple of years earlier.

On paper, he was the ideal man. At Southampton be had a mix of good, young players and experienced pros, the likes of Osgood, Channon, Shilton, Keegan, Mick Mills and Alan Ball. He wanted to do the same here and expected it to work. Problem was we were in the 2nd Division. Burley, Kennedy, Swindlehurst, Gatesy and Frank Gray were hardly the same lads were they? The same players he was publicly slating after Oldham tonked us 3 or 4 nowt at Roker.

The biggest mistake though was we let Chris Turner go and the 'keepers we went through were shambolic. McDonagh, Dibble, Bolder, Duncan, Mimms and Hesford among others. At one point, we could have had all 6 in goal at the same time and we'd have still got beat.

He was on the board of directors at the same time as he was manager, I'm sure. It was a horrible time for the club mind, Batey and Cowie were at each others throats constantly but Lawrie didn't help himself. Refusing to come back from Florida for pre season and leaving it all to the clown Chatterley and then claiming the only way he'd leave was if he'd won the First Division title or the European Cup with us. Before the end of the season, he was gone.

As Jimmy Tarbuck supposedly once said, Lawrie Mac and the Titanic had one thing in common, they should never have left Southampton.
 
HeroHurley said:
It was. IIRC, he'd won the FA Cup in '76, lost a League Cup final, qualified for the UEFA Cup three times and finished 2nd to Liverpool in 84. Man United offered him the job when they sacked Dave Sexton a couple of years earlier.

On paper, he was the ideal man. At Southampton be had a mix of good, young players and experienced pros, the likes of Osgood, Channon, Shilton, Keegan, Mick Mills and Alan Ball. He wanted to do the same here and expected it to work. Problem was we were in the 2nd Division. Burley, Kennedy, Swindlehurst, Gatesy and Frank Gray were hardly the same lads were they? The same players he was publicly slating after Oldham tonked us 3 or 4 nowt at Roker.

The biggest mistake though was we let Chris Turner go and the 'keepers we went through were shambolic. McDonagh, Dibble, Bolder, Duncan, Mimms and Hesford among others. At one point, we could have had all 6 in goal at the same time and we'd have still got beat.

He was on the board of directors at the same time as he was manager, I'm sure. It was a horrible time for the club mind, Batey and Cowie were at each others throats constantly but Lawrie didn't help himself. Refusing to come back from Florida for pre season and leaving it all to the clown Chatterley and then claiming the only way he'd leave was if he'd won the First Division title or the European Cup with us. Before the end of the season, he was gone.

As Jimmy Tarbuck supposedly once said, Lawrie Mac and the Titanic had one thing in common, they should never have left Southampton.
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Dibble saved us.
 
L1lyBrown said:
I know someone who played for the lads at the time. Said he was an absolute c**t
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My dad used to drink in a pub ran by Bobby Kerr.

Ex-footballers used to drop in and there were quite a few stories flying around about how out of his depth he was without a group of senior pros to basically run the team for him, and how the players didn't like him at all.
 
I saw this thread and thought, "Has he died?".

I was probably a bit young to be anything but excited by it, as he was a big(ish) name after the success he had with a, tbf, unfashionable club like Southampton, where it seemed he'd over achieved.

My uncle wasn't overly impressed iirc as he thought he wasn't particularly stand out in managerial terms barring the time at Southampton. Think it was an element of "local lad made good" which got people excited too.

Don't know the ins and outs but imagine his own 'self-belief' (arrogance) rubbed players and the board up the wrong way too.
 
Not defending him but in his first season we went from rock bottom 0 points in the first 5 games to 11th or 12th.Did a coaching change happen,a bad egg or 12 arrive? 😆 Chatterly iirc was their till the death.
 
errant said:
just seen this post match interview with Lawrie Mc - and educated man... :lol: i suppose he was years ahead of Cantona for talking bollox & highsight is a wonderful thing when he predicts only great things ahead...


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Amazed to hear him say he'd take responsibility, that was one of .y main memories of him was that he didn't take any responsibility and blamed Mark Proctor for us being relegated.

I never liked him at Southampton a d was swimming against the tide when he was appointed as I never thought he would be any good here.

I really hoped I was wrong and took no satisfaction out of being right about him. I'd far rather he'd been a huge success rather than the useless arrogant shite I always thought he was.
 
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