Phil Neville - Steve Bruce is a top manager

[Ohnonotagain]

Yeah, base an argument that hes a top manager on a couple of games against good sides who arent in top form. The latest of which his side have only drawn while conceding 24 shots. Totally disregard, for example, getting turned over by a struggling villa side last week, or being beaten by Norwich. Absolutely ridiculous argument to cherry pick a couple of matches like that. Its you who needs to give your head a shake.

Name me better current Premiership managers.

Better than Benitez.

Benitez must be the most overrated manager in Premiership history.

possibly but he lost the plot after Bent and Gyan decided to fuck off.....yet again our seeming failure to plan ahead and identify adequate potential replacements let us down

He was expected to replace them with peanuts if i remember. Ellis wouldnt splash the cash.

I said he'd at least match Wor Rafa's "achievements". Obviously he blew a load of money on Joe Linton, he has always been shite when given money, but he's getting similar results to Benitez with largely the same team.

Dont think Bruce signed Joe Linton tbh.

Name me better current Premiership managers.

Benitez must be the most overrated manager in Premiership history.

He was expected to replace them with peanuts if i remember. Ellis wouldnt splash the cash.

Dont think Bruce signed Joe Linton tbh.

Maybe he did soz

 

[Uncle D]

And he’s right. He is.
With hindsight our problems ran a lot deeper (short) but we would have been much better off sticking with Bruce. Even if we had gone down.

ffs

 

[KNGHTHOOD]

What's he won ?

Author of the week in Wallsend and Byker.

 

[Kermit]

Name me better current Premiership managers.

Benitez must be the most overrated manager in Premiership history.

He was expected to replace them with peanuts if i remember. Ellis wouldnt splash the cash.

Dont think Bruce signed Joe Linton tbh.

Maybe he did soz

come on mate, you cant be serious? This is too easy. How about i will say all of them except say, Watfords, (as of today), arsenal's (as of today), Hassenhuttl, farke, potter, lampard, solksjaer, espirito santo, silva and wilder.

Included in the rest are the real 'top' managers. Im talking klopp, pep, mourninho. Then there are the next group including rodgers, hodgson, pelligrini who are either highly experienced at a good level, have won things, or both. I would class these as excellent managers due to their careers. The next group includes the likes of dyche & howe. Very good managers who have worked wonders at smaller clubs and wouldnt be short of offers, from good clubs, if they were to move on.

So that leaves the 8 i omitted at the beginning. I have only had to do that because you will rightly say, "what have they achieved?". All of these have only been managing a few years and are all young. A number of them are tactically astute and have good experience in European football. They are recognised as innovative with fresh ideas and play good attacking football. You look at potter and farke and its remarkable they are in the premier league so quickly. Its interesting to contrast their philosophies with a man who publicly confessed hes, "not that into tactics". Whos failure is always someone elses fault. Someone who, having done the hard part and broken into premier management has had to drop down the the championship several times as no Premier league club wanted him. I would take every single premier league manager over this absolute bluffer.

 

[joedurham]

Ironically, looking back over the last 12 years, our best moment was under Bruce when we had the attacking trident of Bent, Gyan and Welbeck. If it weren't for Bent's treachery and Welbeck's injury, things might have been different

 

[Alfa]

Bruce did a decent job here and was in hindsight probably sacked prematurely.

I was probably firmly in the ‘sack Bruce’ camp at the time but if you try and look back dispassionately at some of our managerial sackings I’d say an argument could be made that several were in hindsight done prematurely and that the club probably wouldn’t be in the state we’re in now had we persevered with some of them.

Bruce, Poyet, Grayson for starters.

I don’t think Bruce’s Sunderland would have been relegated the season he was sacked. Poyet, even if we’d gone down would have been a decent prospect to bring us back and Grayson likewise on reflection could he have done any worse than Coleman and even if we’d gone down I’d say he’d probably have got last season’s squad promoted

And none of them ever served up football as bad as we’ve seen in the last few weeks.

 

[Perryqhill]

Ironically, looking back over the last 12 years, our best moment was under Bruce when we had the attacking trident of Bent, Gyan and Welbeck. If it weren't for Bent's treachery and Welbeck's injury, things might have been different

It's since come out you know that Bruce went to Quinn and said "If I can get big money for Darren, can we sell him" with Quinny replying "yes" and sure enough a deal was on the table from Villa already and Bent was gone.
Bruce didn't bank on instant injuries to Welbeck and he then rushed Campbell back, who then injured his knee again. The lack of firepower is exactly the same as how things ended up in his relegation season at Birmingham and his relegation season at Hull, having sold players to generate more money for more spending and leaving them short.

Bruce knew at the time he needed to bolster the midfield, as he was relying on Colback and Henderson at that point no longer thinking Steed and Zenden were up to it, Meyler re-injured (rushed back playing several games over xmas and Bruce admitted he'd played him too much), Catts in and out and having messed up with the signing of Riveros who he didn't trust and having sold Cana. He tried to add to it with Sess but didn't know where to play him at first and also with Muntari who wasn't fit and Bruce hadn't realised his best position wasn't central, but wide, so we ended up not signing Muntari permanantly.

The following summer having had relative success with pace and trickey why did he sign Wickham who wasn't exactly rapid and bring in Larsson and Bendtner who he had previously worked with who had no pace? Add to that we brought in Ji, Vaughan in the midfield as well as lumping money on Gardner simply because he had scored goals from midfield, not realising he'd had licence to get forward on the right of a three man midfield to do it. Add to that the signings of Brown and O'shea having already signed the Paraguayan centre half who's name I can't remember, Mensah, Turner, Kilgallon, Bramble in the previous two seasons and still having Anton Ferdinand on the books. The squad mess wasn't created by anyone other than Bruce.

We went from a pacey exciting team to a drab and dreary one - it just highlights how anything with Bruce is so short lived and short term with no foundations, he'd have sold the SOL if someone had come up with the money and it bought him another centre half.

 

[Kermit]

Bruce did a decent job here and was in hindsight probably sacked prematurely.

I was probably firmly in the ‘sack Bruce’ camp at the time but if you try and look back dispassionately at some of our managerial sackings I’d say an argument could be made that several were in hindsight done prematurely and that the club probably wouldn’t be in the state we’re in now had we persevered with some of them.

Bruce, Poyet, Grayson for starters.

I don’t think Bruce’s Sunderland would have been relegated the season he was sacked. Poyet, even if we’d gone down would have been a decent prospect to bring us back and Grayson likewise on reflection could he have done any worse than Coleman and even if we’d gone down I’d say he’d probably have got last season’s squad promoted

And none of them ever served up football as bad as we’ve seen in the last few weeks.

Agree with all points other than those regarding bruce. I firmly believe he sowed the seeds of our decline by replacing quality with plodders. A number of these new players were frees/loans on good wages for their ability, frees always are on good money. Many of his signings were also injury prone. He wasted a lot of money. He also spent some decent money in big transfer fees

Fraizer Campbell, john mensah, wes brown were all injury prone and on good money. Bendtner, welbeck and mensah expensive loans so loan fee and no money in when they left. Wasted 8m on wickham, 2m on ji dong won. Marcos angeleri, da silva, riveros, craig gardner, seb larson, david vaughan. Bringing this shite in while Henderson, malbranque, bent, Jones left. He actually alienated jones to the extent we took a hit financially to facilitate his departure. People saying bent wanted to leave, who knows how much of a part jones leaving played in that.

“I always found Kenwyne a joy to play with,” said Bent

“Even when it was said that he wasn’t running, he wasn’t doing this or that, he always had that presence where he might not do anything for 15 minutes but then he’d do something that would affect the game, knock a header down to me and I’d be in or he’d score a goal himself.

“I always felt that he did well in most games, he was brilliant to play up front with and probably the best person I’ve played up front with in my career."

In mitigation i will say cattermole, sessegnon, mignolet and oshea were good signings. Gyan and cana were good players but ultimately not good signings.

It's since come out you know that Bruce went to Quinn and said "If I can get big money for Darren, can we sell him" with Quinny replying "yes" and sure enough a deal was on the table from Villa already and Bent was gone.
Bruce didn't bank on instant injuries to Welbeck and he then rushed Campbell back, who then injured his knee again. The lack of firepower is exactly the same as how things ended up in his relegation season at Birmingham and his relegation season at Hull, having sold players to generate more money for more spending and leaving them short.

Bruce knew at the time he needed to bolster the midfield, as he was relying on Colback and Henderson at that point no longer thinking Steed and Zenden were up to it, Meyler re-injured (rushed back playing several games over xmas and Bruce admitted he'd played him too much), Catts in and out and having messed up with the signing of Riveros who he didn't trust and having sold Cana. He tried to add to it with Sess but didn't know where to play him at first and also with Muntari who wasn't fit and Bruce hadn't realised his best position wasn't central, but wide, so we ended up not signing Muntari permanantly.

The following summer having had relative success with pace and trickey why did he sign Wickham who wasn't exactly rapid and bring in Larsson and Bendtner who he had previously worked with who had no pace? Add to that we brought in Ji, Vaughan in the midfield as well as lumping money on Gardner simply because he had scored goals from midfield, not realising he'd had licence to get forward on the right of a three man midfield to do it. Add to that the signings of Brown and O'shea having already signed the Paraguayan centre half who's name I can't remember, Mensah, Turner, Kilgallon, Bramble in the previous two seasons and still having Anton Ferdinand on the books. The squad mess wasn't created by anyone other than Bruce.

We went from a pacey exciting team to a drab and dreary one - it just highlights how anything with Bruce is so short lived and short term with no foundations, he'd have sold the SOL if someone had come up with the money and it bought him another centre half.

Well done you have remembered even more shite than me . Good post.

 

[Ohnonotagain]

come on mate, you cant be serious? This is too easy. How about i will say all of them except say, Watfords, (as of today), arsenal's (as of today), Hassenhuttl, farke, potter, lampard, solksjaer, espirito santo, silva and wilder.

Included in the rest are the real 'top' managers. Im talking klopp, pep, mourninho. Then there are the next group including rodgers, hodgson, pelligrini who are either highly experienced at a good level, have won things, or both. I would class these as excellent managers due to their careers. The next group includes the likes of dyche & howe. Very good managers who have worked wonders at smaller clubs and wouldnt be short of offers, from good clubs, if they were to move on.

So that leaves the 8 i omitted at the beginning. I have only had to do that because you will rightly say, "what have they achieved?". All of these have only been managing a few years and are all young. A number of them are tactically astute and have good experience in European football. They are recognised as innovative with fresh ideas and play good attacking football. You look at potter and farke and its remarkable they are in the premier league so quickly. Its interesting to contrast their philosophies with a man who publicly confessed hes, "not that into tactics". Whos failure is always someone elses fault. Someone who, having done the hard part and broken into premier management has had to drop down the the championship several times as no Premier league club wanted him. I would take every single premier league manager over this absolute bluffer.

I give you Klopp, Pep, Jose and Rodgers. Pelligrini and Hodgson are hardly setting the league alight as are Howe and Dyche. Your argument that the last two would get other offers is exactly what has happened to Bruce. Bruce has usually managed on a tight budget. When Ellis cut the purse strings and sold Bent, Cana, Gyan, Henderson etc and wouldnt spend to replace them....what did you expect?
One of the best games i have seen at SOL was a 0-0 draw with a strong Man Utd side where we passed them off the park. He seems highly rated by his peers and given some money i believe would do very well.

 

[citybythesea]

And he’s right. He is.
With hindsight our problems ran a lot deeper (short) but we would have been much better off sticking with Bruce. Even if we had gone down.

Problems were deeper than the manager......still are

 

[Kermit]

I give you Klopp, Pep, Jose and Rodgers. Pelligrini and Hodgson are hardly setting the league alight as are Howe and Dyche. Your argument that the last two would get other offers is exactly what has happened to Bruce. Bruce has usually managed on a tight budget. When Ellis cut the purse strings and sold Bent, Cana, Gyan, Henderson etc and wouldnt spend to replace them....what did you expect?
One of the best games i have seen at SOL was a 0-0 draw with a strong Man Utd side where we passed them off the park. He seems highly rated by his peers and given some money i believe would do very well.

He didnt cut the purse strings at all then mate. We signed johnson and fletcher after that for big money. You clearly have this inexplicable belief that he is a good manager despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. Pelligrini has won cups in England on top of the premier league. Hodgson has taken inter and fulham to europa league finals, managed england, Switzerland, Liverpool and udinese among numerous others across the world. If you are willing to disregard all of these facts and cling to the belief that Bruce is somehow superior, despite his biggest achievement being finishing 10th, then i dont see much else i can say to change your mind. I will leave you with these two thoughts.

Firstly, dyche best finish was 7th, howes was 9th. Both superior to your mate.

Secondly, when man utd decided to appoint and old boy, why did they go for a relative rookie in solksjaer rather than go and get brucey with all of his PL experience?

 

[Jonny hates jazz]

He didnt cut the purse strings at all then mate. We signed johnson and fletcher after that for big money. You clearly have this inexplicable belief that he is a good manager despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. Pelligrini has won cups in England on top of the premier league. Hodgson has taken inter and fulham to europa league finals, managed england, Switzerland, Liverpool and udinese among numerous others across the world. If you are willing to disregard all of these facts and cling to the belief that Bruce is somehow superior, despite his biggest achievement being finishing 10th, then i dont see much else i can say to change your mind. I will leave you with these two thoughts.

Firstly, dyche best finish was 7th, howes was 9th. Both superior to your mate.

Secondly, when man utd decided to appoint and old boy, why did they go for a relative rookie in solksjaer rather than go and get brucey with all of his PL experience?

Give over, Pellegrini won cups with an astronomical budget and Dyche and Howe have plodded along keeping clubs stable ( which is doing a good job) dont forget, Dyche is only in the job at Burnley because Howe couldn't make it work.

They all do pretty well given the task they have against the big boys..but the real shit ones are Hughes and Moyes imo... the modern game has passed then by.

 

[Ohnonotagain]

He didnt cut the purse strings at all then mate. We signed johnson and fletcher after that for big money. You clearly have this inexplicable belief that he is a good manager despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. Pelligrini has won cups in England on top of the premier league. Hodgson has taken inter and fulham to europa league finals, managed england, Switzerland, Liverpool and udinese among numerous others across the world. If you are willing to disregard all of these facts and cling to the belief that Bruce is somehow superior, despite his biggest achievement being finishing 10th, then i dont see much else i can say to change your mind. I will leave you with these two thoughts.

Firstly, dyche best finish was 7th, howes was 9th. Both superior to your mate.

Secondly, when man utd decided to appoint and old boy, why did they go for a relative rookie in solksjaer rather than go and get brucey with all of his PL experience?

He didnt sign Fletcher or Johnson.

Finishing 7th or 9th doesnt win anything.
Pelligrini won at megabucks Man City.
Hodgson hasnt won anything in the Premiership. They went for Solksjaer and seem to regret it now.

 

[Kermit]

He didnt sign Fletcher or Johnson.

Finishing 7th or 9th doesnt win anything.
Pelligrini won at megabucks Man City.
Hodgson hasnt won anything in the Premiership. They went for Solksjaer and seem to regret it now.

I never said he did. Im just saying short didnt stop spending money under bruce, it was long after.

 

[Kent_Mackem]

Hmmmmmmm... 10th in The Premiership or 11th in League One? Not many people are going to choose the latter.

 

[Exapno Mapcase]

What's he won ?

A lifetime supply of steak bakes.
Bruce did a stabilising job to begin with. Our "high position" under him was not one of achievement - we could have been drawn into relegation - he and the team lost their way after a good start. I would say the crowd were pretty patient with him and if anything his Skunks allegiance saved him from too much criticism from the majority as I think there was a general sense of not bringing that into it and not wanting to be accused of football "bigotry". Only right at the end did he get such a high level of abuse. The way he and his media chums have gone on since you'd think Bruce hadn't lost a game and he ignores just how poor our form was for a calendar year. Comparing his tenure with now and extrapolating unbridled success if had stayed ignores the reality of our situation then. He is lacking in class and dignity and has shat on so many clubs who have employed him in good faith thinking he is honourable.

 

[Kent_Mackem]

Just as an aside my mate took this lass home (ages ago obviously) in Gillingham and the next morning when the subject of her boyfriend came up she said he was in Sunderland. “Feck’s he doing in Sunderland?” He asks. “Oh he plays for Gillingham.” Alarm bells are now ringing. “What’s his name?” “Steve Bruce” Apparently my mate got his strides back on and was out of there in record time. Didn’t even stay for breakfast!

(This lass wasn’t Steve Bruce’s now wife who I am sure is really nice.)

 

[rey mysterio]

@Turnip from the Tip

Bruce is waaaaaaaay out in front of anyone else among the current crop for managing PL games.

As of this Saturday evening it’s:

Bruce 405 games
Mourinho 307 games
Hodgson 301 games

Say what you like about him – and plenty do – he’s experienced.

He has won the exact square root of nout and he ate all the cake when it was one of the ball boys birthdays

 

[Somtam]

It's be interesting to se how the likes of Bruce and Hughton would do if managing Man City and Liverpool and how Klopp and Guardiola would do if managing Brighton and Newcastle. Give each a three year run - would the clubs swap positions in the league?

 

[Ohnonotagain]

I never said he did. Im just saying short didnt stop spending money under bruce, it was long after.

He pulled the purse strings on Bruce after Mignolet, Bent, Gyan, Cana, Henderson were sold. He was expected to replace them for buttons at the start of the season. Bruce got crucified by the fans at the start of that season for the poor start unjustly. When he was given the money he generally bought well Bent Cana Sessegnon Mignolet Bendtner, Cattermole. Turner he overpaid for. Decent manager but youre welcome to your own opinion.