FTAO Pat and Don...

Do you regret forcing Mark Robins out now?

Just that.

 

Almost bankrupt the club with the loan signings

and produced some of the most boring, turgid depressing football ever witnessed at Oakwell. No Cup run, no smiles, no memories. FACT.

 

Re: Almost bankrupt the club with the loan signings

You keep trotting that line out and it has no basis in fact WHATSOEVER. That fact is Cryne backed him then changed his mind.

You didn't enjoy us demolishing Leeds then? Or the away win at Ipswich? Or the two great games at home against Boro and Newcastle? Just to name a few Perhaps where he went wrong was not continually bairning about losing Adam Hammill.

And if cup runs are still your once in a hundred year barometer, how can you back Hill? Gone out at the first hurdle in three out of four attenpts hasn't he? FACT

 

Signing players and selling them at a profit

was the brief given to Hill and he's delivered so far, the strategy being that the club needs to stand on its own two feet. What Robins did was profligate and counter productive, not to mention the stale football that he turned out week after week. Hill's footballing ethos is a million miles away from Robins and I know which I prefer to watch.

I repeat, we are not in the bottom 3 yet and the season isnt even half over. Put aside your personal crusade for a moment and get behind the team.

 

I agree that things are pretty bad under Hill but were they really any better under Robins? I do not look back at the Robins era with much fondness.

 

Fantastic match v Middlesborough very early in his tenure.

Relegation party at Bramall Lane

My two highlights of the Mark Robins era.

 

Re: Signing players and selling them at a profit

I am behind the team where it matters at Oakwell. You are a fine one to talk about personal crusades.

Robins wanted to move the club to the next level. Hill's footballing ethos is one that produces defeats so you are welcome to continue watching it to L1 and beyond. And if you call tippy tappy crap good football then god help the game. I won't deny that there has been good football interspersed between awful garbage but the fact he has not dealt with our weak central defensive issues and that we insist on square balls at all costs and that we have 8 wins this year and 29 points from the last 40 games leads me to one conclusion - he is out of his depth and has no idea of how to arrest this awful form.

 

56 points

 

Re: Signing players and selling them at a profit

Exactly. Personal crusades have always been SM's speciality. Mike Sheron was the first one I recall but to be fair he's always been willing to move on to a new target.

 

Like Wiseman

Im generally right though, Im sure you'd agree.

 

I doubt they regret making the club run in the black without Patrick having to sign off cheques for players like back in the Bobins days.

 

Daft question. Mark Robins could not do the job under the new financial restriction, in fact he was not even prepared to try. We were all gutted to see Hammill go, but that was just one player, Hill lost 3 in one go and this January is facing losing his current two best players.

I was sad to see Robins go at the time, but life moves on and we were certainly not progressing under him. There has been progress under Hill, in terms of the club operating as a solvent, debt free business. Obviously we are struggling to adapt to that, but who else is going to take this on? And look where Robins is now, at a club with far less spending power than us and enormous debts. We nicked their best player and they are tapping us up for loans.

I think you will find it is perhaps Robins with the regrets not Cryne or Rowing.

 

Absolute tripe, he was not given chance. He was told about the chnaging financial picture after he had identified targets (i.e. C Davies) that he thought would take us to the next level, based on what he thought the support woudl look like. The news that this was not to be the case was dropped on him and he wanted time to review his targets for the season but his position was made untenable.

If they don't have regrets they should have.

 

Re: Almost bankrupt the club with the loan signings

Predictive text.

 

Tripe? We sort of both just said the same thing, more or less. Robins was not prepared to work under the new economic realities. This was on the cards, if the fans knew that I'm sure MR did. And if he's been dreaming up shopping lists more Arismendi style wastes of space and has been slapped down then surely that is in the best interests of all concerned? If anything, it sounds like he handled himself a bit badly and effectively bottled it. He was oddly conspicuous by his silence on the subject and it's no coincidence that he didn't work for a year. Then Davies does come to the club anyway?

He demonstrated to the board he was not up to it, so why would they regret that? He did them a favour if anything.

 

He never got the chance to work under the new conditions, that is the point...

To say he was not prepared to do so is strecthing the truth.

He demonstrated nothing of the sort to the board. And if they woudl rather we have dwindling crowds and an awful record they have got it.

 

Davey, Robins, Hill all have produced good entertaining football but have also produced some reight proper ***** (turgid even) none of them can escape, there maybe a few plusses and minuses accredited to any of the three yet we still stand where we have stood since we returned to this league. Lets hope we can say the same, whoever is in charge, come May.

 

By demonstrated, I meant that the opportunity was there and he declined it, none too gracefully by all accounts. Practically stating, I am not the right man for the job. I don't think his decision was manipulated and the fact it triggered a clause in his contract made it appear much more of a mess than it need have been.

On the subject of regret, I think the board will feel that that event could have been handled a lot better, particularly from a public perspective. But to regret losing a member of staff who can not come to terms with the new economic realities and be prepared to pull in the same direction as the rest of the club? No. From their point of view they will feel well rid and relieved it happened sooner rather than later.

 

My point is that he was not given the chance to re-assess his targets for the summer given the sudden change in direction.

 

Just clear up for me....

.... how do you know that this is what happened?