General Premier League Thread 2023-24 Mod Note in op 27/6/23 And 21/05/24

Osmosis Jones

Chelsea were almost starting to put something together towards the end, finished the season strong.

I was starting to think Poch would get another season.

Necro

Chelsea are such a weird weird club nowadays.

https://twitter.com/JacobsBen/status/1792979568409624860?t=f4YykFK-owaM4JdocMPO0Q&s=19

Looking at McKenna to replace Poch now

ShamoBuc

Chelsea seem to love doing things in a manner most others wouldn't.

A strange habit.

Necro

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122166853#Comment_122166853

I mean, they were just starting to look like a team that might cause problems next season and they decide to remove the coach.... Cue another season of adjustment. Absolutely bonkers.

retalivity

Surely its De Zerbi. Mckenna would be mad to take it

ShamoBuc

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122166860#Comment_122166860

They were up there in the form table at the end of the season. They looked to be clicking - although take Palmer out and it would look very different.

That 'gimme the ball' dust up for the penalty is exactly the kind of thing you associate with a club that has a few problems - and they have quite a few in fairness.

Necro

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122166864#Comment_122166864

Chelsea do like giving money to Brighton so maybe that rumour is true🤣

Sandor Clegane

I have to assume he wanted out himself because if that was a board decision then it's complete madness, starting to click, playing well and finally looking like a team only for this to happen…unless he wanted out himself then this is a new low.

jacool

Potter made a fortune out of Chelsea. Surely someone else, who might want to retire early, could go the same route.

Like many here, I felt Chelsea had turned a corner, but now I think they just turned another one, to go 180 degrees.

Patrick Mahomes

What kind of influence does Fergie have now at Utd that Jim Ratcliffe is in charge of the football side. That dinner Fergie had with Poch a few years back might come back into play if ten Hag gets sacked after the FA Cup Final.

Regards,

P.

jacool

This must be wrong, because I read somewhere that Arsenal bottled it, except they weren't called Arsenal, but rather Woolwich.

Kiith

Chelsea are such a **** disaster. Poch had actually gotten them playing some good football, and the form chart puts them well in the top 4 from the last few months, with a total mess of a squad (expensive mess, but still a mess). Boehly really is a clown.

SlickRic

Is it too obvious to say De Zerbi is headed there?

~Rebel~

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122167065#Comment_122167065

Would seem to suit both parties - and who better to get the most out of Caicedo. Would imagine he'd get similar from an Enzo/Caicedo midfield as he did out of a Mac Allister and Caicedo one. Have a lot of the types of players he likes too, and probably young enough that they won't have too big an ego about being micro managed positionally.

theoneeyedman

I dislike Chelsea personally, always have, and I would personally like to see them go to the wall (just a personal opinion, doctors differ etc), but there are some hugely dodgy dealings going on around there - it's saying something that the Roman era looks a more honest and legit regime than what's going on now. Huge amounts of money swilling in and around that club, agents, money transferring from GB to places like Eastern Europe and South America through agents..... very hard not to think there is not a huge swindle in progress there.

From a football POV, Poch is a loss to them, and depending on his contract situation he will be a good appointment for someone, the last 6 months will have helped his reputation to anyone who was watching.

Patrick Mahomes

There is no way Tony Bloom let Di Zerbi out of a contract to go to another Premier League team for free.

Regards,

P.

~Rebel~

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122167167#Comment_122167167

We know he's leaving - but do we know that the contract was terminated entirely? Or is it possible it's more a case of 'gardening leave', where the next club will have to pay some nominal fee?

With everything that's come out since, it sounds like things were untenable at Brighton anyway with a fundamental disagreement on transfer strategy - he was demanding they spend on more established mid-20s players to push on, while Bloom/Brighton refused to leave the model of kids and aulder lads.

machiavellianme

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122163848#Comment_122163848

Sky brought it up on Sunday. Pointlessly asking Micah Richards. He exclaimed that the club are just looking to move forward.

Patrick Mahomes

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122167178#Comment_122167178

There might a clause in some contract where he is free to go to a club on the continent but there is a £ price if he joins another premier League team. Also at Chelsea he would have no say in who the club signs Poch pretty said that he would have to work with the players the club signed and he had no say in which players they signed.

Regards,

P.

El Gato De Negocios

Third times the charm.

chicorytip

Pochettino is the nearly man of elite management.

CSF

Guardiola wins manager of the season over Emery. I give up tbh. Just pack the trophy up if it has to go the league winner. They already get a prize for winning the league anyway.

TitianGerm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122167604#Comment_122167604

Emery did a great job and I think he probably should have gotten the award but Villa did only get 7 more points this season and only had 3 wins in their last 10 games. It all depends on when the voting took place really, those dropped points in the run in would have affected his chances of winning I think. Plus City are the first team to win the PL 4 times in a row so there's always that, even if they are cheaters.

CSF

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122167683#Comment_122167683

What do the other 3 seasons have to do with this season? This is serious justification gymnastics. Like this Man City season is probably just inside their top 5 seasons under Pep.

Weaker than numerous Liverpool teams that won no leagues. If you’re still giving that to him just because Villa dropped some points in the last few games (I mean the win at the Emirates was literally GW33) then just go all out and treat the award as part of the trophies and medals given out to the winning team.

If taking a team you inherited in November of the previous season in 17th place to the Champions League (and no, it wasn’t a freak scenario where it was a consistently successful team that were on a brief down spell) isn’t enough, then what is going to be?

~Rebel~

If the three previous wins count for anything, it should count against Pep winning it. Coming into the season as the absolute established dominant force in the league couldn't have been spelled out any clearer than by their 3 previous wins on the bounce, so it's not exactly a surprise for them to just do it again. Just as it won't be a surprise for them to do it again next year. If you're the odds on favourite to do a thing, and then do that thing, it's a bit harder to call it the most exceptional performance of the season.

Emery fully deserved it, head and shoulders the most impressive season from a manager, after turning them around in incredible fashion last year first. Taking over and stabilising a team only outside relegation on goal difference when he came in halfway through last season was a great start - then powering them on to best the likes of Spurs, Chelsea, Man Utd etc to take 4th is phenomenal. I'd have Emery first, Arteta second, and Pep third I suppose.

A bunch of decent performances lower down too, with Iraola and Glasner's settling-in periods putting them in a great position for next year. O'Neil's done well too, as has Dyche under the circumstances.

CSF

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122167784#Comment_122167784

I'm going to go one step further with the cynicism too, and say that if Big Ange had gotten Spurs top 4 instead, he may just have won it.

jacool

Someone in Sky Sports made a classic boo boo this morning. They showed the list of "forwards" for the England Euro squad, and underneath the picture of Jude Bellingham, it said Marcus Rashford!! Firing offence in my book !!!!!

jacool

Sky interviewed McKenna last night at some event. He was very diplomatic, to be fair.

Interesting that only 3 managers left during the season, and now 4 have left after the end.

Those colours don't match up - don't blame me!! Oddschecker.com for complaints :)

CSF

I’d be stunned if Chelsea went after another Brighton manager, so soon after Potter.

Fitz*

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122168323#Comment_122168323

They nabbed a lot of the recruitment team from Brighton aswell, but off the top of my head I'm not sure if they were involved in the recruitment of RDZ or whether that was after their time at Brighton.

Speaking of ex-Brighton recruitment people, it seems that Dan Ashcroft might be in some trouble with his Newcastle→Man Utd move as he was liaising with Omar Berrada about moving to Man Utd while he was employed by Newcastle (and Berrada was on gardening leave from Man City at the time). This might force Man Utd in having to pay Newcastle a larger fee now.

kowloonkev

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122168276#Comment_122168276

Wtf are they using a pie chart for as if next manager odds are based on statistics.

Deeper Blue

Surely it'd be very hard for McKenna to turn down the Chelsea job if offered

Necro

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122166971#Comment_122166971

Ah that's just a silly, infantile name some spurs fans have for Arsenal. Refers to Arsenal's original roots not in North London essentially.

jacool

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122168819#Comment_122168819

I'll be straight onto them. I have a ticket open with them to fix the colours already :)

loyatemu

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122168454#Comment_122168454

what are they going to do, sack him for gross misconduct? He wants to leave!

YTM

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122168938#Comment_122168938

His argument now is they actually sacked him rather than he resigned.

And Telegraph Sport can reveal that Ashworth believes his departure from Newcastle gives him grounds to argue the gardening leave is null and void as things were not handled correctly before his departure.

In effect, his argument ahead of arbitration is that he was not asked to formally write down his resignation by chief executive Darren Eales and should not have been placed on gardening leave until he did so. He will therefore argue he was removed from his position rather than asking to step down

Mitch Connor

Original reports are that he said he had been approached by United and would like to go; so whether he wrote out a resignation letter or not I reckon Newcaslte could argue easily that they followed a common process.

Regardless, its a effing mess - and I think INEOS handled it poorly, never mind the email mistake. Basically accusing Newcaslte of being childish was a dumbass move from Jim.

Talisman

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122168276#Comment_122168276

The contracts of two of the four expired. Klopp announced he was leaving Liverpool 5 months ago, it was hardly a surprise. West Ham have been active seeking a replacement for Moyes for a few months, his impending departure from the club was no secret it just wasn't spoken about very much.

De Zerbi leaving Brighton wasn't a total surprise. He was butting heads regarding the recruitment of players and had been linked with several high profile jobs including that at Liverpool. The real surprise was the timing of the announcement that he would be leaving, perhaps the club wanted to give the fans the opportunity to say goodbye to him.

Pochettino leaving Chelsea has been the only real surprise, he had got the team together in the last few months which bode well for next season.

eagle eye

I'm with everybody on the undeserved firing of Pochettino even if though I don't rate him. He did a good job there given the situation when he arrived.

A manager that nobody seems to be talking about is Michel at Girona.

What he's done there is incredible and he's got all three teams he's managed promoted to La Liga so it's not just him being lucky.

I'd imagine somebody is going to be looking to hire him. That's if he's happy to leave. His team are in the Champions league next year, if he got them out of their group his profile will grow massively.

Flaneur OBrien

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122168837#Comment_122168837

Absolutely. Just make sure there's a decent amount set out in the contract for early termination. Every manager should jump at the chance.

Deeper Blue

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122171059#Comment_122171059

It'd be so typical for him to go and then get sacked after a year like Potter did. Meanwhile Ipswich go and hire Chris Wilder and finish bottom, never to be seen again.

Fitz*

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122170010#Comment_122170010

A Spanish manager who previously played as a midfielder and employes a playing out from the back, with inverted full backs type philosophy as a manager.

A manager who's current club are currently under investigation for financial irregularities & dodgy dealings with their big striker.

A manager currently employed by the CFG.

Sounds like he might be being groomed for a different job in the PL.

As someone who claims to be a Athletic Bilboa fan, I'm sure you're well aware of the controversy surrounding Michel & Girona this season and next, and their ownership and how that has helped to influence their rise through the ranks.

Girona - "Another fairytale story".

Another Lance Armstrong in reality

y0ssar1an22

Mc Kenna fairly non committal with his comments.

Asked about interest in him, with former club Manchester United also linked, McKenna told Sky Sports: "When you do well as a manager, or as a player, there’s always going to be speculation.

“I know what we have achieved is not an ordinary thing, so there’s always going to be speculation.

“But that’s not where my focus is tonight, it’s about what we’ve achieved last season, what we’ve achieved over the last couple of seasons, not just myself but everyone at the football club.

“It’s been a wonderful couple of years and tonight’s about celebrating that. I know everyone’s looking forward to next season and I know the club’s going to be in a really, really good place going into that season.”

eagle eye

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122171132#Comment_122171132

I'm aware of City's stake in the club but the squad is not one you'd expect to be in the top four in La Liga.

I'm unaware of controversy surrounding any of their players.

Why would who employs Michel have any bearing on his achievements with a very average squad?

Michel's contract is up and he hasn't signed a new one yet.

Tbh I've dismissed most of the talk surrounding them as crap from haters of the City group. What they've achieved on the field is incredible.

Talisman

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122171132#Comment_122171132

The connections will be a nightmare for UEFA to untangle before next season's Champions League.

y0ssar1an22

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122171183#Comment_122171183

Troyes getting that young Brazilian lad is mad.

3rd division French team they are!

Suvarnabhumi

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122170010#Comment_122170010

They were talking about him on the radio the other night.

TitianGerm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122171236#Comment_122171236

No it's ok. City Football group own less then the cut off point for the common owner test. Apparently Peps brother is a decent size shareholder in the club though. Funny coincidence that if you ask me.

Deeper Blue

BBC reporting that McKenna and his assistant "feel the time is right to move" and he's likely to reject any new deal offered by Ipswich. He did seem fairly non committal in that clip from the awards ceremony last night