Nigel Khan is a rare blogger these days but in this one off piece for ClaretandHugh he explains where he stands on the Pellegrini appointment, the ‘next level’ discussion, what he believes the fans need to do now and more.
The appointment of Manuel Pellegrini as manager of West Ham can only be welcomed by the fans as , he is by far and away the best manager that the owners have ever appointed in their 25 years in football.
Not only that he is the most decorated manager we have ever employed winning titles in three different countries as well as cups.
Perhaps though we should look to his performance with two of the lesser clubs he managed in Spain to gain real insight as to what may be achievable at West Ham.
Villarreal a small provincial team that when he arrived had only ever been a top flight club for five years. He took them to their highest ever finish and to the quarter finals of the Champions League.
He then spent one season at Real Madrid, achieved Real’s record points of 96 in a season but still failed to win the title as Barcelona managed three points more.
After being fired as a result (!), he arrived at Malaga, another of the smaller clubs in Spanish top flight,
He stabilised upon arrival and in his first full season took them into the Champions leaguefor the only time in their history. He left them in 2013 to join Manchester City, and this season Malaga were relegated out of top flight.
So his CV it is without doubt the best we’ve seen for a manager we have hired, and hopefully he can continue his successful career with us.
The Premier League is more competitive than the Spanish league, and though he has the very highest of Premier League experience, it was far easier to walk into Man City with the finances and the existing squad they had and build on that.
West Ham he has an ageing team that possibly needs a complete overhaul but does not have the money in one transfer window to do so. Without even taking time to analyse our squad we could all say we need new goalkeeper, central defender, central midfielder.
That’s just for starters; other departments need strengthening and the squad basically is very thin with a nucleus of 1st teamers but as injuries start to bite we struggle. That will take time to get right, and hopefully he will be afforded the time free from board and fan pressure.
The board have undermined every manager they have had at West Ham at some point, generally when times are not good, but that only heaps more pressure on them when the really need support from their bosses.
The fans were sold a dream and demanding its delivery need to rein in short term expectation and allow Pellegrini at least one full season stress-free of demands for his head if we go 4 or 5 games without winning.
Us fans have played our part in the demanding stress placed on the past two West Ham managers and we perhaps need to stop using the ‘next level’ as that in my opinion is a false reality at the moment.
What we need is stability and a manager who is given time to evolve the team into his image. Evolution of the playing staff not revolution should be the byline to next season.
Wholesale change can sometimes work against you as the players will all be unfamiliar with each other yet I have faith in Pellegrini that if given the constant funds needed and the time to build he will be adding more successes to his impressive CV and West Ham at last will benefit.
At Malaga he had a billionaire sheikh bankrolling things
And left because of financial problems and FFP –
Well thought out and fair suggestions from Nigel well done mate
Good article. Allardyce, Bilic and Moyes all had a nightmare with injuries. Where would we have finished if we had had Antonio and Carroll all season I wonder? Pellegrini will atttract a higher calibre of player than a bottom-half club with toxic atmosphere would have. Let’s hope his fitness team can cure our perennial problem.
I enjoyed that piece. Good thoughtful stuff that is difficult to disagree with. The emphasis does have to be on gradual change. I am not sure how much the manager influences players’ decisions on whether to join a club. That’s not an implied dig- I just have no idea! Might be worth emphasising that at BOTH Villarreal & Malaga Pellegrini took over at a time when there was a cash injection- at Villarreal one of the richest men in Spain stepped in in the late 1990s. Again not a complaint. Quite the opposite. He should be getting a
substantial amount made available & at both those clubs I think he showed he could deal with redesigning & building a club. So all is well. Nigel makes the point about board interference- the need for the board to listen to their manager & their willingness to make the big internal changes remains the possible cloud on the horizon in my opinion. Over to you board members- prove us wrong to have doubted you!!
Absolutely right. We need as a fan base to keep our feet on the ground. Their are a Lot of people puffing their chests out over the pellegrini appointment. Expectations have risen yet again. Same people will be making judgements good or bad after only the first few games. New players will be labelled as brilliant or useless after only their first few games. Once again we are starting from scratch with a new manager with a new philosophy and new players. We should give the man time to rebuild. Previous managers haven’t been given time because fans and ultimately owners have lost patience. I think pellegrini WILL be given time, because of his cv if nothing else. The thinking will be, give him time because if he can’t do it, probably nobody can.
Time given to pellegrini needs to be extended to any new players he signs too. new players need to be given a bit of leeway. We have had a few players who fans have given a hard time to or lost patience with early on and labelled them as useless the last few seasons. They inevitably get moved on and then also inevitably immediately start banging goals in and performing for some other team on a regular basis. We put far too much pressure on new players to be an instant success and it’s not that easy. Arnoutavic last season is a prime example of that. If he hadn’t been the record signing he might have been dropped.
Enjoyed that Nigel, thanks 🙂 as others say hard to disagree with any of it which is not easy when adressing us fans 😉 the whole team does need a refresh to play the way his teams play, apparently he is known for making the players train multiple times a day during pre-season to get them fit enough to play his way so there is every chance of more injuries initially but will be a refreshing change to see players supremely fit turning out for us. I do hope like you he is given the time some of the current squad don’t appear capable of playing posession based football but Lanzini, Mario, Hernandez, Arnie and Fernandes have the mobility too, its whether Pellegrini can coach players like Kouyate, Obiang, Noble, Cresswell, Reid, Carroll etc to adapt their games ?
Excellent piece. The problem with this club, if we ignore the obvious issue of the owners and stadium, is unrealistic expectation. That, in part, is due to the hyperbole often put out by club and associated blogs, but fans are much more short termist these days too. I grew up hoping for the odd cup run and beating the odd big boy here and there. Most of my fondest memories are from days in the old 2nd division. The premier league, Sky and latest incarnation of Fifa18 have created much more glory hunting plastics who now expect a constant flow of trophies and European football.