It’s me that’s the troll 
For somebody so offended by trolls you do sure spout a lot of factious, passive aggressive nonsense.
He made his own luck by assembling that team to be fair. And repeated the trick by getting promoted twice.
Aaand I’m out…
Stand by for March 2020 edition when John Coleman is shamefully sacked by Accy Stanley and suggested as potential Walsall manager…“they’ve always been a yo/yo club haven’t they” “Coleman’s been managing 20 + years and sacked by Southport…and Rochdale”
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Actually he’s not a bad shout looking at what he’s actually achieved! Just like I look at what Keith Hills achieved and my response is meh. Comparing Rochdale with Accy Stan. I know who has the easier job there, it’s not Keith Hill.
You telling me that signing Andy Rammell a 31 year old striker who had scored a fantastic 13 goals in 69 games for Southend (2 goals in his last season with them from 33 appearances.) was a stroke of genius rather than just a matter of luck. Because he couldn’t do it again.
Depends how you set your team up doesn’t it? Some players suit certain systems. Plenty of players have struggled at one club and done well at another.
got Lucky ??? I’m out of here ffs…
“Got lucky” could apply to a one-off promotion. Graydon did it twice.And in his first season in the 2nd tier, he took us to down the last game. Even when he was sacked we weren’t nailed on for relegation. His sacking came as a surprise to fans, not just to the national media.I think it’s probably true that he was reaching the end of the time when his strict disciplinary approach could work, because player power was on the increase, and players were becoming less likely to tolerate such a climate , but it was a hell of a long time to be lucky.
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To my mind that was his biggest achievement. The squad that season had no right to be anywhere near safety.
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It might have been on on here that someone suggested it was the derbies that did for us that season. We were pretty successful in them ,and took points. But the argument was that those games just took too much out of us for the other matches.So he might have done even better,if there’s anything in that.
I’m not denying that I had some of the best times in my life as a saddler when he was manager . It’s just that the team he assembled IMO just happened to gel together and the sum of the parts became much greater than the individual parts.
If he was a truly great manager and it was all down to him then he could have done the same elsewhere, especially when he went to manage his dream team Bristol Rovers and he clearly couldn’t.
That’s a managers job though? To assemble players and jel them correctly. Which he did twice for us. Maybe you can fluke it once, but not twice.
I couldn’t give a toss what happened at Bristol Rovers. Maybe he didn’t get his favoured targets. Maybe he had characters he couldn’t get through to. I don’t know or care. It wasn’t luck that he recruited properly here, jelled the team, formed a cohesive unit and got this club promoted. Twice.
When you’ve only achieved something 4 times in your entire history, the bloke who managed it twice in two attempts probably wasn’t fluking it.
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[quote=“saddla, post:131, topic:2395”]
It’s just that the team he assembled IMO just happened to gel together and the sum of the parts became much greater than the individual parts.
Isn’t that a working definition of a successful manager? You could say the same about most successful managers at our level,and higher in some cases.Replicating such over-achievement at different clubs is rare.If he’d just done it for one season, you might have a point. But he assembled two promotion teams,and didn’t do too bad in the middle season.
Tell me about it. A simple discussion ends up just going around in circles in almost every single topic🤦♂️
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I think that’s a good point. Some managers with their values and ability just suit certain clubs.
Now if Nombre had allowed me to expand on my point I’d have said Keith Hill went to Barnsley in the championship and barely lasted a year so what’s certain is his methods don’t work at championship level.
John Coleman ironically went to Rochdale and finished 12th with them…in league two. He then went to Southport and didn’t last long there. Goes back to Accy and it’s like he’s never left as they instantly become good again (think they nearly went down to non league while he was away).
Maybe a little different was Sir Ray was already mid 50s when he left Walsall so maybe a combination of this is as good as it gets and him not having the motivation when he pitched up at Bristol Rovers.
Sir Ray was far from lucky and it wasn’t just that squad he built in 98 that clicked. He played the loan market incredibly well. Continuously improving the team at any sign of a blip in form.
The man also took average players and turned them into formidable competitors.
The championship was a step to far with the budget he had.
Ray made every fan proud to support Walsall… LEGEND
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100% agree with all of that
Haven’t we been tonked 4-0 a couple of times by Rochdale in recent seasons? Keith Hill did a good job at the Dale: I remember them as bottom Division 4 for years. He did well to make them into a mid-table “Division 3” side - I’d kill for that at the moment!
Someone will have the stats to prove/disprove this theory but I’ve always felt the Dale have been one of the teams we usually struggle against!