I think the bookies are right. We are looking very likely to go down. However, I do not advocate sacking Coyle - and people who believe we would get a better manager to replace him may somewhat deluded in my opinion. A team with the resources of BWFC is always going to struggle with the loss of two key players(Holden and Chungy), and the fact that we were unable to keep the services of Sturridge for a few more months on loan. The injury to Alonso after the Blackburn game sums up our luck this season. With key players injured we have had to rely on players who would otherwise be warming the bench. We expect this for a few games - but not half a season! Coyle does not become a bad manager overnight. He has proven himself as someone who can get a team with few resources up into the Premier League - he has also led us to safety in the past, and to a respectable league position the season after. We need long term stability, not a managerial merry-go-round.

The transfer window will be make or break - do we break the bank to strengthen the squad? Can we sign some class players on loan again?

As fans, after 10 years tears of Premiership football, should we accept relegation just because we have a manager who is way out of his depth?

There are 20 games left, managers available out there with proven P'ship abilities. It's a simple task. Set up the team not to concede and take the chances when they arise like we used to do.

Coyle's too far gone now I'm afraid. His experiment didn't work & the fans deserve a manager with some basic knowledge of this premiership lark.

We could give Coyle 20 million and he wouldn't know what to do with it.

I've got a season ticket and I ain't prepared to keep turning up watching us get battered each week. It's demoralising and embarrassing and I don't want to be around when the crowd get nasty.

He has proven himself as someone who can get a team with few resources up into the Premier League
*****
Unfortunately, he's now also proving that he's someone who can't keep one there - something that he would have proved earlier, no doubt, if he'd stayed at Burnley.

They went down anyway ..... but we still have time to change and give ourselves a fighting chance ...

"People need to stop harping on about how Megson had 18 points by this time, it's a different season. 18 points would see as high as 14th in the table. It's all relative."


What exactly does this mean?

Maybe it means ' 12 points this season is a far greater achievement than 18 points were in 2009 '

...or maybe not ....

"Newcastle have brought in a number of top players to replace those who have gone"

And spent?

This is partly my point. Your manager didn't address a threadbare squad, maybe the sale of Cahill could've bought you 4 or 5 players...

This is partly my point. Your manager didn't address a threadbare squad, maybe the sale of Cahill could've bought you 4 or 5 players...
**********
I hardly think the 6m that Arsenal offered would fund 4 or 5 quality players ... but it's more about what a manager can do with the resources he HAS, not what he could do if he could change half his squad. The question is ... could anyone have done (or DO) any better with what's available? The answer IMO - be that Bolton or Blackburn - is almost certainly ...YES.

INTERESTING FACTS
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Birmingham City were relegated last season and lost a total of 15 league games throughout the season..

On Boxing Day, Bolton lost their 14th league game of the season..

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interesting facts is brought to you from someone who is looking at the stats of the premiership and not false hope and excuses.

Good article this, Woody. Some good points well made.

Before I start, I am not one for suggesting managers get sacked without any thought. I also think I see the whole picture, rather than recent form.

When Coyle was appointed, I was as happy as anyone. He brought a new blend of football which was exciting and successful. He brought fans back to the Reebok and generally restored a positive give around the place. He signed our best player, for free. Let's not forget that last season was our best in years and Coyle somewhat masterminded our route to the semi final of the FA Cup.

Unfortunately, injuries have taken their toll. No doubt about that. Everyone would probably admit that we wouldn't be in this position with Lee or Holden. I would also throw not having Sturridge as a big miss too, although I reckon Coyle was being very ambitious by trying to re sign him on loan.

Having said that, Coyle has not covered himself in glory with his team choices, tactics and subs all season.

Chopping and changing at every opportunity hasn't helped the team build any momentum. He made poor decisions with team selections against the big teams. Playing 442 against them was astonishingly bold. We got overrun in midfield and couldn't cope. I would've thought that he learned from those batterings that Chelsea, Man U and Liverpool handed to us.

He has never wanted to play Steinsson although he is one player that displays some passion and desire for the team. His signings of Boyata and Kakuta are both pointless and poor. Boyata doesn't want to play for us, I remember someone telling me that he didn't want to come in the first place. Kakuta doesn't even get on the bench anymore.

Coyle is simply too attacking. Epitomised by the sub yesterday. We had a strong foothold in the game. A point would've done. He took our most effective grafted off the pitch and put a loose cannon on. He is simply too anxious for a win. He threw away 1 point yesterday, but more importantly, threw away singer potential confidence and momentum. This automatically makes our great away win at Blackburn pointless as we didn't build on that - which is something he advocated all last week.

I still think Coyle has been damned unlucky this year. Injuries and suspensions have disrupted the squad, but he has complicated things more though. When you are struggling, you go back to basics. Coyle hasn't done that.

So, in all honesty, I feel for Coyle. I don't think he is a bad manager, but I can understand why people suggest that he should be sacked. Do I think he should be sacked? Yes, purely because a new manager will review everything and go back to basics for the rest of the season, rather than over complicating things. I won't be dismissing the good times we had with Coyle 18 months ago though.

TRR ..I think that's a very fair and well balanced set of observations you've made there.

Credit where credit's due

Got to agree with the OP on this one.

Given the current level of investment in Premiership football, a team such as Bolton always needs to be moving forward just to tread water. The injuries to two of our star players (Chungy and Holden), the loss of our two top goalscorers from last season (Elmander, and not being able to re-loan Sturridge) and the rapid decline of two of our most loyal servants (Jussi and Davies) has meant that this has been impossible. To exacerbate this, we are in a financial straitjacket that has prevented us from pro-actively addressing these issues with anything other than bargain basement transfer dealings.

This is just my opinion, but I think that to blame everything on Coyle seems a little bit unfair?

I think your Half wrong with Coyles Team selection Rowbot as alot of our injuries have been in specific areas such as the fullbacks and up front. He has had little scope to change the players not performing or not up too the job and in other cases we have not had fit players available. Apparently Steinsson has been having personal issues for around a month prior to the Fulham game and was not able to train properly. Issues like this would not normally be an issue but our injuries have also hampered the situation.

Earlier on in the season people on here were calling for SKD to be dropped as he was not playing well enough to warrant a start but we had no other options as Blake is not good enough and N'Gog was injured.

Also with regards to the substitution yesterday I do believe a change was necessary as like a lot of people on here have said our defence has been woeful all season and trying to go another 30+ mins without conceding is asking a lot of them. Also I think that the game was at a stage where either side had the ability to win the game but It would take a a change for that to happen and a risk needed to be taken to hopefully swing the game in our favour but it did not pay off. However leaving things as they were would have let Newcastle change to try and shift the balance of the game and could have lead to the same result.

"However leaving things as they were would have let Newcastle change to try and shift the balance of the game and could have lead to the same result."



Oh my god.......


I really have read it all now....

comment by McGinlay's Right Hook (U10540)

I don't agree with you and I'll break it down into 3 points to explain why.

1. The current level of investment only applies to the top 6 with their greater revenue streams/owner investment and also the 3 promoted clubs with their new found broadcasting money. The other 11 clubs are in the same boat as us.

2. We have always been in a financial straitjacket and always been a trading club.In other words we have always needed to sell to buy. Coyle now has the most professional players available to him by some margin than we have ever had. He has chosen to 'water the squad down', no-one else.

3. Injuries happen to any manager. The art of management is to deal and prepare for every eventuality and deal with it. I've been a manager for years and if I gave my senior managers my problems and excuses for my poor performance, the retort was "I want solutions not problems!"
I'm now a director of my own company and I realise how true those words were.

Hopeful

We can't tell the future, bit the way the game was going, we were more likely to score. The posession stats would probably back that up. Newcastle had 1 shot in the 2nd half before Muamba went off.

I reckon people could'be handled a 1-0 loss. If Newcastle had scored a late goal against the run of play, our fans would say we were unlucky.

Instead, Coyle handed the game on a plate. Even if Muamba took a knock, I don't understand why he didn't bring Pratley on. He can at least run around, put some tackles in and break forward. We needed to carry on doing what we were doing. It was working.

OC doesn't shoulder all of the blame; but he's been unable to do anything with the resources he's had to work with. He only seems able to do well when he's got a few star players to rely on. But that's not enough - to do well at a club like Bolton, you have to be able to get 100% out of everybody ..and lift / inspire those players sufficiently when times are rough. He's been unable to do this for the vast majority of games ...and there's no evidence that he's gonna be able to change that inside the timescale needed. IMO someone out there would be able to do better with the players we already have. Relegation is a high price to pay for sitting on the fence and hoping managerial change is not necessary.

Bringing in new players (likely end of Jan, and then a few weeks to bed in ) might be too late anyway. Change needs to occur much sooner than that - the players we already have are capable of a better showing than bottom 3 ... but only if they had someone able to lift / motivate and organise them proficiently.

Yes, he's been unlucky ..but he's still made a pig's ear out of the hand he has been dealt, TBH. That can't continue, or it's Bolton who will pay the ultimate price, not Owen Coyle.

Wolves have just equalised - thought i'd spread some more xmas cheer amongst the doom-mongers!!!

"Coyle now has the most professional players available to him by some margin than we have ever had."

=============================

Megson spent a fortune compared to Coyle.

Reebok Bricks (Owen. You've got 0 games left to convince me you know what you're doing) (U6418)

Accept your viewpoint, although I would suggest that it is not only the top-six who benefit from having larger resources available to them. When you see mid-table sides such as Stoke City spending £10 million on Crouch and £6 million on Palacios; Aston Villa spending £18 million on Bent and £10 million on N'Zogbia; QPR paying Joey Barton 80k a week, you can see that a clear asymmetry persists well beyond the top-six.

Say what you will about injuries, but it would be very hard for anybody to legislate for losing probably two (of our three) best players for most of the season.

I work as a lecturer and business consultant, and have seen many many times the dangers of short-term decision-making by businesses which tend to deal with effects rather than addressing causality. I genuinely think that this is what we would be doing in getting rid of Coyle. But hey, just my opinion and I wouldn't want to get into a slanging match with a fellow Wanderer!

"Wolves have just equalised - thought i'd spread some more xmas cheer amongst the doom-mongers!!!"

Doom Mongers??? Realists pal... And don't get personal again... People bite. Back..

Guess the Wolves goal is Coyles fault. He bought Fletcher and sold him to Wolves !

Certainly Coyles fault that Burnley were relegated..

Wolves fight back ...Blackburn take a point at Anfield ... Fulham take a point from Stamford Bridge it's not doom-mongering, though it is doomful, in so much that it shows our rivals still have the stomach for a fight, whilst we continue to be the kickstart for all the failing (but grateful) teams who cross our path .....

Correct.....

Still...... Be Reet...

comment by McGinlay's Right Hook (U10540)

No need to fall out over a difference in opinion.

Stoke were promoted 3 1/2 years ago and have been very frugal in their spending and have created the financial wherewithall to make purchases like you mention due to becoming established in the Prem and excellent management by Tony Pulis.

Villa have generated more than enough to spend by selling James Milner, Stuart Downing & Ashley Young.

I accept what you say about short term decision making, but that's the nature of Premiership football. Always a risk in changing managers but far better managers from better positions we now find ourselves in, have made way and it's paid dividends.