Season 2007-08 images

[TJB-fox]

6 hours ago, davieG said:

 

Unpopular opinion: 

A great guy / man manager and a decent championship manager who was let down HUGELY by the board and upper echelons of the club.

From what I’ve heard from a player whilst he was manager, Olly was brilliant- honest, genuine, hardworking and really gave a shit about the club and the players, just probably didn’t quite realise how much of a mess he was walking into. Right place wrong time perhaps.

Thank god he went and we got Pearson in though. I don’t think many other managers in England could’ve done a better job at clearing out the muck and rejuvenating the club. 

[Leicesterpool]

1 hour ago, TJB-fox said:

Unpopular opinion: 

A great guy / man manager and a decent championship manager who was let down HUGELY by the board and upper echelons of the club.

From what I’ve heard from a player whilst he was manager, Olly was brilliant- honest, genuine, hardworking and really gave a shit about the club and the players, just probably didn’t quite realise how much of a mess he was walking into. Right place wrong time perhaps.

Thank god he went and we got Pearson in though. I don’t think many other managers in England could’ve done a better job at clearing out the muck and rejuvenating the club. 

Olly does well when he's not at a big club under less pressure like when we as at Blackpool and Palace. Up at Grimsby now isn't he.

[TJB-fox]

9 hours ago, Leicesterpool said:

Olly does well when he's not at a big club under less pressure like when we as at Blackpool and Palace. Up at Grimsby now isn't he.

Honestly I’m not so sure mate. His time with us was a complete anomaly in my opinion just because of how rotten our club was at the time. 

Didn't do brilliantly at QPR recently but again was a tricky gig having to sell best players and bring through youth. I’m gobsmacked he’s managing at league 2 level, but it does seem that he loves to buy into a project and maybe Grimsby was that next project. 

[Foxin_Mad]

10 hours ago, TJB-fox said:

Unpopular opinion: 

A great guy / man manager and a decent championship manager who was let down HUGELY by the board and upper echelons of the club.

From what I’ve heard from a player whilst he was manager, Olly was brilliant- honest, genuine, hardworking and really gave a shit about the club and the players, just probably didn’t quite realise how much of a mess he was walking into. Right place wrong time perhaps.

Thank god he went and we got Pearson in though. I don’t think many other managers in England could’ve done a better job at clearing out the muck and rejuvenating the club. 

I agree. The club had been staying up by the skin of its teeth for a number of years. On a downward spiral. 

 

We then had that strange season where we had Allen, Megson and Holloway. We signed some strange players for quite high wages. I couldn't really blame Holloway for that season. Defensively the team were ok, we were just absolutely crap up front apart from odd games, I think we scored 42 that year we beat norwich 4-0, WBA 4-1, watford 4-1. So only 34 goals over 43 other games. As usual I dont think the manager merry go round helped.

[TJB-fox]

9 minutes ago, Foxin_Mad said:

I agree. The club had been staying up by the skin of its teeth for a number of years. On a downward spiral. 

 

We then had that strange season where we had Allen, Megson and Holloway. We signed some strange players for quite high wages. I couldn't really blame Holloway for that season. Defensively the team were ok, we were just absolutely crap up front apart from odd games, I think we scored 42 that year we beat norwich 4-0, WBA 4-1, watford 4-1. So only 34 goals over 43 other games. As usual I dont think the manager merry go round helped.

Martin Allen was only here for a short period of time but was far more culpable than any manager we had that year off the pitch. How that man got a job at Leicester is beyond me and why he was allowed so much control by Mandaric is even more baffling. Honestly it’s no surprise to see the demise of some good football league clubs when they allow muppets to run them. 

[Raw Dykes]

17 minutes ago, Foxin_Mad said:

I agree. The club had been staying up by the skin of its teeth for a number of years. On a downward spiral. 

 

We then had that strange season where we had Allen, Megson and Holloway. We signed some strange players for quite high wages. I couldn't really blame Holloway for that season. Defensively the team were ok, we were just absolutely crap up front apart from odd games, I think we scored 42 that year we beat norwich 4-0, WBA 4-1, watford 4-1. So only 34 goals over 43 other games. As usual I dont think the manager merry go round helped.

Even worse than that. 30 goals in the other 43 games. That's about 2 in 3, or a goal every 1.5 games/135 mins. Pretty shite.

 

Defence was very good. 2nd best in the league, I think. Goes to show how bad the attack was.

Edited 3 August 2020 by Raw Dykes

[1972 Fox]

13 hours ago, Des. said:

The misery I felt after that final home game against Sheff Wed

The season tickets raining onto the pitch towards the end of that game. 

[RoboFox]

I've largely put that season to the back of my mind, so I've had a quick read through the Wikipedia page.

 

We had some pretty turd players back then coming through the revolving door at the Walkers... Who on earth is Jonny Hayes?! And how did Elvis Hammond manage three years at the club? 

 

But on paper the core squad wasn't that bad, was it? We just couldn't score goals and the chairman was playing real life Football Manager.

Having said that, when Stearman was the season's best player, something's gone a bit awry.

[Koke]

Jonny Hayes had a decent  left foot on him. 

 

Elvis Hammond (ankle) was a treasure. My peak frustration with Elvis was when we were about to celebrate a certain goal, only for Elvis to clear it off the line. 

[Footballwipe]

Some Sky Sports News clips from that season here

 

Plenty of press clippings from that season here, including this horrifying one from May 2008 just after we went down:

 

[Fox92]

21 hours ago, davieG said:

 

He's right about support and jeering though. Still stands to this day.

[TJB-fox]

1 hour ago, RoboFox said:

I've largely put that season to the back of my mind, so I've had a quick read through the Wikipedia page.

 

We had some pretty turd players back then coming through the revolving door at the Walkers... Who on earth is Jonny Hayes?! And how did Elvis Hammond manage three years at the club? 

 

But on paper the core squad wasn't that bad, was it? We just couldn't score goals and the chairman was playing real life Football Manager.

Having said that, when Stearman was the season's best player, something's gone a bit awry.

Out of all the crap we had that season you pull out Jonny Hayes as an example? 

Went on to win a few cups and titles with Celtic and a decent career with Aberdeen.

 

[RoboFox]

7 minutes ago, TJB-fox said:

Out of all the crap we had that season you pull out Jonny Hayes as an example? 

Went on to win a few cups and titles with Celtic and a decent career with Aberdeen.

 

Yeah, I read his Wikipedia page. Doesn't mean to say I'd ever heard of the bloke or recalled him ever playing for us.

[Stadt]

There was plenty of things out of Holloway’s hands that season but he took over with us out of the relegation zone and took us into the 3rd tier for the first time in our then 124 year history. Unforgivable.

[Corky]

The worst thing about all of it was that there was real optimism before the season- a new owner with money and promises, a manager who was straight talking and had done well in the lower leagues. We ended it an absolute basket case and at a level never seen before.

 

The whole campaign was a complete mess.

[The Horse's Mouth]

2 hours ago, Fox92 said:

He's right about support and jeering though. Still stands to this day.

He seems to have a rant about this at every club, remember distcintively at QPR maybe hes the problem 

[Stinkenzo]

Billy bloody Davies

[sishades]

5 hours ago, Blue Fox 72 said:

The season tickets raining onto the pitch towards the end of that game. 

I remember getting attacked at the end of the game over some tit smoking in the family stand. Toxic game with a toxic ending. After a hitting him with a couple of punches I legged it down the stairwell with dozens of riot police heading in the opposite direction. A horrible day all around.

[UpTheLeagueFox]

18 hours ago, when_you're_smiling said:

I remember feeling so low I went out and got hammered in Loughborough that night, only to later see half the squad, including Hulme who’d missed the penalty that day, out in a club.

Now some get upset if they so much as smile after a game.

The overly-sensitive, non-perspective society we have sadly now become.

Any reasonable perspective people shown these days is often met with "YOU HAVE LOSER MENTALITY" and other such nonsense.

[The Horse's Mouth]

1 hour ago, Stadt said:

There was plenty of things out of Holloway’s hands that season but he took over with us out of the relegation zone and took us into the 3rd tier for the first time in our then 124 year history. Unforgivable.

Yeah I dont like this revisionist history on Ollie, we had 3 but context is needed when discussing them, Ollie had the most time and had a window where he was backed and it went tits up.

[davieG]

When he became Manager we were hovering around 15th - 17th at the end of the season we were 22nd

 

He signed all these players for in excess of £2m 

 

Steve Howard		Derby County	£1,500,000	01.01.2008
Barry Hayles		Plymouth Argyle	£150,000	02.01.2008
Zsolt Laczkó		Olympiacos	On loan	04.01.2008
Ben Alnwick		Tottenham Hotspur	On loan	07.01.2008
Gábor Bori		MTK	On loan	08.01.2008
Matt Oakley		Derby County	£500,000	11.01.2008
Jamie Clapham		Wolverhampton Wanderers	Free	31.01.2008
Lee Hendrie		Sheffield United	On loan	28.02.2008
Kelvin Etuhu		Manchester City	On loan	04.03.2008
Harry Worley		Chelsea	On loan	07.03.2008
David Bell		Luton Town	On loan	28.03.2008
Harry Worley		Chelsea	Free	05.05.2008

 

He got rid of all these players.

 

Eric Odhiambo		Dundee United	On loan	01.01.2008
Alex Cisak		Tamworth	On loan	10.01.2008
Jonathan Hayes		Northampton Town	On loan	11.01.2008
Carl Cort		Released	Free	11.01.2008
Max Gradel		Bournemouth	On loan	11.01.2008
Shaun Newton		Released	Free	14.01.2008
Jimmy Nielsen		Vejle Boldklub	Free	23.01.2008
Mark De Vries		Released	Free	25.01.2008
Carl Pentney		Ilkeston Town	On loan	29.01.2008
Alan Sheehan		Leeds United	On loan	31.01.2008
Alan Maybury		Aberdeen	On loan	31.01.2008
Darren Kenton		Leeds United	Free	31.01.2008
Hossein Kaebi		Released	Free	04.02.2008
Robert Douglas		Plymouth Argyle	On loan	14.03.2008
Carl Pentney		Fisher Athletic	On loan	April 2008
Jamie Clapham		Released	Free	May 2008
Elvis Hammond		Released	Free	May 2008
Alan Maybury		Released	Free	15.05.2008
Robert Douglas		Released	Free	15.05.2008

 

 

He had plenty of opportunity and £sss to keep the club in the Championship.

 

But what really bugged me about him was his general attitude as he never seemed to take the prospect of being relegated seriously and it came across like he thought it was a big joke.

 

Calm down and have a sandwich as were slowly but surely sinking into the abyss.

 

 

 

 

PS By comparison Pearson in his 1st season in the Championship spent £2.2m on players and sold one for £1m and got us to 5th.

 

If only we'd got him instead of Holloway

[UniFox21]

This threads reminded of that glorious game vs Coventry where Zsolt Laczkó and Gabor Bori were incredible down the wings. And then went to shit after that

[Stadt]

2 hours ago, Stadt said:

There was plenty of things out of Holloway’s hands that season but he took over with us out of the relegation zone and took us into the 3rd tier for the first time in our then 124 year history. Unforgivable.

Quoting your own post, who does that.

 

But it was losing that status of being one of the nine clubs that had never been in the third tier that bothered me more than relegation at the time. At the time we didn’t have much to cling onto so maybe I’d attached myself to it but it definitely stung, what’s happened since has lessened the blow and indirectly lead to all we’ve achieved but Holloway sickens me in a way most of the villains associated with club don’t (Wise, aside)

[Corky]

1 hour ago, Stadt said:

Quoting your own post, who does that.

 

But it was losing that status of being one of the nine clubs that had never been in the third tier that bothered me more than relegation at the time. At the time we didn’t have much to cling onto so maybe I’d attached myself to it but it definitely stung, what’s happened since has lessened the blow and indirectly lead to all we’ve achieved but Holloway sickens me in a way most of the villains associated with club don’t (Wise, aside)

Just had a look- we've spent 13 seasons in the bottom half of the second tier (including League One in that) since 1925.

 

It's not as though we've been that close to the third tier either on lots of occasions.

[Stadt]

58 minutes ago, Corky said:

Just had a look- we've spent 13 seasons in the bottom half of the second tier (including League One in that) since 1925.

 

It's not as though we've been that close to the third tier either on lots of occasions.

I’m not really one to be bothered about the media favouring the big 6, it’s pretty obvious the broadcasters are going to pander to the biggest audiences but I do resent being called a small club. We’ve consistently been in the top flight or at worst challenging for promotion for most of our existence. We’ve always been a medium sized club.