The return of Ian Evatt in a match we must win.

Don't disagree with that- he didn't cover himself with glory. 

 

11 hours ago, Take Hunt Off said:

Megson didn’t help himself from day one , it was fairly toxic with the fans right from the beginning.Neither did he make much effort to engage with the fans 

Got to say though he wasn’t the worst manager we’ve had .

Coyle , Freedman easily worse than him. 
The Hull game was his downfall but not wholly down to him .Matty Taylor missed a sitter to put us three up. Hull brought on the poisoned Irish dwarf Hunt & he banged two in subs were dodgy but he was trying to close the game down just like BSA would have done. The whole ground was toxic , walking back home I knew he’d be gone in the morning.

He was a twat though !
 

ps The hierarchy of the club were responsible for the European debacle 100%

however the 2-2 in Munich was achieved by half the B team.

The Hull game it was snowing on way back, in 4 different places M62 was down to one lane due to weather and roadworks. Took ages to get home. Closest I have come to packing it in the toxicity around the club at the time was awful.

People can argue Megson was not totally to blame but he was a major part of it. The fact he had a year at Sheff Weds and then a caretaker role at West Brom but no other decent level job maybe sums him up. Bitter angry ginger man ! 

Edited February 24Feb 24 by Ani

On 22/02/2026 at 10:40, Spider said:

This is the sort of toxicity we need.

Thanks to folk like you, successive managers have been hounded out to prevent us being dragged into non-league football.

You, and thousands of football manager experts in the stands, go loyally down to the stadium for every home game with a bellyful of boos and vitriol at the ready. We might even sneak a win, but you and The Lads will be on hand to remind us all how shit the manager is because the left back was wearing flamboyant boots.

Parky was hounded out, criticised, insulted from the stands and that has proven to be another win for The Lads.

Giving managers a fair chance is for wimps.

wimp

7 hours ago, Zico said:

just had a look, teams below, he took a decent set of first team players to Munich

but he left all these behind for Lisbon

Steinsson, Andrew O'Brien, Gardner, Nolan, Campo, Diouf , Davies, Taylor, Speed, McCann

you don't have to play them, just stick them on the bench if needed, Lisbon scored in the 85th so a few off the bench in the second half could've been the difference of getting to the quarter finals

just like they did in Madrid in the previous round when most of them played

cunts

 

Munich

Al Habsi, Andrew O'Brien, Cid, Michalik, Gardner, Alonso (Giannakopoulos 56), Nolan, Guthrie, McCann, Braaten (Teymourian 77), Davies.
Subs Not Used: Walker, Speed, Harsanyi, Sinclair, Sissons.

 

Madrid

Jaaskelainen, Hunt, Andrew O'Brien, Cahill, Samuel, Giannakopoulos (Diouf 59), McCann (Campo 58), Nolan, Joey O'Brien (Meite 85), Taylor, Davies.
Subs Not Used: Al Habsi, Teymourian, Alonso, Vaz Te.

 

Lisbon

Al Habsi, Hunt, Cahill, Meite, Samuel, Joey O'Brien, Guthrie, Teymourian (Braaten 71), Giannakopoulos, Vaz Te, Helguson (Woolfe 76).
Subs Not Used: Walker, Harsanyi, Sinclair, Sissons, Jamieson.

Some great nights but it's always such a shock to see the kind of dross we had by that point. 

Starting with Cid and Michalik vs Bayern Munich takes the cake. Half the benches here never played above the national league. 

On 24/02/2026 at 05:41, Zico said:

just had a look, teams below, he took a decent set of first team players to Munich

but he left all these behind for Lisbon

Steinsson, Andrew O'Brien, Gardner, Nolan, Campo, Diouf , Davies, Taylor, Speed, McCann

you don't have to play them, just stick them on the bench if needed, Lisbon scored in the 85th so a few off the bench in the second half could've been the difference of getting to the quarter finals

just like they did in Madrid in the previous round when most of them played

cunts

 

Munich

Al Habsi, Andrew O'Brien, Cid, Michalik, Gardner, Alonso (Giannakopoulos 56), Nolan, Guthrie, McCann, Braaten (Teymourian 77), Davies.
Subs Not Used: Walker, Speed, Harsanyi, Sinclair, Sissons.

 

Madrid

Jaaskelainen, Hunt, Andrew O'Brien, Cahill, Samuel, Giannakopoulos (Diouf 59), McCann (Campo 58), Nolan, Joey O'Brien (Meite 85), Taylor, Davies.
Subs Not Used: Al Habsi, Teymourian, Alonso, Vaz Te.

 

Lisbon

Al Habsi, Hunt, Cahill, Meite, Samuel, Joey O'Brien, Guthrie, Teymourian (Braaten 71), Giannakopoulos, Vaz Te, Helguson (Woolfe 76).
Subs Not Used: Walker, Harsanyi, Sinclair, Sissons, Jamieson.

If you recall those days players signed for the club, or didn't, because we were, or were not, in European competitions.

It always seemed a stupid reason but was often cited.

Imagine then NOT selecting them for those matches!

On 23/02/2026 at 21:27, Lt. Aldo Raine said:

I think the money Megson spent came from the sale of Anelka, didn't it?

 

Yes. At least based off the figures on Soccerbase, in the year after Allardyce left we sold Anelka, Faye, Nolan and Meite for £25m and spent almost exactly that.

I think there was too much ego on both sides for Big Sam to have stayed here much longer regardless, even if I believe he's telling the truth about Gartside. PG believed we were what Brentford are now and could basically plug any manager in there and carry on. 

Although looking at the managerial records of Lee, Megson and Coyle after they left us it's a miracle we stayed up for as long as we did.

Let's be right Big Sam would've let eventually regardless.

He'd already turned down City.

Another decent season with us he'd have been off anyway like all good managers. Probably to England or a club in better shape than Newcastle. His stock was massive.