" What ever any fan feels,He is a nice guy and "
Posted: Mon Nov 23, 2015 9:14 am
" What is true is Slade is a nice guy, open and honest "
By Steve Tucker
23/11/2015
What is true, is that it does feel hard to know sometimes where to pitch one’s comments, positive or negative, about the Cardiff boss.
The first thing to note is that Slade is a nice guy, an avuncular figure really, open and honest and a pleasure to deal with after the exertions required with some of his predecessors.
But being a nice bloke in football is neither here nor there.
In fairness, what is true, is that Slade has improved morale within the Bluebirds squad.
He has acted as a unifying force and galvanised a dressing room that was previously divided.
What cannot be denied either is that Slade has had to preside over a cost-cutting regime in the Welsh capital that makes George Osborne look like Father Christmas.
He has slashed millions from the wage bill and pruned a squad which, under former boss Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, had become so unwieldy the players’ Christmas party looked like a gathering of the extras from Ben Hur.
The problem is, of course, despite the protestations from Slade that he is no longer shopping at Harrods, one is left wondering what the point is of going to Home Bargains and buying a bucket with a hole in it, even if it is cheap.
Slade’s signings have almost uniformly been poor.
Alex Revell has been shipped off to League One, while Stuart O’Keefe was branded by Slade himself this week as merely a squad player.
Eoin Doyle, also out on loan now, was brought in too and described as one for the future.
But what price the future as the present slips through one’s fingers and the Premier League galleon sets sail loaded with bullion to strange shores that seem increasingly more distant from a Cardiff perspective.
Cardiff's shocking stats can't explain just how dull they were
The other problem is that Slade seems to never learn from his mistakes either.
His preference for strikers that simply could not find the net as Kenwyne Jones sat around for so long naturally earned distrust among the fan-base, the lop-sided midfield, which was back against Derby although admittedly surely only because of injury, irks the majority.
There seems an inability to move forward, to learn, to progress at Slade’s Cardiff.
In the same way, the Bluebirds seem inflexible, their formation set in ancient stone even if all the evidence seems to be crying out for change.
The comments after the Derby defeat are almost unanimously negative, there is barely no-one coming out to defend Slade despite the fact Cardiff are still only three points off the play-off places.
Maybe, we South Wales press are unforgiving and hasty too, but, above all that, perhaps the important thing I like to think anyway, is we say it as we see it.
By Steve Tucker
23/11/2015
What is true, is that it does feel hard to know sometimes where to pitch one’s comments, positive or negative, about the Cardiff boss.
The first thing to note is that Slade is a nice guy, an avuncular figure really, open and honest and a pleasure to deal with after the exertions required with some of his predecessors.
But being a nice bloke in football is neither here nor there.
In fairness, what is true, is that Slade has improved morale within the Bluebirds squad.
He has acted as a unifying force and galvanised a dressing room that was previously divided.
What cannot be denied either is that Slade has had to preside over a cost-cutting regime in the Welsh capital that makes George Osborne look like Father Christmas.
He has slashed millions from the wage bill and pruned a squad which, under former boss Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, had become so unwieldy the players’ Christmas party looked like a gathering of the extras from Ben Hur.
The problem is, of course, despite the protestations from Slade that he is no longer shopping at Harrods, one is left wondering what the point is of going to Home Bargains and buying a bucket with a hole in it, even if it is cheap.
Slade’s signings have almost uniformly been poor.
Alex Revell has been shipped off to League One, while Stuart O’Keefe was branded by Slade himself this week as merely a squad player.
Eoin Doyle, also out on loan now, was brought in too and described as one for the future.
But what price the future as the present slips through one’s fingers and the Premier League galleon sets sail loaded with bullion to strange shores that seem increasingly more distant from a Cardiff perspective.
Cardiff's shocking stats can't explain just how dull they were
The other problem is that Slade seems to never learn from his mistakes either.
His preference for strikers that simply could not find the net as Kenwyne Jones sat around for so long naturally earned distrust among the fan-base, the lop-sided midfield, which was back against Derby although admittedly surely only because of injury, irks the majority.
There seems an inability to move forward, to learn, to progress at Slade’s Cardiff.
In the same way, the Bluebirds seem inflexible, their formation set in ancient stone even if all the evidence seems to be crying out for change.
The comments after the Derby defeat are almost unanimously negative, there is barely no-one coming out to defend Slade despite the fact Cardiff are still only three points off the play-off places.
Maybe, we South Wales press are unforgiving and hasty too, but, above all that, perhaps the important thing I like to think anyway, is we say it as we see it.