Thank You Stan

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Originally Posted by McShels

With the appointment of Trapattoni as our new manager, Tardelli as his assistant and the possibility of Chippy Brady also being involved I think it is now time that we Irish fans thank Stephen Staunton for f*cking up the Irish team in the last couple of years thus forcing the FAI to go out and do something right in appointing Giovanni.

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It's all about the four-year plan :)

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Originally Posted by John83

A few weeks back, on another website, someone posed a question about a fundamental result in my area of expertise. He felt that it couldn't possibly be true. I explained it. He still didn't understand, and insulted me. I didn't feel bad. I felt he was an idiot. I was right.

Likewise, if someone calls me a coward, or an idiot, or something less polite for having a different opinion to them on a contentious issue, be it Roy Keane, Steve Staunton, Bertie Ahern, abortion, Europe, education, immigration or any of the thousands of topics that people debate (generally with half the facts - the half that supported their bias before they looked into it), I won't feel bad. I'll feel that they are irrational and impolite; I may even think they're a jerk, but I won't feel bad.

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Where did I state "John83 is a coward"?

I've previously stated that I had MAJOR issues with Stauntons tenure and indeed castigated him for it on this very forum. I'm far from whiter than white when its comes to my comments re Staunton.

However, I feel an unrelented and sustained attack on the man at this stage is cowardly.

I'm entitled to that opinion as much as you are to your paranoia.

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Originally Posted by kingdom hoop

I think if I saw Stan walking down the street today I'd be more inclined to punch him than hug him. (disclaimer; wouldn't do either, just used as helpful hypothetical illustration)

One can forgive his ineptitude as a manager, we'll never forget his commitment as a player, but his belligerent attitude whilst manager has left a distinctly sour after-taste. Washing this out with memories of his playing days won't be all that easy.

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the memory is a funny thing, but at the end of the day you will always remember the things that happen closer in time to now, if ye know what i mean! so even if staunton was a legend 15 years ago, that will be overshadowed by more current memories....and vice versa :)

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Originally Posted by Wolfie

Where did I state "John83 is a coward"?

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You didn't. You said:

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Originally Posted by Wolfie

The blokes received a battering - a lot of it self inflicted, he took the job, he was well compensated, etc etc, I know - but continual sniping at him at this stage is ungracious and cowardly.

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... which I took as referring to the comments preceding that, mine among them. That's not unreasonable. It's certainly not paranoid.

For the record, I disagree with you, not least on your use of the word cowardly. By all means though, explain how retaining negative feelings towards him at this stage is

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lacking courage; ignobly timid and faint-hearted

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I'd like to hear your reasoning.

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Originally Posted by jebus

Complete nonsense. He had a 4 year contract that was terminated before the half way mark and so deserved compensation

EDIT: Was just told that Wikipedia once had in their World War 2 profile, 'World War 2 could be described as a storm in a teacup', :D :D

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Agree with citizen here, he should have takin the Keegan option and admit he wasnt up to it - which he clearly wasnt - and walk away. Instead in this greed filled world he took the Steve McClaren option and took money from the grass roots of irish football, the grass roots which provided Stan with a way into the english league and premiership where he would have earned vast wealth for doing a job he loves.

No respect for the man at all!

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Originally Posted by John83

These others are not "cowards", Wolfie, nor are they people "who to a certain extent wouldn't even cross the road to see Ireland play", Paulie. That dismissal is insulting and deeply misguided.

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Maybe I should have been clearer. I have no problem with people criticising Staunton if it's done in a reasoned and constructive manner and the person doing it has the best interests of the team at heart. If someone has thought about it, and they just cannot get past Staunton's time as a manager then that is their choice. I personally prefer to remember his 14 or so years playing for us rather than focusing on his two years managing us. What I find though with a lot of people, is that because he is an easy target, that people seem to talk of him as something of a joke. I know it's a generalisation but in my experience the people that do this are people that have no interest in going to see Ireland play. If they weren't slagging him off they would just choose someone else. If someone that goes to the games was doing this, while I still wouldn't agree with it, at least they have invested time, money and emotion into supporting the team. I suppose that there are too many people that are only too prepared to kick a man when he is down.

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Originally Posted by Paulie

Maybe I should have been clearer. I have no problem with people criticising Staunton if it's done in a reasoned and constructive manner and the person doing it has the best interests of the team at heart. If someone has thought about it, and they just cannot get past Staunton's time as a manager then that is their choice. I personally prefer to remember his 14 or so years playing for us rather than focusing on his two years managing us. What I find though with a lot of people, is that because he is an easy target, that people seem to talk of him as something of a joke. I know it's a generalisation but in my experience the people that do this are people that have no interest in going to see Ireland play. If they weren't slagging him off they would just choose someone else. If someone that goes to the games was doing this, while I still wouldn't agree with it, at least they have invested time, money and emotion into supporting the team. I suppose that there are too many people that are only too prepared to kick a man when he is down.

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Good post.

I don't think it's fair to use the metaphor of kicking a man while he's down in relation to Staunton. For me, the lack of any indication that he regrets anything and the persistent denial that anything was wrong deny him any redemption. They certainly don't suggest that he's 'down'. He'll regain a measure of my sympathy when assesses his tenure realistically. He's still claiming that things were coming right and that he did a lot of good with young players coming through, that he was fired because of media pressure.

As I've said before, the rubbish he spouted after games like Cyprus and San Marino was kicking the fans when they were down.

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Originally Posted by John83

Good post.

I don't think it's fair to use the metaphor of kicking a man while he's down in relation to Staunton. For me, the lack of any indication that he regrets anything and the persistent denial that anything was wrong deny him any redemption. They certainly don't suggest that he's 'down'. He'll regain a measure of my sympathy when assesses his tenure realistically. He's still claiming that things were coming right and that he did a lot of good with young players coming through, that he was fired because of media pressure.

As I've said before, the rubbish he spouted after games like Cyprus and San Marino was kicking the fans when they were down.

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Better post, and one a lot of people would agree with. The media and fans wouldn't have come down on him so hard if his interpersonal skills were even slightly better!

The one thing that ****ed me off more than anything was the total lack of regard for the fans. We seemed like an afterthought. He never once seemed to think about the pain that his reign was bringing to people who follow the team everywhere and seemed to think that we were a bunch of idiots swayed by the media. He totally failed to realise that the only way of getting his opinions through to the fans was - unfortunately - through the media.

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Originally Posted by jebus

Was just told that Wikipedia once had in their World War 2 profile, 'World War 2 could be described as a storm in a teacup', :D :D

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When we all know it was described as "the emergancy"

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Originally Posted by citizenerased

No, his respect went when he held us to randsom for 800,000, should have walked away knowing his inability to to the job, neck like a jockeys b*ll*x...no time for the man!

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Originally Posted by Ireland4ever

Agree with citizen here, he should have takin the Keegan option and admit he wasnt up to it - which he clearly wasnt - and walk away. Instead in this greed filled world he took the Steve McClaren option and took money from the grass roots of irish football, the grass roots which provided Stan with a way into the english league and premiership where he would have earned vast wealth for doing a job he loves.

No respect for the man at all!

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I've said on many occasions that I think he should never have been offered the job (obviously) and that having been offered it, he should have turned it down because he should have been aware that he didn't know enough about management to do the job.

He didn't take the job with the intent of ruining our chances of qualification, and making himself public enemy no. 1. That, unfortunately for everybody, is how it turned out. During the campaign, and since then, he has done himself no favours at all by portraying himself as a victim of fan and media pressure, by showing a lack of willingness to admit any error on his part, and suggesting positives where it was abundantly clear that no positives existed.

Having said that, he was fired by the FAI, however it may have been termed. As such, he was entitled to the remainder of his contract, and he took it.

I can't imagine that anybody here would turn down 800,000 that they're entitled to due to being fired, even if they had performed very poorly at their job.

Stans career as player and manager are two different areas obviously and nobosy is mixing the two.

A great loyal player....and in later years a crap manager completly out of his depth.

Hitler was a very intelligent student and religious alter boy before getting older and becoming a amass muderer.....he is still remembered as being a mass murderer though.

Your legacy that you leave behind is everything that a person has done in their lives/career not picking and choosing one over the other.

I love the way people try and attribute to an international football manager saintly attributes that the rest of us would laugh at.

How many of us when a job of a lifetime comes round in our line of business would say "Sorry, I am not up to it" when you believe you are?

How many of us when asked to leave a job with terms complying with your contract would say "Keep the money and invest it in the company. I might never get another decent job again at 40 years of age but hey, that's the right thing to do!"

How many of us recognise our own faults and never attempt to blame other people for our failings?

Please........

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Originally Posted by OwlsFan

I love the way people try and attribute to an international football manager saintly attributes that the rest of us would laugh at.

How many of us when a job of a lifetime comes round in our line of business would say "Sorry, I am not up to it" when you believe you are?

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No one. Why on earth would you say something you don't believe, which is furthermore against your best interests?

Perhaps a better question is whether he believed that. Better still, is why John Delaney, er, eh, sorry, the 3 man FAI committee that John Delaney chaired, no, wait, they only made a recommendation, the 12 man FAI committee that John Delaney chaired believed that. Scratch that, they were only rubber stamping the recommendation of the 3 man committee.

Finally, many people have no problem with Staunton having taken the job. I can recall plenty of people posting that they'd have done the same in his situation, and while I don't hold that opinion, I don't have any great antipathy for Staunton for taking the job.

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How many of us when asked to leave a job with terms complying with your contract would say "Keep the money and invest it in the company. I might never get another decent job again at 40 years of age but hey, that's the right thing to do!"

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First of all, the FAI isn't a company. The purpose of a company is to make money. The purpose of the FAI is to administrate association football in the Republic of Ireland. I could have just replied to your question with the same question, replacing "company" with "charity", but that would be an equally misleading comparison.

Another question though, how many of us are as wealthy as Steve Staunton? I'm not going to suggest that we're demanding he give up that new ivory back-scratcher, but it's still a factor.

If I'm employed to do a job, make a mess of it, hurting the reputation of my employer in the process and am let go, I wouldn't get paid any more money. To save the hassle of proving I'm incompetent, I'd probably get the two week's or so pay and the holiday pay owed to someone being let go. I certainly wouldn't get two year's salary. Not unless I was at least a CEO.

Combining these factors, we've a wealthy man getting money none of us would ever get if fired for poor performance. Gee, maybe we should just stick to considering the FAI as a company.

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How many of us recognise our own faults and never attempt to blame other people for our failings?

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Next to none of us. Only yesterday, I was corrected on the spelling of Trapattoni, and my first reaction was irritation. In my head, I concocted several excuses and counterarguments to justify not having bothered to look up the correct spelling, but ultimately they amounted to trying to justify an error. On another day, I might even have posted that crap. Yesterday, I stepped back a moment and admitted I was wrong. Another example, something of the order of 80% of drivers think they're "above-average" drivers. All of us make errors. All of us lack perspective on ourselves.

Steve Staunton's job was perspective. If a football manager can't see that there's a problem, then he can't fix it. Yet months after being fired, he's still denying that anything was wrong.

I don't think it's that much to ask of him.

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Originally Posted by John83

....If I'm employed to do a job, make a mess of it, hurting the reputation of my employer in the process and am let go, I wouldn't get paid any more money. To save the hassle of proving I'm incompetent, I'd probably get the two week's or so pay and the holiday pay owed to someone being let go. I certainly wouldn't get two year's salary. Not unless I was at least a CEO.....

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Whether you were a CEO or a tea-boy and were being let go by your employer, you would get paid whatever is due on termination of employment according to the terms and conditions of your contract of employment. That is the law and that is what Staunton got, nothing more, nothing less.

If I was offered the Ireland job I would turn it down as I am not qualified for the job and I would probably make a mess of it. Staunton should have done the same as he should have known he was not qualified for it. But anyone I have since stop caring about him since he was gone. We have moved on and gone from the worst manager in the world to one of the best.

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Originally Posted by NeilMcD

If I was offered the Ireland job I would turn it down as I am not qualified for the job and I would probably make a mess of it. Staunton should have done the same as he should have known he was not qualified for it. But anyone I have since stop caring about him since he was gone. We have moved on and gone from the worst manager in the world to one of the best.

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As far as I am aware, you didn't play 100 times for your country and have a career in the top flight stretching many years. I don't believe for a minute that he "should have known" he wasn't up to the job, especially since he had Bobby Robson as his side-kick. He worked under numerous managers and would have gained lots of experience as a result.

As it happens he was hopeless but to compare your position with his is an invideous comparison unless you're Ray Houghton or Paul McGrath in disguise. Some inexperienced managers work out. Some flounder. We got the latter.

I loved Staunton's comment when he was asked about his appointment as Leeds assistant manager in Division 1 (yes that's the English third tier) under the similarly inexperienced and inept Gary McAllister. Didn't he say it was a great opportunity to learn the ropes? What a muppet. And this is the man who thought he was capable of managing Ireland at the highest level of football?

A gobsh*te of the highest order. I lost all respect for him when I had to endure his almost comical mismanagment of our team for the best part of two years. His gross misconduct also earned him a multi- million euro payout which he gladly took so he desevers all the abuse he gets.

As for your point Owlsfan about taking jobs that we aren't up to the task of doing and accepting a payout when we were fired. Personally it never has happenned but if it did yes I probably would take the job and the money but I wouldn't expect everybody who my sh*t performance in the job affected to say the sun shined out of my ar*e afterwards. Also I'm not a multi-millionaire so your analogy doesn't count.

"My tears gone cold Im wondering why..........."

:D

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Originally Posted by youngirish

I loved Staunton's comment when he was asked about his appointment as Leeds assistant manager in Division 1 (yes that's the English third tier) under the similarly inexperienced and inept Gary McAllister. Didn't he say it was a great opportunity to learn the ropes? What a muppet. And this is the man who thought he was capable of managing Ireland at the highest level of football?

A gobsh*te of the highest order. I lost all respect for him when I had to endure his almost comical mismanagment of our team for the best part of two years. His gross misconduct also earned him a multi- million euro payout which he gladly took so he desevers all the abuse he gets.

As for your point Owlsfan about taking jobs that we aren't up to the task of doing and accepting a payout when we were fired. Personally it never has happenned but if it did yes I probably would take the job and the money but I wouldn't expect everybody who my sh*t performance in the job affected to say the sun shined out of my ar*e afterwards. Also I'm not a multi-millionaire so your analogy doesn't count.

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Ouch!