[BaggieSteve]

Love the term "extreme short termism" Steve!          

Not sure where it came from Drewks. I guess extreme short termism defines what happens in the next ten minutes

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I'll declare my hand up front by saying that I was extremely disappointed in the dismissal of Bilic, who I genuinely believed had been badly let down by the club's approach to strengthening a Championship squad. However, I also agree with many of my fellow posters who charge him with not improving in key areas with the money available (particularly defence and central midfield) and sentimentally re-signing decent but not outstanding players, such as Krovinovic. These have turned out to be bad errors of judgement.

However, I have to say that I believe the appointment of Allardyce has been an unmitigated disaster. When Bilic was sacked, Dowling gave one of the reasons as we were too easy to beat; I'm guessing Allardyce didn't get that email. In my mind, absolutely nothing has been improved, except that our defending seems to be even more comical. We are now hanging our survival on the performance of two loanees whom we have yet to see - no pressure there, then. Interestingly, the defence - clearly our biggest issue - has not been strengthened. Pleased we have another reserve goalkeeper though.

When Pulis was sacked, we replaced him with Pardew. When this went, very quickly, tits up, we demanded his sacking and hammered the Board for such a shocking appointment, criticisms totally justified by the results. At the time, I don't recall any of us cutting him any slack by saying that he was having to work with Pulis' substandard squad. We knew he was crap and we said so. For Pardew, read Allardyce. I see precious little, if any, difference.

After last night's debacle, I think we all feel, in out heart of hearts, that this is game over for the season. So, just as we did with Pardew, please get rid of the guy and wee Sammy, recognise this is just not working and, if its appropriate, let Jimmy Morrison take over for the remainder of the season, as we did with Big Dave. However, this time don't fall into the sentimental trap of offering him the job of getting us out of the Championship as we did with BD. That didn't work and its unlikely to do so again. At the end of the season, recognise we are at a critical point in the club's history, accept that a one year return back to the EPL may not be the best thing and start to restructure and plan longer term, starting with a young manager with fresh ideas and a desire to play attractive football.

I accept the financial penalties involved in such a approach so it would require Lai to sell the club to someone actually interested in us and football. It's just that I think our current approach of extreme short termism - while indicative of football in general - is killing us.

I'd agree that we are down regardless of what happens...

However, I disagree about sacking Allardyce now.

Every manager needs a fair crack of the whip and that means a few games with all of his signings in the team. As yet, 50% of his signings haven't kicked a ball and Diagne has only been here 5 days.

Despite that, early impressions of Diagne are that he's head and shoulders above the strikers already at the club that we paid big money for.

I acknowledge that Allardyce has failed to sort the defence. I expected him to be able to improve us in this department and that hasn't been the case. But I think the fact we haven't strengthened is largely down to us having zero cash in the bank rather than Allardyce not wanting to sign someone. Not sure what happened to the Hegazi and Ferguson cash. I guess spent already on Grant, who on current evidence looks like massive waste of money...

But I do think the defensive midfielder will make a big impact. I watch La Liga and he looks like a good player. A big strong protector who can play a bit. Much better than the tripe we recruited in our terrible summer recruitment phase.

And that's why I think Big Sam needs 4 or 5 more games with him in the team.

To play devils advocate on the comparison with Pardew, I think this squad is massively inferior to the squad Pardew inherited from Pulis. That squad had plenty of top level and international experience in Foster, Dawson, Evans, Gibbs, Hegazi, Chadli, Krychowiak, Rodriguez, Rondon and the old school of Brunt, Barry, Yacob and McAuley. The only Premier League experience in this squad is Gibbs, who is 2 years older (and far worse) than he was back then and Ivanovic, a 36 year old. New blood is absolutely imperative to improve this side.

If nothing improves after 4-5 games, we can give Mozza (or someone else) a chance. There will still be sufficient time for him to show what he can do.

Well, the next four games are against two top teams (Spurs and Manure) and two near us (Burnley and Brighton), so it will be a fair indication of progress with the new players. Like all of us on this board, regardless of my views on the manager, I want him and the team to succeed, I want us to stay up. I agree, Slick, on the relative merits of the squad but the reality is that, when we replaced the managers (Pulis and Bilic), both squads were at the bottom of the league, both new managers were brought in to remedy that situation and both failed, although Allardyce may yet prove me wrong...I hope so.
Just as Pardew was brought in to improve what was there, so was Allardyce and, let's be honest, the latter arrived in a fanfare of "Allardyce the saviour, miracle worker, never been relegated", descriptions that none of us ever associated with Pardew. My problem is that, to date, I think we've gone backwards under Allardyce, we've not even stabilised, let alone improved. By all means judge him after the next four games and your comment that not to do so when most of his signings haven't yet played, is very fair. I'm just basing my pessimism on what I've seen to date but I would seriously be delighted to be proved completely wrong.