I agree! Pearce needs to have a good clearout. There is no other answer, he needs to create some cash to spend on new players. People will say it's not as easy as that but it is.

Is this the same Paul Hince that advocated the sale of SWP to Chelsea last season? What a great move that turned out be for the lad. We need a clear out alright, but not a clearout of our talented players.

I agree with Paul Hince's comments in prinicpal, but calling for a 'comprehensive clear out' is not that easy an option considering a couple of basic points: not enough finance available to re-build the team after that clear out; players of high enough quality to come to a team that finished 15th in the premiership. We have a good youth/academy setup which bodes well for the future, but I dont see where the players we need to attract to improve the current squad will come from. P.S Im not a pessimist - I am keeping the faith - but its going to be a hard season next term I feel.

Well said Hincey!

I agree with much of what is said here. Many fans would agree that a comprehensive clear-out is needed. But the bottom line is that there is not enough money available to buy in players that will give us European football next season. Thus we're simply looking at EPL survival. Would a team made up from the U18s and the reserves survive in the EPL? Micah has not only made the jump, he's actually one of our best players. Middlesbrough have played a team of youngsters on more than one occasion and they did OK. So, I believe the answer is Yes. On that basis, I would sell the whole of the first team, with the exception of the promising youngsters. That money would pay off a lot of the debt. I'd then campaign with a team of youngsters made up form the remnants of the first team, the reserves and the U18s. Such a team would be great to watch and would just get better and better over the next few years. And the club wouldn't be saddled with a load of crippling debt for the next decade.

For once this comment is spot on. The current problems go back to the seasons after City's promotion back to the Premiership when players were brought in for big money and or wages and then sold on for a negative return. Examples are Anelka (bought for 12m sold for 7m), Fowler (bought for 6m sold for nothing), Vuoso and the rest who came in on frees but who commanded big wages (McManaman, Bosvelt, Tarnat etc). Wardle was seduced by Keegan's naive dream of buying success based on overpriced and overpaid players past their sell by dates, and this seemingly led to Bernstein's departure. Wardle undoubtedly has the club at heart, but doesn't seem to have either the resources of a Steve Gibson or the acumen of a Bernstein. The current policy of not getting ouyrselves into further financial trouble is probably the right one but the damage is already done and will take some years to put right without external investment. Unfortunately, for this reason, clearing the decks, whilst it's an attractive idea, is not really possible as an already thin squad would be depleted still further. I can only think that Pearce's policy of offering contract extensions to journeymen like Sun and Sibierski is based on a desire to maintain some depth to the squad at not too high a cost, knowing that he won't be able to bring a lot of players in. I don't think he intends them to be first pick, but rather there or on the bench if needs must and there are injuries elsehwere. If he can bring in 3, hopefully 4 decent players in the key weak positions then the first team might improve, the problem will continue to be that when we get injuries and suspensions then the next tier of players will struggle.

Jarosik would be a good signing and so would Pennant. Is it possible to get Zinadine for a year to do an Ali? That would certainly put bums on seats because slowly but surely the fans have been turning away, you only have to look at the attendances over the last 3 seasons. AS FOR THE FANS WHO LEAVE THE GROUND WITH 5 OR 10 MINUTES TO GO, WELL I'VE NEVER UNDERSTOOD THAT. THE TEAM NEEDS THE SUPPORT UNTIL THE FINAL WHISTLE.

Some good points but the point overlooked is that it was Bernstein who brought Keegan to city and it was Bernstein who arranged the loan facility and initiated the spending and it was Bernstein who never risked a penny of his own money in the club - so why so many call for the return of Bernstein beggars belief, he did the easy bit but Wardle is doing the hard bit - i.e. turning around the debt to build a sustainable future for our club, its unpopular, its not glamorous but it is vital.

If JW loves the club so much can he write off the loan he gave us and then give us another 20mill! (tongue firmly in cheek) I hate articles like this, they make me so optimistic for the LONG summer ahead! Similar articles were written this time last year and look how the season went. CTID

Some good points although no mention was made of Pearce extending contracts of the not fit for Rochdale players he inherited from Keegan. That is hardly clear the decks.

thats all well and good mr hince but who will take these pathetic excuses for a footballer from us.
mills,thatcher,sibierski,reyna,flood the list is endless.

Thats right Hince, blame the only person not connected with the club any longer. The bottom line is Invisible Man Wardle was happy to sign the blank cheques for Mad Kevin, so the buck stops with him. He got his 'soft' loans back from the SWP sale, so should now step down and let somebody capable try and run the club. The club is leaking season card holders in their thousands. Time for revolution.

If, as the board keep telling us, the debt is manageable why do we keep selling our best players. Newcastle's debt is approaching 100m, and boro (pray they don't win the uefa cup tomorrow) also have a far bigger debt than ours and much less revenue coming in yet they keep investing in their squad. This policy will cost us dear next season- the gates will go down and so, I fear, will we.

Fine, so Pearce begins the task by giving contract extensions to Reyna, Sibierski and Sun. What does that tell us?

Heard it all before, we've had big crowds for years but still been relegated four times in recent history. Pearce isn't blameless, he coaches the players, he attempts to motivate them, he picks the team and sets the tactics. Having said that, he is still learning and the board should look at providing him support in terms of a tactical mentor and financial support.
Completely cheesed off but I've bought my seasoncard for next year as always............

Not a bad article. Wardle backed the wrong horse, Keegan over Bernstein. The fans should not forget this - a major error with disastrous consequences. Wardle has been fantastically generous as a supporter but he was much better supporting a professional chairman than doing a job that he seems incapable of on PR/leadership/strategic/financial fronts. He should be on his knees begging Bernstein to come back but power, as we know, is difficult to relinquish

What a lot of drivel Mr Hince, there's obviously no news.

Firstly your list of "big clubs" doesn't include Arsenal (lets ignore Chelsea for now) or Spurs, or Everton, simply because there stadia are not as big as ours, thats plainly rubbish. I would personally welcome some of our supporters never coming again, loyalty to moaning is all some of them have. Crowds don't make football clubs "big", winning does.

We are a weak premiership club, with a lot of fans thats all.

Secondly we didn't mortagage our future just on filling Keegans nest, we did it creating the ground big enough to makes us 4th (for now) most supported club. Had we not done that, we'd have been down about 10th in your list of big clubs, proabbly around Middlesbrough, who incidenatlly are in a European final, now thats BIG.

Our board have made mistakes, but so has Pearce, and yes the players have let us down, but ultimately SP picks the players, so if some are letting him down he should stop picking them, the buck does and must stop with him. I like him personally, but that doesn't necesarily mean he is, or will be a premiership manager. We have no choice now but to stick with him, but at any other club 9 defeats in 10 games would see the manager under considerable pressure. I don't see any on Pearce, his players, or even the board. Too many at City are in the comfort zone, some of the performances at Blackburn were a disgrace, simple as.

I wish all the best of luck, but wish is all City fans can ever do.

Patience is exactly what is needed.
SP putting City where we want them to be is not going to happen overnight, or maybe even in the next two seasons, but i believe he will. As another story on this site says, let him build a team in his image.
SP is often compared with Allardyce and what he's achieved at Bolton with a limited budget, yet it's been forgotten that in 01/02 they finished 5th bottom on GD +4pts from relegation and in 02/03 they finished 4th bottom +2pts from relegation. No City manager would survive beyond that yet look how Bolton have thrived by sticking with their man.
City's season wasn't poor from start to finish, it went wrong for reasons that can be addressed, the central midfield being the most telling.
City's fans are going to have to play their part in the clubs future by de-activating the big panic buttons a lot of them seem to have in their minds.

It's all very well saying don't blame the Board, because they made an honest mistake for the right reasons, but I think a lot of City fans have very little sympathy because of all the spin and subterfuge that has gone on since Wardle and Co bought into Keegan's dream. This isn't like the Risdale thing at Leeds where the supporters egged the Chairman on in his spending. Indeed many Blues were genuinely alarmed when Bernstein was removed as Chairman, because they correctly feared an unrestrained Keggy would behave like a kid with the keys to a sweet shop, which he duly did. Many fans for example were aghast at the sum we paid for Robbie Fowler, and if so many supporters could see what was coming, then they are entitled to ask why couldn't the Board. Furthermore, we might have accepted such an error of judgement as an honest mistake, had we not had to endure a campaign of spin and bunkum since. I for one can remember Mackintosh telling us that our 62 million debt wasn't a problem as it was "manageable", and yet here we are some 18 million better off (Anelka plus SWP minus Samaras and Vassell), and there still isn't a brass farthing in the coffers. Transfer deals which make the Board look bad (eg Macken to Crystal Palace) are disguised by being announced as "undisclosed fees", AGMs come with a time limit to stop people asking awkward questions, and we still don't know whether the SWP money went on paying back some of the high interest loans to our American creditors, or the low interest loans to our Chairman. That is why City fans are angry, not because the Board made an honest mistake, but because we feel like we're being conned.
And that's without even talking about the short sightedness of our recent forays into the transfer market, eg we could have bought Bent and Camara last summer, but chose instead to muddle along and keep the money, only to then be forced to spend it out of sheer desperation in the January transfer window (always, always, always a seller's market) on a young Greek lad, who has not the faintest idea how to lead a Premiership forward line. Bad judgement every which way you look at it!

As mentioned elsewhere on this site, the issue may not just be with the players. We can't do anything with the financial situation. We can't bring in the players. We can't clear the decks. Something has to change but not in terms of the players as the money isn't there. And in any case bringing in other players would only paper over the cracks. The problem is in the backroom staff. The training that the players do is not sufficient for them to be able to run for 90 minutes and they are injury prone. They are unprepared on match day, they are undisciplined in terms of the tactics, the passing, their movement, any idea of what to do on the pitch. Yelling from the touch line is good. Preparation before hand is better. Bring in some proper coaches, ditch Keegan's deadwood coaches, and start to reap the benefits of proper caoches who know what they're doing. This team, as it is, Reyna Sun Sibierski and all, could look 10 times better if they were properly drilled and properly working, together, as a team, as a unit, as one. Instead of the pointless humping the ball up to the big lad we do at the moment.

i aint just sayin this.but behind the scenes and in the terraces, i think it was very unsettleing earlier in the season when barton and distin started all this rubbish about maybe wanting to leave, and the transfer request saga.this i think dented our season instantly, as these are the times the fans started to luv barton, these are also the times the club was in rich form.instantly it created a feel-bad-factor round the terraces as nobody was happy with what we was hearing from our club captain and our most promising midfielder.since these days weve slowly but surely had more barton injurys, poor performances from the players mentioned and the rest of the team.we had a few good wins inbetween all this to giv us hope , only to be routinely let down at two hurdles towards europe, wigan game and west ham.and if i remember rightly the real turnin point was a poor defeat away to fulham, and i bet these were around the times all the unsettleing behind the scenes incidents started.it affects a club like us wen our own captain and best players doubt us.nevermind how it affects the fans and feeling upon th eterraces.its time for the players to start putting in the hard work the fans deserve.time for sylvain to commit.and time for joey to commit. so they can repay the fans for all the pain theyve caused, and bring a good feeling back to us, the one we had b4 all the nonsense started about half way thru the season.then i really think we can move forward.i dont think we need to spend major money.the key is being united together as a team.instead of individual needs.

Chas,Shrewsbury. You are a moron.

Can somebody tell me when was the last time 'clear the decks' actually worked anywhere? A few keys players are needed for sure by SP.We should, and will give SP every ounce of support we can, but we have to admit that it does eventually take a bit more than 'passion & committment' to succeed, but we believe in him and his potential to excel in the tactical dept.

Does anyone think of the fact that had Keegan not spent a lot of money we wouldn't a) have been promoted and b) survived in the premiership. I agree with a lot of you that the players he signed were rubbish but they had experience, uinlike the team we had when we were relegated the year after we got promoted. The problem is many people expect more from players like Fowler, McManaman & co because they were paid well and had a great CV. They didn't play well but surely they made an impact on the squad, moral in the team must have been high. Would Distin and others have joined us if he didn't buy into the dream? I doubt it. Yes, he wasted money but we haven't been relegated in a few years and the longer we can keep that up the better until we can reduce our debt burden created by BOTH Keegan and the new stadium. No point looking at the past, we've survived this long, lets survive longer and build on that.

Chas, while I agree that we could do worse than sell most of our first team minus the youngsters, it won't happen because it would raise considerably less money than the SWP transfer. Only Dunne, Distan and Barton would command a worthwhile fee (if we include Samaras in the young category), and Dunne is probably the one most fans would want to keep. Unfortunately most would go on a free or for a very low fee, so we're stuck with them for a while.