Stendel Signs - TH had nothing to do with it :shitwine:

[CritchSmile]

You can't win on here man

Folk saying Neilson's football was dire and boring, but we were winning.

Levein plays hoofball and sit back because it suits the players but it doesn't work because it's a shite tactic. 

Stendel try's to play a different type of attacking game but it doesn't suit the players. So are we going to go back to leveins tactics that don't work? Naw. Keep Stendel, bin the players and let him bring in people that are suited to his tactics

Just a normal manager who can get us looking forward to our weekends at Tynecastle and win a few games in the process will do, Kash.

It's not too much to ask. Our budget outstripped almost everyone else.

[The Comedian]

Cathro must be laughing his wee boab off at these happenings.



Knocking about with Nuno Espirito Santo and probably away to a massive EPL club with him soon enough, meanwhile we are relegated under Grand Wizard Leveins expert tutelage.

[CritchSmile]

We've been gaslighted into believing we aren't deserving of a competent manager.

[Zizou]

That he then quickly lost Sibbick who had looked promising was a huge blow. But results wise since the winter break we won 5, drew 3 and lost 3 including 2 wins over Rangers at Tynecastle (something Levein hadn't managed in over 20 matches) and a stirring win at Easter Road. One of the defeats was also at Parkhead so a bit of context is required in looking at how things panned out between January and March. 

To add further context to this, 2 of those wins were against Airdrie and Falkirk (Falkirk could have won in all honesty). Rangers also lost to Killie, Hamilton and drew with St Johnstone around our games so we caught them at a great time.

Hibs game was good.

[BoJack Horseman]

The whole culture at the club is rotten. There is no ethos, no willingness for anyone to do better or improve themselves or the club. The attitude of the players is absolutely disgusting and it's set from the very top to the bottom.

If the director of football is overshadowing the manager at every turn (see Cathro), then who are the players going to respect? Not here to defend Cathro but he was being undercut and disrespected from the outset. Accusations that Levein was picking the team and still signing players. The embarrassing scenario of Levein passing notes down from the stand to Cathro and then two minutes later subs and tactical changes would be made accordingly.

Members of Cathro's failed backroom team are allowed to stay. Guys like Daly because he's a Levein yes man. MacPhee somehow stays because he's a snake oil salesman and convinces people he's a master tactician. But no one takes any responsibility, Daly and MacPhee both chuck Cathro under the bus and question his training methods and team fitness (newsflash lads, you're the fucking coaches, you're partly responsible as well). Then the director of football becomes manager.

And then that DoF comes in, the man who appointed the previous manager and effectively ran the team, picked the side and signed the players, gets the manager's gig. He shows up twice a week at most for training and lets the two coaches, Daly and MacPhee, the two men who were part of the Cathro shit show and couldn't even stand up to him, are given responsibility to run the show in Levein's absence.

And because Levein isn't there the majority of the time it breeds contempt. Players slack off. Other players are favoured as they become yes men to Levein because they get an easy ride. Other players then start getting allowed to train and rock up as and when they please. Just fucking look at the laughable deal we dished out to Whelan. Come up from down south one a week to play and then can train from home. And glass knees Naismtih then allowed to train from home.

So inevitably when Levein gets binned and a new manager comes along he's up against it straight away to try and turn around the mentality of the slackers in our squad. And the previous manager still lingers around the club, at the training ground, at reserves games, at the stadium. What message does that send out? Who are the players going to react to? The new guy whose come in and tried to implement new ideas and make the players work hard, or the previous manager who gave them an easy ride and is still creeping about and is undoubtedly still in touch with them.

We are ultimately a club that has consistently rewarded failure and created a culture as such. The atmosphere and ethos of the club is utterly vile. I'm not going to put forward a case for defending Stendel here as he's made plenty mistakes, but whoever came in was really up against it with the previous manager still lurking about and toil to get a reaction from the players.

Pozzy for that. The vibe around the club had been off as fuck ever since the summer of 2015 and had deteriorated into a properly toxic environment since.

This documentary being made is going to be watch through your fingers stuff but I have no doubt they'll have captuted a bit of it when it does air.

[Snake Plissken]

Never seen such a demonstrably shite manager so vigorously defended

I guess not being Levein and pulling some funny faces buys you a lot of goodwill.

[Hendricks]

To add further context to this, 2 of those wins were against Airdrie and Falkirk (Falkirk could have won in all honesty). Rangers also lost to Killie, Hamilton and drew with St Johnstone around our games so we caught them at a great time.

Hibs game was good.

You can go through all the games though man, the reality is we became a better team into 2020, not great by any means but certainly more competitive, harder to beat, scored more goals, looked more dangerous etc. e.g. We would have won against Motherwell but for Halkett's brain fart, there was fuck all Stendel could do about that. Levein should have been out long before he was and Budge again showed how hopeless she is by taking so long to get a new man in, then bringing him in early December with a mass of upcoming fixtures and the squad in total turmoil. She fucked him over putting the new guy in at that point. 

As for catching Rangers at a good time, maybe so but as I say he won both games against them, two Tynecaste wins over them, something Levein never managed in over 20 such matches.

[Mikey]

Never seen such a demonstrably shite manager so vigorously defended

I guess not being Levein and pulling some funny faces buys you a lot of goodwill.

All the talk of gegenpress and philosophies pulling the wool over folk's eye.

In reality, it was like watching the Alamo. That fucking St Johnstone game when we could have conceded about 10

[Cheeky Gnando’s]

Budge was talking about having to ship players out 4 days after he signed

https://www.edinburghnews.scotsman.com/s...ut-1337888

That would be some going if she's lied to him to get him and then said that to the media a few days later. Who knows though.

Just irritates me when folk use Hearts having no money for players as an excuse for his results (not saying you are). It's Hearts ffs. That has been the story of our history.

It does rankle with me that he was asked to work under conditions that Levein wasn't and that Levein's incompetence and his/Budge's profligacy impacted on his ability to put a team together.

What I am absolutely convinced of is that he was told the squad was great, ready to turn a corner etc - all the shit we were fed for months before Levein eventually got (kind of) binned. He's arrived and realised pretty quickly how bad the group was and how ill-equipped they were to play the way he wanted. I can see a scenario where he's been told that it would be players out before players in and accepted it, but been misled about the standard of the squad - since Budge is clueless and believed the shit Levein was feeding her, this wouldn't even have been intentional.

It's not an excuse for him, true, and I always said he deserves hefty criticism if we got relegated - he should have had enough to get us clear of trouble, and while I still think he would have in the end, the fact we are still in this position with less than a quarter of the season to go is dreadful. On the other hand, he wasn't supported in any meaningful way and that's why I'll always hold back from properly tearing into him.

[Hendricks]

Never seen such a demonstrably shite manager so vigorously defended

I guess not being Levein and pulling some funny faces buys you a lot of goodwill.

He took charge of less than 20 games. Forming such an opinion given what he walked into is daft. It was going to take any manager "not Levein" a lot longer than that to sort things out. It might still even if Stendel is away.

[CritchSmile]

For balance, the conditions Budge set for Stendel was shocking and the players could smell that lack of support.'
What a weird club.

[Real Spencer]

11 points from a possible  45 and what is likely to be his final game is one which will ultimately cost this club millions 

Others are far more culpable than Stendel. His reign was pure shite though

[Hendricks]

The whole culture at the club is rotten. There is no ethos, no willingness for anyone to do better or improve themselves or the club. The attitude of the players is absolutely disgusting and it's set from the very top to the bottom.

If the director of football is overshadowing the manager at every turn (see Cathro), then who are the players going to respect? Not here to defend Cathro but he was being undercut and disrespected from the outset. Accusations that Levein was picking the team and still signing players. The embarrassing scenario of Levein passing notes down from the stand to Cathro and then two minutes later subs and tactical changes would be made accordingly.

Members of Cathro's failed backroom team are allowed to stay. Guys like Daly because he's a Levein yes man. MacPhee somehow stays because he's a snake oil salesman and convinces people he's a master tactician. But no one takes any responsibility, Daly and MacPhee both chuck Cathro under the bus and question his training methods and team fitness (newsflash lads, you're the fucking coaches, you're partly responsible as well). Then the director of football becomes manager.

And then that DoF comes in, the man who appointed the previous manager and effectively ran the team, picked the side and signed the players, gets the manager's gig. He shows up twice a week at most for training and lets the two coaches, Daly and MacPhee, the two men who were part of the Cathro shit show and couldn't even stand up to him, are given responsibility to run the show in Levein's absence.

And because Levein isn't there the majority of the time it breeds contempt. Players slack off. Other players are favoured as they become yes men to Levein because they get an easy ride. Other players then start getting allowed to train and rock up as and when they please. Just fucking look at the laughable deal we dished out to Whelan. Come up from down south one a week to play and then can train from home. And glass knees Naismtih then allowed to train from home.

So inevitably when Levein gets binned and a new manager comes along he's up against it straight away to try and turn around the mentality of the slackers in our squad. And the previous manager still lingers around the club, at the training ground, at reserves games, at the stadium. What message does that send out? Who are the players going to react to? The new guy whose come in and tried to implement new ideas and make the players work hard, or the previous manager who gave them an easy ride and is still creeping about and is undoubtedly still in touch with them.

We are ultimately a club that has consistently rewarded failure and created a culture as such. The atmosphere and ethos of the club is utterly vile. I'm not going to put forward a case for defending Stendel here as he's made plenty mistakes, but whoever came in was really up against it with the previous manager still lurking about and toil to get a reaction from the players.

Very good post. It's honestly ridiculous that people think everything was going change in a couple of months considering how much damage Levein had done to the first team. I believe there are grounds for certain criticisms of Stendel, not changing the keeper quick enough was definitely one mistake but judging him on this very short period given what had come before is nonsense.

[Zizou]

It does rankle with me that he was asked to work under conditions that Levein wasn't and that Levein's incompetence and his/Budge's profligacy impacted on his ability to put a team together.

What I am absolutely convinced of is that he was told the squad was great, ready to turn a corner etc - all the shit we were fed for months before Levein eventually got (kind of) binned. He's arrived and realised pretty quickly how bad the group was and how ill-equipped they were to play the way he wanted. I can see a scenario where he's been told that it would be players out before players in and accepted it, but been misled about the standard of the squad - since Budge is clueless and believed the shit Levein was feeding her, this wouldn't even have been intentional.

It's not an excuse for him, true, and I always said he deserves hefty criticism if we got relegated - he should have had enough to get us clear of trouble, and while I still think he would have in the end, the fact we are still in this position with less than a quarter of the season to go is dreadful. On the other hand, he wasn't supported in any meaningful way and that's why I'll always hold back from properly tearing into him.

There does appear to be some sort of miscommunication or misleading somewhere but if he hadn't done in his research in the month or so it took to get him then that is pretty poor. He'd have only had to watch one game to see the state of it.

Spiers got a lot of stick for his unkempt comment in the press conference (rightly so) but his wider point about how the whole thing felt off and neither Budge or Stendel looked like they wanted to be there was spot on. There's just something not right about him at Hearts and I think this contract situation shows what he was thinking regarding to a long term project here. My gut feeling is he saw this as a wee diddy league he could impress in and get back to England quickly.

[Billy Butcher]

Equally I've never seen a manager who has been given so many asterisks next to anything positive he's done. We've just seen 'the Rangers wins don't count as other teams beat them' put forward as an argument.

It's a bit of both. He wasn't great and should have had the common sense to change some of his tactics when it was clear they weren't working and we were having to chase games against diddies after going 2 or 3 down. However, he had a difficult hand with the whole ethos of the club - senior players laughing at him in training because they knew Levein pulled the strings in reality (that's not to the first time we've seen that, btw), for example.

I honestly don't know if any realistic candidate could have done any better considering the circumstances - there is absolutely no point in bringing up Robinson, Wright or any experienced manager that had a clue about Hearts because there is no chance they would have touched the job with Levein kicking about.

[Cheeky Gnando’s]

For balance, the conditions Budge set for Stendel was shocking and the players could smell that lack of support.'
What a weird club.

100%. As much as his time in charge really isn't good enough, this is important context. HTG sets out pretty well how much of a basket case we became, and to then give him restrictions like *not having his own coaching staff* after hiring him to sort things out? Mental.

[Kashinda]

Absolutely baffles me that we beat Rangers twice and beat Hibs 3-1 at ER but couldn't beat shite times at numerous times of asking.

Give the gig to Lockie.

[Zizou]

Equally I've never seen a manager who has been given so many asterisks next to anything positive he's done. We've just seen 'the Rangers wins don't count as other teams beat them' put forward as an argument.

It's a bit of both. He wasn't great and should have had the common sense to change some of his tactics when it was clear they weren't working and we were having to chase games against diddies after going 2 or 3 down. However, he had a difficult hand with the whole ethos of the club - senior players laughing at him in training because they knew Levein pulled the strings in reality (that's not to the first time we've seen that, btw), for example.

I honestly don't know if any realistic candidate could have done any better considering the circumstances - there is absolutely no point in bringing up Robinson, Wright or any experienced manager that had a clue about Hearts because there is no chance they would have touched the job with Levein kicking about.

Rangers completely collapsed at that time. It's up to you how you view it but it wasn't some magnificent achievement to beat them. Hamilton did it at Ibrox a week later. Same goes for Cathro's 4-0 hammering of them.

It's one of the few positive things he actually managed though so can give him it.

[Big Physical Acey]

Stendel and Levein were both shite.

The St Johnstone game took about five years off my life expectancy.

[Drederick Shanktum]

Hamilton winning back to back games against the huns and Motherwell. Has really fucked us