Ian Holloway, your thoughts

I actually tried to join you're forum a good while ago but there were some problems receiving the emails from the Admin/mods. A lot has happened since then and we have obviously been promoted but I am still of the impression that we were promoted not because of Holloway but in spite of Holloway. I used to actually love seeing holloway on match of the day when he was in charge of Blackpool, but when I found out he was going to be managing us I just felt worried and I still do. If possible I would like to know your thought on the man as a manager and a person?
Thanks

Holloway did a great job here and revved up alot of fans into beliving in his vision, he had a good squad that could have gone on to reach the premiership if the board at the time sought new owners or investors. Upset alot of fans with his move to Leicester and his comments about the reasons why but in hindsight more fans should have take what he said as a neon sign saying WARNING ADMIN IS COMING but they should to back the chairman instead and the rest is history as they say,

As for Palace he will keep you in the fight next season thats for sure.

Angry wrote:

Holloway did a great job here and revved up alot of fans into beliving in his vision, he had a good squad that could have gone on to reach the premiership if the board at the time sought new owners or investors. Upset alot of fans with his move to Leicester and his comments about the reasons why but in hindsight more fans should have take what he said as a neon sign saying WARNING ADMIN IS COMING but they should to back the chairman instead and the rest is history as they say,

As for Palace he will keep you in the fight next season thats for sure.

You are more optimistic than me, thats for sure. To be honest I am not sure he knows anything other than attack and what with no Zaha and Murray out for six months minimum the only silver lining for me is I am not to bothered if we come straight back down. That may sound really weird me saying that but before we have always had a s**t or bust approach and we have busted. At least the money will do up our stadium as it really needs it. Either way it will be interesting to see who he brings in and it could be a lot worse I could support Brighton

A great coach for young players, a manager who know how to handle players. A man who can change things at half time and above all a manager who creates a team, on and off the park. You could do a lot worse.

CPFC2013 wrote:

Angry wrote:

Holloway did a great job here and revved up alot of fans into beliving in his vision, he had a good squad that could have gone on to reach the premiership if the board at the time sought new owners or investors. Upset alot of fans with his move to Leicester and his comments about the reasons why but in hindsight more fans should have take what he said as a neon sign saying WARNING ADMIN IS COMING but they should to back the chairman instead and the rest is history as they say,

As for Palace he will keep you in the fight next season thats for sure.

You are more optimistic than me, thats for sure. To be honest I am not sure he knows anything other than attack and what with no Zaha and Murray out for six months minimum the only silver lining for me is I am not to bothered if we come straight back down. That may sound really weird me saying that but before we have always had a s**t or bust approach and we have busted. At least the money will do up our stadium as it really needs it. Either way it will be interesting to see who he brings in and it could be a lot worse I could support Brighton

You only have to look at the job he did at blackpool when he took them up they caused some upsets and held their own so there is every chance he could do the same for palace.

All depends who you buy now IMO.

Holloway almost kept Blackpool up without anywhere near enough investment but you have far more potential than them.

Murray's injury was a big blow and you still made it. The cash for Zaha was a great deal especially as he stayed on loan but I think you need to replace them wisely with proven players. You seem to have a really good youth system, or you've been very fortunate with youngsters recently, which helps.

Exciting times for the Eagles.

As a man I don't like him but as a manager then that's different. It depends what Palace do in the market rather than who they have as a manager in my opinion. Take the dosh and don't buy and you will yo yo for a couple of seasons but be flush at the end of it. Also depends on your owner and whether he pockets the dosh himself and legs it or invests it wisely in the future. I'll bet Holloway doesn't stay though. The man has no stickability whatsoever and the first sign of him not getting his cut and budget wants he will be off.

By the way I agree with you that you were promoted despite him this time rather than because of him. He inherited a top club and they nearly blew it.

I'd take Holloway back in a heartbeat.

He made us believe we were good and could take on the big teams and actually win and he brought believe back to home park.

He left after the previous board sold one of the best teams to wear the shirt in recent memory, a team he built.

Certain supporters class him as a Judas and call him hollowords, I class him as one of my favourite managers and I wish he would come back and finish the job he started.

From his time at Argyle you're not too far off the mark when you say his only tactic is attack but if you take a look at our defensive stats during his time here, they were definately decent. What he lacks tactically he 'can' more than make up for psychologically with his 'never say die' attitude. Also consider the coaching staff around him (admittedly his responsibility but nonetheless can make all the difference).

The man's an inspiration and a great motivator under the right circumstances. If your board back him to the best of their ability he'll deliver the best he can. He's a decent bloke with ambition but doesn't suffer fools, treat him fairly and stick with him is my opinion. Good luck in the prem.

We had a really good side under Holloway, played very good football and it was fun. Isn't that what we all want as fans? Damon's view is obviously spot on.

Sensiblegreeny wrote:

As a man I don't like him but as a manager then that's different. It depends what Palace do in the market rather than who they have as a manager in my opinion. Take the dosh and don't buy and you will yo yo for a couple of seasons but be flush at the end of it. Also depends on your owner and whether he pockets the dosh himself and legs it or invests it wisely in the future. I'll bet Holloway doesn't stay though. The man has no stickability whatsoever and the first sign of him not getting his cut and budget wants he will be off.

By the way I agree with you that you were promoted despite him this time rather than because of him. He inherited a top club and they nearly blew it.

Holloway as a player [and he was a very good one] played 400 matches for Bristol Rovers and 150 for QPR.He was manager for 5 years at Bristol Rovers,5 years at QPR and 3 years at Blackpool,which would suggest that he is hardly a man with "no stickability whatsoever".The only lack of "stickability" he showed was in walking out on Argyle,which in view of what happened at the club afterwards, was a very wise move and one which was also followed by another manager in Pulis who went on to achieve great things at another club.Also very dodgy to suggest that Palace got promotion in spite of him.Certainly makes you wonder how the hell he managed to get QPR and Blackpool promoted in earlier times if that was the case.I do agree that Palace's status retention will depend almost entirely on the funding given to the manager though.Highly unlikely that the current squad is good enough to survive but Palace will almost certainly have better resources than Blackpool,who actually almost stayed up under Holloway's management,so i would by no means rule out Palace doing OK if the circumstances are right.

i was one of those at leicester singing at holloway. before i knew the facts!

the man was a man manager, man! he knows how to put together a squad and how to motivate supporters, and id have him back anyday. just a shame our board at the time were so outclassed and out of their depth.

anyhoo, best of luck next season.

I don't think he's the smartest man in the world, and Plan B was always throw two strikers on and see what happens.

He left us in the shit but I'm not sure I blame him for that.

He did inspire the team and gave the place a belief for all of half a season that we could compete with the bigger clubs, and brought in players we weren't used to seeing in terms of quality (along with a number of Cherno Samba type signings).

He won't be overawed by the challenge and hopefully that rubs off on your squad, but I'd given him the nickname 'Hollowhead' long before he shat on us, and his media persona is a LOT more bearable if you're winning games. If you start losing, you'll want to slap him around.

He couldnt win this season with Palace. If he got you promoted easily it would have been Freedman's fault. If he failed it would have been his fault. If he did what he did than it's somewhere in between.

Excelllent man-manager. Not the most tactically fluid- often he would just throw more strikers on but very often it worked a treat in spite of its predictability. He and his scouting team always had a great eye for picking out gems too. All in all a very good manager and one that has got results at every club he's been at aside from Leicester.

Looking at it from the outside, I don't think he's done such a bad job at Palace either. He's certainly declined them from their form when Freedman was in charge but I think that side would have declined a little whoever took over. Dougie overachieved to an insane extent to get them top of that league in the first place imo. If Holloway's form was extrapolated over a season, Palace would have come 8th or 9th and that's not even including the three excellent play-off games. I think that's hardly bad.

As for his leaving us, I agree with the majority of this thread in that he could obviously foresee the troubles that were to come and got out for that reason. That said, I imagine he probably foresaw the problems ten days earlier when he was proclaiming his green blood and the ridiculousness of the rumours linking him with a move. So I can understand why an element of bitterness remains for that. Holloway did however apologise for the way in which he left us many times after, so I personally retain no bitterness towards him.

Personally I think he'll have a real struggle keeping you up and you'll quite probably come bottom, I'm sorry to say. I just don't think the team is quite up to standards and you'll be without Zaha as well as Murray for much of the season too. There'd have to be big investment to keep you up in my opinion.

its that word again, overacheived. you acheive what you acheive, pedanticly, you cant overacheive, the concept does not exist

Away from football issues, a friend met him briefly through her job. She described him as rude, sexist and arrogant.

He's a very good man-manager & created a united team atmosphere. You need to be on the look-out when he claims he bleeds red & blue......

I'm just as intrigued about why Freedman left. A palace supporting friend of mine thinks there were behind the scenes issues about money but suspects there's another story there as well.

Some prefer to call him Hollowman.....he has ability and can get players playing for him.

BUT.....don't expect any long time loyalty from him.

He left Plymouth under a cloud....ok he new more than we did what was going to happen.

Signing his book in the city and kissing the badge one minute and then jumping in his car and sodding off to Leicester because they had more potential the next. A lot of people couldn't bring themselves to read his book after that and left it on the shelf or strait in the dustbin or charity shop.

Sweetest moment of the season was to go up there a few months later and win 1-0......and watch them get relegated....and soon it's good-bye Hollowman.

Am I right in thinking that he's got as many relegations on his CV as promotions?

ZYPH wrote:

Some prefer to call him Hollowman.....he has ability and can get players playing for him.

BUT.....don't expect any long time loyalty from him.

He left Plymouth under a cloud....ok he new more than we did what was going to happen.

Signing his book in the city and kissing the badge one minute and then jumping in his car and sodding off to Leicester because they had more potential the next. A lot of people couldn't bring themselves to read his book after that and left it on the shelf or strait in the dustbin or charity shop.

Sweetest moment of the season was to go up there a few months later and win 1-0......and watch them get relegated....and soon it's good-bye Hollowman.

Sensiblegreeny's Xmas present that year was a signed copy of that book. His face was a picture when he opened it.

He did, to his credit, say this...

Quote :

I had a year out of football and had to think about what went wrong in my life. I was given some decent values from my mum and dad in our council house, and one of them was honesty and trust and loyalty. And I forgot to do all that at Plymouth. I left them. And I made the biggest mistake of my life.

I liked Ollie and he was proved right in the end with Staplewallet not funding the team and selling off our good players

Ollie always had a go and if we was 2-1 down he would shove as many forwards on to at least try and get a goal unlike managers like Luggy and Fletcher

Ollie also could find a good striker he got Ebanks and Hayles in