Life President Douglas Ellis said he knew that Paul Lambert was the man for the job after seeing Norwich’s performance against us on the final day of the season.
Speaking to the Official Site Ellis said he came up with a list of three replacements should Alex McLeish move on, and Paul Lambert was one of them:
‘After the departure of Alex McLeish I came up with three names and one of the names was Paul Lambert. I was enthused about him after seeing Norwich play against Villa. Lambert’s Norwich team thoroughly impressed me. I knew then that if Alex was to leave then Paul would be the ideal man for the job and I’m glad that Randy and Paul went for him.’
I think the best comment is the following though. Ellis stresses that manager stability is the key to moving forward and he does have some sympathy with the board because he says appointments are never easy:
‘It’s important that there is stability in the manager’s chair if the club is to move forward. People will recall that I had 13 managers and that I sacked 11 of them, with Ron Saunders walking away to Birmingham and Graham Taylor asking for my permission to take the England job. People may think otherwise, but I understand the importance of managers having time.’
He continues:
‘The most successful managers I picked tended to be the ones who stayed longest, the better they do the less need there is to remove them from office.’
I’m just going to quietly chuckle to myself at the idea that a manager has a need to be removed from office from day 1 and the longer they last the less need there is to do just that.
Ahhh memories.
Ellis rightly ends by saying that Lambert will need time to stamp his mark on the team:
‘The new manager cannot be expected to do it overnight, he will need a season or two to make his mark and I am sure he will be given that and will do well.’
I never tire of the Paul Lambert Forum Thread.
Paul Lambert Profile.
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