Whatever the reasons, diplomatic Lambert has made the right decision
It only took three games, but the man many viewed as captain material upon his signing, has now been handled the captains armband. Ron Vlaar just screams skipper, and Paul Lambert has made the right call in installing the Dutch colossus as our captain, presumably for a while to come.
He has been extremely diplomatic in what he’s had to say regarding the matter, and here are the widely available quotes:
“I just wanted to give Darren a break, I just wanted him to concentrate on scoring goals. I think Darren at Newcastle the other week and against Swansea was excellent.
“He is playing well, but I thought I would change it and let him just concentrate on scoring goals.”
“Vlaar was amazing, I thought he was colossal.
“He’s not a young kid, he’s not 21, he has been at a huge football club himself and is a top player.”
I think he has got the whole matter spot on, has limited any possible disruption and made our most imposing player captain. Sounds good to me. Now we don’t know how Bent feels about the whole matter, because it did seem like he really wanted to be captain of our great club, but Lambert is right, his main priority has to be scoring goals.
He arguably had his best performance of the young season against Swansea, and if we can get Bent back amongst the goals, we’ll be laughing. I thought it was the right decision naming Bent as skipper in pre-season and for the first few matches, and I think it’s the right decision handing it to Vlaar now.
We’ve got a young team now, and all the clichés should apply about leading with or without the armband, and I think Bent as a senior player will help in that aspect. In such a young team and in defence in particular, Vlaar as captain can work perfectly. Many are of the feeling that strikers generally shouldn’t be named captain, due to not being involved as much as others, and I’m inclined to agree with that. Vlaar is a beast, already a fan favourite and is exactly the type of character we’ve been missing for a while.
As Lambert mentions Vlaar is no mug, has been at a number of top clubs previously and above all is the right man for the job. I think the manager has handled this matter extremely well, and I think this will allow both Vlaar and Bent to have more of an impact.
Well played gaffer!
UTV.
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Randy L. needs to do the same thing what he has done with his club at NFL. This time sell up to someone in the middle east and then get lost!
He is obviously obsessed with his continuous cut backs and there is no interest from him for AVFC to succeed in the league. So I can’t see the point for him to stick around??
Lambert or anyone else cannot do much with having small team of players who are not mainly suited to the premiership. Given the circumstances we need a miracle! We are destined to go down eventually and that is mainly the opinion from most other commentators. Unless we get a new owner who is willing to spend big! I understand Learner’s point of view for the cut backs however “if you can’t take the heat then it’s time to get out of the kitchen” The premiership definitely more than ever before is about the big fish who are ready spend and set high targets and Randy obviously has got no ba**s or the passion to do this so why stick around??
We are a big club with a long history were not here to settle for sh**y relegation battles. We should be a regular top 10 club if not even more. Over the years the premiership has become more and more about the big boys with the deep pockets, and Randy isn’t suited to this he has been failure for his team in USA as well. Even though on a personal level he has just made a tidy profit by selling up is NFL club for $1billion. I think the fans were glad to see the back off him, and I don’t think that profit is going to benefit AVFC either he couldn’t care less if we got relegated long as he can continue to cut back.
I know i have targeted the owner, but he is actually the reason why we have become a joke for last few seasons! There is no other solution to this problem, we can carry on buying players from lower leagues or getting different managers in and then after hoping for miracles, but the truth is that’s not going to make us survive in the top league! Randy must do us the same favour like he has done for his other club @USA, that would be our best chance for long term success long as we don’t end up with another american owner! You only have to look at Liverpool(destroyed), Man utd(fans hate the Glazers) and now AVFC…