Rémi Garde has signed a three-and-a-half year contract to be the boss of Aston Villa, as Lerner and Fox gamble on the French man to prevent the club’s slide into the Championship.
With Garde’s managerial experience limited to being at the helm at Lyon for three years, there are no guarantees with Garde. The 49-year-old, did well with a far from vintage Lyon team, which had fallen from grace after dominating the French Ligue to being swamped by Paris St Germain’s new-found wealth. His Premier League experience is limited to playing 30-odd league games for Arsenal.
Bastia coach Reginald Ray is expected to become one of the Garde’s assistants, but Garde has not yet succeeded in bringing Gérald Baticle and Bruno Génésio to join him from Lyon.
There’s no doubt that Garde will probably have the incentive of a bonus payment if he can save Villa from the drop, considering his starting point.
Kevin MacDonald will continue in a caretaker capacity against Spurs on Monday evening, although Garde will be in the stands at White Hart Lane to see the task in hand with his own eyes, before kick-starting his Villa managerial career at Villa Park against Manchester City next week.
The prospect of Garde taking charge hasn’t exactly excited Villa supporters. In a MOMS poll asking who should be the next Villa boss, only 11% of fans voted for the French man. The favourite amongst the couple of thousand fans that voted was David Moyes with 34% of the vote.
Of course, there were no guarantees of success for whoever came in as Villa boss with concerns over the quality of the current squad. The logic of Garde being chosen is he could be a good fit for the club’s transition into a more ‘European’/’Moneyball’ style of set-up in terms of player acquisition and squad management. Can Garde do a short-term survival job like his predecessor, remains the big question though.
Garde is a wildcard choice, nobody can currently deny that, but saying that, if one club is in need of something out of the left-field at the moment, it’s Aston Villa FC.
Follow MOMS on Twitter – oldmansaid
Good job they’ve employed him before the Spurs game. After, he might not have been so interested. Hopefully, he doesn’t resign at at half time!
I don’t think it is a gamble, given the current position that we are in. If you gave Pep Guardiola the job it would still take a momentous effort and a hugh slice of luck to retain our premiership status this year. I think He’s here for the full three and a half years factoring in the possibility of us going down.
In my opinion on paper our squad is better than at least 3 other premiership clubs so if he can find the best 11 and inspire them to play as a team (not publicly criticize them) and choose a preffered system for our home games and stick to it. Wecome Remi, and don’t forget to say ‘Cheese’ on the team photograph
This will not be a popular appointment with the supporters. If the results don’t come, and come quickly the knives will be out. The club I have supported for 50 years destroyed by a bunch of total w……rs. RIP Villa
I think Garda a good fit and will give the team a boost with his tactics
Let’s face it the team did not have a tatic under dim Tim