I don't think the football he was playing at Palace was entirely rugby football. Of course, it was based around organised defence and lots of men back, but think he had them countering with pacy players as opposed to just hoofing it up field and knocking the shite out of the other team.
Don't think you can blame Palace for not wanting to hand him the reigns to the transfers given the amount he splurged at Stoke. Don't think you can completely blame him for wanting to manage on his own terms. Just one of those things.
Good post mate. I agree that while Palace weren't the most aesthetically pleasing team to watch they weren't kicking lumps out of teams and using long-throws to score half their goals from like Stoke did under Pulis, or how West Ham play for the most part under Fat Sam most games. The fact that they had inferior players simply meant that they had to play a more defensive style and that worked for them. They actually played some pretty decent football once they were safe, the 3-1 or 3-2 win at Everton late in the season comes to mind.
He did splurge quite heavily with Stoke but Palace are a club that have a tiny budget compared to all other PL clubs, probably less than everyone in the PL apart from Burnley, and most likely less than several Championship clubs too. As you say he can understandably be annoyed that the club weren't willing to spend on players like Sigurdsson (who would have been attainable as he was already living in London) or Caulker (who was also very attainable), but at the same time the club operates on really tight finances.
I can't help but think that he should have know this before, but his frustration probably boils down to the fact that this year would have been a better time than any for the club to spend money to consolidate their PL status, especially with safety virtually assured with a manager like Pulis in charge who will grind out enough points wherever he goes. The added TV prize money earned last year surely should have allowed Palace to be more active in the window than only spending £2m on Kelly and £800k on Campbell.
Had Pulis known that they were going to be this stingy I'm sure he would have made a decision earlier in the window, so with that in mind its quite likely that the board have gone back on promises with regards to summer spending. Either way though, the club will be in a terrible position now and the cost of not spending a few million extra in this window could very realistically come back to bite them tenfold next summer if they get relegated and lose up to £100m in revenues.
On another note, the availability of Pulis as a potential replacement will surely be very tempting indeed for some early relegation straglers who might just get a bit trigger happy knowing that a manager like Pulis could come in and save their skins instead of persisting with their current managers. Fat Sam and Paul Lambert are probably feeling the noose tightening ever so slightly today with today's news I would suspect, and will be under tremendous pressure to deliver now that there is a manager available who can work miracles on a low budget.
