11pm

BD may only have left this morning, but rumours of his successor have started already!

Who should be the next Motherwell manager?  Cast your vote now!

4.20pm

At this afternoon's press conference, John Boyle made the following statement:

"I have to advise you that Billy Davies has today left Motherwell Football Club. Pat Nevin, Billy Davies and myself had a meeting this morning at which Billy agreed that it would be in the best interests of the Club if he was to relinquish his position as Manager and leave the Club. We agreed to accept his decision. He is leaving on entirely amicable terms.

"This is a sad day and I’d like to thank Billy for the work he has done. No one could doubt his commitment and enthusiasm. Everyone at Motherwell Football Club wishes him all the best for his future career.

"That said things have not been going well for a while as a look at the league table will confirm. The Directors will be seeking applications for the position of Manager and hope that the added impetus the appointment will give can help improve our League position.

"The Board understands the frustration felt by some of our supporters and are determined to restore the Club’s fortunes.

"Miodrag Krivokapic and John Philliben will jointly take charge of the team until a new appointment is made."

1.30pm

Radio Clyde are reporting that John Aldridge is favourite to take over from BD.  Spot the Tranmere connection...?

11.00am

THE OFFICIAL MOTHERWELL WEBSITE REPORTS THAT BILLY DAVIES HAS BEEN SACKED!!!

Pat Nevin confirms that BD is no longer in charge, and a press conference will be held later in the day.

BD's record in charge of Motherwell was 41 wins from 136 games.

More details as soon as we receive them.

Davies Sacked - Unofficial Motherwell Homepage comment:

Ricky - "Billy never really had much chance to succeed at Fir Park.  Consistently having the rug pulled from under his feet Billy never had the chance to get consistency going.  Having said that, he did himself no favours with some strange decisions on the park.  I backed Davies as much as I possibly could but in the past few weeks felt this could no longer continue and with no credibility left he had to go."

James - "I think this is great news and not before time either.  I will shed no tears at BD's departure and am of the opinion that he should never have been appointed in the first place.  Surely the next step must be to get rid of his backroom team too, as despite appointing a defensive coach we have one of the worst goals-against records in the country.  His scouting network will definitely also have to be looked at, as some of our recent signings are clearly not of SPL standard.

"I will give BD credit for his first season in charge, when we came close to qualifying for Europe, but if truth be told we should have had the European place tied up around February but instead allowed Hearts to overtake us.  Since then he has been forced to move on a number of our so-called "star" players and replace them with free transfers and Bosmans.  These were obviously difficult circumstances to work under, but the likes of Hearts have also been forced to sell their top players and Livingston have bought practically an entire team of Bosman signings, both with far greater success than Motherwell.

"I think the final straw came in the last few weeks when BD started playing players woefully out of position.  His tactics and team selections in recent weeks smacked of sheer desperation." 

Ricky's report of the Rangers game is now available.

In today's Daily Record, 'Well legend Willie Pettigrew predicts that Billy Davies has only two weeks left to save his job.  Pettigrew, a regular at Fir Park, says that BD has Saturday's game against Hearts, the CIS League Cup tie with Airdrie and the visit to fellow strugglers St Johnstone to turn things around:
"I'm Motherwell through and through and hardly ever miss a game. I don't know Billy but as long as he's the manager everyone should get behind him.  I certainly have a great deal of sympathy for him because of the conditions he's been forced to work under. But I think these next three games are crucial. Billy needs to get four points, at least, from the league matches and defeat against Airdrie is unthinkable.  Billy is having a hard time and the fans have put him under real pressure and are having a go, which I don't like to see.  At the moment the team are just not good enough but I hope they prove me wrong.  It's difficult not to feel sorry for the manager because he's had to downsize his squad, which happens in business, and it takes a hard man to do that.  I just wonder if Billy has the experience to cope with everything which has gone on at Motherwell over the past few months.  At the end of last season we saw a wholesale slaughter of the squad. We must have lost seven or eight players. He's really had the feet pulled from under him.  Billy has done well with what he's had to work with but I do think he may be running out of time.  We are already in a relegation battle with St Johnstone in two weeks and if they beat us then I think we're down."

 Pettigrew went on to say that he defended John Boyle, but believes the players must take some of the blame for our poor start to the season:
"They aren't doing enough to help their manager. There is a lack of leadership on and off the park and I would like to see some of the older players helping out the youngsters.  We do have a good crop of young lads but they are suffering right now and I would like to see guys like David Kelly and Stuart Elliott lead the way a bit more.  We got rid of all the big names who were brought in and the manager just hasn't had the money to replace them properly.  He's brought in guys, if not on the cheap, then certainly not of the same quality of the players who left.  I wouldn't criticise Boyle because he's a businessman and couldn't allow the club to continue losing so much money.  He should have known Motherwell have never had big crowds, even when we were doing well. We have 7,000 die-hard fans and that number isn't going to grow right now because the team aren't doing it on the park.  You wouldn't go into a supermarket if it was filled with 99p shops, would you?"

Looking forward to Saturday's game against Hearts, Pettigrew added:
"This is a massive game for us because already there is a bit of daylight between bottom and top.  We can't afford to be relegated. It would be difficult to come back up right away as the First Division is a competitive league.  I have been there through the bad times and good times and I know Motherwell will recover from this. I just hope for Billy's sake it happens soon."

Enter our new Prediction League  - cash prizes to be won!