Thumbheed
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Posts posted by Thumbheed
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30 minutes ago, et tu brute said:
I will certainly criticise him for it and his abortion of team selections. The bloke was a massive part of the problem under Bruce and it has been plain to see this during the last three games. He needs kicked out asap or dropped down to a lower level.
I am surprised there's not been more intensity in the team, hence why I question the fitness levels, but I didn't think he'd come anyway near undoing whats been (or hasn't been) instilled into the team these past 2 years, I think our issues on the field go way past tactics, formations, style of play and team selections tbh.
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Won't criticise him at all for how we play but the fact there hasn't seem been any improvement in the team fitness levels is inexcusable.
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Come full circle now.
Name me a top manager who hasn't had any failings in their career and started right at the top? Of course there may be some, but the vast majority will have made the step from a smaller club to a huge one and the truth of the matter is that if Howe was employed by a huge club at any point before his relegation at Bournemouth, not many would have batted an eyelid.
There's a unique opportunity for him to test his skills out at a club aiming to be a prominent club and there's not many of those clubs about, in many ways, this could be the perfect role for him.
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2.5 years is what Rafa has left on his contract too...
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17 minutes ago, Colos Short and Curlies said:
You would hope that (a) there is a self awareness of this and (b) funds available to bring in a decent defensive coach to address it
I'd be very very surprised if either were true.
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Had a bit more of a think about Howe getting the job and I'm starting to come round to it a bit more.
After results, the next best measure of the quality of a manager is their ability to improve players so when you look through some of the players he's added value to then it's actually quite a sizeable and impressive list of players. If he can put some shine back on some of the players who've fallen by the wayside under Bruce, he could have some good success here.
Having said that, my concerns about his supposed inabilty to coach a defensive unit still remain.
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Not vehemently against Howe being appointed but I just don't see a manager that will be able to give us the edge and steel we desperately need for a relegation battle.
What he did at Bournemouth was genuinely impressive irrespective of net outlay and their eventual relegation, but what can't be ignored is the fact that when he was managing, he was up against a closed shop top 6 and 14 others all capable of beating each other, you look at the league now and it's a far more settled top 10/11, with most of those teams having settled squads with plenty of quality throughout them, a top manager or in most cases both. Outside of those top 10/11 you then have 3-4 teams with some real top quality players in their side.
Getting us out this predicament is not gonna be an easy task and I just can't see how Howe would bring us to the performance level we'd need to compete against these teams.
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2 minutes ago, STM said:
While we are on Martinez, the over reaction to that possibility completely outweighs reality. Martinez wouldn't be my preferred choice, largely because I don't like him but to suggest he is an outright worse candidate to Favre/Fonseca is naive.
His record is arguably better than theirs. Don't fall into the romantics of an untested manager from aboard because that could go either way too.
I remember a clamour for Remi Garde.
I don't think it is though. Favre in particular has a good track record at most clubs he's managed and Fonseca has also shown the ability to raise the performance of a team beyond their expected standard, whereas Martinez had Wigan pretty much where they'd expect to be (battling relegation) and would often spend large parts of the season in relegation places until a sporadic 5 games blitz of form. OK, he won an FA Cup but I wouldn't judge a manager's career solely on one cup tournament. Then by all accounts he benefitted greatly from a defence that was well set by his predecessor at Everton and undid that in the following season. The final point is that you can't judge a managers ability on their international record due to the vast difference in quality of opposition teams play. His biggest achievement with that squad is a Semi final with one of the best squads in international football.
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27 minutes ago, SUPERTOON said:
Not many are complaining with the time it’s taking, the discussion is simply saying for the majority of us we would be unhappy with Martinez which based on his managerial career is a very fair statement.Oh aye, yeh!
My bad, should probably have read the full conversation, but yeh, Martinez would be a massive disappointment, if he can't do it with the golden generation of Belgium, I don't know what makes anyone think he could do it with a similar standard of player here.
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1 hour ago, 54 said:
There are some proper melts in this thread. 3 weeks ago we where stuck with Brucey ball and Ashley, take a chill pill
My personal timeliness of managers is:
Keegan
Dalglish
Gullit
SBR
Souness
Roeder
Allardyce
Keegan
Kinnear
Hughton
Pardew
McClaren
Rafa
Bruce
Keegan and SBR aside, no other appointment had the consideration these guys seem to be making. I've waited 20+ for this to happen, I can afford to wait a little longer.
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42 minutes ago, Joey47 said:
If we get the right guy it won't take long before he turns "unwinnable" games into winnable ones. How many games did we feel were unwinnable under Rafa?
Unwinnable games being the top 6 or whatever, we'd be naive to assume we can bridge that gap quickly.
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I have faith the they're doing the right thing, but my concern is we could feasibly be a 1/3rd of the way through the season without a win, with about 8-10 unwinnable games after that. Its easy to look at the league and say we're only 2 wins away but that doesn't take into account that other teams have better runs and more stability.
Having said that, the January window is gonna be mental and I am here for the ride.
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14 minutes ago, gdm said:
I think we are fucking about trying to convince Rafa.
There's a convenience to this for all parties concerned, Everton can save face with it being an unpopular appointment, Rafa can say the club made it clear the option was on the table and would be happy for him to go and we get our man
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Much prefer it when we just had 2 threads of the same posters calling each other cunts tbh
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1 minute ago, The Prophet said:
It'd class. I was saying to my mate, its such a strange feeling, obviously I don't want us to go down, but I wouldn't even be that possed if we did, as we now have owners who would do what is necessary to get us straight back up.
It's mad ain't it? Still have to pinch myself that our future is affectively secured.
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Just as a side note, how mint is it to actually have an active forum with multiple threads getting contributed to?
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Rafa would still be my first choice. 0% chance of it happening but he ticks every single box.
Whilst his style of play was more functional than anything else, I found it cathartic having a manager who was actually able to implement a clear identity on the team and have us defensively organised. Furthermore, that period after Almiron signed was one of the best spells we'd seen at the club since 2008 when Keegan had Owen playing as a number 10. I choose to beleive that period would be more indicative of what he'd achieve with some funds rather than the prior 18 months when he was managing uphill.
Not to mention he's been the only manager to engage football at a grassroot level since Keegan himself, he just gets it.
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1 hour ago, The Prophet said:
Any particular reason Fonseca isn't good enough? I caught his last season at Roma, but don't know loads about him.
His spell at Roma suggests his attacking play came at the expense of defensive solidarity, and our defense is literally our weakest area which to me doesn't bode well in a league where there's high quality players distributed throughout the league and where any team can beat anyone.
There's been plenty of well coached sides (albeit smaller sides) who played with attacking intent but haven't had the quality nor the defensive stability that's required to survive in the league and I see us in a similar position where we don't really have a dearth of outstanding attacking quality that makes us stand out from our rivals, couple that with the fact we're still a long way from the Jan window and we could find ourselves in a difficult spot if we don't get this right. Our Dec fixtures are horrific - do I fancy going into those games playing nice stuff but leaving ourselves defensively vulnerable? Nah.
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4 minutes ago, HaydnNUFC said:
I think you may be surprised. We have no semblence of any plan or identity either going forward or defensively. We sit off teams in spite of clearly not being coached well enough defensively and our attacking plan is pass the ball to Saint-Maximin and hope he runs past 3 or 4 defenders before assisting Wilson. A new manager will change that because Bruce is just that bad, Villa is a prime example. Look at the mess they were under Bruce, they bring in Dean Smith from Brentford and he completely turns them around. Fonseca can do that imo.
I guess we'll see.
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We've still got 10.games to play against the traditional top 6 (except Leicester) and then there's alot of handy and settled teams outside of that, so not sure we're gonna blow teams away with like of ASM, Almiron, Willock and Wilson like we think we might.
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5 minutes ago, KaKa said:
I think our strength is more in forward areas and so we probably actually need someone that can make the most of that and that can sometimes be the best form of defence in actuality.
How many times have we had over 50% possession in the last 4 years?
I think we're in for a rude awakening if we think someone's gonna come in and turn that round with a squad that's geared towards playing on the counter.
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10 minutes ago, SAK said:
I didn’t read anywhere that having the same chairman was blocked, lots of senior managers have directorships across different companies?
The Guardian has it down as the clubs voting to "temporarily ban commercial arrangements that involve pre-existing business relationships".
As for the point about senior managers having directorship over a number of companies, well I assume the ban would include them too, but not preexisting commercial arrangements, conveniently enough.
Suppose the bottom line is though that this won't stand up to any sort of scrutiny anyway.
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7 minutes ago, SAK said:
But as Aramco aren’t owned by PIF this new rule can’t stop them sponsoring us.
https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/mobile.reuters.com/article/amp/idUSKBN23O0VK
Al-Rumayyan is the chairman though.
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Fuck it.
Hope we get sponsored by beoutQ now.
PIF, PCP, and RB Sports & Media
in Football
Posted
I honestly depise this aspect of football so so much, it's pure cancer for the game, but after the way the PL treated us the past 18 months and with the media, pundits and other fans basically calling us cunts for the past 20 years, I would like nothing more than for us to take the absolute piss if it meant that everyone who is pissed off by our situation becomes even more pissed off.
Fuck 'em.