Holmesy

Eddie’s job is to find a way to get the players we have working together in a system that fits them full stop (same as any other manager). And that includes our Germany international striker, our Congo international striker, our Brazil international, our Italy international and our 5 England internationals, not to mention the rest. The reason he can’t is because of his own rigidity. You can find all the excuses you want but everything points back to poor management this season. Fatique - find a system that manages energy. Poor summer signings - you signed them. Play to their strengths. We lost Isak - you’ve had 60 games to find a solution without him. Aging squad - you kept hold of players you should have let go of. Show us why. Players not giving 100% - re-engage them by doing something different. I wouldn’t give him another penny to spend, other than replacing outgoings. Show us you can adapt and find a way to get the current (very expensively assembled) players to work and then we’ll consider backing you again. He earns the right to stay another season based on what he’s done up to this point, but he has to show he can evolve. No more excuses! If he can’t/won’t, move on. Throwing more money at him just plays into his rigidity.

Totally agree. It’s fucking nonsense. 60 chances to get it right.

It’s literally his job to find a way to make it work. The reason it hasn’t is because he’s trying to do the same fucking thing that worked with Isak, but without Isak. It’s an argument that is designed to excuse Eddie’s performance in this dogshit season but it does the opposite - it draws more attention to the fact that he cannot adapt.

Come on man, be reasonable! You can’t use facts to back up a legitimate argument on here. Eddie won us the cup remember.

You do know that men chat women up, women chat men up, men chat men up and women chat women up, right? Is it merely the fact that I mentioned women that has offended your sensitivities? Would it be easier to stomach if I corrected the post to a person of non-specific gender identity chatting up other people of non-specific gender identities? Because the point still stands.

I also wasn’t devaluing women, but why let the truth stand in the way of a good bit of wokeness. I am a prick though - one out of three isn’t bad. Anyway, Eddie would kill for one of out three these days…

😀

Alright, I’m going to put this in a different context to see if you understand. You're out chatting women up. You use the same chat-up line 10 times, get slapped in the face 7 times and laughed at 3 times. The next night, you go again. Do you: a) Use the same chat-up line again because it’s the only one you’ve practiced, and blame it on the shoes you were wearing or b) Use a different chat-up line to try and change your fortunes with the ladies?

This is such a counterintuitive argument. His job is to find a way to win, not to find a way to win playing 4-3-3, man-to-man, high press. That’s entirely on him. He has had 50 games to figure it out and still hasn’t. Are the tools at his disposal shit? No, they’re international footballers. Are they as good as we would want them to be? No, but they’re not 14th place players. They’re not worse than Sunderland’s players or Brentford’s or Bournemouth’s or Everton’s. But the summer, the summer! Yeah, the summer was almost 12 months ago. 12 months he’s had to make it work with these players. It’s no longer a relevant argument. The summer can be used as an excuse for why we didn’t improve on last season, not why we’re utterly wank in most departments and would be battling relegation now if we hadn’t picked up early season points.

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I didn’t realise you were the world’s leading authority on the word momentum. I stand corrected and bow to your higher expertise.

Your second paragraph literally explains why he’s a momentum manager 😀 3.5 seasons of upward trend followed by one disaster, and now the momentum has stopped, he can’t get a tune out of the players (that he bought). What do we have to go on as evidence that he can turn it around when the momentum stops? We have none. What evidence do we have that he can’t? Bournemouth. The situations are almost identical.

There’s poor form and then there’s poor form caused by poor management. I’m fairly certain Rafa would have made it work at Everton if he’d been given time but the fans didn’t want him from day 1, and the Board realised they had made a mistake, and bowed to fan pressure. I agree with you that no one could have done what he did at Bournemouth and here, but Eddie is a momentum manager - it works for a while and then it doesn’t. The one thing he has not demonstrated is that he can turn it around when it doesn’t. Eddie is basically Bielsa at Leeds but with more money to spend. Is it inconceivable he turns it around? No. But I don’t think he can do it without significant changes to both playing staff and approach.

As I’ve said before, Rafa made us competitive in the PL with a team of largely championship players. If you can only play one way and can’t find a way to grind out results when injuries hit, you are a limited manager. Did he adapt the way they played that season to mitigate the injuries or did he keep playing exactly the same way with lesser players? I don’t even need to look up the answer and neither do you.

True but the comments he has made seem to suggest he will stick to one plan, one way of playing, same coaches etc. And I don’t think you can become a good in-game manager overnight. He used to play 4-4-2 at Bournemouth though, so there’s every chance he’ll do something different but I imagine it will be a close relative of what we’ve seen for 4.5 years.

You seem to be conveniently forgetting he also got Bournemouth relegated after failing to turn it around. He absolutely does not always turn it around.

It’s clear most of the Eddie diehards feel that way - it’s the only way they can feel really. I think there’s now a general acceptance that he won’t change, so it’s either more of the same or a new manager. I’m at the point now where more Eddie ball isn’t something I want, regardless of if it gets us back into Europe, because we’ve seen its limitations and his. I’d rather we had a manager with a higher ceiling, and that comes from adaptability and flexibility.

His pace is an asset but he’s so raw. He got through in the first couple of minutes, won a couple of free kicks. He’s the least of our problems right now. If only we had someone with the vision, weight of pass and technical ability to play him through…..

He’s our one technical player per team allowance. Notice he was taken off when Wolte came on. There can be only one!

It’s not as simple as that, as has been discussed a billion times. Managers go stale, their voices stop being heard, their ideas and methods become boring for players. It’s why the top managers change things to keep the experience fresh. Eddie doesn’t. What you call a sideways step will likely still give us new momentum. And it will also take the rest of the league a while to figure us out again. Our current guise has been well and truly figured out. For example, Arsenal have scored only two goals from a short corner in the past year (I think the commentator said), both against us.

That why he doesn’t play. We’re all about running around, not doing clever stuff.

We’re chod in every second half

Depends which toe

Woltemade unlocks Arsenal’s defence within 5 minutes of coming on. More than the rest have done for 80 minutes.

Glad someone knows the patterns