St. Maximin

17 hours ago, Optimistic Nut said:

 

"Without fans".

 

They were averaging 28k plus in the third tier. 

 

They're also the last of the "hit the jackpot" clubs that FFP has made sure must not happen again. Why can't a Derby or Peterborough for example dream of getting the oil baron takeover and become the best team in the world? It's a once a generation thing, but it's just not allowed to happen anymore. 

 

That's why I hope City win the lot while the clubs most intent on keeping everyone else down, continue to miss out to them.

 

 

 

Obviously they do have fans. I was attempting to paraphrase Lordshola in his post I quoted, though I did miss out the word ‘real’.
 

I can still understand why he has that view though. As Froggy said their attendances are significantly below those of the other biggest clubs. Seems impossible to get tickets to most games here in London. 
 

People have such a desire to see clubs fail based on a few actions of their managers or the small sample of fans they’ve met of those teams. Each to their own, but it just means the same team wins every time and that is surely really boring for football. 

2 minutes ago, Lordshola said:

It’s because it just doesn’t really mean anything to anyone. They are a cheating, manufactured club with no real fans and we all know it.

 

It’s just fantastic that the likes of Klopp and Arteta are kept away from winning the league as well…

Well it’s exactly that which confuses people. It’s not good for football that a cheating, manufactured club without fans gets to win arguably the best league every year, just to ensure teams with real fans don’t win it because they have a manager that annoyed people. 

9 minutes ago, Geordie Ahmed said:

 A club does indeed go far deeper than the manager, it's the fans and that's where Arsenal/Liverpool are massively insufferable meanwhile City fans are irrelevant

I think it’s all the same really. Every fanbase has its share of idiots that don’t represent them in general. We’re no exception, but it’s not stopped others from wrongly having this idea we’re all deluded with unrealistic explanations. 
 

City fans have seen their team go from nothing to dominant in pretty much no time during the last 15 years. No surprise we don’t come across many annoying fans given what they’ve been able to enjoy. Given how poor their atmosphere and attendances can be also, in many ways I prefer a more annoying fan base that seems to care than an irrelevant one. 

Each to their own here - I get why Klopp and Arteta aren’t liked but I really struggle to see why people would rather Man City win the league again. Even if you don’t have hatred for their manager, it’s surely really boring seeing the same team win again and again and getting to where they are through being able to spend extraordinarily before the other big teams could surely doesn’t help. 
 

Klopp and Arteta are just whinging idiots. A club goes far deeper than that the person managing. Surely nicer just seeing them not having something to complain about too. 

2 hours ago, TheBrownBottle said:

Yep.  And it’s no different from what’s went before - the difference being that in the past, the tournaments weren’t as bloated with so many beatable sides.  The Euros are a joke at this point.  Here’s England’s KO record post-1966:

 

1968 Yugoslavia (L)

1970 W Germany (L)

1986 Paraguay (W), Argentina (L)

1990 Belgium (W), Cameroon (W) W Germany (L)

1996 Spain (W) Germany (L)

1998 Argentina (L)

2002 Denmark (W) Brazil (L)

2004 Portugal (L)

2006 Ecuador (W) Portugal (L)

2010 Germany (L)

2012 Italy (L)

2016 Iceland (L)

2018 Colombia (W), Sweden (W), Croatia (L)

2020 Germany (W), Ukraine, (W), Denmqrk (W), Italy (L)

2022 Senegal (W), France (L)

 

England in that entire period have beaten major nations twice in KO football - Spain at Euro 96, Germany at Euro 20.  Both at Wembley, which likely isn’t coincidence - and that Germany side was utterly shite (Spain at Euro ‘96 weren’t much better).

 

Yugoslavia at Euro ‘68 and Iceland at Euro ‘16 are the only fixtures on that list where the result didn’t go the way most would have expected.  We don’t beat better teams, and nothing has changed under Southgate. 

 

 

 

Yeah I’d say in his defence, losing to the best teams isn’t a new thing for England (and there are plenty of things I maintain he deserves praise for). I don’t think you can argue he’s had favourable draws though (Sweden and Ukraine in particular as quarter-finals). I get the argument anyone can beat anyone at that level, but surely it becomes a theme when you typically beat the weaker teams and lose to the better ones over a few years. 
 

I’m all for humble pie if he can lead us to victory this summer mind. 

18 hours ago, Kid Icarus said:

Ah we're doing this nonsense again

If we’re talking about Southgate’s record of typically beating weaker teams and losing to the better teams in big tournaments, then I’m not sure what’s nonsensical about it. He’s our second most successful manager but you move the goalposts based on the standard of the squad and opposition. Colombia and Sweden sides missing their star players and Germany and Denmark sides at Wembley (all inferior sides) have been the biggest big tournament challenges he’s succeeded in. 

1 hour ago, Cf said:

 

In terms of xPts from understat we "should" have finished 15th and 16th. The football was obviously shit but we over performed which was pretty clear via eye test. The 16th was only a couple of points from relegation so a couple of key things falling the other way could have seen that as a relegation season quite easily. So no it wasn't great on paper. 

Yeah the football was horrendous without doubt, though my point was based on results he wasn’t a disaster and ultimately on paper we’re looking at eventual outcomes. 
 

I would say 15/16th didn’t seem terrible anyway with that squad and injuries we had. Bruce had a mare with Schar and Joelinton (even Howe didn’t initially think he was a centre mid though), but our star players were arguably Dubravka (a good midtable keeper then), Wilson (a great striker but often injured) and ASM (at times brilliant, but also regularly frustrates and was often injured). 
 

I seem to remember us finishing above Brighton, who weren’t far from relegation, yet their manager got a lot of praise and quite a few players were rated highly. 

On 20/03/2024 at 16:07, gjohnson said:

Bruce was abysmal plain and simple purely from a results perspective. Dalglish was dire but at least brought in the majority of Bobby's foundation, Souness who everyone knew was a walking disaster was at least brought in for a legitimate reason, despite it ending badly for us. Pardew was brought in as yes man, and did actually achieve something for a season at least despite his obvious limitations and obnoxiousness, MacLaren was a decent bloke but lacked the ability to do what he was trying. Benitez was an anomaly which either indicated a tempory respark of Ashleys interest or Charnleys incompetence at finding someone who wasnt put in his lap. Bruce didn't get results, wound everyone up and was clearly just FMA final insult cos he thought he would be able to beat the fans over the Keegan debacle and failed miserably

I know I’m not towing the party line here and of course results don’t tell us the bigger picture, but Bruce was not a disaster from a results perspective until the start of his final season. I think 13th and 12th was reasonable on paper given the squad he had and I’ve yet to see anyone suggest otherwise. 
 

His tactics were dreadful (or non-existent) but I think the main cause of hostility was he was a classless and lazy idiot. 

3 hours ago, Sibierski said:

We had Gallagher in a more defensive role yesterday, get regularly bypassed by Brazil and defence exposed loads by simple balls. So it wouldn’t be any more exposed.

 

Sick of watching England in the games against ‘named’ sides, and Southgate take the cautious, pragmatic approach. Why our record is so poor in them, like 4 wins in 25 against top 10 ranked countries at the time? 

 

Argument mostly comes down to, a defensive approach wins tournaments. But how about trying our own approach and changing that narrative whilst we’ve got an abundance of exciting attacking talent. Maguire is Maguire, we’ll concede one from a mistake in big games regardless, but at set up to create more and hopefully score more. 

I think the idea you should be defensive to win tournaments is a bit backward tbh. France weren’t great to watch in 2018, but I think it’s fair to say they were playing to their strengths. Portugal were pretty unwatchable in 2016, but I could understand as even with Ronaldo they didn’t seem to have the quality of other teams. On the contrary I would say Italy in 2021 were, perhaps uncharacteristically, not that defensive and the same with Argentina in 2022.
 

I’m all for balance and being sensible, but surely an element of playing to our strengths comes into it. Often seemed Southgate would overcompensate by removing attacking players and play more defensive players. 

4 hours ago, thomas said:

it's fairly damning that 80% (conservatively estimated) of the fanbase would rather see an out-of-position Tino at LB instead of Burn  

 

And I'm one of them.

He looks no more out of position than Burn tbf. Burn has played quite a lot at LB, but he is a 6ft7 CB that just happens to be left-footed. He often drifts into a CB position and nowadays the high number of right-footed LWs makes right-footed LBs more effective imo. 
 

To me it just looks like the classic case of a manager who wants a player he can ‘trust’ because the more exciting and seemingly more obvious option is risky, which is a bit of a shame. Surely you try and mould the way they play to complement the players around, because whatever he’s trying to do with a very sluggish and easily targeted LB isn’t working. 

6 hours ago, Yorkie said:

 

Adam Clery (who's very good in this format I have to say) absolutely nailing the Burn stuff for me. From 32:58.

I don’t think he is at all. He claims we ‘function better’ with him in the side, but our home form since he got back in the side completely suggests otherwise. Actually don’t mind him away for games like Villa (where he was good), but at home against weaker sides without the midfield cover, it’s suicidal. Far from all his fault as it’s a slow defence, but he’s the obvious change.
 

People act like Livramento is unproven there too. He put in some excellent performances at both LB and RB and imo was our best player before Christmas. It’s not like he can’t defend either or even being a more attacking player would harm the way we ‘function’ as his recovery pace is so fast. Plus his mistakes don’t get highlighted as much because he’s on to help us salvage a result following goals Burn had a hand in. 
 

What I do agree with is on how the crowd reacts and it seems harsh when other defenders are at fault. But we all know it’s frustration at the manager not using alternatives. 

5 hours ago, Kid Icarus said:

They don't, it's how teams played a few years ago but not now, not even Liverpool - Robertson's often on the bench and Trent plays in midfield. And when they did, they had 3 streetwise midfielders to cover them, at the moment we don't. Man City play Ake at LB and set up similar lopsided way to us too. There's no top team in the league that you see play like that now.

 

As for the rest, a clown show? Really?  This is why people go on about the criticism and scapegoating being over the top. You should be embarrassed.

 

 

 

This doesn’t seem unfair and I’m confused. Original post seems more of a criticism of Howe than scapegoating Burn. Leaving aside Burn’s performance, Tino was very good when he played earlier on this season and without assuming he’s the saviour of our season, he never looked like he’d get outpaced on a regular basis like Burn would. That’s not Burn’s fault though and I think he does seem like a very easy target, but it’s because there’s a pretty obvious alternative who has proven himself, whereas the likes of Botman, Longstaff et al don’t currently have that. 
 

Ultimately that’s a Howe issue though and quite concerning he’s not addressed it the bigger picture. Our home form of recent has been abysmal when you consider the goals were conceding and I have to say Howe’s approach has really cost us and in the case of Burn, is exposing him and making him a very easy target. 

I tend to agree with the criticism of him, but I think lack of pace and poor positioning can be levelled against the other defenders too and so it seems harsh he gets more. Difference is they should all be first choice despite that, whereas I can’t see why Tino isn’t at LB. The fact Howe has sometimes made that switch early says a lot. You can’t have a regularly struggling starting left-back. 
 

Sure he’s had some great games recently and had a strong second-half yesterday too. Imo he’s absolutely an option for deeper and more defensive spells. But he’s had a huge hand in several goals recently and clearly being targeted. Cost of that can’t be ignored. 

I think it can seem like there’s a lot of animosity because he’s constantly playing ahead of more natural full-backs, who are quicker and offer more going forward, as well as seemingly being harshly dropped. Seems the loyalty to Burn is unreasonably so much higher to him than Tino. Also maybe a reaction to him getting an easier time because he’s a local and a great lad (which he is and I’m sure offers enough to the squad by his leadership alone). 

We hear a lot about how he shouldn’t play against fast right-wingers because of his lack of pace, but isn’t that pretty much every right-winger in this league?  You can’t get away with a full-back who is that slow; you’ll just get found out. 

8 hours ago, Django said:

Finding it amusing how quickly ten Hag is trying to brush this under the carpet, there's no word about punishments or consequences even, only that's its an internal matter and the case is closed, he has ... accepted responsibility for his actions.

 

Yeah right Erik everything points to these players basically having no respect for you and the club but as you say, the case is closed, he's accepted responsibility so everything is fine.

Don’t care for ETH, but Rashford was too ‘ill’ to train in Manchester after a night out in Belfast. Irrespective of what the manager is like, that’s pretty disgraceful and unprofessional behaviour towards a club that pays him crazy money and he should know better. The guy was a national hero not long ago and now he’s ruined his reputation and is acting like an idiot when he should really be maturing. 

We’ve actually got it wrong all this time. Clearly Joey has actually been looking out for the female pundits, worrying about their mental health all this time. One of football’s good guys. 
https://x.com/common_sensepod/status/1749871853881987522?s=46&t=h8yv-Yp4IOGkVPLw7fULYw

7 hours ago, tgarve said:

Bellingham? 

Of course there are brilliant players who have played for that team. I just thought Sancho thrives on all the space that you get as a strong counter-attacking team in that league. Looks like he doesn’t have the pace or skill to be dangerous in a better league. 

Sancho

Well his Dortmund record was excellent, but it just seemed hard not to look good in that team and league. 

Real sad state of affairs there are Toon fans that like this bloke and tbh I struggle to see why. He was good for about 6 months having spent a lot of his time in jail, went on some rants about Ashley while pretending to read philosophy and then promptly left. I appreciate he had a very tough upbringing but he’s never really tried to not be a horrible bloke. A lot of other people like him at least learn to grow up. 

On the subject of Rafa, it might seem negative but I wonder if he could have experimented with the 3 CBs and WBs the odd match like Rafa did. Not his fault we had an injury crisis, but the same midfielders wasn’t working. Meanwhile we still had a few defensive options on the bench - sure Dummett/Krafth/Burn/Manquillo/Ritchie could have slotted in here and there…

31 minutes ago, Ghandis Flip-Flop said:

And yet he generally managed fine last season 🤷🏻‍♂️ where we 'checks notes' played a high pressing system. The whole team isn’t functioning well at the minute rather than individuals. Hopefully that gets corrected in the coming weeks

Your use of the phrase ‘generally managed fine’ is pretty key here. While I agree, I think you expect a bit more than that from a full-back. I feel for a while he survived on having lower expectations than others - the reliable midtable CB playing LB and a local lad living his dream unexpectedly etc. 
 

As well as not offering lots going forward, I don’t recall him having strong wingers in his back-pocket. He just seemed mostly solid with clear limitations and one of them being lack of pace. I think managers eventually found that out and he started becoming more mistake-prone later last season. It’s not a surprise - he’s been a very solid CB imo but way too slow to be dealing with some of the quickest players out wide. Trippier isn’t especially quick either, but has sufficient acceleration and agility that Burn doesn’t have. 

He shouldn’t and won’t be under pressure for a long time, but needs to take account for this. It should be a routine win amongst a tough run, but it’s made it incredibly hard for us and now we’ve got really tough away fixtures. 
 

Our inability to break down defensive teams is coming back to bite now. But I at least expect us to defend properly 

Can only assume Livra had a knock, otherwise he’s had a howler there. 

1 minute ago, Stifler said:

Can well and truly fuck off.

Keeps going forward like an attacker and keeps costing us goals.

Done it 3 times today to let Chris fucking Wood score a Hattrick and look like prime Messi whilst he stands watching the background shrugging his shoulders asking what the defence was up too?

If I was one of our players on the pitch I’d be throwing everything at the cunt in the changing room.

There is zero excuse for it.

I can handle mistakes and fuck ups, but I draw the fucking line at deliberate recklessness.

Got us knocked out of Europe too. Ridiculous that a fairly slow centre-back thinks he can dribble through teams like Messi. 

1 hour ago, Myleftboot said:

How can’t Almiron and manquillo not speak english they’ve been here about 10 year.

Presumably the club like the idea of wishing in different languages. I imagine Karius can speak English too. 

Pretty sure that’s the Russia flag upside down on those sleeves #sportswashing