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Fitness


Dan Gleebals

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It strikes me that this season more than most, our squad is being pushed really hard pre-season.  KK will have had his squad at the club base for almost a month before we fly off to Mallorca.  Poor Managers, tactics and formations aside for the last 3-4 seasons, do people think our approach in staying local and pushing the players will pay off this season?

 

I remember Fat Sam saying he was shocked at the condition of some of the players when he arrived.  Whilst he seemed to iron out some of the injuries, I am not so sure his methods were are as thorough and "hard" as he made out.  It seems (with a new fitness coach this season) the players are getting pushed really hard - and training "outstandingly" according to KK.  Is it the KK effect or methods that are ensuring the team seem to be training so well?

 

With such a small squad will this mean our players will feel it later in the season, be more prone to fatigue related injuries or will it ensure a small squad is less likely to be affected by the niggles that have plagued us in the past?

 

Finally, thinking back, when we have been at our strongest and fittest in the past, has this coincided with better results and performance?

 

Clearly, if these methods keep the likes of Duff, Owen and any other serial treatment junkies in top shape it has to be worth it.  If it takes its toll, who knows.

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I would say under Sir Bobby was the last time we where truly fit, so yes it does coincide with performances.  Fitness is massivley important noways.  Under Sam,  I remember our players looking absolutely knackered pretty much from the second half onwards and towards the end of the season under KK our fitness levels seemed higher than the teams we where playing.

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Any man that can keep Mark Viduka playing about 5-6 games in a row should recieve and OBE.

 

Keegan is old school, he's in great shape aswell and leads by example. Allardyce talked a good talk, but if he can't keep up with the lads how is he meant to push them further?

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Any man that can keep Mark Viduka playing about 5-6 games in a row should recieve and OBE.

 

Keegan is old school, he's in great shape aswell and leads by example. Allardyce talked a good talk, but if he can't keep up with the lads how is he meant to push them further?

 

I see what your getting at but leading by example isnt the only method though, I cant imagine Alex Ferguson or Wenger keeping up with their players.

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Any man that can keep Mark Viduka playing about 5-6 games in a row should recieve and OBE.

 

Keegan is old school, he's in great shape aswell and leads by example. Allardyce talked a good talk, but if he can't keep up with the lads how is he meant to push them further?

 

I see what your getting at but leading by example isnt the only method though, I cant imagine Alex Ferguson or Wenger keeping up with their players.

 

I reckon they'd both be able to keep up with Milner though.

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Any man that can keep Mark Viduka playing about 5-6 games in a row should recieve and OBE.

 

Keegan is old school, he's in great shape aswell and leads by example. Allardyce talked a good talk, but if he can't keep up with the lads how is he meant to push them further?

 

I see what your getting at but leading by example isnt the only method though, I cant imagine Alex Ferguson or Wenger keeping up with their players.

 

I reckon they'd both be able to keep up with Milner though.

 

At least if they did he wouldn't go off throwing a strop like wonderboy, even though he can apparently do no wrong! :D

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Guest thenorthumbrian

I would say under Sir Bobby was the last time we where truly fit, so yes it does coincide with performances.  Fitness is massivley important noways.  Under Sam,  I remember our players looking absolutely knackered pretty much from the second half onwards and towards the end of the season under KK our fitness levels seemed higher than the teams we where playing.

 

Allardyce was like the wizard of Oz - behind the smoke and mirrors there was very little of substance there.

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Guest ObaStar

I would say under Sir Bobby was the last time we where truly fit, so yes it does coincide with performances.  Fitness is massivley important noways.  Under Sam,  I remember our players looking absolutely knackered pretty much from the second half onwards and towards the end of the season under KK our fitness levels seemed higher than the teams we where playing.

 

Allardyce was like the wizard of Oz - behind the smoke and mirrors there was very little of substance there.

 

little substance but a lot of sam

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Every new manager seems to complain about the fitness of the squad they inherit. It's a bit like builders and plumbers commenting on what a mess the previous guy made of the job.

 

 

exactly

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I don't recall KK having too many problems keeping the squad fit, the last time he was here.

 

Whatever methods he uses, he seems to be effective. He'll need to be with the size of squad he's looking at.

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This fitness thing at times is such bullshit a team scores a few late goals & the word is it is all down to fitness, most of them are off set pieces & have fuck all to do with fitness.

 

Fitter players concentrate better toward the end of games.

 

Fitter players can demonstrate better technique towards the end of games.

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This fitness thing at times is such bullshit a team scores a few late goals & the word is it is all down to fitness, most of them are off set pieces & have f*** all to do with fitness.

think back to the season we finished 3rd with robson. how many times did we come back in the last 15 with very few from set pieces.

 

(mind you a season later no team in the league lost as many leads as we did.)

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This fitness thing at times is such bullshit a team scores a few late goals & the word is it is all down to fitness, most of them are off set pieces & have f*** all to do with fitness.

 

Fitter players concentrate better toward the end of games.

 

Fitter players can demonstrate better technique towards the end of games.

 

As I said at times is such bullshit. Goals are scored through out the 90 mins. Fitness is only mentioned when goals are scored for/against a few times on the bounce. Nobody mentions the fitness of teams that don't concede late goals.

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This fitness thing at times is such bullshit a team scores a few late goals & the word is it is all down to fitness, most of them are off set pieces & have f*** all to do with fitness.

think back to the season we finished 3rd with robson. how many times did we come back in the last 15 with very few from set pieces.

 

We had a good team :thup:

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Guest battyleespeed

big sam was about scientific approach to sports and fitness - whether or not he could make it work in bigger scheme of things is open to question

kk was writing about a decade ago regular column to football mag (total football?) and in his writings lot of fitness related things kept popping up. He seemed like very knowleadable about practical fitness training (does not equal to scientific, though). I have a hunch that he is preparing for the worst and assumes that there won't be much reinforcements so getting the current team as fit as possible will give a theoretical advantage at the start of season. It's impossible to maintain very high fitness level over extended period of time (due to stress of extensive physical training) so the training must be phased down at some point or we'll take the risk of burning out the players by overtraining them.

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Just skimmed through that post battyleespeed and what you have to remember is Keegan will have been brought through his time at Liverpool, when all they did in training was 5-a-sides. He's done well to adopt more modern basics of fitness building imo, I'd much rather they did a week of running and light ball work followed by something light-hearted like head tennis or a pen shootout to encourage team building, than any of Allardyce's horseshit methods.

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Guest battyleespeed

Pilko, yeah, I know he is very much a 5-a-side coach which is all good. The other teams are no mugs so they have their players fit as possible so I don't see how fitness alone will give us any distinctive advantage over the season. I guess it comes to down to making sure that we are optimizing the performance of our own players.

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This fitness thing at times is such bullshit a team scores a few late goals & the word is it is all down to fitness, most of them are off set pieces & have f*** all to do with fitness.

think back to the season we finished 3rd with robson. how many times did we come back in the last 15 with very few from set pieces.

 

We had a good team :thup:

which had the fitness to tear the oppo to bits when the oppo were tiring.
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This fitness thing at times is such bullshit a team scores a few late goals & the word is it is all down to fitness, most of them are off set pieces & have f*** all to do with fitness.

think back to the season we finished 3rd with robson. how many times did we come back in the last 15 with very few from set pieces.

 

We had a good team :thup:

which had the fitness to tear the oppo to bits when the oppo were tiring.

 

I think it was more speed than fitness but there you go.

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This fitness thing at times is such bullshit a team scores a few late goals & the word is it is all down to fitness, most of them are off set pieces & have f*** all to do with fitness.

think back to the season we finished 3rd with robson. how many times did we come back in the last 15 with very few from set pieces.

 

We had a good team :thup:

which had the fitness to tear the oppo to bits when the oppo were tiring.

 

I think it was more speed than fitness but there you go.

 

It must be said though, as well as speed that lee, shearer and given were more than fitness too.  :pow:

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