Alan Pardew

[Cajun]

Our success last season was built on a solid defence and a couple of players who could pull something from nothing. Ironically Pardew would do well at a club like City who are pretty much already set up for his approach.

 

Our defence has crumbled this season so the game plan (the only game plan) has gone out of the window, well we got by in Europe until Santon and Saylor decided to play like a pair of Spam Hampers but our league form fell apart because Colo wasn't the player he was last season and we don't have the players capable of those sort of performances (and Krul missing a lot of games).

[TRon]

Last season our strengths were continuity/having a settled team (August-December) and various players doing something spectacular when it mattered. We've had neither this season. Like you say it's been done to death so who cares?

 

Do you not think that what you've cited is a pretty damning indictment of Pardew's management skills though? I don't see how they are a defence for him.

 

Case in point.

[Ashley17]

Well I think having a settled back 4 helps, especially when you've got different players all across the pitch. It must effect understanding, the spine of the team has been missing for a lot of games. If we'd had the squad we've had since January at the start of the season it would have been less of a problem. We were fielding Perch & Williamson at home to Man Utd for example, we got away with that sort of thing last season but not this year.

 

Agree that we cannot rely on players scoring ridiculous goals but if you've got a squad capable of players doing it, why did we have so many last season and so few this season?

[Pilko]

The only time this season I would have really bought the 'tired from the EL' excuse would have been Atromitos away and the famous Notting Hill Carnival line. Thursday night to Saturday was maybe a bit much and it was a hard game away at Chelsea anyway. Otherwise, it's pretty garbage.

 

I think it's cos he has said it so many times; if it was a one off thing you could probably buy it.

[Dave]

I think everyone would agree that the summer transfer dealings weren't up to scratch. Well, apart from madras and a few others that vigorously defended it. But Pardew said he was perfectly happy with it and as late as November (9 games into the season) said we were going for top four. 25 games and £20m of first team investment later we're still struggling to stay in the division. If that's purely down to the club being in Europe and having to actually manage the squad game by game then it merely proves that he's out of his depth.

[Guest Brendan_Rice]

I hear what you are saying Dave, some of the tactics and formations this year have been frustrating.

 

The set pieces are shocking, not being able to clear the first man in inexcusable and that free kick routine to Williamson was dog shit. Some of the team choices were a bit off for me as well, some of our players just look out of position at times.

 

But no matter how frustrated I am there has been a fair bit has went against us this season. Our injury list is the worst in the league (arguably this could be down to coaching), we did have a few more games to play, Ba fucking off half way through the season didn't help, not strengthening in the summer was just plain daft (don't think this was Pardew's fault).

 

All in all I think Pardew deserves another season. I just hope he learns a lot from the mistakes this season and we push on.

 

 

[Ashley17]

I think one thing we can all agree on is that he needs to talk less shit, pretty much everything he says is rubbish and in many cases totally inaccurate.

[Deuce]

Warning: Turbo post, don't read if easily bored.

 

Over the past few days, I've seen Pardew getting the blame for everything. Some of it justified, some of it no more than speculation as means to meet the agenda. I get it, Pardew is public enemy number 1. And rightly so - last week was a sour one for us all, it's going to take some getting over. But beyond last week, we haven't been up to it all season. We've barely won games by more than 1 goal, and some of them have been last minute goals. Without being bothered to do the maths, I think we've probably spent the least minutes in front in games this season. It's been turgid to watch pretty much all of the time, we've gone out of cups at the first round and other than a couple of 1-0 wins in the KO rounds of the Europa, there's been nothing good to say. So why are we so much shitter than last season?

 

Firstly, let's not kid ourselves. Last season we didn't play well in a lot of games but we found a way to win. There's a lot to be said for momentum - the pre-season plans were disrupted, but the majority of the squad still got away. Those that didn't played for the reserves, which wasn't a disaster. This meant players were, for the most part, fit, with the exception of Ben Arfa who got destroyed in the USA. The new lads were incorporated and everything was rosey. This season, there were no new lads to incorporate bar a few kids, and Anita signed shortly before the Spurs game. Cabaye & Ben Arfa were away at the Euros and got minimal pre-season action, as a result both have had fragmented seasons. Beating the mackems early on last year gave us a big boost and we managed to muddle our way past Fulham & Scunthorpe. Without going through the whole fixture list, great peformances at home to Blackburn and away at Stoke were our only wins by more than 1 goal as we relied on a great defensive resistance, particularly Steven Taylor. The back 4 was pretty much unchanged - something we haven't been able to replicate this season. Once Taylor got his injury we started to ship goals left right and centre leading to a very lean December.

 

In the games at Wolves, home to Everton, home to Fulham, home to QPR..I could go on, we held on for 3 points after withstanding heavy pressure as we sat back after getting the goal(s). This is not a new thing, and as we found out away to Fulham, the opposition making a big change left Pardew flat footed and we got fucked over, conceding 5 second half goals to average opposition. Once we reached 40 points, we finally started to relax and play a bit, which came in March and lasted a month. In this spell, Cabaye was played pretty much behind Cisse with devestating results, which can be best summed up by the goals against Swansea and Stoke. When Ba was sold this season, Pardew spoke of his will to play Cabaye in the "number 10" role, but we have yet to see it. As a result there is nobody feeding Cisse, and we're relying on lumps into the box. Cabaye is playing in front of the back 4, but from there is he doing anything that Anita cannot do? I doubt it.

 

There's also no doubt we had players in a real purple patch last season who played well above themselves. Perch & Williamson kept a couple of cleansheets, somehow, whereas this year Williamson has looked every inch a total waste of space. Players like Ryan Taylor came in and played multiple positions to good effect. This season, players have been badly out of form, Tiote, Cisse for the most part, Cabaye to an extent, the usual candidates like Obertan & Shola, Colo's obvious problems. We've also missed a Leon Best type character, scoring a handful of goals and occupying defences - although who knows if his injury would have happened had he stayed. We have had a lot of injuries, especially compared to last season. Whilst we should be able to deal with standard injuries, you can't deny we've had more than the average. This is a failing of the club though - why is the conditioning so poor? Especially when it was pretty good last season. It's definitely something the club needs to look at as we can't go on like this.

 

Even in Pardew's first season, when he took over from Hughton, we were better at everything then than we are now. Set pieces? Easily one of our biggest threats, Steven Taylor got 3 in 3 ffs. Winning well? We fucked Wolves 4-1, beat Liverpool 3-1, Birmingham 2-0..there was plenty to be optimistic about although there were horror shows like Stoke & Fulham away, but with the loss of Carroll it could be forgiven a little. That is without mentioning the 4-4.

 

So, so far we've got a poor pre-season, bad "luck" with injuries and out of form players. There's reasons for all of them but the next thing to consider is the Europa league. The first thing is that being away for another game during the week obviously gives you less time to prepare for a game, you can't deny that. But how do other clubs manage? How have we managed previously? Typically, clubs competing in the Europa league will come close to getting back into it - or better - the next season. Liverpool, Spurs and latterly Chelsea are pretty close. We're nowhere near. So whilst our squad isn't as strong as those teams, you'd have to question why that is. The lack of investment in the summer really left us under prepared, but many of the first teamers didn't play in the EL group games, so I don't buy tiredness as an excuse. Hopefully without the Europa League Pardew can do some proper preparation, and we'll see some well executed game plans, such as Stoke & WBA last season.

 

The quality of football has been heavily criticised too - it wasn't brilliant for most of last season until the spell I touched upon earlier, but it was effective. We scored a lot of "ridiculous" goals, something we've rarely seen this season. Ryan Taylor against Everton and Jonas down at Wolves being decent examples before even going to Cisse territory. We have generally tried to play from the back at home since January, the only problem is it gets to the final third and a hopeless cross is fired in. This is where we'd benefit from Cabaye being 20 yards further forward. I'm not sure Pardew knows how to get the best out of what he's got - the problem is we don't know if Sissoko can play deeper, but he certainly isn't a number 10 and his ball carrying skills could be pretty useful still from a bit deeper. I'm fairly sure Coloccini will leave and I wouldn't be surprised to see Jonas follow him as we move to an even more French line up.

 

The more you consider it, the more you have to say last season was  the fluke rather than this season being a one-off. You can't fluke your way to 5th place though, there were some very well thought out game plans and the shape of the team in "that" run of games was great. I hope Pardew has plans to replicate it but it's going to rely on players being fit and on form. Looking back on these 2 and a half seasons under Pardew there are some things that he has only done this season, but also some worrying traits. It seems to me that his main aim is to get us "safe" and then expand a bit, but until then we'll see more of what we've seen this season. Nervous football where we sit back on 1 goal advantages. It's no surprise we've come back from behind so much at home recently, as we have to attack more and show some flair, which otherwise we wouldn't see I bet.

 

I'm not in the Pardew out crew just yet, for some reason the players seem to quite like him and the structure of the club is based around him. I think we need some more staff, as we seem light on those numbers compared to a lot of clubs, and the conditioning needs a serious overhaul. But the recruitment structure we have is decent, we've got good calibre players and the optimist in me hopes that we can get a settled team over the summer and build a team that can finish where it deserves, which is about 8 places higher than where we are now. If you look at how we played in the first half yesterday - that's more like it, we need to do it for a whole game though. What I do fear is that we'll get off to a bad start and he'll be canned in October, and we're thrown into another transition season. I hope Pardew turns it round - I have no hope of us being brilliant in these remaining 4 games, but we must stay up by any means necessary and get back to "normal" next season. I just hope normal is last season rather than this.

 

Okay HTT.

[Mistle17]

I'm sorry, but regardless of any excuse including; unsettled back fours, European fatigue due to playing against generally inferior sides to us, whatever....there is no way we should be 16th place in the league with 4 games to go.

[Ronaldo]

Ba has nothing to do with it. We were on something like 20 points from 20 games with him an ever-present.

[Wullie]

A lot of clubs use Europe as a positive -  give some minnows a midweek kicking then send the players out full of confidence on Sunday - Bobby did it all the time,  even Souness basically let that principle carry him in his first fifteen games.  Not in Pardew's nature though -  why get a confidence boosting win when you can grind out a draw against Maritimo?

[Mole_Toonfan]

Ba has nothing to do with it. We were on something like 20 points from 20 games with him an ever-present.

 

Honestly Ba is the case in in point of how we don't attack as a team properly.... First Ba was the only one getting in the box and now Cisse is the only one.

 

Its absolutely horrendous and no surprise they are the only ones who score when no one else is allowed anywhere near the penalty area.

[Dave]

I hear what you are saying Dave, some of the tactics and formations this year have been frustrating.

 

The set pieces are shocking, not being able to clear the first man in inexcusable and that free kick routine to Williamson was dog shit. Some of the team choices were a bit off for me as well, some of our players just look out of position at times.

 

But no matter how frustrated I am there has been a fair bit has went against us this season. Our injury list is the worst in the league (arguably this could be down to coaching), we did have a few more games to play, Ba fucking off half way through the season didn't help, not strengthening in the summer was just plain daft (don't think this was Pardew's fault).

 

All in all I think Pardew deserves another season. I just hope he learns a lot from the mistakes this season and we push on.

 

That's fair enough, I was in the same boat until Sunderland which I felt was just unforgivable. An absolute shitload has gone wrong and not all of it can be laid at Pardew's door, even if the majority can IMO. If we are to continue with Pardew (and I've still no reason at all to believe this won't be the case) then some major investigations have to be carried out into just how badly this season has played out. The squad investment, injuries, playing style, subs, coaching. The lot needs looking at, because it ain't working.

[Guest Brendan_Rice]

Ba has nothing to do with it. We were on something like 20 points from 20 games with him an ever-present.

 

I think he unsettled the team a bit with his transfer bullshit. I know if I was in a team with someone that didn't want to be there I would want him just to go.

[Dave]

http://i.imgur.com/UXSYMYb.png

 

[ponsaelius]

A lot of clubs use Europe as a positive -  give some minnows a midweek kicking then send the players out full of confidence on Sunday - Bobby did it all the time,  even Souness basically let that principle carry him in his first fifteen games.  Not in Pardew's nature though -  why get a confidence boosting win when you can grind out a draw against Maritimo?

 

twice

[Guest Brendan_Rice]

I hear what you are saying Dave, some of the tactics and formations this year have been frustrating.

 

The set pieces are shocking, not being able to clear the first man in inexcusable and that free kick routine to Williamson was dog s***. Some of the team choices were a bit off for me as well, some of our players just look out of position at times.

 

But no matter how frustrated I am there has been a fair bit has went against us this season. Our injury list is the worst in the league (arguably this could be down to coaching), we did have a few more games to play, Ba f***ing off half way through the season didn't help, not strengthening in the summer was just plain daft (don't think this was Pardew's fault).

 

All in all I think Pardew deserves another season. I just hope he learns a lot from the mistakes this season and we push on.

 

That's fair enough, I was in the same boat until Sunderland which I felt was just unforgivable. An absolute shitload has gone wrong and not all of it can be laid at Pardew's door, even if the majority can IMO. If we are to continue with Pardew (and I've still no reason at all to believe this won't be the case) then some major investigations have to be carried out into just how badly this season has played out. The squad investment, injuries, playing style, subs, coaching. The lot needs looking at, because it ain't working.

 

Would agree with that, if we can't learn from all the mistakes we made this season then something is badly wrong. Hopefully the summer brings a few decent signings and a lot of preseason work with the team/formations etc.

 

If we under perform next season, Pardew should resign.

[Mole_Toonfan]

http://i.imgur.com/UXSYMYb.png

 

 

Someone should show that to Pardew

[Deuce]

More European matches than any of the others.

 

Vindication.

[Guest Brendan_Rice]

http://i.imgur.com/UXSYMYb.png

 

 

Someone should show that to Pardew

 

If anyone didn't realise that we have went backwards this season...

[Deuce]

Also, it's completely disgraceful that we've played a whopping total of 2 cup matches this season.

[littlelunchbox]

This thread continues to astound me,

 

Till this day we still have turds coming on here preaching about "our fans rate our squad too highly"

 

 

 

 

 

[Guest Brendan_Rice]

http://www.physioroom.com/news/english_premier_league/epl_injury_table.php

 

We are top the league, say we are top the league

[Gallowgate Toon]

My only hope under him is that he stumbles onto a formula that works again. For all the cries that we don't have an attacking game plan, I've been looking over THAT period of games and we were a very threatening side, we can evidently play good football with him as manager.

 

It's interesting going back over those games and seeing so many differences in the team. Despite sending out some absolutely awful defences, we weren't cautious against West Brom, Liverpool or Stoke, which makes me wonder how we've gone from that mentality to this ultra defensive stuff. We sent out Ba, Cisse and HBA at West Brom for example, when we had a back 4 of Simpson, Williamson, Colo and Perch going from that, he obviously doesn't need his best defence to go for it.

 

We looked a lot more balanced as a team then as well. For starters, our wingers were higher up and Cabaye was a little deeper than Sissoko is now. The difference in their styles when in that role is telling. Sissoko encourages individualism (he's not helped by having deeper wide men mind), Cabaye was more like a metronome, keeping possession and picking out intelligent passes etc. he was really making us tick and we moved forward as a team as a result.

 

Jonas was brilliant too, he added something different in that midfield, the ability to create space by picking up the ball and running with it. He still wasn't particularly productive but he was so useful at making space. If you compare that to now, we've had Tiote, Cabaye, Anita and Perch playing in that area but all 4 have the same style, they can't dribble (I'm not sure Jonas can anymore either mind), we're so static and predictable as a consequence.

 

The frustrating thing is, we've got the personnel to still play like that, yet we don't. Gouffran and Ba is a fairly like-for-like switch in that wide forward area, while I thought Jonas was great as a box-to-box midfielder I think Sissoko could do it even better and Debuchy is a massive improvement over Simpson. We've also added some pace at the back in MYM and even though HBA is out, Marveaux is a very good stand-in. Everything's there but he just doesn't seem to know how to get the balance right. I hope his mentality shifts with a clean slate and he stumbles onto the right formula next year, if we're not relegated of course.

[littlelunchbox]

http://www.physioroom.com/news/english_premier_league/epl_injury_table.php

 

We are top the league, say we are top the league

 

top of the league but with 3 players due back in 5 days apparently.

 

great back to midtable mediocrity in 5 days.