Jump to content

Recommended Posts

  On 23/05/2024 at 10:14, Tiresias said:

 

I'm not saying had to go route 1. Sheffield United sold their best players when they came up and Luton are Luton. Neither are good yardsticks for what can be expected of a promoted team. 

 

I'm also very much not suggesting he completely abandon the good football, sorry maybe should have clarified in that. But it's not a binary, positive attacking football or dreary dycheball. You have to accept you are going to have to be more compact if the gegenpress isn't working. I'm not saying he should have turned into Sam Allardyce, but he should have tightened things up. The same issues being present at the end of a season as at the start is a sign of poor management, not heroic sticking to principles. You can play positive attacking football in a more compact manner. You may have to sacrifice a bit of all out attack. 

 

I'm sorry but it just doesn't cut it 'sticking to principles'. Relegation affects peoples jobs in that club as well as the fans, hell even the career of players. Again I'm not saying has to start kicking other teams all game etc, but to not even attempt to fix the very real and very obvious problems? That screams of ego getting in the way. they stormed the championship, maybe they still go down anyway, but if I were Burnley I'd feel a lot better if I went down like Luton did, leaving no-one any doubt they gave a good go at it. 

 

Sorry I normally love teams like Burnley who play really good football rather than sticking everyone behind ball, but it was just so crap. 

Expand  

Screams what Rafa used to say about the blanket that’s too short. If you go attack heavy as a promoted team you get nailed in defence. Similarly if you pack the defence you have nowt up front. Your blanket won’t cover both.
 

For new promotes, it’s finding a balance that works. Luton came closest in terms of that pragmatism but had a poor record of going ahead and losing leads (14 times leading; 6 wins, 2 draws, 6 losses). The only two worse teams were, of course, Sheffield Utd and Burnley.

 

We went ahead 25 times, won 18, drew 4, lost 3 (Liverpool, Forest, City).

Link to post
Share on other sites

  On 23/05/2024 at 10:14, Tiresias said:

 

I'm not saying had to go route 1. Sheffield United sold their best players when they came up and Luton are Luton. Neither are good yardsticks for what can be expected of a promoted team. 

 

I'm also very much not suggesting he completely abandon the good football, sorry maybe should have clarified in that. But it's not a binary, positive attacking football or dreary dycheball. You have to accept you are going to have to be more compact if the gegenpress isn't working. I'm not saying he should have turned into Sam Allardyce, but he should have tightened things up. The same issues being present at the end of a season as at the start is a sign of poor management, not heroic sticking to principles. You can play positive attacking football in a more compact manner. You may have to sacrifice a bit of all out attack. 

 

I'm sorry but it just doesn't cut it 'sticking to principles'. Relegation affects peoples jobs in that club as well as the fans, hell even the career of players. Again I'm not saying has to start kicking other teams all game etc, but to not even attempt to fix the very real and very obvious problems? That screams of ego getting in the way. they stormed the championship, maybe they still go down anyway, but if I were Burnley I'd feel a lot better if I went down like Luton did, leaving no-one any doubt they gave a good go at it. 

 

Sorry I normally love teams like Burnley who play really good football rather than sticking everyone behind ball, but it was just so crap. 

Expand  

 

In my opinion these types of clubs need to do a better job of identifying the kind of manager they bring in then.

 

Some managers are completely married to their philosophy and how they play. Its less likely to bode well for a team trying to come up and stay in the Premier League if the type of play isn't as pragmatic or compact, if they are unable to get better players in when promoted, and so that was likely the mistake in the first place.

 

 

Edited by KaKa

Link to post
Share on other sites

  On 23/05/2024 at 08:40, Optimistic Nut said:
Expand  

YES LA… hold on mate I see what you are up to here well done mate we’ve all had a laugh. 
 

I would probably take a League One job to be honest lads. This talksport thing is getting stale for me. Sittin there listening to these prats calling in on the weekend. 
 

see ya later I guess. 

Link to post
Share on other sites

  On 23/05/2024 at 10:27, Nucasol said:

Screams what Rafa used to say about the blanket that’s too short. If you go attack heavy as a promoted team you get nailed in defence. Similarly if you pack the defence you have nowt up front. Your blanket won’t cover both.
 

For new promotes, it’s finding a balance that works. Luton came closest in terms of that pragmatism but had a poor record of going ahead and losing leads (14 times leading; 6 wins, 2 draws, 6 losses). The only two worse teams were, of course, Sheffield Utd and Burnley.

 

We went ahead 25 times, won 18, drew 4, lost 3 (Liverpool, Forest, City).

Expand  

 

Yeah I think Rafa spoke a lot of sense, and I also profoundly disagree with anyone that says Rafa was too negative, he did definitely go caution first but he also changed, his last season was classic, first half we were functional and not especially exciting, but second half we were a counter attacking team but we were a good counter attacking team, not just hoying balls aimlessly.

Link to post
Share on other sites

  On 23/05/2024 at 10:53, Checko said:

Felt with Rafa that he took a little time to find out what worked best, but he'd tinker a bit and find a good system. Which is probably the sign of a good manager.

Expand  

 

I think second half of his last season maybe. First two and a half you knew what you were going to get. Played the Championship season with the same sort of system he used back in the Premier League. Still convinced that first season was used almost like an "apprenticeship" so the players knew exactly what their roles were and how to set up when we were back in the PL.

Link to post
Share on other sites

  On 23/05/2024 at 11:05, Optimistic Nut said:

 

I think second half of his last season maybe. First two and a half you knew what you were going to get. Played the Championship season with the same sort of system he used back in the Premier League. Still convinced that first season was used almost like an "apprenticeship" so the players knew exactly what their roles were and how to set up when we were back in the PL.

Expand  

 

No doubt he was implementing a system in the championship season to prepare the team for a more challenging PL season. We could have swept the Championship away with the quality in our side with more free flowing attacking football.

Link to post
Share on other sites

  On 23/05/2024 at 11:09, Conjo said:

 

No doubt he was implementing a system in the championship season to prepare the team for a more challenging PL season. We could have swept the Championship away with the quality in our side with more free flowing attacking football.

Expand  

 

Aye, think he knew if he'd done that, he'd have been at square 1 almost come pre-season, drilling the side to play how we needed to challenge in the PL. 

Link to post
Share on other sites

  On 23/05/2024 at 11:05, Optimistic Nut said:

 

I think second half of his last season maybe. First two and a half you knew what you were going to get. Played the Championship season with the same sort of system he used back in the Premier League. Still convinced that first season was used almost like an "apprenticeship" so the players knew exactly what their roles were and how to set up when we were back in the PL.

Expand  

Yeah quite possibly. Just have some memory of us being stronger in the second half of the last 2 years of Rafa, but I don't want to look it up because I'm probably way off!

Link to post
Share on other sites

  On 23/05/2024 at 07:25, Menace said:

I mean Burnley gave him £100m to spend, and Luton still achieved more than him with a fraction of the squad available to them. Fair play to him, he's failed but landed upwards - I'm sure he can't believe his luck.

Expand  

 

Took a look at the 100 mil he spent and it looks to be about 75% shite. Jordan Beyer at 13 mil - Played 15 games, James Trafford at 15 mil - Looks to have been swindled by Pep like Arteta was with Zinchenko and Jesus. 14 mil for Aaron Ramsey from Villa - Played 14 games. Think losing Maatsen was a big part of their failure. He was their star man in their promotion season. In a CL final now. Assignon looked good for them, he'd be a good buy for someone. Was always creating, caused us a few scares. 

 

Fulham did a lot better with the 100 mil they were given, even if they got relegated, they bought some star names. 

 

 

Edited by Astroblack

Link to post
Share on other sites

  On 23/05/2024 at 15:59, Astroblack said:

 

Took a look at the 100 mil he spent and it looks to be about 75% shite. Jordan Beyer at 13 mil - Played 15 games, James Trafford at 15 mil - Looks to have been swindled by Pep like Arteta was with Zinchenko and Jesus. 14 mil for Aaron Ramsey from Villa - Played 14 games. Think losing Maatsen was a big part of their failure. He was their star man in their promotion season. In a CL final now. Assignon looked good for them, he'd be a good buy for someone. Was always creating, caused us a few scares. 

 

Fulham did a lot better with the 100 mil they were given, even if they got relegated, they bought some star names. 

 

 

 

Expand  

Horrific that 

Link to post
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...