Eddie Howe

[80]

5 minutes ago, Wullie said:

 

Surely that's more evidence of it mainly being down to extreme fatigue than suddenly the league's best defensive unit has turned into the worst with mainly the same players and the same manager in the space of a month?

I don't see why it's hard for people to recognise that over the past few weeks we've been toothless in attack, largely due to lack of energy in the press and dynamism in our moves. Therefore as we tire during games we repeatedly surrender possession and have to defend wave after wave of attack. Conceding goals becomes inevitable because a PSG-style defend forever approach is not sustainable long term as a winning strategy.

 

If we haven't been two goals up by the 60 minute mark - preferably half time - we've been fucked. The only goals scored after that time in a match will be for the opposition. Thankfully this ought to change by the end of January.

[Wullie]

10 minutes ago, Kid Icarus said:

Playing Ritchie is an absolute lose/lose for Howe mind.

 

He'd get criticism for doing that and Ritchie would weaken us 

 

Just take a look at the thread when the team was announced for the Man United cup tie (that we won 3-0 away) many posts along the lines of "Ritchie? Howe is chucking the tie then"

 

The idea that anyone would have seen him selected in a PL game and gone "ooh great rotation selection Eddie" is hindsight on steroids.

[Geordie Ahmed]

8 minutes ago, TRC said:

Being tired is fair enough but you have to adapt and try something different at some point

Potentially a fair question but I'd argue we don't tend to see top managers generally deviate from their playing style, even when they are missing players

 

I think having a plan B or another way of playing is certainly useful but don't think the core way of playing ever changes, Pep played that way when he first came to the league, I remember people saying his style needed to change as it won't last here but he stuck with it and it's been more subtle tweaks over the years but the primary way of playing hasn't changed, same for Klopp as well

 

So I can understand why Howe has stuck with his primary style of pressing (in recent games we can see the intensity of this is way off) and I believe it's the better approach to take long term

[Smal]

16 minutes ago, Wullie said:

 

Surely that's more evidence of it mainly being down to extreme fatigue than suddenly the league's best defensive unit has turned into the worst with mainly the same players and the same manager in the space of a month?

The fatigue is 100% a factor. We haven’t attempted to adapt to try and combat it one bit though. Howe is right to try and stick to his principles, but if the whole principle is intensity and you can’t be intense then there has to be some room for manoeuvre.  

 

I think/hope Howe will learn from this experience. We should come back stronger from it.

[The College Dropout]

22 minutes ago, Kid Icarus said:

Playing Ritchie is an absolute lose/lose for Howe mind.

 

He'd get criticism for doing that and Ritchie would weaken us 

Maybe in the matches Ritchie plays. But when Gordon comes back and can play full throttle for 90 minutes for a run of games. It pays itself back. Rather than starting him for 11 games straight and getting diminishing returns game after games as fatigue sets in. You back up a little bit, so you can go harder for longer.

 

24 minutes ago, Dr.Spaceman said:

 

I just think you've got to accept that you're going to have to play lesser skilled players from time to time in order to keep your better players fresh. How Lewis Hall has played so little is beyond me. Ritchie is there too, people are talking about experience on the pitch, he's up there in that regard.

Aye.

 

24 minutes ago, madras said:

You rotate until you don't have the players to do so. 

 

We did rotate Isak and Wilson, Barnes got injured playing instead of Gordon, Murphy got games before getting injured, with Tonali out we have no replacement for Bruno, Trippier was even benched for Man City and didn't get any pitch time. Gordon and Barnes started to leave out Murphy V Brentford.

 

Some make it sound like we wanted the same 11 out every game and it's not the case.

 

 

 

25 minutes ago, Heron said:

I feel you're perhaps referencing a different post to what I quoted as part of the discussion to be honest. Your comments don't really answer what I'm asking. If you have injuries, you're forced to rotate, how often you rotate is probably then reduced owing to perceived levels of quality and the capability of those being rotated in to get the job done.

 

What you're saying above, to me, is a very "good in hindsight" notion. When players are playing 100%, are playing well, and getting results, and you are uncertain of the capability to maintain results with their positional competition then it is natural you're less likely to willingfully rotate. As I said in my previous post, given Trippiers influence it has become apparent why perhaps Tino wasn't rotated in sooner. Not for his playing ability but for his lack of influence over the team.

 

The Gordon one, for me, would have been avoided had Barnes not been injured, which no one could foresee.

 

So this comes across very hypothetical now...

 

 

 

My point is.. when players get injured. You still have to rotate. The point of rotation in the first place is to keep your best players performing at a high level. That need is still there even if their immediate backup or rotation partner is injured. You maybe rotate them a little less but you eventually just have to replace them with a much inferior player. That's the cost of having a weak squad.

 

Instead.. we're getting diminishing returns game on game. Without rest, fatigue just makes performances worse and worse.

 

This isn't hindsight from me at all. I advocated resting Bruno & Gordon against Man U in the league cup back in November was it? I advocated resting key players in a few matches in December including the League Cup QF! I'm not against resting players against Sunderland! With my very limited knowledge of sports science, I thought if we continued to throttle our key players our performances and results would get progressively worse until the winter break due to fatigue and a loss of confidence.

 

At this level - with our style of play. The idea of running our best players into the ground is incredibly naive at best and stupid at worst. 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited January 2 by The College Dropout

[Colos Short and Curlies]

10 minutes ago, TRC said:

Being tired is fair enough but you have to adapt and try something different at some point

exactly, we’ve basically tried to play the same way throughout the injury crisis which lends itself to ‘we had none to bring in to give Gordon a rest.’

 

we could have gone 3 at the back with Tino and Hall at wingback, we could have brought 1 player from the u23s in to at least gove someone 20 minutes less in their legs.

 

i said it earlier that yes the injury situation. Is a freak and a genuine excuse but Howe has not done anything to play the hand that he’s been dealt other than to keep flogging a handful of players.

 

he also chose to give Ritchie and Dummett extensions, there are players out there who we could have brought in on loan or low fees as a low cost riskier option. We didn’t and if they are in the squad then they should be considered first team options

[r0cafella]

Really hope he turns it around, I want us to have all the success in the world with us. 
 

I truly hope he learns from this period and comes back a better manager once we get through this period. 

[Dr.Spaceman]

25 minutes ago, Heron said:

Aye, that's fair re. those two. You could argue why Hall was brought in for example. However, I think we have tried to play with 'lesser able' squads from time to time and to varying degrees we did so vs Man United and Man City in the cup, but it's seemingly being forgotten about.

 

In short, I think we absolutely would have been rotating more if we had viable options.

 

 

 

 

I do think it's a bit weird that we went to Man Utd with that starting 11, played as well as we did and then haven't used that setup again.

[Smal]

15 minutes ago, Wullie said:

 

Just take a look at the thread when the team was announced for the Man United cup tie (that we won 3-0 away) many posts along the lines of "Ritchie? Howe is chucking the tie then"

 

The idea that anyone would have seen him selected in a PL game and gone "ooh great rotation selection Eddie" is hindsight on steroids.

 

I guess the evidence from the Man Utd game (that we won 3-0 away!) is an argument for rotation and playing fresh players to give regulars a break every now and then.

 

That team was fresh and managed to carry out Howe’s principles and won 3-0 away against a CL team. A functioning Howe team is far more than the sum of its parts so why not play some of that side more often when the main lot are absolutely on their knees and have been for weeks (months?)? Some of them simply cannot fulfil basic duties. 

 

 

Edited January 2 by Smal

[madras]

8 minutes ago, The College Dropout said:

Maybe in the matches Ritchie plays. But when Gordon comes back and can play full throttle for 90 minutes for a run of games. It pays itself back. Rather than starting him for 11 games straight and getting diminishing returns game after games as fatigue sets in. You back up a little bit, so you can go harder for longer.

 

Aye.

 

 

My point is.. when players get injured. You still have to rotate. The point of rotation in the first place is to keep your best players performing at a high level. That need is still there even if their immediate backup or rotation partner is injured. You maybe rotate them a little less but you eventually just have to replace them with a much inferior player. That's the cost of having a weak squad.

 

Instead.. we're getting diminishing returns game on game. Without rest, fatigue just makes performances worse and worse.

 

This isn't hindsight from me at all. I advocated resting Bruno & Gordon against Man U in the league cup back in November was it? I advocated resting key players in a few matches in December. I'm not against resting players against Sunderland! 

 

At this level - with our style of play. The idea of running our best players into the ground is incredibly naive at best and stupid at worst. 

Bruno and Gordon came on for half an hour V Man Utd. Many said it would actually be better for them, keep them ticking over type thing. That's often the rotation bit, not playing the 90 but not spending the day in the garden centre either.

[Wullie]

Just now, madras said:

Bruno and Gordon came on for half an hour V Man Utd. Many said it would actually be better for them, keep them ticking over type thing. That's often the rotation bit, not playing the 90 but not spending the day in the garden centre either.

 

When Liverpool thumped West Ham a couple of weeks ago in the League Cup, they brought Salah, Trent and Diaz on despite being 3-0 up and coasting.

[Wandy]

35 minutes ago, McDog said:

 

 

How about the reserve keeper's performance after being thrust into the first team midseason? You thought that was shit also?

 

Already conceded that point a few pages back bud. 

[toon25]

28 minutes ago, mighty__mag said:

 

You think wrong then.

 

We all have hope and expectations, and before a season even begins that's all done in hindsight. 

 

Reality is, factual evidence has now derailed our season, and peoples excitations change, they either understand the circumstances and look at it and accept its going to be a much more challenging expectation, probability or likelihood. 

 

You then factor in, Aston Villa, Spurs, and Liverpool who have pushed our numbers down by having very good seasons, then don't disregard both Brighton and West Ham along with ourselves and Man Utd.

 

Realistically, I think given our misfortunes at times this season we could still fight for around 7th 

 

I won't be disheartened if we finish from 8th to 10th though.

 

You're sort of right in a way though, if they surveyed 100 fans after the first home game of the season, asking where they felt we might finish, 90 out of that lot would have said hopefully in the European spots, the odd few saying hang on we're only one game into the season, but if you are saying that from now, then I'm standing by what I said at the top.

 

??

 

 

 

I'd say these factors needed to have reflected player recruitment strategies, ultimately, which I don't think they did.

[Wullie]

4 minutes ago, Smal said:

 

I guess the evidence from the Man Utd game (that we won 3-0 away!) is an argument for rotation and playing fresh players to give regulars a break every now and then.

 

That team was fresh and managed to carry out Howe’s principles and won 3-0 away against a CL team. A functioning Howe team is far more than the sum of its parts so why not play some of that side more often when the main lot are absolutely on their knees and have been for weeks (months?)? Some of them simply cannot fulfil basic duties. 

 

I think that's fair but we are so bare bones that even that hasn't been a recent option. Willock's energy and versatility has just been such an enormous miss all season.

[The College Dropout]

5 minutes ago, madras said:

Bruno and Gordon came on for half an hour V Man Utd. Many said it would actually be better for them, keep them ticking over type thing. That's often the rotation bit, not playing the 90 but not spending the day in the garden centre either.

And then he played damn near every minute for the rest of November and December. He should’ve sat that game out. He should’ve sat out another game or two. He cannot get around the pitch atm. 
 

We are still asking him to press oppositions deepest midfielder. He doesn’t have the legs for it. If he’s going to play every minute we need a gameplan he can actually execute. Opposition midfielders keep running off him and it’s leading to goal after goal. 

[Ronaldo]

19 minutes ago, Wullie said:

 

Just take a look at the thread when the team was announced for the Man United cup tie (that we won 3-0 away) many posts along the lines of "Ritchie? Howe is chucking the tie then"

 

The idea that anyone would have seen him selected in a PL game and gone "ooh great rotation selection Eddie" is hindsight on steroids.

Correct. But Matt Ritchie shouldn’t be here collecting £40,000 a week to put arms round shoulders either. 

[Kid Icarus]

8 minutes ago, Smal said:

 

I guess the evidence from the Man Utd game (that we won 3-0 away!) is an argument for rotation and playing fresh players to give regulars a break every now and then.

 

That team was fresh and managed to carry out Howe’s principles and won 3-0 away against a CL team. A functioning Howe team is far more than the sum of its parts so why not play some of that side more often when the main lot are absolutely on their knees and have been for weeks (months?)? Some of them simply cannot fulfil basic duties. 

 

There was a point long after this game where I think it was generally accepted on here that we were going to have to play the same XI multiple times because of the players available (at one point we had 3 'keepers or 3 academy players on the bench) and because of the importance of the games.

 

That Man United XI was our C team. 4 of them then got injured on top of our other injuries. (Willock, Targett, Krafth, Burn)

 

 

 

Edited January 2 by Kid Icarus

[Gottlob]

1 hour ago, ponsaelius said:

Howe has been unlucky with injuries and suspensions, there is no doubt. We banked in the summer on adding depth at fullback, making sure we had four hard working wingers who we could run into the ground, and a midfielder who could cover both #8 as well as Bruno's role (in theory). Clearly the idea was to maximise the resources, facilitated in part by actually selling our one wild card, to double down on our style of play and make sure we had the depth to push it across multiple competitions. Ultimately we have tried to reinforce what worked last year - rather than look to enhance/augment what we've got and give us something different to win games. Whether that was signing a number 10/wide attacker who can play between the lines, a designated defensive midfielder to give us more control in transition, another striker who could offer more out of possession than Wilson etc etc - these were options that were available to us and we chose not to go for.

 

I think it's not unreasonable to say at this point that it has backfired. This is partly through sheer bad luck in the case of Tonali and Barnes in particular. But our inability to change it up or find other ways to win games has made this season's crash far worse and also I'm afraid made Howe look increasingly naive. We've ran players into the ground and made injuries worse, which has increasingly made our fundsmental style of play ineffective, which has now increasingly made players devoid of confidence. Confidence that has been rattled further by crashing out of the cups and leaving the season effectively over by January. It is a vicious spiral and I think, mitigating factors accepted, Howe has to take blame and be questioned for it. Both for his input in transfer decisions (we know he will have had some) and how we have adapted this season to very different circumstances.

 

 

 

 

This is the long and short of it. Heading into the summer transfer window, I wanted us to buy a starting right winger, defensive midfielder and left back, then look towards cover at the striker and centre back positions. Instead we bought another left winger, an identikit centre midfielder, and an aspiring right back. I felt we'd found a bit of value in the transfer market and I was happy that we'd doubled down on our strengths, but it turns out I was right all along and should never have doubted myself.

[The College Dropout]

1 minute ago, Kid Icarus said:

 

There was a point long after this game where I think it was generally accepted on here that we were going g to play the same XI multiple times because of the players available (at one point we had 3 players or 3 academy players on the bench) and because of the importance of the games.

 

This I agree with mostly. Except the reason for it was knowing Eddie doesn’t like to rotate if he doesn’t believe in the backups. 
 

I also think there was an acceptance that this approach that Eddie was likely to choose would lead to increased fatigue and probably poor performances and results. I think me and @Erikse were saying, if fatigue is our big issue - things would only get worse because Howe wasn’t going to rotate. 
 

Where i differ is I think it is has been a choice and a wrong choice.  From giving Ritchie, Dummett, Krafth contracts, to signing Hall, to not playing them or youth. These are choices. 

[madras]

7 minutes ago, The College Dropout said:

And then he played damn near every minute for the rest of November and December. He should’ve sat that game out. He should’ve sat out another game or two. He cannot get around the pitch atm. 
 

We are still asking him to press oppositions deepest midfielder. He doesn’t have the legs for it. If he’s going to play every minute we need a gameplan he can actually execute. Opposition midfielders keep running off him and it’s leading to goal after goal. 

He never had the legs for it, Longstaff (fit) covered loads for it and Miley can't read it yet.

[Paullow]

I know these markets aren't that reliable, and can easily be influenced by small punts, and can change instantly, but you'd never think Howe would be as short as 5/2 to be the next to leave just a month ago. Hopefully common sense prevails.

 

[The College Dropout]

Just now, madras said:

He never had the legs for it, Longstaff (fit) covered loads for it and Miley can't read it yet.

He could definitely get back sharper than he does now. Or are you suggesting that he’s actually not fatigued?
 

And it keeps happening.  Why haven’t we changed our midfield setup? 

[Zero]

If Gordon is so tired that he can only start jogging after 60 mins, we may as well sub him off and play Ritchie / youngsters like Sanusi, who at least is willing to run and keep the team in shape

 

You definitely can feel that Howe’s not thinking sensibly. It’s like he cannot accept his plan A is not working (even though it’s not his fault) and keep doing the same thing, playing the “best players available” and trying to sneak a win to proof everyone’s wrong. And then the problem get worsen and worsen. Just like what TCD said.

 

I am genuinely disappointed by his handling approach towards the crisis this season. He could have done a much better job to prevent it, or easing it. In fact some of us have been saying we will have trouble back as early as late September. Yet Howe simply continue his approach full-throttle and crash it in the worst possible way. No matter you are still fully supporting him for the job or not, you should be disappointed, rightfully.

[Yorkie]

Gordon for a while looked like our only hope of getting something in the second half. He was the out-ball and he also provided a very good assist for the equaliser. If we had any hope of getting anything from the game then I think he had to play the full 90 again, sadly, such is the situation. 

[Zero]

8 minutes ago, The College Dropout said:

This I agree with mostly. Except the reason for it was knowing Eddie doesn’t like to rotate if he doesn’t believe in the backups. 
 

I also think there was an acceptance that this approach that Eddie was likely to choose would lead to increased fatigue and probably poor performances and results. I think me and @Erikse were saying, if fatigue is our big issue - things would only get worse because Howe wasn’t going to rotate. 
 

Where i differ is I think it is has been a choice and a wrong choice.  From giving Ritchie, Dummett, Krafth contracts, to signing Hall, to not playing them or youth. These are choices. 

I would go further and say he should play youngsters like Alex Murphy or Sanusi, if he still prefers the team to play high intensity pressing football. You need fresh players to carry out your tactics.

 

Another approach is to change to plan B, if any