Eddie Howe

[KaKa]

4 minutes ago, Dokko said:

 

This is the only doubt I have about him. When I look at this season, I don't see it. 

 

I think we may need some outside influence in the backroom staff, show other ways of working.  

 

Yeah, you don't see it because you refuse to acknowledge the effect the unavailability of certain players has had on our approach.

 

You also think just changing formation or the way the team plays is something that can just be done at the drop of a hat in the middle of the season to fix everything immediately. Or simply dropping any player that makes a mistake will fix things too.

 

This is not a realistic perspective.

[Matt1892]

2 hours ago, Theregulars said:

My goodness! Like a little doggo with a chew bone. A really unique combination of ignorant, pugnacious and annoying. 
 

I’ve clearly responded to the point you made accusing Howe of tactical inflexibility / ineptitude by saying that there are obvious mitigating circumstances that mean he can’t really do much in terms of flexibility. It’s like collecting your weekly shop, finding half of it rotten, and then expecting a greater variety of meals and snacks from the lesser pool. You’re asking for something that isn’t possible. 

 

It’s so obvious that you’re butt hurt that Newcastle aren’t as successful as last year and you’re rounding on the manager as you’ve nothing else to focus disappointment on. Tbh your likely joyless existence is probably a fair price to pay for it all. 

 

While we’re playing the patronising internet links game, here are some for you:

 

https://www.psychologytoday.com/gb/basics/projection?amp

 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias

 

https://www.psychmechanics.com/signs-of-low-intelligence/

 

 

 

Players being injured doesn’t mean he can’t change the tactics involving the players he does put out, it is absolutely ridiculous to think we can’t deviate from the standard 4-3-3 with a high line no matter the players we put on the pitch.

 

If you have a keeper that you rely on to sweep allowing you to play a high line, then that keeper is injured and the replacement can’t sweep, you don’t carry on playing that high line, especially when you are shipping a high number of goals in the process.

 

 

[Theregulars]

1 minute ago, Matt1892 said:

Players being injured doesn’t mean he can’t change the tactics involving the players he does put out, it is absolutely ridiculous to think we can’t deviate from the standard 4-3-3 with a high line no matter the players we put on the pitch.

 

If you have a keeper that you rely on to sweep allowing you to play a high line, then that keeper is injured and the replacement can’t sweep, you don’t carry on playing that high line, especially when you are shipping a high number of goals in the process.

 

 

You really must write all this to the manager - I’m genuinely concerned he’s not noticed or thought about it.

[LiquidAK]

Howe isn't beyond criticism btw. Personally I think he's made a mistake with Hall - he's obviously held him back feeling that he's not ready, and maybe that approach will bear fruit, but I think given how bare-bones we've been that policy probably needed relaxing earlier. I also think he's been too reticent to swap out Burn or Longstaff. 

 

That said, I'm not looking at those decisions and saying "clearly I'm right and he's wrong, the big idiot". My criticism has to be tempered with the knowledge that he has a lot more information than I do and he's making a judgement based on that. If he's gambled on these decisions and it's not come off, that's just the nature of football management, not every decision is going to go the right way. The difference is I'm confident that he'll get more right than he gets wrong.

[Matt1892]

Just now, Theregulars said:

You really must write all this to the manager - I’m genuinely concerned he’s not noticed or thought about it.

You are not the only one concerned.

[Matt1892]

17 minutes ago, SUPERTOON said:

We did this very successfully with lesser players from about January onwards in his first season. I have been wondering why we haven’t tried it this season.

The option would be you drop the defenders back to make more of a low block, then you would look at dropping 2 of the midfielders to slightly deeper so you don’t create a space between them and the defence, then pushing the other midfielder slightly forward to link between them and the attack.

 

It would give you a formation similar to Liverpool and Brighton then and would cut out a lot of the issues with being exposed at the back.

[Theregulars]

If you think Howe is actually inflexible then in my view you’re not watching the games or you don’t understand football beyond surface level. Clearly on Saturday our tactics changed to overloading their right back with hall, Anderson and Barnes and we went all out attack with the fullbacks. One can make tactical changes without fundamentally changing the formation. he sacrificed 2 defensive positions for an offensive overwhelm and he was richly, totally and justly rewarded.

[Theregulars]

Just now, Matt1892 said:

The option would be you drop the defenders back to make more of a low block, then you would look at dropping 2 of the midfielders to slightly deeper so you don’t create a space between them and the defence, then pushing the other midfielder slightly forward to link between them and the attack.

 

It would give you a formation similar to Liverpool and Brighton then and would cut out a lot of the issues with being exposed at the back.

And what about the sacrifice of attacking intent and pressing which that involves? 

[Matt1892]

Just now, Theregulars said:

And what about the sacrifice of attacking intent and pressing which that involves? 

What pressing?

[SUPERTOON]

Just now, Theregulars said:

And what about the sacrifice of attacking intent and pressing which that involves? 

In fairness, we haven’t pressed that effectively for a while now.

[Theregulars]

I can’t help you. Mind how you go.

[Theregulars]

2 minutes ago, SUPERTOON said:

In fairness, we haven’t pressed that effectively for a while now.

Perhaps because we’re having to be more balanced because of the injuries, totally undermining the already wrong point that he offers no tactical flexibility. 

[SUPERTOON]

1 minute ago, Theregulars said:

Perhaps because we’re having to be more balanced because of the injuries, totally undermining the already wrong point that he offers no tactical flexibility. 

Don’t get me wrong I understand the reasoning, just saying I wouldn’t have minded seeing us try out a low block (we did so to some degree at home to Wolves and we looked really solid).

[Matt1892]

1 minute ago, Theregulars said:

Perhaps because we’re having to be more balanced because of the injuries, totally undermining the already wrong point that he offers no tactical flexibility. 

You just asked how we keep up the pressing as if it was a reason for us not changing things up, then when it is pointed out to you that we don’t press effectively anymore you claim it shows Howe’s tactical flexibility by stopping us pressing.

[Smal]

Our pressing has been off/late/non-existent since October but that can be put down, more or less 100%, to injuries and the period where we had to field the same XI for a dozen games screwing our players up physically.

 

What I don't think can be defended as easily is that we haven't changed our midfield/defensive structure to defend transitions better. Sticking to your principles is fine and generally what the best managers do, but we have been conceding the same goal 2 or 3 times a game for about 3 months now with zero sign of it changing which surely has to be a major concern.

 

 

Edited April 1 by Smal

[Theregulars]

7 minutes ago, SUPERTOON said:

Don’t get me wrong I understand the reasoning, just saying I wouldn’t have minded seeing us try out a low block (we did so to some degree at home to Wolves and we looked really solid).

Ah fair enough. Maybe wouldn’t work vs West Ham who weren’t attacking; they invited us to take the initiative and tried to hit us on the counter (doing so effectively a few times). If anything this discussion is further evidence of Howe’s tactical flexibility within a system. 

[astraguy]

Any word on Tino,Miggy from eddie?

[KaKa]

16 minutes ago, Theregulars said:

And what about the sacrifice of attacking intent and pressing which that involves? 

 

This is what makes me laugh.

 

When the changes then completely stifle our attack and invite even more pressure because we're pinned back in our half, then they'll moan about that.

 

Think they have all the answers.

[SUPERTOON]

Just now, KaKa said:

 

This is what makes me laugh.

 

When the changes then completely stifle our attack and invite even more pressure because we're pinned back in our half, then they'll moan about that.

 

Think they have all the answers.

From my point of view, it was more we have conceded 3 or more in 8 of the last 15 games (something along those lines). I wouldn’t have minded seeing a change in some of those games to help out a clearly struggling defence. Our injuries/fatigue have meant we can’t press as effectively as we did last season a switch to a low block may have helped.

[80]

47 minutes ago, KaKa said:

And looking at his approach to things it is very likely he will continue to learn and improve on things going forward.

 

This is not the calibre of manager or person to disregard so willy nilly.

 

 

Agree with the vast majority of your post.

 

To throw a little grenade in, though, sometimes I wonder/worry that his next major period of growth will come after he leaves us i.e. as a consequence of the deep reflection he'd undergo during his first real period of downtime since he joined us. Personally, I suspect he'd conclude he needs to be slightly less rigourously methodical in his approach to allow more serendipity in.

 

A sort of horrifically depressing catch 22 situation for us, basically  Time will tell, obviously. My thinking may well be influenced by NUFC-related trauma!

 

I would like to find ways to expose him to other ways of doing things though, as kind of inverted sabbaticals. I get the impression much of his working life is based around trying to personally invent things himself, and it takes a major disruption to break that habit e.g. leaving Bournemouth.

[STM]

I made a post a few weeks back where I said we needed to move to 4231, in order to have 2 players sitting. Bruno + 1 and have a Willock or whoever protecting them as the AM. Just to change the shape of our midfield trio.

There would be no need to change our pressing philosophy or attacking intent. 

 

Howe didn't do that, I'm sure he has his reasons. So there's a slight criticism of a man I adore.

 

Something like this:

 

            Miley     Bruno

 

Miggy         Willock       Gordon

 

                     Isak

 

Obviously that was when Miley and Miggy were available.

 

 

Edited April 1 by STM

[KaKa]

4 minutes ago, 80 said:

Agree with the vast majority of your post.

 

To throw a little grenade in, though, sometimes I wonder/worry that his next major period of growth will come after he leaves us i.e. as a consequence of the deep reflection he'd undergo during his first real period of downtime since he joined us. Personally, I suspect he'd conclude he needs to be slightly less rigourously methodical in his approach to allow more serendipity in.

 

A sort of horrifically depressing catch 22 situation for us, basically  Time will tell, obviously. My thinking may well be influenced by NUFC-related trauma!

 

I would like to find ways to expose him to other ways of doing things though, as kind of inverted sabbaticals. I get the impression much of his working life is based around trying to personally invent things himself, and it takes a major disruption to break that habit e.g. leaving Bournemouth.

 

I think he'll definitely be doing this during the off-season, especially having faced some new and different challenges this season, with having had to balance the demands of European football for the first time. Can't see him resting on his laurels at all. 

[Guest]

17 minutes ago, astraguy said:

Any word on Tino,Miggy from eddie?

Not yet

[SUPERTOON]

18 minutes ago, astraguy said:

Any word on Tino,Miggy from eddie?

Twitter rumours suggest Tino misses tomorrow, Miggy is going to be a bad one.

[STM]

Having an internal investigation into the medical/fitness side would be my starting point. Perhaps rotate the work load of players who've started the previous weekend?

 

After that, I'd want Eddie to come up with a serious plan B. Perhaps a legitimate DM who can sit in front of the back 4 and release Bruno or maybe a change of formation for tougher games.