Eddie Howe

[AyeDubbleYoo]

18 minutes ago, SUPERTOON said:

Not improving the team (which wasn’t the strongest anyway) in nearly two years can’t be said enough tbh. With that in mind, he’s doing a fantastic job keeping us competitive. It’s not only that we haven’t strengthened, everyone else in that time has.

 

Villa added like 4 attackers with CL experience just in January

[Chris_R]

10 hours ago, The Prophet said:

Poor Eddie looks like he's aged a bit over the last year.

 

He has, by a year.

[Yorkie]

29 minutes ago, SUPERTOON said:

Not improving the team (which wasn’t the strongest anyway) in nearly two years can’t be said enough tbh. With that in mind, he’s doing a fantastic job keeping us competitive. It’s not only that we haven’t strengthened, everyone else in that time has.

 

Too right. The first thing to blame should always be PSR.

 

It's grimly predictable that our season could, yet again, hinge on the goalkeeper. We identified that as an area to upgrade but we couldn't. 

[Cf]

34 minutes ago, Elliottman said:

He sounded pretty pissed off after the game I thought. Think the realisation he’s took some of these players as far as he can has kicked in. 

 

This is pretty much it.

 

We're at the point now where the "old guard" are on the decline. Your Trippiers, Schars, Wilsons, etc are reaching the ends of their careers. They're not overnight bad footballers but starting to become evident that they're not at the level of CL contenders no matter how well they might be coached.

 

PSR is the obvious elephant in the room and I do wonder if this is why we've been very restrained the last couple of windows because we know a big refresh needs to happen.

[mighty__mag]

To be fair to Eddie, he was without his best player in Isak, and two key players in Joelinton and Botman,

 

I think Liverpool have lost once at home all season, and we simply never win there, anything other than a loss was on the cards. 

 

Don't think Howe deserves the shit he gets sometimes, it's more or less down to individuals on the pitch who lack confidence on the big occasion, hence I'm worried about the cup final, Howe will have them drilled, but on the day, I'm not convinced certain players will be mentally prepared.

 

 

Edited Thursday at 10:48 by mighty__mag

[Dokko]

Wasn't prepared to give away our gameplan for the final. Fair play, always thinking ahead. 

 

Tbh, didn't see it, expected worse, some key players out and didn't disgrace in terms of scoreline. Smallest amount of kicking. This game just isn't a priority. We move on. 

[TRon]

1 hour ago, Elliottman said:

He sounded pretty pissed off after the game I thought. Think the realisation he’s took some of these players as far as he can has kicked in. 

 

 

Not surprised, there wasn't really much to enthuse about. If Willock and Murphy have bad games, you can put it down to them being out of their depth. But Pope, Bruno and Tonali were hardly much better.

[huss9]

14 hours ago, Danh1 said:

Whatever happens between now and May it gives me comfort that we are closer to not seeing Jacob Murphy in a black and white shirt every week. Purple patch was nice but he’s utter shit and soft as fucking clarts. 
 

Wrong thread.

 

 

 

we talking about murphy or do you mean willock?

[huss9]

2 hours ago, Elliottman said:

He sounded pretty pissed off after the game I thought. Think the realisation he’s took some of these players as far as he can has kicked in. 

hopefully he's also realised  willock and pope have done nothing to warrant a start over miley and dubs.

[Likelylad]

1 hour ago, mighty__mag said:

To be fair to Eddie, he was without his best player in Isak, and two key players in Joelinton and Botman,

 

I think Liverpool have lost once at home all season, and we simply never win there, anything other than a loss was on the cards. 

 

Don't think Howe deserves the shit he gets sometimes, it's more or less down to individuals on the pitch who lack confidence on the big occasion, hence I'm worried about the cup final, Howe will have them drilled, but on the day, I'm not convinced certain players will be mentally prepared.

 

 

 

Agree with this but he doesn't help himself sometimes. 

Numerous times this season his lack of proactive in game management has cost us. I was at Fulham and you could see what was happening in real time and he refused to change it up until they scored. 

He brought Pope back in and he's let him down big time last night and that first goal against Nottingham Forest and i don't think he's going to get better going forward. 

 

Still absolutely love him mind but he's not infallible. 

[The College Dropout]

24 minutes ago, Likelylad said:

Agree with this but he doesn't help himself sometimes. 

Numerous times this season his lack of proactive in game management has cost us. I was at Fulham and you could see what was happening in real time and he refused to change it up until they scored. 

He brought Pope back in and he's let him down big time last night and that first goal against Nottingham Forest and i don't think he's going to get better going forward. 

 

Still absolutely love him mind but he's not infallible. 

He’s always done this. We’ll be getting slapped and he won’t make any changes until we concede. I’ve stopped expecting him to change. It is what it is. 
 

Edit: he’s not going to change his planned subs.  He’ll follow his planned subs until the score is far off plan.  

 

 

Edited Thursday at 12:55 by The College Dropout

[huss9]

he has made half time subs before.

last night was calling out for one - even two.

[Shays Given Tim Flowers]

14 hours ago, Jordan said:

What was the game plan though?! What was our plan to win that game? 

Keep the defensive line deep, look to transition their possession into a rapid counterattack in midfield by pressing centrally and then engineer a 3 on 4 with the first or second ball played in behind. 
 

Hall to man mark Salah which denied Gordon of the overlapping run which free allows him to cut inside. Feel like the first para is why Gordon was played centrally. 

 

 

Edited Thursday at 13:16 by Shays Given Tim Flowers

[wyn davies]

14 hours ago, sushimonster85 said:

 

Why is he not the manager to take us forward?

I believe he is at his peak with this team and we are beginning to hover around top 10 when we need to be top 5 

[huss9]

8 minutes ago, wyn davies said:

I believe he is at his peak with this team and we are beginning to hover around top 10 when we need to be top 5 

he has had no fresh meat for a couple of years.

we have players from the ashley era still in the first team

and also players that what were bought to get us out of relegation threat.

 

thats said, he is supercautious with subs at times, and doesnt explain an off form willock in for a confident miley. or pope.

not sure about the formation last night - must have been a plan there that the players failed to execute.

[Jackie Broon]

1 minute ago, wyn davies said:

I believe he is at his peak with this team and we are beginning to hover around top 10 when we need to be top 5 

 

I've been disappointed with aspects of Eddie's management this season, how slow he is to make changes when things obviously need changing and our lack of consistency and intensity against teams we should be beating. But, top 5 is an unrealistic and unfair expectation given the financial gulf between us and the big 6. European qualification is a realistic expectation, and we are on course for that.

 

We will probably have more money to spend to refresh the squad in the summer and push on, he has more than earned the chance to do that, if we don't push on from that with Eddie then that's the time to say he's not the man to do it.

[Mahoneys Tache]

Perfect reflection of where we are. We are better than most, much better than a lot, not elite yet. To win there would require a full strength team with the best of the rest that we have on the bench, Liverpool to have a bad night and us to be at peak performance. They are just much  fucking better than us. I don’t think they will be for long with a fair wind but at the moment they are. 

 

 

Edited Thursday at 13:44 by Mahoneys Tache

[The Prophet]

56 minutes ago, The College Dropout said:

He’s always done this. We’ll be getting slapped and he won’t make any changes until we concede. I’ve stopped expecting him to change. It is what it is. 
 

Edit: he’s not going to change his planned subs.  He’ll follow his planned subs until the score is far off plan.  

 

 

 

 

Agree and disagree. I think he could be more pragmatic with his subs, but there's been times when we've been level or a single goal down at HT where hes rung the changes.

 

It's not like he never does it, it's just that you could argue he doesn't do it enough.

 

Of course in mitigation it's not like our bench is packed with game changers.

[Lush Vlad]

11 minutes ago, Jackie Broon said:

 

I've been disappointed with aspects of Eddie's management this season, how slow he is to make changes when things obviously need changing and our lack of consistency and intensity against teams we should be beating. But, top 5 is an unrealistic and unfair expectation given the financial gulf between us and the big 6. European qualification is a realistic expectation, and we are on course for that.

 

We will probably have more money to spend to refresh the squad in the summer and push on, he has more than earned the chance to do that, if we don't push on from that with Eddie then that's the time to say he's not the man to do it.

 

I do agree with a lot of this and I know the likes of Bournemouth and Forest would have to do it a bit more consistently to show they're not a flash in the pan.  But if they finish above us this season, I think It ruins the argument a bit and even my view on Howe and his abilities would go down a bit.  

 

2 of the traditional Sky 6 are miles behind us and you'd imagine Spurs might figure it out a bit with a new manager and/or once half their squad aren't injured.  But this season feels like a good time to be taking advantage of that.  A bit like we did under Pardew for 5th and under Howe for 4th.  Chelsea have also had a bit of a mid-season wobble.  Meaning we're well in touch with them, when it looked unlikely earlier on in the season and when you consider the gazillions they've spent. 

 

Obviously plenty of the season to go and I do think we can finish top 5-6.  Just hypothetically speaking. 

[nemtizz]

Even with our strongest XI Anfield is a tall feat.
 

Sounds like a cope but surely he has a specific gameplan for the final. It’s the only way the formation last night makes sense. 

[Jackie Broon]

16 minutes ago, Lush Vlad said:

 

I do agree with a lot of this and I know the likes of Bournemouth and Forest would have to do it a bit more consistently to show they're not a flash in the pan.  But if they finish above us this season, I think It ruins the argument a bit and even my view on Howe and his abilities would go down a bit.  

 

2 of the traditional Sky 6 are miles behind us and you'd imagine Spurs might figure it out a bit with a new manager and/or once half their squad aren't injured.  But this season feels like a good time to be taking advantage of that.  A bit like we did under Pardew for 5th and under Howe for 4th.  Chelsea have also had a bit of a mid-season wobble.  Meaning we're well in touch with them, when it looked unlikely earlier on in the season and when you consider the gazillions they've spent. 

 

Obviously plenty of the season to go and I do think we can finish top 5-6.  Just hypothetically speaking. 

 

I agree with a lot of that too but there are always going to be one or two of the big 6 who underperform and one or two clubs outside of the big 6 that overperform. It happens pretty much every season.

 

We have every chance of getting 5th from our position, I still think Forest will drop off and we'll finish ahead of them. If they don't drop off, good on them, they'll deserve it. If we finish 5th it will be a good achievement but the expectation for this season shouldn't be more than just qualifying for Europe imo.

[sushimonster85]

1 hour ago, wyn davies said:

I believe he is at his peak with this team and we are beginning to hover around top 10 when we need to be top 5 

 

Yeah, but why do you think that is what I'm asking? What about his coaching style, man management etc makes you think 'he is at his peak'

[AyeDubbleYoo]

5th would be absolutely incredible TBH, barring another unreal season it was always the highest I thought we could do. 
 

4th would need Forest to drop off as well another team, which is a stretch. Chelsea could be the one, but more likely we come 5th. 

 

 

Edited Thursday at 14:58 by AyeDubbleYoo

[The College Dropout]

2 hours ago, The Prophet said:

 

Agree and disagree. I think he could be more pragmatic with his subs, but there's been times when we've been level or a single goal down at HT where hes rung the changes.

 

It's not like he never does it, it's just that you could argue he doesn't do it enough.

 

Of course in mitigation it's not like our bench is packed with game changers.

That's because the result is bad enough for him to change things. He's lost belief in plan A. He doesn't tend to make unplanned changes when the score is ok or he thinks Plan A might work eventually.

 

Many examples where the game is going against us for 5-10-15 minutes but the opposition haven't scored and Howe sits on his hands until they score. Sometimes they don't score.

[The Prophet]

20 minutes ago, The College Dropout said:

That's because the result is bad enough for him to change things. He's lost belief in plan A. He doesn't tend to make unplanned changes when the score is ok or he thinks Plan A might work eventually.

 

Many examples where the game is going against us for 5-10-15 minutes but the opposition haven't scored and Howe sits on his hands until they score. Sometimes they don't score.

 

Again, agree and disagree. 

 

There have been instances such as Arsenal away (22/23) where they shredded our press in the first twenty. In response he switched to a midblock and comfortably saw out the game.

 

However there's also been examples such as Wolves away (23/24) where our full backs were becoming isolated v their pacey wide men and he reacted way too slowly.

 

I definitely think his in game tactics is an area he can develop and become more proactive, but I don't think it's as simple as saying he always reacts a certain way.