Eddie Howe

[r0cafella]

Just now, Shadow Puppets said:

Last summer was primarily a PSR issue, although of course there was the whole Guehi saga. We never really planned to do much other than that though.

 

This summer has clearly been a disaster so far, but the factors, from my understanding are:

 

- being left high and dry by Mitchell with little warning, thrusting people into roles they’re perhaps not comfortable / capable of being in.

 

- aiming for, not necessarily the “wrong” targets, but targets that we are competing with the big 6 for. It’s ambitious, but so far, it’s been a major realisation that we have a firm ceiling when it comes to targets like that.

 

- the Isak situation has certainly fucked up the strategy further. As of the start of July, Ekitike was SUPPOSED to be replacing Wilson. After that an entire shift has had to take place, essentially paralysing the rest of our business until some form of solution is found (whether that means an agreement with Isak for another year).

 

 

The first point makes zero sense and never did. I understand it's party line but it doesn't tally. He left without a notice period? He kept it totally silent? He was on a contract with no notice period? Again doesn't add up. 

 

Disagree on the targets part no point going over it in every thread so I'll leave it be. 

 

Re isak it seems the stories at conflicting at best some say we weren't aware others say we were. 

 

Either way, I don't think we would want to go into another window with this set up as it clearly isn't fit for purpose. 

[Dr Venkman]

18 minutes ago, Matt1892 said:

This summer has been an absolute disaster so far, and it is staggering that he went to war with Paul Mitchell over transfers, came out on top only for him and his team to serve up this complete shit show over the summer.
 

Mitchell must be at home laughing his head off at the shambles how our summer window has turned out, comedy gold for anyone who is not a fan of the club and a complete embarrassment for us.

 

Isak should have been told to get his head down and we would look at any transfer for him towards the end of the window, after we had done all of our other business and a replacement was lined up. Instead we have let the signing of a CB and CM be placed on hold whilst we stumble around in slapstick fashion like we have Fred Karno’s army leading our transfer activity.
 

It isn’t too late to turn it around, but as it stands, the 2025 transfer window is looking like an Eddie Howe disasterclass, you can’t demand control only to have your team make such a shambles of it and you can’t use it as an excuse if our season suffers because of it. If you insist on having your nephew run the show then you have to take responsibility when the nepotism leads to us going backwards.

 

Time to tell Isak he is staying and focus on significant upgrades for Wilson, Longstaff and Kelly, which shouldn’t be hard.

Fucking hell, look who’s back . Didn’t have any thoughts on Howe’s achievements since March?

[Menace]

I don't buy this "Mitchell left them in a lurch" bs either. Any job position of power the notice period is 60+ days. Let alone a sporting director of a close to a billion pound club. They will have known months in advance.

[Nucasol]

3 minutes ago, Menace said:

You really believed Ekitike was Wilson's replacement?

Yes, for 1 season, before Isak was sold next summer.

[r0cafella]

1 minute ago, Menace said:

I don't buy this "Mitchell left them in a lurch" bs either. Any job position of power the notice period is 60+ days. Let alone a sporting director of a close to a billion pound club. They will have known months in advance.

It's pretty obvious he wasn't willing to just sign off on transfers he didn't agree with and was either pushed or walked. 

[AyeDubbleYoo]

3 minutes ago, r0cafella said:

The first point makes zero sense and never did. I understand it's party line but it doesn't tally. He left without a notice period? He kept it totally silent? He was on a contract with no notice period? Again doesn't add up. 

 

Disagree on the targets part no point going over it in every thread so I'll leave it be. 

 

Re isak it seems the stories at conflicting at best some say we weren't aware others say we were. 

 

Either way, I don't think we would want to go into another window with this set up as it clearly isn't fit for purpose. 

Well we know we don’t want this setup, the CEO and DOF have both resigned and will be replacement. I don’t get the point of assessing our current setup since it’s obviously the result of successive errors or unfortunate circumstances. We never planned for this and we don’t think it’s good, it’s just what we have to work with right now. 

[Guest]

Spurs/Poch, probably Poch Chelsea too for disconnect between players they wanted/players that were signed.

 

”

Mauricio Pochettino: I'm not in charge of transfers, maybe Spurs should change my job title

"I am not in charge, I know nothing about the situation of my players. I am only coaching them, trying to get the best from them."”

[Thomson Mouse]

22 minutes ago, Matt1892 said:

This summer has been an absolute disaster so far, and it is staggering that he went to war with Paul Mitchell over transfers, came out on top only for him and his team to serve up this complete shit show over the summer.
 

Mitchell must be at home laughing his head off at the shambles how our summer window has turned out, comedy gold for anyone who is not a fan of the club and a complete embarrassment for us.

 

Isak should have been told to get his head down and we would look at any transfer for him towards the end of the window, after we had done all of our other business and a replacement was lined up. Instead we have let the signing of a CB and CM be placed on hold whilst we stumble around in slapstick fashion like we have Fred Karno’s army leading our transfer activity.
 

It isn’t too late to turn it around, but as it stands, the 2025 transfer window is looking like an Eddie Howe disasterclass, you can’t demand control only to have your team make such a shambles of it and you can’t use it as an excuse if our season suffers because of it. If you insist on having your nephew run the show then you have to take responsibility when the nepotism leads to us going backwards.

 

Time to tell Isak he is staying and focus on significant upgrades for Wilson, Longstaff and Kelly, which shouldn’t be hard.

 

Someone’s been watching too much Love Island.

[Shadow Puppets]

1 minute ago, r0cafella said:

The first point makes zero sense and never did. I understand it's party line but it doesn't tally. He left without a notice period? He kept it totally silent? He was on a contract with no notice period? Again doesn't add up. 

 

Disagree on the targets part no point going over it in every thread so I'll leave it be. 

 

Re isak it seems the stories at conflicting at best some say we weren't aware others say we were. 

 

Either way, I don't think we would want to go into another window with this set up as it clearly isn't fit for purpose. 

Eddie or the players were certainly never told about Mitchell leaving until late May. Whether announced it to higher up before then I don’t know. Some contracts have a 3 month notice, some a 1 month, so who knows 🤷‍♂️ (he served 1 month).

 

Again, with Isak, I can only really communicate what players and agents thought, because thats where my info tends to come from, but the players certainly had no idea that he wanted out, hence their anger towards him now. Elanga even cited him as one of the people who convinced him to join. Those conversations were happening throughout June.

 

People in the industry / agents absolutely expected Isak to be at NUFC for another year. There had been chatter about other clubs being interested, but nothing from the player side to say he wanted to go.

 

 

[AyeDubbleYoo]

You don’t want Poch and you don’t want an all-powerful manager either. You want a structure with top professionals in specialist jobs who work together to get the right players in. I think that’s what we thought we were assembling before everyone quit. 

[Shadow Puppets]

Just now, AyeDubbleYoo said:

You don’t want Poch and you don’t want an all-powerful manager either. You want a structure with top professionals in specialist jobs who work together to get the right players in. I think that’s what we thought we were assembling before everyone quit. 

👍🏻

[Ben]

1 minute ago, AyeDubbleYoo said:

You don’t want Poch and you don’t want an all-powerful manager either. You want a structure with top professionals in specialist jobs who work together to get the right players in. I think that’s what we thought we were assembling before everyone quit. 

 

Arh well maybe we'll have it sorted by next summer and try again.

[Guest]

1 minute ago, AyeDubbleYoo said:

You don’t want Poch and you don’t want an all-powerful manager either. You want a structure with top professionals in specialist jobs who work together to get the right players in. I think that’s what we thought we were assembling before everyone quit. 

Yeah wasn’t really a comment on what we should have, more that it does happen. I wouldn’t imagine Maresca for instance has much say on incomings/outgoings at Chelsea 

[Stuy_O]

1 minute ago, r0cafella said:

It's pretty obvious he wasn't willing to just sign off on transfers he didn't agree with and was either pushed or walked. 

 

Agreed. To say Mitchell is somewhat responsible for this window is mental. He was obviously up his own arse but the questions he raised about our recruitment have been answered clearly this summer. 

There does seem to be a slight feeling that you can't hold Eddie to account for anything because of the brilliant job he's done. I love him to bits but I get the feeling he's awkward to work with. He got the nod with the approach this summer, these are his target we're going for and failing miserably. 

 

[AyeDubbleYoo]

Did Eddie choose all the targets when we signed Isak, Tonali, Bruno, Botman etc?

[Ben]

Just now, Stuy_O said:

 

Agreed. To say Mitchell is somewhat responsible for this window is mental. He was obviously up his own arse but the questions he raised about our recruitment have been answered clearly this summer. 

There does seem to be a slight feeling that you can't hold Eddie to account for anything because of the brilliant job he's done. I love him to bits but I get the feeling he's awkward to work with. He got the nod with the approach this summer, these are his target we're going for and failing miserably. 

 

 

So what the fuck has Mitchell done for yhe past 12 months ?

[Zero]

2 minutes ago, Shadow Puppets said:

Does the director of football have “full control” at any club? Managers have and always will have a significant say.

it really depends, but most of the top clubs do let DOF to have the final say on transfer as ultimately it should be DOF who is responsible for transfers and long term squad planning, while first team coach mainly responsible for utilizing the players on hand and extract the most of them. These club also tends to have a DOF last longer than the coach.

 

however for some clubs when the head coach has done a marvellous job, he will start to have more influence on transfer, probably to the point that it exceeds what his role should have, thus starting to have power struggles with DOF. Just look at Liverpool - even Edwards have had enough and quit after uncountable clashes with Klopp. I genuinely think similar things happened between Eddie and Ashworth/Mitchell. To be honest, all managers want to have more influence on transfers. I remember a lot of people here also suggests that Eddie should always have the final say on transfer so as to give what he wants best for the team.

 

The problem is, ultimately, Eddie is just an human being and couldn’t replicate an AI to do all the jobs. Probably if he is fully focusing on transfers and approach those players by person they really would join Eddies project. But the reality is he can’t, and suddenly we all remember what a DOF should do.

[Stuy_O]

Just now, Ben said:

 

So what the fuck has Mitchell done for yhe past 12 months ?

Well he's alleviated some psr pressure by selling a donkey for 20million, Almiron for 12? And probably tried to get a new strategy adopted that the manager didn't agree with, who knows? 

The last year wasn't being debated either, it was this window.

[Zero]

9 minutes ago, Shadow Puppets said:

Eddie or the players were certainly never told about Mitchell leaving until late May. Whether announced it to higher up before then I don’t know. Some contracts have a 3 month notice, some a 1 month, so who knows 🤷‍♂️ (he served 1 month).

 

Again, with Isak, I can only really communicate what players and agents thought, because thats where my info tends to come from, but the players certainly had no idea that he wanted out, hence their anger towards him now. Elanga even cited him as one of the people who convinced him to join. Those conversations were happening throughout June.

 

People in the industry / agents absolutely expected Isak to be at NUFC for another year. There had been chatter about other clubs being interested, but nothing from the player side to say he wanted to go.

 

 

I agree re Isaks part. If Arsenal knows Isak is unhappy and wants quit they would approach us before end of June. That’s the only explanation. Probably even Howe doesn’t know the contract issues. But then by the time we bid for Ekitike I do think the club or Howe already knows Isak want to quit this season or next season and Ekitike is the replacement.

 

No sure about Mitchell’s part. It’s really weird. You can put the blame on PIF / Eales.

[Super Duper Branko Strupar]

43 minutes ago, Matt1892 said:

This summer has been an absolute disaster so far, and it is staggering that he went to war with Paul Mitchell over transfers, came out on top only for him and his team to serve up this complete shit show over the summer.
 

Mitchell must be at home laughing his head off at the shambles how our summer window has turned out, comedy gold for anyone who is not a fan of the club and a complete embarrassment for us.

 

Isak should have been told to get his head down and we would look at any transfer for him towards the end of the window, after we had done all of our other business and a replacement was lined up. Instead we have let the signing of a CB and CM be placed on hold whilst we stumble around in slapstick fashion like we have Fred Karno’s army leading our transfer activity.
 

It isn’t too late to turn it around, but as it stands, the 2025 transfer window is looking like an Eddie Howe disasterclass, you can’t demand control only to have your team make such a shambles of it and you can’t use it as an excuse if our season suffers because of it. If you insist on having your nephew run the show then you have to take responsibility when the nepotism leads to us going backwards.

 

Time to tell Isak he is staying and focus on significant upgrades for Wilson, Longstaff and Kelly, which shouldn’t be hard.

What a peculiar post.

[Interpolic]

1 hour ago, Matt1892 said:

This summer has been an absolute disaster so far, and it is staggering that he went to war with Paul Mitchell over transfers, came out on top only for him and his team to serve up this complete shit show over the summer.
 

Mitchell must be at home laughing his head off at the shambles how our summer window has turned out, comedy gold for anyone who is not a fan of the club and a complete embarrassment for us.

 

Isak should have been told to get his head down and we would look at any transfer for him towards the end of the window, after we had done all of our other business and a replacement was lined up. Instead we have let the signing of a CB and CM be placed on hold whilst we stumble around in slapstick fashion like we have Fred Karno’s army leading our transfer activity.
 

It isn’t too late to turn it around, but as it stands, the 2025 transfer window is looking like an Eddie Howe disasterclass, you can’t demand control only to have your team make such a shambles of it and you can’t use it as an excuse if our season suffers because of it. If you insist on having your nephew run the show then you have to take responsibility when the nepotism leads to us going backwards.

 

Time to tell Isak he is staying and focus on significant upgrades for Wilson, Longstaff and Kelly, which shouldn’t be hard.

 

Crap post, you have not been missed.

[Abacus]

39 minutes ago, r0cafella said:

The first point makes zero sense and never did. I understand it's party line but it doesn't tally. He left without a notice period? He kept it totally silent? He was on a contract with no notice period? Again doesn't add up. 

 

Disagree on the targets part no point going over it in every thread so I'll leave it be. 

 

Re isak it seems the stories at conflicting at best some say we weren't aware others say we were. 

 

Either way, I don't think we would want to go into another window with this set up as it clearly isn't fit for purpose. 

It was reported, I'm not sure whether this is true or not, that Mitchell's departure was as much of a surprise to Howe as his appointment was. So, somebody knew he was going, but didn't tell him.

 

What was said was that they wanted Howe to concentrate on the end of the season. Again, speculation and paper talk so treat with a dollop of salt.

 

IF true, that fits with what Eales said on Mitchell's appointment, that they wanted Eddie to concentrate on what he's good at, on the pitch. Which seemed to cause Howe to come out spitting feathers.

 

I don't think Howe can be blamed at all for being left high and dry by the people above him.

[r0cafella]

9 minutes ago, Abacus said:

It was reported, I'm not sure whether this is true or not, that Mitchell's departure was as much of a surprise to Howe as his appointment was. So, somebody knew he was going, but didn't tell him.

 

What was said was that they wanted Howe to concentrate on the end of the season. Again, speculation and paper talk so treat with a dollop of salt.

 

IF true, that fits with what Eales said on Mitchell's appointment, that they wanted Eddie to concentrate on what he's good at, on the pitch. Which seemed to cause Howe to come out spitting feathers.

 

I don't think Howe can be blamed at all for being left high and dry by the people above him.

Aye yeah they may not have told Eddie that's true but somewhat immaterial as the decision was made prior to that. 

 

I'm not blaming Eddie either, he wants things done a certain way I understand that. I do however believe he wants to have final say over transfers and that model doesn't mesh well with the system we should be implementing imo. 

[David Edgar]

Need a thread for his nepo brother's negotiating 

[AyeDubbleYoo]

6 minutes ago, David Edgar said:

Need a thread for his nepo brother's negotiating 

Nephew isn’t it?