Eddie Howe

[Vinny Green Balls]

4 minutes ago, Tonalis Bookie said:

Lets not pretend this downfall has only began this season. We have been abysmal since March, we lucked into the champions league on the final day. Had the Villa goal have stood we would be looking at a very different view of things right now.

 

FWIW i think the squad is actually marginally better but we are seeing the same issues as the last time we had CL. No ability to rotate, exhausted players, some playing injured and loyalty to a player in a position that was shown to be fatally flawed for over 2 years.

jumping the gun a little? Or are you going by the broken clock apprach every season?

[Theregulars]

6 minutes ago, Sibierski said:

Said it in tactics thread, Elanga as the striker and a 4-4-1-1. 
 

Instead he’s getting scrap minutes, and we’re playing bad with 4-3-3 with same midfield and Wolte increasingly getting isolated in games.
 

Wissa will be playing LW or Wolte will be on bench more. They’re not playing together anytime soon. 

Respectfully, when your proposed solution is to play an underperforming winger up front then you’ll lose your audience.

[Andy]

31 minutes ago, Yorkie said:

 

Pinning our current troubles on the summer recruitment is just a lazy critique imo. In fact it's almost a cliche at this point because we've heard it all before. 

 

It's too early to make a judgement, it's as simple as that. There's also mitigation, particularly in the case of the strikers, because of the Isak saga, the fact Wissa got injured, and the fact that we essentially resorted to Woltemade after PSR dictated our top targets (and our own fucking player) were destined for someone else. 

 

The whole unit is dysfunctional. That doesn't just come down to who we placed on our summer shortlist.

 

Areet Yorkie how many of my posts do you want to call lazy this week?

 

Recruitment is a problem. Howe is currently a problem. The players are a problem. I'm not pinning it on one element, but it's the one obvious thing that can and should change. The manager can't be driving recruitment at a top level club. 

 

I'm not sure how anyone can look at this summer's recruitment and say it was fit for purpose. Lazy critique and clichéd or not, it's just a reality. We're almost a third of the way through the season, three points above 19th, and only one of our signings looks like they fit into the system that we've been playing for the last four years. With a rough fixture list and an impending CL campaign, we needed a "hit the ground running" type window and just didn't get it. As a result, we look completely stale across the pitch. 

 

That Elanga was the first target sums it up for me. At best he was signed to solve a problem that didn't exist, at worst his ineffectiveness and sloppiness on the ball creates a problem of it's own. 

 

Ramsey - feels like a nothing signing. He did nowt for Villa for two years and looks the same for us. Their fans on Villa Talk were over the moon at the fee, which never bodes well. 

 

Ramsdale - we don't seem to want to give him a go. Jury is out. 

 

Woltemade - everything he touched went in to start with which was obviously unsustainable, now we literally can't get the ball to him. Looks a great player, but whether he's a great fit, jury is also out for me. 

 

Wissa - bad luck with the injury obviously and could go either way. At the price tag, didn't look an amazing value signing even pre-injury. 

 

If the signings we made over the summer end up proving me wrong, fantastic, that's what it's all about, but I just don't see it. Particularly with Ramsey and Elanga, I really just don't see them as being the type of players that we needed that will consistently win us points. 

[Sibierski]

1 minute ago, Theregulars said:

Respectfully, when your proposed solution is to play an underperforming winger up front then you’ll lose your audience.

But the point is he can play there, and it gets Wolte playing in a role that’s then plug in for Wissa to play in replace of Elanga.

 

We’re not going to suddenly play a completely different way when Wissa is back and it’s deluded to think so. 
 

We’re going to have £150m worth of summer signings on bench in November/December when 3 of Wissa / Wolte / Ramsey / Elanga are on bench.

[Guest]

1 minute ago, Vinny Green Balls said:

Absolutely disagree. that was seasons between. Of course you should give someone a second chance and a clean slate at a new club, especially when relegation is looming over it. Fraser had that second chance and acted like a shit, and so was exiled for his efforts.

 

I have heard others say what you are saying, and I think it's a case of inaccurate cliche. People behind the scenes have said that he can be a bit brutal in training. This nice guy thing is because he is even keeled and politican like in press conferences.

We will agree to disagree then.

 

We have lots of clear examples of immense loyalty. Which in almost all aspects of life is a great thing. But to be a top leader and be literally the best in the world, which PIF and us all want it can become too much.

 

Its well known he turned down Celtic before us because he could not bring his whole team with him.

 

We have the situation with many players now, can it loyalty or favourites. Many examples.

 

All you can give is someone suggests in training, etc. That’s different. If Fraser is the only ruthless thing you can bring up, that’s really not helping your argument.

[Yorkie]

1 minute ago, Andy said:

 

Areet Yorkie how many of my posts do you want to call lazy this week?

 

Recruitment is a problem. Howe is currently a problem. The players are a problem. I'm not pinning it on one element, but it's the one obvious thing that can and should change. The manager can't be driving recruitment at a top level club. 

 

I'm not sure how anyone can look at this summer's recruitment and say it was fit for purpose. Lazy critique and clichéd or not, it's just a reality. We're a third of the way through the season, two points above 19th, and only one of our signings looks like they fit into the system that we've been playing for the last four years. With a rough fixture list and an impending CL campaign, we needed a "hit the ground running" type window and just didn't get it. As a result, we look completely stale across the pitch. 

 

That Elanga was the first target sums it up for me. At best he was signed to solve a problem that didn't exist, at worst his ineffectiveness and sloppiness on the ball creates a problem of it's own. 

 

Ramsey - feels like a nothing signing. He did nowt for Villa for two years and looks the same for us. Their fans on Villa Talk were over the moon at the fee, which never bodes well. 

 

Ramsdale - we don't seem to want to give him a go. Jury is out. 

 

Woltemade - everything he touched went in to start with which was obviously unsustainable, now we literally can't get the ball to him. Looks a great player, but whether he's a great fit, jury is also out for me. 

 

Wissa - bad luck with the injury obviously and could go either way. At the price tag, didn't look an amazing value signing even pre-injury. 

 

If the signings we made over the summer end up proving me wrong, fantastic, that's what it's all about, but I just don't see it. Particularly with Ramsey and Elanga, I really just don't see them as being the type of players that we needed that will consistently win us points. 

 

I don't think I have, but apologies if it seems I've targeted you, not intentional!

 

I just don't agree that you can make a judgement about a summer transfer window barely a third into a season, and never will. 

 

Elanga seems like a bad fit is as much as I'll stretch to. Arguably Woltemade too but as we've said, he was way down the shortlist.

[Theregulars]

Ok.

 

Your point is both that it’s deluded to think he’ll change formation, but in your previous argument you talked about changing formation to put elanga up top. So, aside from the delusion of playing elanga up top in anything other than an emergency or to mop-up minutes when we’re winning, your point (by your own logic) is delusional. 
 

I don’t think it’s delusional to suggest that he might try to change formation. Clearly something isn’t working and I think he’s a man open to trying new things and experimenting. He hasn’t had to yet because this is arguably the first sustained period of poor form, and even then it’s weirdly only sustained away from home in one competition, so we’re actually winning a lot of games around the (admittedly really bad) away league games. So it’s not necessarily as simple as “maybe I’ll jack in the formation”, especially when 1/2 main players he signed to sustain a formation change has yet to be available to him. 
 

If we all can see that there is a lack of creative guile, then he can, and I suspect he can see that woltemade is a possible answer to it as the creative fulcrum of the side. Maybe you are right and he’ll never give it a go, and it might then lead to a sad ending, but id be surprised if he never tried it.

[Cf]

Regardless of how it pans out results wise I think it's fair to say our summer recruitment was mostly a bit of a shambles. 

 

Obviously recognised by the club having finally making the required appointments at board level. 

[TheBrownBottle]

The performances are far more of a concern than the results.  We’ve had these spells with Howe before, and I’d back him 100% to fix them - but we’ve never looked this half-arsed under Howe at any point.  The XI seems to now pick itself, irrespective of long or short term form.  We look lethargic and clueless.  

[Doctor Zaius]

One of the worrying things for me is that players who have ability, are looking poor at the minute. 

 

Bruno isnt getting on the ball enough. Tonali is looking sloppy. Botman looks poor. Gordon has looked really poor. Woltemade is isolated. These are arguably are best players and he isn't getting enough out of them.

 

Having said that, ultimately it's our struggles in keeping the ball and our ability to create chances in the final third. Its not working remotely on a tactical level right now. 

[Whitley mag]

He’s got enough credit in the bank to see out the season unless things really nose dive further.

 

This is undoubtedly the lowest point in his time here though and it’s to be hoped it’s not reminiscent of his last season at Bournemouth when he ran out of steam and ideas.

 

Still of the opinion he should never have had total control over transfers and the club have really fucked up if this doesn’t improve.

 

 

 

 

 

Edited November 9, 2025 by Whitley mag

[Sibierski]

3 minutes ago, Theregulars said:

Ok.

 

Your point is both that it’s deluded to think he’ll change formation, but in your previous argument you talked about changing formation to put elanga up top. So, aside from the delusion of playing elanga up top in anything other than an emergency or to mop-up minutes when we’re winning, your point (by your own logic) is delusional. 
 

I don’t think it’s delusional to suggest that he might try to change formation. Clearly something isn’t working and I think he’s a man open to trying new things and experimenting. He hasn’t had to yet because this is arguably the first sustained period of poor form, and even then it’s weirdly only sustained away from home in one competition, so we’re actually winning a lot of games around the (admittedly really bad) away league games. So it’s not necessarily as simple as “maybe I’ll jack in the formation”, especially when 1/2 main players he signed to sustain a formation change has yet to be available to him. 
 

If we all can see that there is a lack of creative guile, then he can, and I suspect he can see that woltemade is a possible answer to it as the creative fulcrum of the side. Maybe you are right and he’ll never give it a go, and it might then lead to a sad ending, but id be surprised if he never tried it.

Yea my argument is to change it, but he’s showing he’s not going to. So my suggestion is just my view of what I would like, but I don’t think for one second Howe will do it.

 

We’ve also been poor at home, so it’s not just away. Wolves and Fulham were proper slogs for home wins, and they’re bottom 5 sides. We’re fundamentally off it in the current shape / personnel. 

[Jesse Pinkman]

If you listen to his after game comments it’s easy to see Howe’s issue. He’s bought into the physicality and set piece meta. 
 

When asked why he didn’t sub off Dan Burn earlier he said something about impacting the team’s height, which would leave the defence susceptible to Brentford’s long throws and set pieces. He didn’t seem to fathom that, in any case, we were getting destroyed due to lack of pace at LB. What’s the point if you would concede another way anyway?
 

He also said Joelinton’s duel winning ability against Brentford’s physicality was a huge miss…

 

He’s going full Dyche. 

 

 

Edited November 9, 2025 by Jesse Pinkman

[Sibierski]

6 minutes ago, TheBrownBottle said:

The performances are far more of a concern than the results.  We’ve had these spells with Howe before, and I’d back him 100% to fix them - but we’ve never looked this half-arsed under Howe at any point.  The XI seems to now pick itself, irrespective of long or short term form.  We look lethargic and clueless.  

I don’t know how we haven’t changed up the midfield when we literally have three fit and available.

 

Not convinced we will change it either for Man City unless Joelinton is injured.

[midds]

6 minutes ago, TheBrownBottle said:

The performances are far more of a concern than the results.  We’ve had these spells with Howe before, and I’d back him 100% to fix them - but we’ve never looked this half-arsed under Howe at any point.  The XI seems to now pick itself, irrespective of long or short term form.  We look lethargic and clueless.  

I'd agree with that too. 

 

Any team can lose games but the manner in which we're losing them just isn't acceptable. We're not getting unlucky here, we're not getting stitched up by the ref or VAR or whatever, we're being completely outplayed and losing deservedly. We've barely put a fight up despite taking the lead today and last week. We've completely backed off and sat on the lead and shipped 3 to both teams in the process. It's just not fucking good enough and I'm blaming the players as much as I am Howe for that. That spark and fizz that ran throughout every performance has totally disappeared. The gut punches in September to Liverpool and Arsenal seem to have completely knocked the stuffing out of the entire club

[mouldy_uk]

He needs to trust more in all his players, we know we don’t have a super strong squad, but as soon as our first 11 look tired then we fall to pieces.
 

His entire game plan is energy (intensity), which you need fairly fresh legs for. I would have been started Hall, Miley and Schar today as a minimum. 

[Whitley mag]

6 minutes ago, Jesse Pinkman said:

If you listen to his after game comments it’s easy to see Howe’s issue. He’s bought into the physicality and set piece meta. 
 

When asked why he didn’t sub off Dan Burn earlier he said something about impacting the team’s height, which would leave the defence susceptible to Brentford’s long throws and long throw-in. He didn’t seem to fathom that in any case we were getting destroyed due to lack of pace at LB. What’s the point if you would concede another way anyway.  
 

He also said Joelinton’s duel winning ability against Brentford’s physicality was a huge miss…

 

He’s going full Dyche. 

I think he’s fallen into a trap where it’s not about how his team play, it’s about stopping the opposition.

 

We don’t seem to have any patterns of play attacking wise and even Tonali didn’t really look like he knew what he was meant to be doing at times today.

 

It’s a fucking mess and he’s got a huge job on his hands to turn this around.

[The College Dropout]

8 minutes ago, Jesse Pinkman said:

If you listen to his after game comments it’s easy to see Howe’s issue. He’s bought into the physicality and set piece meta. 
 

When asked why he didn’t sub off Dan Burn earlier he said something about impacting the team’s height, which would leave the defence susceptible to Brentford’s long throws and set pieces. He didn’t seem to fathom that, in any case, we were getting destroyed due to lack of pace at LB. What’s the point if you would concede another way anyway?
 

He also said Joelinton’s duel winning ability against Brentford’s physicality was a huge miss…

 

He’s going full Dyche. 

 

 

 

It’s a fair point. I don’t think he wants Ramsey and Hall in the same team in a 433.  Which makes the Ramsey transfer confusing.  Hall is the future at LB so if we needed more height elsewhere Ramsey doesn’t fit the ball imo. 
 

I agree suddenly we go from a big dominant side to a small one. 

[Kid Icarus]

11 minutes ago, Yorkie said:

 

I don't think I have, but apologies if it seems I've targeted you, not intentional!

 

I just don't agree that you can make a judgement about a summer transfer window barely a third into a season, and never will. 

 

Elanga seems like a bad fit is as much as I'll stretch to. Arguably Woltemade too but as we've said, he was way down the shortlist.

Side point to Andy, but the summer being shit doesn't necessarily have to be about whether players will come good or not.

 

You're absolutely right to say that it's too early to judge the individual players that we ended up getting in November, particularly with the huge overhaul we had. However, that we ended up with those players and how is another matter. Then there's the overhaul (which we know Howe doesn't like), the drama, the very public nature of everything we did, the huge additional workload on Howe (and it taking his attention away from coaching), all the pressure that comes with it, the decision to sell Isak - all of that caused varying degrees of damage in different ways imo and I'm a strong believer in off field problems transferring to the general vibe around the club, to the crowd, and in the end, into performances and results.

[Choppy Chop Chop]

Howe out is for people who paint roundabouts #NUFC on BlueSky 

[1892er]

I remember the last time we played Burn at LB  for a prolonged period we looked absolutely horrific and the same thing is coming to pass now. 

 

He's been unlucky that both our Full backs have been crocked, but this lifting form has been going on for a while. I'll reserve judgement on him until we have a full strength squad.

 

He always seems to be fighting with one arm tied behind his back, whether that be losing out players to injury or the players we identified as transfer targets not wanting to join. 

 

I like all our signings with maybe the exception of Elanga but he might come good. The balance just seems off at the minute and I'm hoping getting players back will see some improvement.

 

Also think individuals are letting him down but we're simply not producing enough quality consistently for what we want to achieve.

 

Now is definitely not the time to turn on Eddie. I've got no doubt he'll be so pissed off and gutted about it as much as anyone. 

 

 

Edited November 9, 2025 by 1892er

[TRC]

1 minute ago, Choppy Chop Chop said:

Howe out is for people who paint roundabouts #NUFC on BlueSky 

Howe out or keep him he has to prove himself next few games. If he rolls out the same shit 4-3-3 then it’s time for him to go

[Choppy Chop Chop]

So it's not the strip then. #NUFC Bluesky 

[Stifler]

21 minutes ago, Cf said:

Regardless of how it pans out results wise I think it's fair to say our summer recruitment was mostly a bit of a shambles. 

 

Obviously recognised by the club having finally making the required appointments at board level. 

Woltemade will be class long term, Wissa was always a Wilson (will be good for 2/3 years) option.

Ramsey is a better than Willock and not massively going to change the 1st 11 signing.

Thaiw has been class, but Elanga is the flop I thought he would be, and we are not stronger in the RW, CM/AM, and FB positions, and weaker at LW due to the poor performances of Gordon and the inconsistency of Barnes.

Singing Ramsdale has been an utter fucking waste of time considering the performances Pope has put in and and still retained his spot.

[Yorkie]

1 minute ago, Kid Icarus said:

Side point to Andy, but the summer being shit doesn't necessarily have to be about whether players will come good or not.

 

You're absolutely right to say that it's too early to judge the individual players that we ended up getting in November, particularly with the huge overhaul we had. However, that we ended up with those players and how is another matter. Then there's the overhaul (which we know Howe doesn't like), the drama, the very public nature of everything we did, the huge additional workload on Howe (and it taking his attention away from coaching), all the pressure that comes with it, the decision to sell Isak - all of that caused varying degrees of damage in different ways imo and I'm a strong believer in off field problems transferring to the general vibe around the club, to the crowd, and in the end, into performances and results.

 

If you go into the how then you've got to go into the why, and that's where I apply a more forgiving outlook towards the club, as you know.