Eddie Howe

[Isaksbigrightfoot]

7 hours ago, Jagten said:

Some interesting analysis on what is now probably the most porous defense in the league here

 

 https://x.com/jon_mackenzie/status/1746354228828766487?s=46 

The problem isn’t the defence for me. It’s that defensive midfield hole that we have.

 

If we had a beast of a defensive midfielder teams wouldn’t be cutting through us.

[Lenny]

8 hours ago, BShearer said:

this season is a bit of a reality check for Howe but also for the club in terms of if we want to be a PL/CL force what we need to improve on an look out for.

 

all the injuries, the sick schedule increase, the group of death CL draw, the horrific Carabao draw.

these can be excuses but then excuses wont get us to be a PL/CL force.

we need to improve on these and learn from them a lot and also on the transfers which were generally quite on the hit since takeover until the summer window. this time tho the way it turned out this was a mediocre window in hindsight which helped us not much really apart from the few good games Livramento had.

 

 

 

Is it really a reality check? There's pretty unanimous acknowledgement from the club be it commercial, operational, on field and all in between that we massively over achieved last season. 

[Isaksbigrightfoot]

4 minutes ago, Lenny said:

Is it really a reality check? There's pretty unanimous acknowledgement from the club be it commercial, operational, on field and all in between that we massively over achieved last season. 

And we did over achieve.

 

But are we where we should be this season?

 

We may well be slightly under achieving this season. Albeit our injuries have been horrendous.

[Begbie]

55 minutes ago, ExiledGeordie said:

Howe is a victim of his own success. All the positives in terms of impact that he’s had which Kid Icarus has outlined above have led to a meteoric rise in stature. Thats meant for some fans I feel a sense that the standards/league position/champions league qualification cannot drop at all irrespective of circumstances, which is unrealistic. I disagreed with my local journo mate when he said that the club absolutely HAS to finish in the top four now have qualified last year. I just don’t think that’s realistic with the squad we have. I mean even if we’d had everyone fit or just a couple of injuries qualifying for the top four and managing extra games with the champions league would’ve been tough. 

 

Howe can and I imagine will adapt tactically and learn from this current situation which has been very challenging but there’s no way his position should be questioned currently. Yes people can comment on or question things he’s done recently but ultimately the injury crisis this season has been the worst I can remember and has completely knackered what we’ve been able to do as a team. Even having 2 or 3 subs (e.g Barnes, Anderson, Wilson) to bring on last night and we’d probably have at least held on for a draw.

 

 

 

I kinda agree with you both, you journo mate and you. I dont believe this season we need to finnish top 4, but I do believe our goal should be that we where in the fight for top 4(atleast top 5). Atm we are almost as far from top 4 as we are from relegation, which I dont think is good enough considering all the money we have spent over the last two seasons.

 

I dont think seriously any Newcastle supporters want Howe out at the moment? and most of us hopes he can turn things around, but we must also be allowed to ask the question about whats wrong. If we analyze the season so far we dont have many good games, by good games I mean games which we played like we did last season. At the start of the season we looked really unfit except a few players(Gordon and Anderson), which I was kinda shocked about because Howe doesnt strike me as a lazy manager like Bruce, so could it be that our players was to hardly trained in the preseason? I must admit we really looked lazy in the pre-season games, Guimarez and Joelinton were playing like they were still on the beach in copacobana with a couple of drinks in their hand.

if Villa hadnt got their star defender Mings injured i´m not sure we would have won that game, and our start of the season would have looked so much worse. Then our managing team(coaches, physios etc), not only Howe has to be asked how you can play almost the same squad in the mickey mouse cup(carabao cup), premier league, champions league and this imo led to our squad getting exhausted and more injuries. I even question last week that we started our best players against a young mid table championship side, and getting just one player injured was lucky.

 

Our transfer window in the summer was terrible, the signings were expensive and none of them are starters by now. Tonali was a fantastic player but i really dont know why we signed him? Is he a replacement for Guimarez? Or is he a signing so Guimarez can move further up the pitch? He really feels like a luxury signing which we really couldnt afford in the summer. I hope he will come good next season. Harvey Barnes feels like a squad rotation player which we know what we get from, and that meant we lost a player who could change up things. PS! I dont say that ASM is the answer but we should have gotten a more creative player.

Imo there are 3 players which we should have signed that we missed out on and thats Diaby, Paqueta and Maddison, all those players I think we could have gotten. We also showed signs last season that our cb are slow, and we should have bought a quicker cb to able to mix things up. I also wondering where are the gems we used to pick up, even under Ashley we could pick up players like Cabaye, HBA, Sissoko, Remy, Ba, etc. Really hope we are not loosing out on them just because we are signing english or PL proven players.

 

In the end football is a result oriented game which our owners know, we have lost 6 of the last 7 games in the Premier League, and among those were Luton and Nottingham Forrest. I dont know why we are not going to a warm country in the 2 weeks break, that could really have boosted the team moral imo. For a long time now we have not been showing signs of improvement and I do fear that this is his last season if he doesnt turn it around soon. I do think and hope that he manage to turn it around and that the club really analyzes from top to bottom(medical team, coaching team ++)what went wrong and how we can improve to get where we want to be.

 

 

 

 

 

[Isaksbigrightfoot]

Howe is a safe option. He is a safe manager. He has done fantastic and took us to the next level. Which was 5-9 position.

 

We are slightly below that right now and it can be excused because of injuries.

 

February onwards we should see the true picture because we will have players back then.

 

Can Eddie take us to the next level which is consistently top 4. I’m not sure. But let’s see.

[The Prophet]

If I had a tactical question of Eddie, this would be it. It's been massively exacerbated by fatigue, but without our trademark intensity and the physicality of Joelinton we've struggled with players drifting between the lines. Villa, Brighton, Dortmund and Liverpool (off the top of my head) have all exploited it.

 

The thing is, if we see it, the notoriously meticulous coaching team do too. It'll be interesting to see whether we alter it with a tactical tweak, a personal change or simply see it as a long term trade off of the high press.

[Smal]

If our midfield line is pressing that high then the defensive line has to step up higher too. We can’t put all the focus on the midfield shape. The defence can’t be that deep when the midfield are pressing, it’s crazy.

[The Prophet]

Just now, Smal said:

If our midfield line is pressing that high then the defensive line has to step up higher too. We can’t put all the focus on the midfield shape. The defence can’t be that deep when the midfield are pressing, it’s crazy.

 

Perhaps the defensive line has dropped deeper due to the absence of Pope? Total guesswork like. 

[RS]

The continual backing off of our centre halves is an issue for me. We invite drives into our box. Even the mackems nearly benefited from it.  

[r0cafella]

5 minutes ago, The Prophet said:

 

Perhaps the defensive line has dropped deeper due to the absence of Pope? Total guesswork like. 

Probably has been, although you can’t just tweak such a thing without considering how it effects the press and space left in front of the defence. 

[Wallace]

A Howe pre-season is said to be really tough.  The US tour would have curtailed that to some extent and I wonder if that has also contributed to our shortcomings this season.  Something else he will have to learn to adapt to as such tours will be the norm from now on.

[80]

"If I bring a defender on it is seen as a negative substitution."

 

It's really ok! Don't think of it as negativity, think of it as wiliness! Guile! Cunning!

 

 

Edited January 14 by 80

[Gallowgate Toon]

29 minutes ago, Smal said:

If our midfield line is pressing that high then the defensive line has to step up higher too. We can’t put all the focus on the midfield shape. The defence can’t be that deep when the midfield are pressing, it’s crazy.

Totally agree. If one of Bruno/Longstaff had dropped back for KdB, he'd still have an awful lot of room to run into, a quick knock past one of them and he's in a similar position with acres. They either all need to drop, defence push up, or a CB takes responsibility to fill the gap.

[duo]

59 minutes ago, Smal said:

If our midfield line is pressing that high then the defensive line has to step up higher too. We can’t put all the focus on the midfield shape. The defence can’t be that deep when the midfield are pressing, it’s crazy.

Over the last few weeks our problem has been our defensive line has pushed up too high.  How many goals have we conceded where Burn has gone high and got caught out.  If we had a DM to sit in that whole KDB just wouldn't have had the space he did.  Bruno just hasn't the discipline to do it. 

[80]

4 minutes ago, duo said:

Over the last few weeks our problem has been our defensive line has pushed up too high.  How many goals have we conceded where Burn has gone high and got caught out.  If we had a DM to sit in that whole KDB just wouldn't have had the space he did.  Bruno just hasn't the discipline to do it. 

I've seen this said a lot. In fairness to him, there's absolutely no indication that he's breaking tactical instruction.

[huss9]

42 minutes ago, 80 said:

"If I bring a defender on it is seen as a negative substitution."

 

It's really ok! Don't think of it as negativity, think of it as wiliness! Guile! Cunning!

 

 

 

i think he means psychologically for the players.

makes them drop even deeper.

 

still could have tried it though, but if we'd still conceded he would have got pelters.

[huss9]

if he had brought a defender on, krafth could have been an option rather than lascelles as we werent being bombared in the air, and he's able of carrying the ball.

but he do you bring off? Isak?

[80]

2 minutes ago, huss9 said:

i think he means psychologically for the players.

makes them drop even deeper.

 

still could have tried it though, but if we'd still conceded he would have got pelters.

I think you're right about him thinking of how the players see it, but he's allowed to educate them out of that.

 

I think the "never take a step back" approach was good for the first 18 months or so to properly inculcate ambition and aggression in the squad, but I think it's fair to say we've got that now. We do have to be careful not to lose it, but to be truly great you have to be able to thread the needle in difficult situations rather than just being a flat track bully.

[huss9]

3 minutes ago, 80 said:

I think you're right about him thinking of how the players see it, but he's allowed to educate them out of that.

 

I think the "never take a step back" approach was good for the first 18 months or so to properly inculcate ambition and aggression in the squad, but I think it's fair to say we've got that now. We do have to be careful not to lose it, but to be truly great you have to be able to thread the needle in difficult situations rather than just being a flat track bully.

i know he loves KK, but even KK had his critics over our tactics and the lack of defensive nous.

but even he had batty, brace, venners etc.

 

 

Edited January 14 by huss9

[Andy]

1 hour ago, The Prophet said:

 

Perhaps the defensive line has dropped deeper due to the absence of Pope? Total guesswork like. 

 

I think this is absolutely the case. Pope is very good at "sweeper keeping", and it's definitely one of Dubravka's weaknesses. In his first few games back in the team, it was exploited massively, and since then we have visibly played with a deeper line.

 

 

[80]

33 minutes ago, huss9 said:

if he had brought a defender on, krafth could have been an option rather than lascelles as we werent being bombared in the air, and he's able of carrying the ball.

but he do you bring off? Isak?

To be clear, I don't have a problem with how he managed the game last night. I'm very much on the Eddie train, and the last two months have gone exactly as I predicted due to forces (probably?) beyond our control - December awful, January steadily improving. I'm hoping for a mammoth run in from February onwards, ideally starting with Villa, and don't see this season as a write off.

 

That quote just stuck out to me as an indication of mindset that I'd like him to get over. By definition, if a tactical move makes you more likely to win in the short, medium and long term, it's not a negative move. Whether bringing a defender on would've done that last night, I'm agnostic on. It's more the principle that I'm interested in, as it's been consistent for two years in every situation now. The game that probably most upset me was Liverpool at home last season - a game they needed to win far more than we did at the time.

 

I think we can give ourselves a license to deliberately rope a dope opponents in let's say four matches a season. Maybe more in extenuating circumstances like a stonking injury crisis such as ours. To be the best, by definition you create opponents who will outwork you because they know they're competing against the best. That's the position we want to be in, and that's when we'll need something else.

 

Unless we're planning on just owning the 25 hardest working players in the world, which seems implausible and, ironically, lazy.

 

 

Edited January 14 by 80

[Sempiternal]

Did we change formation last season, like towards the end? I don’t know if I have imagined it but I thought we did maybe around this time actually not the end of the season. Wonder if Howe will consider it again

[80]

3 minutes ago, Sempiternal said:

Did we change formation last season, like towards the end? I don’t know if I have imagined it but I thought we did maybe around this time actually not the end of the season. Wonder if Howe will consider it again

No not really, but we changed personnel. Murphy for Almiron was the big move and contributed to a big attacking switch up on the pitch and got us out of our low scoring rut.

 

We dabbled with Isak and Wilson both sharing the same pitch too. But pretty quickly Isak moved into Gordon's left wing spot.

 

 

Edited January 14 by 80

[Cronky]

Recent results have not led me to doubt Eddie's ability one iota. The explanation is clear - we have not been able to rest players, either between games or by using subs - and we have generally been playing in mid-week every week. Given the pace of the modern game and the standards that are expected, rotation is an important weapon in the manager's armoury, and Eddie has been deprived of it. 

 

The scale of the over-achievement last year is being under-estimated. We didn't have, and still don't have, a Champions League level squad. In addition to the injury situation and the fixture congestion, that factor also has to be borne in mind.

[SUPERTOON]

https://x.com/PremLeaguePanel/status/1746522331810308448?s=20