Eddie Howe

[timeEd32]

No way the treble winning best team in the world should be losing at Wolves or drawing at home to Palace either. Shit happens in football.

 

I think this is another way last season distorted things for people. Plenty has been said about how finishing 4th raised expectations ahead of schedule, but also we only lost five games, a feat only matched by the title winners. The games we lost were to Liverpool x2, City away, Arsenal, and Villa away. Going back to April of 2022 that Villa game was the only league game we lost that isn't just easily accepted like City / Liverpool / Arsenal. As far as not losing games goes we were about as good as anyone bar the best team on the planet for over a calendar year. 

 

But while we were really good, we were also really fortunate at times. I can think of 4-5 draws from last season that could have easily been losses. Everything went right for us. Now the opposite is happening - we can't catch a break. The injuries and related effects have exposed problems that have always been there (go read that Villa thread where Emery is better than Eddie, Burn is a donkey, our back four is too slow, we need a DM, and there's a dumb amount of space between our midfield and defenders). This season is no doubt disappointing (yet still has some wonderful moments). I wish people could just accept that and chill out instead of making every week a referendum on the manager's future.

[Optimistic Nut]

The only games I can think of last season that we probably deserved to lose but didn't, were Brighton & Arsenal away (Arsenal away even seemed like we just came up with a plan to get 0-0 when Burn was being exposed). Can't think of any others?

[andycap]

2 hours ago, Optimistic Nut said:

The only games I can think of last season that we probably deserved to lose but didn't, were Brighton & Arsenal away (Arsenal away even seemed like we just came up with a plan to get 0-0 when Burn was being exposed). Can't think of any others?

Bournemouth away and maybes palace away. 

[Holmesy]

On 19/02/2024 at 17:01, Yorkie said:

I honestly find it mind-blowing that anyone has changed their perception of Howe - and whether or not he is 'elite' or whether or not he's capable of evolving - based on one very specific matter, i.e. his continued selection of a LB who's been an ever-present in a team which: soared into 4th, got to a cup final, performed admirably in the Champions League, and is in contention for European places again. 

 

I appreciate that the context has changed and a good idea isn't a good idea forever, but you can surely at least recognise that continuing to pick him isn't 'a basic error.' It's a tactical choice designed to benefit our structure when we're in possession and/or attacking. 

Totally understand where you're coming from, but when one player is consistently costing you goals and points, picking him is a basic error. Not just from a tactical POV as well - players will be talking, regardless of how matey they are or how tight knit they are, there will be elements within the squad that are talking about Dan Burn letting the side down and undoing their efforts. It just doesn't send a good message to other players, that consistent shit performances will not be punished. No 'elite' manager would persist with a player like this - they had/have a ruthlessness that demands higher standards, and they all would've dropped Burn a long time ago. 

EH has literally ignored a catastrophic weakness in our team, that every opponent has exploited to good effect over the past few weeks. They don't have to be any more sophisticated tactically than 'fast player, run at their left back'. That's as basic as it gets. It's non-league level stuff. Attacking plays in the PL should never be as simple as that, this is elite level sport ffs!

 

Pundits have started questioning his selections and highlighting DB, journalists as well. All that stuff starts to seep into cracks that weren't there before and threaten to pick away at the positive atmosphere that has been around the club since the takeover.

And it's just not the DB element that had led to some doubt creeping in - poor squad/fatigue management, mis-managing certain games eg. the Liverpool one mentioned earlier. If it was a one-off, you put it down to a bad day. But there have been 2-3 more occasions this season where poor game management and tactical naivety have cost us.

I am still firmly behind Eddie Howe as our manager. I think he's been a revelation, but where I was 100% last season i'm probably more 90% now. Still firmly in his corner but with some question marks creeping in. 

 

 

Edited February 23 by Holmesy

[SteV]

13 minutes ago, andycap said:

Bournemouth away and maybes palace away. 

We absolutely battered Palace away, bar one excellent save from Pope, which was about the only time they were in our box all game.

[Optimistic Nut]

We weren't great at Bournemouth but I can't remember thinking we got lucky to take a draw.

[andycap]

50 minutes ago, Optimistic Nut said:

We weren't great at Bournemouth but I can't remember thinking we got lucky to take a draw.

I do miggy nicked a goal it was all them majority of the match. 

[jackyboy]

Bournemouth have put in some excellent performances this season. If I remember right they were seconds away from beating Arsenal 

[Shearergol]

They're also our bogey team (along with Liverpool, obviously )

[Colos Short and Curlies]

15 hours ago, timeEd32 said:

 

But while we were really good, we were also really fortunate at times. I can think of 4-5 draws from last season that could have easily been losses. Everything went right for us. Now the opposite is happening - we can't catch a break. The injuries and related effects have exposed problems that have always been there (go read that Villa thread where Emery is better than Eddie, Burn is a donkey, our back four is too slow, we need a DM, and there's a dumb amount of space between our midfield and defenders). This season is no doubt disappointing (yet still has some wonderful moments). I wish people could just accept that and chill out instead of making every week a referendum on the manager's future.

 

I think this is an important point when thinking about the longer term sustainability of how(e) we play. This season has been one of pretty much everything that could go against us going against us whereas the opposite was largely true last season - starting at the top no Europe, early FA cup exit, 3 of the Sky 6 underperforming, Villa giving everything a Gerrard sized head start, relatively few injuries and when they did occur they were in a 'good' order such as one of Wilson or Isak being available.

 

Next season will take away some of the issues from this season in terms of level and amount of games being played but we can't expect it to be like last season unless we upgrade in a few areas of the team or evolve the style of play

[timeEd32]

5 hours ago, Optimistic Nut said:

The only games I can think of last season that we probably deserved to lose but didn't, were Brighton & Arsenal away (Arsenal away even seemed like we just came up with a plan to get 0-0 when Burn was being exposed). Can't think of any others?

I wasn’t just thinking of games we deserved to lose, but also ones we could have had a moment gone against us the way PSG, Chelsea, and Milan (Maignan save) did.

 

Brighton away - this one we were just pretty lucky. I think we cleared two off the line and Pope made a great save on a header.

 

Wolves away - we probably should have won, but it took a 90th minute goal of the season contender volley to get the point so not hard to imagine how we lose

 

Man Utd away - we should have scored in the first half; they had two great chances at the end, including a Rashford header that just missed

 

Arsenal away - Lots of pressure, Nketiah late chance kick saved by Pope

 

Leicester home - I hesitate to include this because we battered them. I don’t know how we didn’t score. But that Pope save on Castagne was truly spectacular and in the nightmare that is this season it probably would have gone in.
 

Probably more realistic to swap in Leeds away for the last one where we got two penalties and also saved one.

[Geogaddi]

Brentford away is the last season is always one that sticks in my mind, we were absolutely terrible first half and lucky not to have been about 3-0 down , Toney missed a penalty as well I think , obviously turned it around in the second half but realistically Brentford should have had the game wrapped up at half time .

 

 

Edited February 23 by Geogaddi

[toon25]

The Burn situation in the past few games has been beyond irksome - particularly given the inevitability of inviting pressure down that left hand side and viable alternatives warming the bench.

 

I love Eddie, but top managers would have this addressed from the outset.

[Kid Icarus]

9 hours ago, Optimistic Nut said:

The only games I can think of last season that we probably deserved to lose but didn't, were Brighton & Arsenal away (Arsenal away even seemed like we just came up with a plan to get 0-0 when Burn was being exposed). Can't think of any others?

Bournemouth home and away, but that's it I think. 

[Optimistic Nut]

42 minutes ago, Kid Icarus said:

Bournemouth home and away, but that's it I think. 

 

At worst they were games that could have went either way I thought? Don't remember either thinking we should have definitely lost that. 

 

Hopefully next season with a few more players and less injuries we retain then consistency we had against the lower teams because first 18 months it was unreal.

[Kid Icarus]

2 minutes ago, Optimistic Nut said:

 

At worst they were games that could have went either way I thought? Don't remember either thinking we should have definitely lost that. 

 

Hopefully next season with a few more players and less injuries we retain then consistency we had against the lower teams because first 18 months it was unreal.

Bournemouth at home we created nothing and we're really lucky to get a pen at 1-0 down. They weren't brilliant but they hit us on the break a few times. Away we were really poor and were fortunate to get a point I thought.

 

Come to think of it Wolves (Pope non-pen) and Fulham (Mitrovich double pen hit) at home were very fortunate as well.

[timeEd32]

2 minutes ago, Optimistic Nut said:

 

At worst they were games that could have went either way I thought? Don't remember either thinking we should have definitely lost that. 

 

Hopefully next season with a few more players and less injuries we retain then consistency we had against the lower teams because first 18 months it was unreal.

 

Games that could have gone either way mostly falling in our direction was my point. The opposite has happened this season.

[Sibierski]

10 hours ago, 80 said:

 

 

To be clear, I don't think he thinks Tino is a bad trainer, but I think he puts a massive emphasis on players who set the tempo for the whole group and put everything in all the time every time. Trippier, Gordon, Joelinton. Players who are overtly demanding of themselves and those around them. Not just professionals who turn up 10 minutes early but fanatics who are in 1hr 15mins early. Which is something I think Burn excels at, to be fair to him.

 

My bias, personally, is to think Eddie is being too stringent about rewarding training standards, but I'm not going to argue with him if it's how he wants to run things considering what he's achieved in dragging teams to new levels over the past 10-15 years. Instead I hope he can coax/inspire players like Hall into doing things as he wants them. The Bournemouth fans were pretty clear that he doesn't mess around in cutting someone loose if he thinks he won't get them to work to his schedule.

 

Just bringing over from Hall thread to stay on topic.

 

One thing I don’t get with Howe, what the bar would be to get a start. Tino only came in because Burn was injured, then moved to RB when Trippier was out and Burn was back, when both were then available, he’s gone. He’s not started when both have been available. 

 

We’re too rigid in who starts in the back line IMO, which is overall reflective to our continued same set up/style. When it works, it works great, when it doesn’t, it’s just double down persistence. 

 

When we get more people back over next month, hopefully we see some more flexibility in our approach, with the original set up the default because it is great and fun when it works.

[80]

2 hours ago, Sibierski said:

 

Just bringing over from Hall thread to stay on topic.

 

One thing I don’t get with Howe, what the bar would be to get a start. Tino only came in because Burn was injured, then moved to RB when Trippier was out and Burn was back, when both were then available, he’s gone. He’s not started when both have been available. 

 

We’re too rigid in who starts in the back line IMO, which is overall reflective to our continued same set up/style. When it works, it works great, when it doesn’t, it’s just double down persistence. 

 

When we get more people back over next month, hopefully we see some more flexibility in our approach, with the original set up the default because it is great and fun when it works.

Yes, the bar you need to get over to get a start is the interesting question. We've never really had an obvious answer for that as the vast majority choices over the past 2.5 years have been driven by injury or restoring a player to the team who was taken out by injury. And, to his credit, until recently we've never had a spell where we've been bad enough to see if it's true that he doesn't change winning teams but he does change losing/misfiring ones. Our non-goalscoring run after Christmas last season was the biggest one until recently, and that only got fixed when injury forced him to replace Miggy with Murphy.

 

Yeah, it'll be interesting to see what happens over the next couple of months, although this season has been such an abortion it's hard to believe we'll actually get to see that. I'm definitely hoping to see a bit more variety, although we're pretty much back to the bread and butter of one game a week, so it'll be less necessary - I can see a strong arguement for remaining consistent now. Rotation and picking players for occasions was more important at the beginning of the season when we had a demanding campaign ahead (for the brief period of time where we actually had a choice in who we played, of course).

 

 

Edited February 24 by 80

[joeyt]

 

Not sure why but "Howe Coffee Machine Fury" is so sensationalist with what it actually states in the article. I know it's Hope and the Mail but still

 

[PauloGeordio]

1 minute ago, joeyt said:

 

Not sure why but "Howe Coffee Machine Fury" is so sensationalist with what it actually states in the article. I know it's Hope and the Mail but still

 

It’s Hope and the Fail! 

[Menace]

A grown arse man using emojis like that is embarassing man

[Ronaldo]

On 23/02/2024 at 09:23, andycap said:

Bournemouth away and maybes palace away. 

We absolutely annihilated Palace, just couldn’t score.

[Heron]

27 minutes ago, Menace said:

A grown arse man using emojis like that is embarassing man

[Joelinton7]

2 hours ago, joeyt said:

 

Not sure why but "Howe Coffee Machine Fury" is so sensationalist with what it actually states in the article. I know it's Hope and the Mail but still

 

It’s because he thinks little tidbits he gets to be privy to in press conferences are the most fascinating things in the world and everybody must know about them because in his mind he’s best mates with Eddie and everyone is jealous of him.
 

In reality Eddie is forced to speak to him and the rest of the media as part of his job. They spend a good 10 mins at the start of every episode of Pod on The Tyne just talking about the “hilarious” shenanigans of the press room, where one time Eddie addressed them by name, and it was the most special moment their life.

 

Then George just mumbles something about hating his job, calls Chris Waugh, “Waffles” (who hurriedly stutters that FFP is an issue), and the other guy says “jolly good stuff”.