Eddie Howe

[Smal]

[Menace]

11 hours ago, timeEd32 said:

 

Let's look at that (going to start in 2015 since Edwards was technical director then and it includes a key signing):

 

(Sold Suarez in 2014 for big money)

 

2015

Benteke - big fee for a PL striker

Firmino - big fee for a 23 year old from Germany off one good season

Clyne - moderate fee from PL

Milner - free transfer; £140k/wk

Other signings: Ings, Gomez, Awoniyi, 

 

Sold: Sterling for one of the biggest fees ever at that point

 

2016

Mane - Big fee for a player who spent two years at a smaller PL club

Wijnaldum - Big fee for one of the best players at a relegated club

Matip - Free transfer; £100k/wk

 

Sold: Benteke, recouping 75% of the fee, and good fees for Ibe and Allen

 

2017

van Dijk - Record fee for a proven PL defender

Salah - Club record fee (until van Dijk later that summer)

Robertson - PL experience from a relegated club

Other signings: Big money on Oxlade-Chamberlain, Solanke on a U21 free

 

Sold: Coutinho for a British record fee; Sakho for big money

 

2018

Alisson - Most expensive GK of all time

Keita - Massive fee

Fabinho - Big fee

Other signings: Shaqiri

 

Sold: Solanke and Danny Ward for decent money

 

2019

Basically nothing

 

Sold: Made a decent profit on Ings

 

2020

Jota - Big fee for a PL player

Thiago - 29 year old from Bayern

Tsimikas - Cheap

 

Sold: Lovren for not much

 

2021

Diaz - Big fee

Konate - Decent fee

 

Sold: Harry Wilson and Awoniyi for cheap (which doesn't look great at the moment)

 

---------------------------

Their early business shares two characteristics that ours has:

• Premier League experience √
• Targeting relegated players √

They did dabble in the free transfer market, but should be noted that the wages (particularly Milner) were significant.

 

They made a big mistake (Benteke), but were able to get out of it by recouping most of their money a year later.

 

What they had, that we haven't had a chance of having, is massive money coming in every summer. Suarez > Sterling > Benteke redo > Coutinho. This allowed them to break their transfer fee record (and world records) multiple times for the likes of Salah, van Dijk, and Alisson (and they got them all right). 

 

I'm not trying to discount what they did - it's obviously excellent (though also not perfect) - but I don't really look at that and see a process that makes me feel like we're missing some big trick. If that's a blueprint worth following then I'd argue we've followed a couple of the core tenets.

 

That's a crazy hit rate tbf. Would love Edwards here although I don't expect it to happen.

[Matt1892]

58 minutes ago, KaKa said:

 

Well it is a wrong assumption because it isn't based on anything tangible, and so it's pretty strange to be honest.

 

After signing Bruno, Isak, Botman and Tonali, Howe went into detail on these players and how highly he rated their abilities as prospects.

 

It in no way sounds like these are players he needed convincing on. This whole thing is so weird.

 

Oh, and maybe go back and read the Gordon thread back once we went in for him. It's all in there.

 

 

 

A manager can prefer players with Premier League experience and still sign players who have never played here. It doesn’t have to be one or the other.

 

There is also no issue with the above.

[gbandit]

20 minutes ago, Smal said:

That’s a brutal image for us like

[Yorkie]

The Liverpool game sends it sky high but we'd still be comfortably bottom even if that game had a more typical xGa. 

 

It's an incredibly damning graphic, has to be said. Defensively we're an absolute disaster atm. 

[Shadow Puppets]

I maintain it is ALL down to the midfield not functioning properly at all without the legs of Joelinton and Willock.

[The Prophet]

7 minutes ago, Shadow Puppets said:

I maintain it is ALL down to the midfield not functioning properly at all without the legs of Joelinton and Willock.

 

I agree, the defenders are struggling due to no confidence in their keeper and a lack of protection in front of them.

 

We've tried to tactically switch up the Bruno-Miley-Longstaff flat three, but it's not had too much success. Without a system overhaul, we can only really wait for injured players to return.

[The College Dropout]

57 minutes ago, Smal said:

I mentioned this last week I think. We are v. bad out of possession.

 

To make it better with current personnel we need significant changes to the system.

 

Even after the Liverpool game we've conceded 14 goals in 6 games. Not unlucky at all. This is the main reason I'm pessimistic of our chances of finishing 7th. You can't defend like this and pickup enough points for 7th. I don't see it changing unless Willock comes back and transforms the side and then we get Pope, Anderson and co. back in March sometime and we improve again. We've got the fixtures at least.

 

And it's why a lot of arguments on here are disingenuous. Someone was talking about "undefeated in 4 or 5" to suggest things aren't bad. We have been super bad out of possession for ages and if it continues we might finish in the bottom half.

 

 

Edited February 27 by The College Dropout

[Hanshithispantz]

Nobody has said things aren't bad 

 

We cannot defend because Howe relies on pressure to push the ball into non threatening areas. We cannot do that at the minute.

 

The fact we're still in games and have been able to string results together despite this is a possitive sign, and makes the calls for his job to be reviewed look silly, but it obviously doesn't mean we're a good side atm.

 

Cannot be arsed for another day of repeating obvious things like so will leave it here.

[TBG]

2 minutes ago, Hanshithispantz said:

Nobody has said things aren't bad 

 

We cannot defend because Howe relies on pressure to push the ball into non threatening areas. We cannot do that at the minute.

 

The fact we're still in games and have been able to string results together despite this is a possitive sign, and makes the calls for his job to be reviewed look silly, but it obviously doesn't mean we're a good side atm.

 

Cannot be arsed for another day of repeating obvious things like so will leave it here.

 

What are you your thoughts on Burn and Hall? 

[Erikse]

In the same way that Arsenal just has better player than us, the 11 players we played against Luton and Bournemouth at home were certainly of much higher quality than that of the opposition, regardless of our injuries. We need an alternative gameplan for sitautions where we can't do plan A anymore, because right now, we are underperforming with the quality of players that we have. Bournemouth and Luton would only dream of having players like Botman, Bruno and Trippier. A Miley and a Dubravka doesn't change the fact that our 11 was much better, they aren't THAT bad.

[The Prophet]

21 minutes ago, Hanshithispantz said:

Nobody has said things aren't bad 

 

We cannot defend because Howe relies on pressure to push the ball into non threatening areas. We cannot do that at the minute.

 

The fact we're still in games and have been able to string results together despite this is a possitive sign, and makes the calls for his job to be reviewed look silly, but it obviously doesn't mean we're a good side atm.

 

Cannot be arsed for another day of repeating obvious things like so will leave it here.

 

This is it. We all recognise the problems, but there's a lot of mitigation and fair reasons for the causes of them.

[OverThere]

Sometimes you have to employ the short blanket. 

[greenhill]

Since that loss against Everton we got only 11 points from 12 league games, that equates to ~35 points in 38 games. Bruce got 44 and 45 points in his two full seasons. Compared to 3 or 4 seasons ago, we got upgrades including Bruno, Trippier, Botman, Burn, Livramento, Gordon, Isak, and Miley featuring heavily during this run, the major subtractions are ASM, Shelvey and Willock (mostly injured). I don’t mean we should sack Howe now, but it is a fact that he is doing worse than Bruce with a much stronger squad at the moment. We are just not as good as we should be right now, even if injuries are accounted. He has to turn things around or questions will be raised.

[KaKa]

21 minutes ago, Erikse said:

In the same way that Arsenal just has better player than us, the 11 players we played against Luton and Bournemouth at home were certainly of much higher quality than that of the opposition, regardless of our injuries. We need an alternative gameplan for sitautions where we can't do plan A anymore, because right now, we are underperforming with the quality of players that we have. Bournemouth and Luton would only dream of having players like Botman, Bruno and Trippier. A Miley and a Dubravka doesn't change the fact that our 11 was much better, they aren't THAT bad.

 

Very simplistic way of looking at the quality of players.

 

Luton and Bournemouth have a number of dynamic attackers with pace and power.

 

Our defence is currently being exposed due to the current midfield which lacks dynamism and recovery speed.

 

This allowed both Luton and Bournemouth to capitalise against our defence which is not the quickest, and at the same time the goalkeeper is not good coming off his line as a sweeper, like Pope is.

[The Prophet]

4 minutes ago, greenhill said:

Since that loss against Everton we got only 11 points from 12 league games, that equates to ~35 points in 38 games. Bruce got 44 and 45 points in his two full seasons. Compared to 3 or 4 seasons ago, we got upgrades including Bruno, Trippier, Botman, Burn, Livramento, Gordon, Isak, and Miley featuring heavily during this run, the major subtractions are ASM, Shelvey and Willock (mostly injured). I don’t mean we should sack Howe now, but it is a fact that he is doing worse than Bruce with a much stronger squad at the moment. We are just not as good as we should be right now, even if injuries are accounted. He has to turn things around or questions will be raised.

 

Why is Bruce even relevant?

[greenhill]

1 minute ago, The Prophet said:

 

Why is Bruce even relevant?

When everyone think that Bruce had done an awful job and someone is doing worse than Bruce, there must be something wrong.

[Mills and Boon]

5 minutes ago, greenhill said:

When everyone think that Bruce had done an awful job and someone is doing worse than Bruce, there must be something wrong.

 

Worse than Bruce over a curated set of fixtures chosen to make Howe look as bad as possible

[KaKa]

12 minutes ago, The Prophet said:

 

Why is Bruce even relevant?

 

I can't believe the correlation.

 

Bruce had ten men in our box the whole game as sitting ducks. Just waiting to concede all game after which we were done. Just because this meant we didn't concede as much playing this way, even though we then lost much more because we often had no chance of getting a result, they actually think this means Bruce was doing better!

 

Words fail me man. 

[Miggys First Goal]

Tell me somebody isn’t trying to pass off Bruce as a better manager than Eddie. 

[TBG]

25 minutes ago, greenhill said:

 Bruce got 44 and 45 points in his two full seasons.

 

Howe got 109 in a season and a half. 

 

Pretty sure we got Champions League as well, but someone will have to clarify. 

[54]

36 minutes ago, greenhill said:

Since that loss against Everton we got only 11 points from 12 league games, that equates to ~35 points in 38 games. Bruce got 44 and 45 points in his two full seasons. Compared to 3 or 4 seasons ago, we got upgrades including Bruno, Trippier, Botman, Burn, Livramento, Gordon, Isak, and Miley featuring heavily during this run, the major subtractions are ASM, Shelvey and Willock (mostly injured). I don’t mean we should sack Howe now, but it is a fact that he is doing worse than Bruce with a much stronger squad at the moment. We are just not as good as we should be right now, even if injuries are accounted. He has to turn things around or questions will be raised.

Penn (Or was is Luke), is that you?

[greenhill]

5 minutes ago, Mills and Boon said:

 

Worse than Bruce over a curated set of fixtures chosen to make Howe look as bad as possible

I don't suggest Howe is a bad manager nor we should sack him now, he is probably a much better manager than Bruce but our current results is worse than that under Bruce is also a fact. I hope and I still have some faith that he could turn things around. But if that doesn't happen before the end of this season, we have to reflect why we were that bad. We still have 12 more league games to play, if our performance and results remain that bad over 24 games it's hard to argue it's over 'a curated set of fixtures'.

[Conjo]

[Rod]

1 minute ago, greenhill said:

I don't suggest Howe is a bad manager nor we should sack him now, he is probably a much better manager than Bruce but our current results is worse than that under Bruce is also a fact. I hope and I still have some faith that he could turn things around. But if that doesn't happen before the end of this season, we have to reflect why we were that bad. We still have 12 more league games to play, if our performance and results remain that bad over 24 games it's hard to argue it's over 'a curated set of fixtures'.

"He is probably a better manager than Bruce"!  Words fail me.