Eddie Howe

[KaKa]

10 minutes ago, Pablo said:

Some cracking to and from comments this afternoon. I think we all need to remember we aren’t the only team trying to win every time we play. Our opposition also have a squad of 25 and who knows how many coaches, sports scientists, physios, analysts etc. Our opponents might be richer than us, they might have less injuries ans they might have a stronger bench. They might have a player who has a season defining performance, and they may have worked out how to exploit a weakness in our system caused by a savage injury list. There players might be good at game management, cheating and off the ball fouls. They might play for Luton on a relatively low wage fighting for their financial future.

We have no right to beat anyone on any given day, we have to work our socks off and take our moments. As the club progresses so will the squad and we will have a stronger first team, bench and more experienced coaching g set up.

in spite of all of the above, the injury and fixture list this year have been crippling, and we are probably overachieving based on every metric except net spend over the past 5 transfer windows.

 

Didn't you hear yet?

 

We are the richest club in the world and shouldn't be losing to any team outside the top 4!

 

2 years out from being relegation fodder every season.

 

 

Edited March 31 by KaKa

[Holmesy]

3 minutes ago, KaKa said:

 

You've seemingly convinced yourself he isn't doing anything, because you think it's as easy as just changing something and everything starts working perfectly.

 

Howe himself came out and spoke about how they make adjustments every game after the Wolves game when Gary O'Neil made that cheeky comment.

 

Just because it isn't as obvious as dropping any player that makes an error, doesn't mean nothing is being done.

I convinced myself a long time ago, using nothing but my eyes and a fairly average brain, that dropping Dan Burn would alleviate a lot of our defensive issues. Put some pace in there and give opposition teams one less focal point to exploit, and we’ve addressed two of our problems. We saw how it worked against Villa - they started targeting Burn and had loads of joy, so we brought Livra on at LB and they had to change plan. We tightened up and saw out the game. Just do that more! It has already worked! 

[Theregulars]

44 minutes ago, Holmesy said:

Keiran Trippier went through a run of terrible form where he individually cost us goals in multiple games (possibly due to fatigue). Never even looked like being dropped despite us having a fully fit Livra on the bench, who has been one of our players of the season despite his lack of minutes.

 

Botman looked crap for ages. Never dropped despite not even being fully fit. Swap him with Burn or Lascelles and bring in a proper left full back.

 

Dan Burn has largely been a disaster for the past 4-5 months and has cost us goals individually in a good number of games. Never looked like being dropped despite us having a fully fit Livra and Hall on the bench, both of whom have looked excellent when they’ve played recently. This is the biggest head scratcher for me. When Bruce continued playing Ciaran Clark and leaving Schar on the bench people went mental. What’s the difference here?

 

This is more of a shape thing. Every set piece, we throw 9 men forward, leaving one back. This, despite having probably the slowest defence and midfield in the league. We are more threatened from our own set pieces than we are threatening - constantly. Leave more players back. We rarely score from set pieces anyway so it’s a shit risk to take - see Bowen’s goal yesterday 

 

Our midfield is cut open so easily, leaving our pedestrian back 4 totally exposed. Dropping one midfielder back to fill the gap between defence and midfield would give us loads more protection. I would suggest Longstaff given that he offers nothing from an attacking standpoint.

 

Against superior teams, sit deeper to negate our defensive fragility. Press hard when they cross the halfway line and use our pace and passing accuracy to play on the counter. 
 

Not all player-related but I also don’t think any of them would be considered crackpot suggestions.

No, I don’t think they’re crackpot. I think your judgment is impaired by your emotional investment.

 

A few thoughts in counter:

 

1. Trippier is the captain and leads us on the field. He talks players through games and, in my view, leads vocally on the pitch the way nobody else in our side can or does. When he’s fit, he’ll play. I agree that Livramento looks brilliant and could have given trippier some relief, and perhaps should have come into the side while burn went through a bad run of form (more on that below). Certainly unfortunate trippier had a run of mistakes but he gets an easy pass from me for the comparatively much higher number of assists, tackles, great passes, crosses, free kicks etc. 

 

2. Botman has looked worse than last year, but “crap” is hyperbolic. He has been injured and the club has explained that it recommended surgery, but the player asked to play on - it would appear the injury and treatment options weren’t clean cut either way. I don’t mind the club giving players say in these matters, although I can understand why others might prefer the club to have overruled him. Lascelles has also been injured, but I think they could have persuaded Botman to get surgery earlier and selected burn and hall. My understanding is that Hall’s minutes have needed to be restricted because of the structure of his deal and our weird FFP position and because he’s not viewed as defensively reliable or fit enough yet. He’s a player who has got better in absentia but certainly some promising cameos (nothing more IMO, although very encouraging yesterday). Given Botman and Burn contributions over time in my view it’s justified to back them and select them. 
 

3. difficult to comment on set pieces as I’m not an expert, but as a general point I sincerely believe we’re one of the best coached sides in the league. Transition point: certainly we keep getting caught, but this may just be a function of players being absent who are key defenders in those situations (joelinton the workhorse warrior and pope the sweeper and much better shot stopper). I’d imagine Howe is aware and trying to work on the issue with the extremely limited options available. 
 

4. I don’t see how you can conclude from his time under this manager that Longstaff offers nothing going forward. He’s playing injured with literal painkilling injections, which is plausibly a compromising factor. Certainly he’s dropped off but the intention is that he is a midfield squad rotation option, not a starter and player of literally every minute. 
 

5. In my view we tried sitting deep away at Arsenal, city and Liverpool and countering. We were battered twice and lost easily the other times. 
 

6. A more defensive midfield set up means one less attacker, so there’s an element of give/take that would need to be factored in. We don’t actually have a defensive minded midfielder available without Joelinton and tonali, but my impression is that you don’t accept this as a fair excuse. 
 

7. burn has not been poor for 4-5 months. He went through a spell of being targeted by coaches for lack of pace given that he now lacked protection with injuries. He’s had some bad games but has had far more good games. 
 

Essentially, you think that with more defensive rotation and a more defensively minded midfield set up we’d have more points. I think it’s probably arguable at best or would only have a marginal impact, which is why I think the hyperbole and generalisations are quite jarring to read. It’s also really important to emphasise that Howe and the players are obviously trying really hard in incredibly difficult circumstances.

 

 

Edited March 31 by Theregulars

[Theregulars]

28 minutes ago, Holmesy said:

What’s even more awful surely, is just going “well there’s not a single thing we can do about that so we’ll just accept conceding 3 goals per game”?!
At least fucking try to stop us conceding FFS! Do something! 
Of course Joelinton is a huge miss, but if one player missing renders our whole defensive game plan useless, it’s a pretty sketchy plan to start with, right?! 

Why do you think he’s not trying?

[KaKa]

3 minutes ago, Holmesy said:

I convinced myself a long time ago, using nothing but my eyes and a fairly average brain, that dropping Dan Burn would alleviate a lot of our defensive issues. Put some pace in there and give opposition teams one less focal point to exploit, and we’ve addressed two of our problems. We saw how it worked against Villa - they started targeting Burn and had loads of joy, so we brought Livra on at LB and they had to change plan. We tightened up and saw out the game. Just do that more! It has already worked! 

 

I don't think it's that simple and so we'll have to agree to disagree.

[Pablo]

In many ways it’s amazing Eddie has maintained our effectiveness going forwards given the injuries to Barnes, Wilson, Isak, Big Jow, and the loss of form of Miggy. Perhaps we recruited poorly not buying pacy defenders, but for everytime Gordon rinses his full back for pace and scores or creates a goal the same happens to our defence. That’s football. I’m as pissed off about it as anyone, continually gifting the opposition a goal start but in elite sport you have to accept that it isn’t all in the managers gift to resolve.

We lost 4 players to injury again yesterday, and a suspension. Sometimes what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger, and I can’t wait to see the phoenix rise.

[Holmesy]

6 minutes ago, Theregulars said:

Why do you think he’s not trying?

Other than Joe Willock coming into the midfield, I haven’t seen anything to suggest that he’s changed/changing anything. And Willock isn’t even a defensive change, he’s a midfield one designed to provide more cover to a porous defence. The defence, however, is still porous. 
 

Have you seen anything to suggest that he is? 

[madras]

19 minutes ago, Holmesy said:

Other than Joe Willock coming into the midfield, I haven’t seen anything to suggest that he’s changed/changing anything. And Willock isn’t even a defensive change, he’s a midfield one designed to provide more cover to a porous defence. The defence, however, is still porous. 
 

Have you seen anything to suggest that he is? 

It's not a "defence" thing, it's a defending thing that the whole team does. When we were at our best defensivly it wasn't because the back 4 was good, it was because the 11 worked to the same aim and knew they could blast it for 70mins and be replaced by someone more or less as good who'd could give it their all.

 

I wonder if anyone watches football or just plays FM and thinks they are the same, "buy in players with high defender ratings and you concede less" type thinking. That also goes for the pace thing, it works in E sports more than real football where speed of thought beats speed of foot.

 

 

Edited March 31 by madras

[LiquidAK]

Are we all going to be this fucking miserable when we finally lift a cup? Genuine question. If it's not possible to just switch off and enjoy yesterday, I honestly don't know why some of you still bother, it'll never be fun for you ever again.

[madras]

Just now, LiquidAK said:

Are we all going to be this fucking miserable when we finally lift a cup? Genuine question. If it's not possible to just switch off and enjoy yesterday, I honestly don't know why some of you still bother, it'll never be fun for you ever again.

There'll be someone in line to lift the cup who won't be smiling enough.

[Holmesy]

10 minutes ago, madras said:

It's not a "defence" thing, it's a defending thing that the whole team does. When we were at our best defensivly it wasn't because the back 4 was good, it was because the 11 worked to the same aim and knew they could blast it for 70mins and be replaced by someone more or less as good who'd could give it their all.

 

I wonder if anyone watches football or just plays FM and thinks they are the same, "buy in players with high defender ratings and you concede less" type thinking. That also goes for the pace thing, it works in E sports more than real football where speed of though beats speed of foot.

 

 

 

I’m 45 mate, I don’t play computer games. 😀

[gbandit]

1 minute ago, LiquidAK said:

Are we all going to be this fucking miserable when we finally lift a cup? Genuine question. If it's not possible to just switch off and enjoy yesterday, I honestly don't know why some of you still bother, it'll never be fun for you ever again.

Gives you an insight into the minds of fans in the ground who only make noise to complain and throw shit at the players 

[madras]

Just now, Holmesy said:

I’m 45 mate, I don’t play computer games. 😀

I'm 56 and I did.

[STM]

3 minutes ago, LiquidAK said:

Are we all going to be this fucking miserable when we finally lift a cup? Genuine question. If it's not possible to just switch off and enjoy yesterday, I honestly don't know why some of you still bother, it'll never be fun for you ever again.

 

I'm just incredibly grateful that some of the ridiculous negativity confines itself to forums and social media.

 

Out and about our manager has massive support and so he should.

[ShootShoot]

Again its not being miserable to criticise a poor performance you can still enjoy the result . Laughed my tits off when Ant G shithoused 2 pens good for him ! Its one of the things we've been missing . Celebrated when Barnes hit two wonder goals but the result shouldnt mask the poor defending 

[ShootShoot]

5 minutes ago, madras said:

I'm 56 and I did.

In my 60s , whats a computer ? 😎

[gbandit]

No one’s praising the defending, it was absolutely shit. We’re saying that there are very understandable reasons why it was shit and not some sign that Howe has no idea what he’s doing 

[Theregulars]

25 minutes ago, Holmesy said:

Other than Joe Willock coming into the midfield, I haven’t seen anything to suggest that he’s changed/changing anything. And Willock isn’t even a defensive change, he’s a midfield one designed to provide more cover to a porous defence. The defence, however, is still porous. 
 

Have you seen anything to suggest that he is? 

Yes. Every time I listen to, watch or read about him, I see a man giving everything he can offer to make us better. 
 

I don’t follow why not making the changes you suggest = not trying. 

[Kid Icarus]

If it's not being miserable to post almost exclusively about how we weren't very good after a 4-3 comeback win, then I'd be interested to see what being miserable is in those circumstances.

[ShootShoot]

Just now, Kid Icarus said:

If it's not being miserable to post almost exclusively about how we weren't very good after a 4-3 comeback win, then I'd be interested to see what being miserable is in those circumstances.

Being miserable is us playing well and winning 8-1 but complaining about the 1 

[Holmesy]

Just now, Theregulars said:

Yes. Every time I listen to, watch or read about him, I see a man giving everything he can offer to make us better. 
 

I don’t follow why not making the changes you suggest = not trying. 

I’m not suggesting he’s not trying. He’s a relentless workaholic. I just don’t see anything different that he’s trying defensively. Maybe I’m missing subtle changes, but we’re still conceding 3 goals a game, so I’m not sure subtle changes are enough even if they are happening 

[Kid Icarus]

Just now, ShootShoot said:

Being miserable is us playing well and winning 8-1 but complaining about the 1 

It's not real misery unless it comes from the Les Misėrables region of France.

[SUPERTOON]

Think there is a balance to be had, defensively we aren’t good enough, that’s probably an understatement.

 

Obviously there are reasons for it, but it’s been that bad consistently now for a couple of months, we pretty much concede the same goals and chances every match and nothing seems to have improved. Hopefully the return of Pope and others (maybe not until next season) will see us back to our best. 
 

I always look back to the Arsenal home game earlier in the season, our best defensive performance by a mile this season. Give me hope going into next season. 

[LiquidAK]

1 minute ago, Kid Icarus said:

It's not real misery unless it comes from the Les Misėrables region of France.

 

Do You Hear The People Sing? 

 

No, just whinging about how shit the team that *checks notes* won is.

[Holmesy]

17 minutes ago, gbandit said:

No one’s praising the defending, it was absolutely shit. We’re saying that there are very understandable reasons why it was shit and not some sign that Howe has no idea what he’s doing 

But the understandable reasons are things that Eddie can influence and isn’t doing. The defending is that shit every single game. The only conclusions that can be drawn from nothing changing despite us conceding 3 goals a game are:

1. Eddie is ok with it because he knows we can score 4

or

2. He doesn’t know what to do about it

 

1 is less concerning than 2, but neither paints a brilliant picture. 
 

Am I missing something? Seriously?

 

 

Edited March 31 by Holmesy