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Reply | The Knives Are Out For Russell Martin In The Media But Do They Have Substance
at 10:03 6 Sep 2024
"he knew that he had to change his strategy if we were to go up, he knew that Alex McCarthy could not play with his feet..."
Yes, so he changed his strategy and we went up. Good stuff, well done RM. So, why straight from the start of the season did he go back to telling McCarthy to play with his feet, knowing that he couldn't do it? Can anyone explain that in a way that doesn't show RM to be either stupid, arrogant, pig headed or out of touch with reality? |
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Reply | Martin fighting for his job…
at 11:29 5 Sep 2024
Yeah but he'll scrape some points together over that run and survive. In that run we have 3 games that we should be getting results from if we're to have any chance of survival. He'll probably get some points and then be showing "signs of improvement". After all, it can't get much worse.
How many points do you think:
- we will get in those 5 games?
- will be enough for RM to keep his job? |
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Reply | Martin fighting for his job…
at 10:35 5 Sep 2024
I agree but:
- what SHOULD happen and what WILL happen are different things
- RM probably doesn't care much about the club. I don't blame him for that, he's a professional
- I can't see him doing what you and I might think are "the basics". For him, playing out from the back is part of the basics |
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Reply | Martin fighting for his job…
at 10:15 5 Sep 2024
I broadly agree in that I can't see him being sacked yet. An Xmas sacking seems possible if our position is dire, but I think the most likely is that we go down with him and he stays in charge in the Championship. The (unnecessary) extended contract showed their hand.
In addition, my view of the summer transfer business is that it was done with an eye on relegation. Only Ramsdale will definitely need to go and it will be easy to find a buyer for him. They've made sure that relegation won't be such a financial disaster this time. So, I don't think we'll see the panic reactions that we saw in our last PL season.
If he is sacked in the next few weeks, it would be the final confirmation for me that SR haven't got a clue what they're doing. At the moment, I'm giving them credit for having a plan. I don't think it's a good plan, but at least it exists. If they get rid of RM now it would show that they don't even have that. |
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Reply | Richard Keys views on Russell Martin
at 13:24 4 Sep 2024
"Martin has been hamstrung by the quality of players he's been given"
A good coach sets his tactics according to the abilities of his players. He doesn't ask them to do things that they can't. RM has had over a year to look at McCarthy, Bednarek, Stephens and THB. He should know exactly how good they are. Yet he still tells them to play dangerous passes at the back because, according to him, the rewards outweigh the risks. This is entirely down to him.
Why has he done this given that he seemed to learn at the end of last season to limit the amount of tippy tappy around our box? Why has he gone back to his earlier purist approach rather than one that fits the players and rescued our promotion push? The suggestion that he is putting himself in the shop window, like Kompany did, is consistent with the facts. Either way, you can tell from the comments he makes that this season he cares more about playing the "right" way than he does about grinding out results. |
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Reply | The Solution Is Clear For Russell Martin If He Is To Stay In His Job
at 12:02 3 Sep 2024
Agreed, but as you might have said before, Ramsdale is able to do more than that. He can do more than kick it straight up the pitch like McCarthy. If we have someone breaking free in a wide position he'll be able to find him. If we have a free man anywhere up the pitch, he has a good chance of finding him and if it goes wrong, no problem.
If OTOH all our men up the pitch are well marked, then we must have free men at the back, in which case playing out from the back becomes a reasonable option.
Above all we need variety to keep the opposition guessing. Let's stop doing the same old, same old. [Post edited 3 Sep 12:05]
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Reply | Some rather telling stats - pass completion
at 11:05 3 Sep 2024
"First, you need strikers who have a good chance to goal conversion ratio"
Not true. Look at the stats. Often when we have 2/3rds possession, the opposition create more chances with 1/3rd possession. Not only that, they are better chances because they come from quick breaks, not slow build up.
"the ball has to be moved from defence to attack quickly"
True. Getting the opposition to engage is not a problem. Any team in the world will move towards your goal when you sit in a low block. But, as you say you then need to attack quickly. You say we don't have the players to do that. I disagree. Arma, for example has plenty of pace and would do this well. Diaz and Archer have scored plenty of goals from quick breaks (that's basically all they did at Sheff Utd). Fernandes and Dibling have shown that they can carry the ball forward at pace.
We have the players to play this way, we just don't have the manager. |
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Reply | Some rather telling stats - pass completion
at 10:30 3 Sep 2024
Part of the problem is that most of these passes are pointless and unproductive. Look at who is actually making the passes:
https://www.premierleague.com/stats/top/players/total_pass
Out of all PL players, we have 3 of the top 6 for passes made. They are Bednarak, Stephens and THB. How many of those passes are useful?
I'd rather get the ball quickly to someone like Lallana or Dibling and let them make the passes. While our defenders are passing it around between themselves, the opposition are either preparing to steal it, or organising their block to stop our attack. |
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Reply | !!!!!!!!!! Russell Martin out !!!!!!!!!!!
at 15:20 2 Sep 2024
I agree that this is the style SR have opted for. But I wonder if that was influenced by Wilcox, or whether the decision to be Man City Lite pre-dated Wilcox and that's why they brought him in? (I know some say we don't try and copy Man City but that argument doesn't convince me.) Either way, the fact that Wilcox isn't there anymore might leave some space for someone to speak up and say that the possession Emperor isn't wearing any clothes.
It's a shame they won't consider Moyes because he knows what he's doing and would have a decent chance of saving us. Potter might too. He'd be slightly more acceptable to the style-police, but if attracting Moyes would be difficult, Potter would be even more difficult.
When he finally does go, RM's replacement will probably be a European manager with high enough possession stats for SR to save face, but enough pragmatism to get results. |
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Reply | Southampton At Brentford The Damning Verdict
at 10:21 2 Sep 2024
Playing as a counter attacking team with 35% possession is exactly what we should be trying to do on our budget. Rather than trying to copy Man City in everything, we should try and copy Brentford. They survive in the Prem and give their fans some excitement by being smart. Smart about tactics and smart about the recruitment that suits those tactics. Brentford's owners are smart, ours are stupid. |
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Reply | !!!!!!!!!! Russell Martin out !!!!!!!!!!!
at 10:11 2 Sep 2024
Others disagree, but I'm saying that we need a complete overhaul of the playing style if we are going to survive. Yes, pissing around at the back is the main problem, but there are many others too.
Anyone watching the game could see the difference between the speed with which Brentford got the ball forward and the way we do it. Brentford will score lots of goals flooding forward in a counter attack. They didn't on Saturday because they did it by pressing instead, but the counter attacking goals will come. Not for us.
Mostly, by the time we get to the opponent's box, the space has gone and we don't have the class to break a PL defence down once it's set (see Newcastle game). We DID do it once on Saturday by combining 3 of our better players. A bit of class from Dibling, Lallana and Sugawara and we got a goal, but that won't happen often enough, particularly without a centre forward to add some muscle. Neither will we score the kind of set piece goal that Brentford scored, because we don't have that physicality.
To score enough goals, we'll need to get the ball forward quicker. |
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Reply | individual errors v team tactics
at 09:53 2 Sep 2024
Team tactics caused the individual errors. Don't tell them to play short at the back and these errors don't happen.
Tactics should play to your strengths and avoid your weaknesses. It's not rocket science. Everyone knows it except the one person who's making the decisions. |
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Reply | !!!!!!!!!! Russell Martin out !!!!!!!!!!!
at 11:13 1 Sep 2024
For me it's not a reaction to results at all. If we'd somehow scraped 3 draws I'd still have the same opinion as I had last year: that this style of play will not bring us success in the Prem. It's not the results that are the main information that we've got from the first 3 games, it's the confirmation that this style will not work when your players are below average for the league you're playing in.
So you're right, just sacking the manager would be bonkers. What we need to do is sack the manager AND change the style of play.
You say the players need time to learn the style of play. Yesterday's main errors came from THB, Stephens and Bedders. How long do they need to learn this style? How much better at it are they going to get after playing it for a year already? |
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Reply | Should Russell Martin be sacked after saying he won’t compromise?
at 10:53 1 Sep 2024
Yes, we would have an infinitely better chance under Moyes if he came in now, but as you say Xmas would be too late. The other reason for that (apart from us having no points by then) is that top managers have said they hate this idea of being brought in at Xmas because they have so little time to work with the players and change the patterns of play. If anyone is going to save us, they will have to change our whole style away from the possession mentality, which will be a lot of coaching to do.
Personally I don't think the board will make a change, but if they do it's likely to be far too late. It is doubtful that Moyes would say yes to us now, but very doubtful that he'd say yes at Xmas. |
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Reply | Mission to Burnley - Season 2
at 09:35 1 Sep 2024
Just watched MOTD and Danny Murphy said a similar thing. I think his words were:
"They're not good enough to keep playing this way. If they keep doing this they'll end up with the same fate as Burnley". I think those were his only words on Saints and they were said very dismissively, like "goodbye".
To me the key words are "not good enough" to play like this - not that it can't be done with outstanding players, just that it shouldn't be tried with below average PL players against a PL level press. |
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Reply | !!!!!!!!!! Russell Martin out !!!!!!!!!!!
at 09:27 1 Sep 2024
They will always feel tense pissing around at the back because it feels unnatural to them. They grew up with coaches shouting at them not to take stupid risks. You can't undo those lessons. Perhaps if they'd grown up at the Barcelona academy or wherever, then it would feel more natural to them, but they'd still know that they don't really have the first touch to be doing this.
Any decent coach will fit his tactics to the players he has available. These ones weren't built to piss around at the back. |
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Reply | !!!!!!!!!! Russell Martin out !!!!!!!!!!!
at 18:56 31 Aug 2024
Relegated by April ??!?!!
We'll have to improve massively for that to happen.
It doesn't matter what we say anyway. The club won't sack him and I think he'll still be here next year, when he'll have a good chance of winning us promotion again because a lot of this squad will be well suited to the Championship. Ramsdale, Dibling, KWP etc will be gone but most will still be here. |
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