Manager Ange Postecoglou

[Murphy]

Yeah I get that.

My main point was that Ange is being punished now in a sense, for the first 10 rounds last season. That's true whether you look at points, goals, "attractive and dangerous style of play", or even xG / xT wankery. If that flying start hadn't happened, it wouldn't hurt as much that we were mediocre in the second half of last season.

Yet the truth is I am seeing significant glimpses this season (first 80 minutes of the Coventry game excepted) of a more attractive and dangerous style of play, compared to the second half of last season.

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We were scoring goals in the second half of last season though. We have more of the ball, but there was more attacking variety in our play. This dominance is more the opponents letting us have it, save the shit teams or the ones silly enough to try and take us on.

Had we not had that electric start we'd have finished 8th or worse.

 

[Confusius]

This inverted fullbacks system doesn't work for us.

Porro and Udogie should be flying down the wings(not playing midfield), not Werner or Johnson primarily.

But if we are to find something positive about last night. The seasons before this, when rotating heavily like we did last night, we would have gone out against Newport.

So maybe our second string are better now, which should make our first string better.

 

[malin]

Small adjustements are there to be made but he is refusing them. Why not invert only left side (which suits Udogie/Spence) with Odobert as touchline winger, and let Son or Johnson play more as a second striker on right side and let Porro overlap and put some crosses for Solanke? Not saying everytime - but some gameplan changes during the game would be more than welcome. We are completely predictable, and Ange looks like its either his way, or no way.

 

[PointToPatrik]

As other people in here are saying,

If he is just willing to tweak the system a bit to where we aren't so one sided in how we play, we could solve some of the issues that are dragging things down.

He doesn't need to compromise his footballing philosophy, just find other ways to achieve it when the primary one isn't working. Like a painter developing a new way to paint.

 

[Go on son]

Yeah I get that.

My main point was that Ange is being punished now in a sense, for the first 10 rounds last season. That's true whether you look at points, goals, "attractive and dangerous style of play", or even xG / xT wankery. If that flying start hadn't happened, it wouldn't hurt as much that we were mediocre in the second half of last season.

Yet the truth is I am seeing significant glimpses this season (first 80 minutes of the Coventry game excepted) of a more attractive and dangerous style of play, compared to the second half of last season.

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But we are not creating clear cut scoring oppurtunities. Some against leicester and took a screamer from bissouma to open it up against everton. Plus a dreadful mistake from pickford.
We spent 60 mil on a striker we dont supply any chances for

 

[SeeSpotRun]

We were scoring goals in the second half of last season though. We have more of the ball, but there was more attacking variety in our play. This dominance is more the opponents letting us have it, save the shit teams or the ones silly enough to try and take us on.

Had we not had that electric start we'd have finished 8th or worse.

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Yes. The anti-Angeball low block has evolved, and most teams are executing it quite well. They still have to do that very well for 90 minutes, and make the most of the few chances they are given, but three out of four teams have managed that so far this season.

Time for Angeball to evolve again.

 

[Murphy]

Yes. The anti-Angeball low block has evolved, and most teams are executing it quite well. They still have to do that very well for 90 minutes, and make the most of the few chances they are given, but three out of four teams have managed that so far this season.

Time for Angeball to evolve again.

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That's the bit I have no confidence in. He's incredibly stubborn, this man. And because we have no plan B, why it's so easily to nullify us.

Three out of four league teams have nullified us this season. About 25 of the last 35 have also managed it to a degree. That's what's concerning.

 

[JimothyCF14]

Time for Angeball to evolve again.

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Lol

 

[Tomo]

This inverted fullbacks system doesn't work for us.

Porro and Udogie should be flying down the wings(not playing midfield), not Werner or Johnson primarily.

But if we are to find something positive about last night. The seasons before this, when rotating heavily like we did last night, we would have gone out against Newport.

So maybe our second string are better now, which should make our first string better.

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As it is 1 v 1 I dare say our best 1 v 1 player is probably Spence who started his career as a flying wing back. That guy genuinely gets full backs on toast and I am not sure we have any player other than him like it, Odobert sort of but I have yet to see Odobert break players like I have seen Spence in the past. If Ange wants wingers who beat players, hold width and can put in a cross why not try Spence for one of the roles, that is where his skillset is best.

Alternatively change system, I think I read somewhere that Ange has played 3-5-2 in the past. We actually do have the players for this now and it would get round the issue with our wingers not being good at 1 v 1.

Vicario
Romero Dragusin VDV
Porro Bentancur Bissouma Maddison Udogie
Solanke Son

 

[Richard Arlison]

It already feels like a foregone conclusion what our results against:

City, Woolwich away, Chelsea, Liverpool, Man U away wil be.......

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We beat UTD and Liverpool last year. We drew at woolwich and City and could have beat City at home too.

 

[Richard Arlison]

As it is 1 v 1 I dare say our best 1 v 1 player is probably Spence who started his career as a flying wing back. That guy genuinely gets full backs on toast and I am not sure we have any player other than him like it, Odobert sort of but I have yet to see Odobert break players like I have seen Spence in the past. If Ange wants wingers who beat players, hold width and can put in a cross why not try Spence for one of the roles.

Alternatively change system, I think I read somewhere that Ange has played 3-5-2 in the past. We actually do have the players for this now and it would get round the issue with our wingers not being good at 1 v 1.

Vicario
Romero Dragusin VDV
Porro Bentancur Bissouma Maddison Udogie
Solanke Son

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I keep asking this question and nobody answers.

If we move to 3 CBs, how do we rotate them and what happens if one or even two of them isn’t available?

The issue under Conte was he needed 3 top class CBs and 6 very good ones. We don’t have 6 CBs full stop

 

[Tomo]

I keep asking this question and nobody answers.

If we move to 3 CBs, how do we rotate them and what happens if one or even two of them isn’t available?

The issue under Conte was he needed 3 top class CBs and 6 very good ones. We don’t have 6 CBs full stop

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Gray and Davies would be the back ups, still leaves 1 short. The LCB and RCB play more like defensive full backs in a back 3, it’s the CCB that has to be an out and out stopper so that might make Dragusin the most vulnerable player, Gray will cover Romero, Davies cover VDV in defensive roles, the stopper is the exposed position.

 

[Kaz Hirai]

We beat UTD and Liverpool last year. We drew at woolwich and City and could have beat City at home too.

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drew at old Trafford as well

 

[Richard Arlison]

That's the bit I have no confidence in. He's incredibly stubborn, this man. And because we have no plan B, why it's so easily to nullify us.

Three out of four league teams have nullified us this season. About 25 of the last 35 have also managed it to a degree. That's what's concerning.

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Every single manager we’ve had has been called stubborn within the first 12’ months.

Managers almost always get more “flexible” or varied in their tactics later on the down the line in year 3 and onwards. I guess it’s after they have built the foundations of their system.

Jose was the only one I can think of for us who would mix it up from the start and ask players to execute multiple different tactics to a high level. But that why Jose needs very expensive, established veterans who have already learned foundations in different tactics. And even then, the same defensive focus and lack of structure or ideas would happen up front.

Again, I think most coaches these days have more structure out of possession and leave the offense more open to the talent of their forwards. Thing is, your forwards need to be either talented and/or have really good chemistry together.

 

[Slav]

As it is 1 v 1 I dare say our best 1 v 1 player is probably Spence who started his career as a flying wing back. That guy genuinely gets full backs on toast and I am not sure we have any player other than him like it, Odobert sort of but I have yet to see Odobert break players like I have seen Spence in the past. If Ange wants wingers who beat players, hold width and can put in a cross why not try Spence for one of the roles, that is where his skillset is best.

Alternatively change system, I think I read somewhere that Ange has played 3-5-2 in the past. We actually do have the players for this now and it would get round the issue with our wingers not being good at 1 v 1.

Vicario
Romero Dragusin VDV
Porro Bentancur Bissouma Maddison Udogie
Solanke Son

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I'd love to see this but with Bentancur swapped for Bergvall or Deki (game dependent). Roddy's looked pretty horrible out there imo and a ban looming.

Johnson seems much more suited to a central role too so could rotate with the front two.

I personally can't see much changing with how we perform with the current squad. We don't have the tools to fit the system, so tweak the system to suit the tools. Is that a compromise a resolute Ange is willing to make?

 

[SeeSpotRun]

I keep asking this question and nobody answers.

If we move to 3 CBs, how do we rotate them and what happens if one or even two of them isn’t available?

The issue under Conte was he needed 3 top class CBs and 6 very good ones. We don’t have 6 CBs full stop

Click to shrink...

Not condoning the suggestion, but we have 5 with Davies and Gray rotating for Romero, Van de Ven and Dragusin.

But I think we're already seeing our DM sit deeper for longer periods this season which gets us closer to a back 3 anyway.

 

[Delulu]

It's true, but it's a cherry-picked cut-off date.

I'd rather look at full rounds, because they include playing everybody once so are at least somewhat meaningful:

• First half of 2023/24 we got 36 points from 19 games, 5th best in the league. That included 8 injury-hit games after the Chelsea disaster
• Second half of 2023/24 we got 30 points from 19 games, 7th best. Those 19 games included 3 at the tail end of our injury / AFC / AFCON player availability crisis.

Look at the second half first: most pundits expected to finish around 7th last season (there was even a thread created about that expectation, "The Race for 7th"). So achieving 7th best in the second half of the season was pretty much in line with expectations for a new manager during a rebuild. Certainly not the unmitigated disaster, "found out", "out of his depth", "Ange out" crisis that some seem to enjoy painting it as.

The first half of the season, measured against the same expectations, was outstanding. Maybe there was some "new manager bounce" at the start, but there was equally a solid effort during the injury-hit period that followed, getting 3 wins and an away draw against City in the 8 games after the Chelsea disaster.

But that overperformance in the first half of the season seems to have ironically helped feed the narrative that Ange doesn't know what he is doing, because our second round results weren't up to the same standard.

I know the comparison is over-done but for reference, Woolwich in their first 5 half-seasons of the rebuild under Arteta were 5th, 11th, 5th, 4th and 5th, plus one FA Cup. Ange so far is 5th and 7th. He's doing ok.

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Calling 32 matches Cherry picked is a bit of a stretch

Either way you look at it , that is a significant amount of games and a woeful outcome

 

[Tomo]

I'd love to see this but with Bentancur swapped for Bergvall or Deki (game dependent). Roddy's looked pretty horrible out there imo and a ban looming.

Johnson seems much more suited to a central role too so could rotate with the front two.

I personally can't see much changing with how we perform with the current squad. We don't have the tools to fit the system, so tweak the system to suit the tools. Is that a compromise a resolute Ange is willing to make?

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Unfortunately it seems all managers we get are put in a position where they have to compromise. That begs the question why get uncompromising system managers then wonder why it doesn’t work if the tools are sub standard.

He might have to but it’s not ideal.

 

[Slav]

Unfortunately it seems all managers we get are put in a position where they have to compromise. That begs the question why get uncompromising system managers then wonder why it doesn’t work if the tools are sub standard.

He might have to but it’s not ideal.

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Yeah I think we can most of us agree that the problem stems at the rotten head! The illusion of positive change.

 

[Sir Archibald Crooks]

Unfortunately it seems all managers we get are put in a position where they have to compromise. That begs the question why get uncompromising system managers then wonder why it doesn’t work if the tools are sub standard.

He might have to but it’s not ideal.

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We need a pragmatist. In many ways Harry Redknapp was the perfect manager for Levy and ENIC, played good football and was always seemingly happy with whatever he was served up player wise. By and large picked a system to suit the players he had. Poch as well at least tried some left field things when left short like Dier as a DM. Basically under these shocking owners you cant have someone that tries to fit unsuitable personnel into their one system whether thats playing Emerson Royal as a wingback or Son and Johnson as touchline wingers.

We know the faults of our owners but i have no idea whats happened to management in general these days. Surely its common sense to adapt to what you have not what you wish you had?