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Manager Thomas Frank

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Are you Frank Out or In?

  • Total voters
    623
The thing with Frank is he would be getting a lot less stick with these results if we actually played well in some of these games. But I can't remember our last decent 90 min performance in the PL. Burnley home?

It's never recovered since we were rancid in that home defeat by Bournemouth. The only time we win in the PL is when we play shit but the opposition are slightly shitter. Our wins are narrow and scrappy and our defeats our just awful outplayed nonsense.

It's why he has to go. Keeping him on won't change anything just like we let the Ange stink linger on for months.

EDIT: Everton away was good too. But that's another team all over the place and our form after that got even worse.
 
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spids said:
I think Frank has coached them all season in secure principles. Do no lose the ball centrally. Play the way you’re facing. Play back and across and we’ll work the flanks, patience etc., and this has slowly killed all creativity and confidence in a bid to ensure close games and not concede cheap goals. Frank is on record as saying his ethos is to keep games tight and hopefully win 8 or 9 of them when things work out. It’s made us predictable and clunky, and is a midtable ethos. That run Simons did first half where he dropped all the way back into our back 3 and played a 1-2 with Palhinha, then slalomed thru their midfield to create the chance for Muani. That is exactly the type of play Frank hates. If he’d lost it early in that move they’d have had a 3 on 2 situation centrally in our half. But we need to take risks to create. It raises energy and gets the crowd engaged. Second half we played so much better as suddenly our attacking players remembered they could move the ball quickly and pass forwards. It remains that Frank is simply the wrong coach for our club, and always will be.
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Remember the "to not take risks is also a risk"?

He hasn't even tried to live up to that, quite the opposite
 
Tomo said:
I don’t think that was the players suddenly waking up. It’s clear in the second half our attackers played with far more freedom, Xavi, Tel and Odobert interchanging. It was a change in tactics, we seemed to go from sit deep and hold position to let’s play football.
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Why didnt we do it from minute one. Its always some reactive shit from this manager, nothing proactive
 
spids said:
I think Frank has coached them all season in secure principles. Do no lose the ball centrally. Play the way you’re facing. Play back and across and we’ll work the flanks, patience etc., and this has slowly killed all creativity and confidence in a bid to ensure close games and not concede cheap goals. Frank is on record as saying his ethos is to keep games tight and hopefully win 8 or 9 of them when things work out. It’s made us predictable and clunky, and is a midtable ethos. That run Simons did first half where he dropped all the way back into our back 3 and played a 1-2 with Palhinha, then slalomed thru their midfield to create the chance for Muani. That is exactly the type of play Frank hates. If he’d lost it early in that move they’d have had a 3 on 2 situation centrally in our half. But we need to take risks to create. It raises energy and gets the crowd engaged. Second half we played so much better as suddenly our attacking players remembered they could move the ball quickly and pass forwards. It remains that Frank is simply the wrong coach for our club, and always will be.
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I remember when Harry came in, he said something about the players being really good but not playing very well.

There’s nothing to stop ‘safe’ play being pacy, one-touch, accurate passing - this is how we played second half. The ball moved more quickly - still down the wings until it reached the final third, where it was still often moved out to the wings. It just happened quicker which opened up opportunities that weren’t just crossing to an invisible attacker.

Because the press was applied more aggressively (first 10 minutes, too - clearly Frank’s idea) it meant that the attack didnt have to come back to our defensive third so often, which meant there were more players into the oppo final third when the ball was recycled which - again - gave more options.

Noticeably, when we were tiring and the subs had been made, Spence was still passing back to break up our own attack and Scarlett who hasn’ played all didn't really know what to do.

It’s a numbers game and comes from the press which hasn’t been working as we’re too passive moving from our defence to attack (no CF to hold up and bring others in to move up the pitch, Bentancur can’t tackle, Romero is too slow playing the ball, Porro is having a mare of a season which makes the RH side really vulnerable -still).
 
postbox said:
I don't think that's clear at all, to be honest

There is nothing about this team this season that suggests we even coach that kind of intent

Hardly any team selections support it

Or subs

I think in recent games he has gone more in that direction, and personally I think that's only because he knows he HAS to - to save his skin. It's not by his design imo as it's obvious we don't work on it
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Dunno - time will tell, I guess?

The joys of supporting this team. Makes you want to cry, doesn’t it?
 
ChrissyWaddleShares said:
I remember when Harry came in, he said something about the players being really good but not playing very well.

There’s nothing to stop ‘safe’ play being pacy, one-touch, accurate passing - this is how we played second half. The ball moved more quickly - still down the wings until it reached the final third, where it was still often moved out to the wings. It just happened quicker which opened up opportunities that weren’t just crossing to an invisible attacker.

Because the press was applied more aggressively (first 10 minutes, too - clearly Frank’s idea) it meant that the attack didnt have to come back to our defensive third so often, which meant there were more players into the oppo final third when the ball was recycled which - again - gave more options.

Noticeably, when we were tiring and the subs had been made, Spence was still passing back to break up our own attack and Scarlett who hasn’ played all didn't really know what to do.

It’s a numbers game and comes from the press which hasn’t been working as we’re too passive moving from our defence to attack (no CF to hold up and bring others in to move up the pitch, Bentancur can’t tackle, Romero is too slow playing the ball, Porro is having a mare of a season which makes the RH side really vulnerable -still).
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Thing is with Harry, we had a great initial bounce with him but it soon tailed off and it took that first January window when we bought Palacios, Defoe and Keane to really get things moving. Its the only window under ENIC where we ever showed any intent and urgency because we were in a relegation scrap.

Redknapp had already shown enough that he should be backed, Frank hasnt and we all know he'll be gone at some point in the next few weeks, even him. Unless we can buy a player that any manager would want, a proper first team player like an Anderson then i hope we dont bother.
 
We drew to bottom club wolves courtesy of a last gasp equaliser. He got outclassed by sean dyche 3 nil. Bournemouth done the double over us. He masterminded the most boring game of football ever away to brentford. Add to that last two games players are having rucks after the final whistle. Should never have been hired.
 
Shadydan said:
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Playing attackers with freedom. Would be hell to watch some of Conte’s games and -once we’d inevitably given up a goal because of the wave-after-wave of attacks on our lumbering defence and lack of MF - we’d be allowed to pop the ball to Kane who’d swing it out to Son and off we’d go.

Some people are talking like we haven’t seen these tactics before and like we haven’t lost many top-top players over the past few years so we’re back early in the development journey.

Short memories in football.
 
Shadydan said:
Why didnt we do it from minute one. Its always some reactive shit from this manager, nothing proactive
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Exactly why we won’t get that second half energy from the jump against West Ham. His whole philosophy is to have as much coaching control as possible. His game plan is to control the opposition in specific ways and be efficient with the types of attacks that he believes the analytics tells him to attack.

That second half was a deviation from that the players were freed up to attack where they felt and not stay locked into shapes to limit Villa. Clearest indication of that was the shots we took from distance and the amount of attacking moves through the middle.

It’s never going to work with this fanbase if Thomas Frank stays Thomas Frank. He can survive if he radically changes his philosophy or goes the way of building the structure from chaos. Let’s the players go, then does the analytics to work out which attacks they are actually good at and fits the game plan around that. But that’s player control, not coach control and just not who he is.

Vinai can’t end it though because it weakens his power and status on the board to be wrong about appointing him. It’s so early in his tenure and this was his first big decision. The Lewis family will hold it over him if he admits the mistake by sacking Frank.
 
ChrissyWaddleShares said:
Playing attackers with freedom. Would be hell to watch some of Conte’s games and -once we’d inevitably given up a goal because of the wave-after-wave of attacks on our lumbering defence and lack of MF - we’d be allowed to pop the ball to Kane who’d swing it out to Son and off we’d go.

Some people are talking like we haven’t seen these tactics before and like we haven’t lost many top-top players over the past few years so we’re back early in the development journey.

Short memories in football.
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I have absolutely no idea what this has to do with the current discussion about our manager or the match last night.
 
postbox said:
Did they respond to Frank? Or did they just go for it?

Is that how Frank WANTS to play or was it (as I suspect) a shit or bust tactic knowing his job was on the line and the crowd was turning? (One he undid with his subs)

This doesn't feel like evolution of Frank, rather desperation

I don't think he knows how to have a team really play that way full time
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Who knows but if he had lost the dressing room which tends to be the main factor why managers get the axe then I wouldn't have expected to have seen the level of desire the 2nd half saw.
If 2nd half had been as bad as the first then that to me would have been telling.
As it stands, the players did seem to up their games. If they wanted him gone, they would likely not have bothered
 
HenryHotspurII said:
Who knows but if he had lost the dressing room which tends to be the main factor why managers get the axe then I wouldn't have expected to have seen the level of desire the 2nd half saw.
If 2nd half had been as bad as the first then that to me would have been telling.
As it stands, the players did seem to up their games. If they wanted him gone, they would likely not have bothered
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That’s 2 good second half’s in a row but we have lost both and why are we starting so poorly in the first place , had we approached the first half of the last 2 games like we did the second we win both
 
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