Saint Benali

Get in there. That was a great break

Think jwp has to take the blame for that one.

Ralph tactical masterclass incoming

**** yeah! Awesome Redmond!

Anyone still want him replaced?

No, he seems to be learning from his stupid mistakes.

I am just surprised it took him so long to figure out 5 defenders was not the answer when we were getting battered every game.

It also raises the question that many had in defence of him. Are the players not as ****e as we thought they were?

He has done well in sorting out the issues and the players seem much more comfortable in the 4-4-2 which is seen in the results. Have to keep it going.

I'm with the IFAB on this one.

"Looking at one camera angle is one thing but looking at 15, trying to find something that was potentially not even there, this was not the idea of the VAR principle.

It should be clear and obvious."

We have gone from trying to overturn clear errors into overturning every error. Even when that error is near impossible to decide.

The phrase ‘but VAR breaks up the game’ is often heard but what do fans want? A correct decision (however long it may take) or a incorrect call made an official often several yards behind play?

It depends on how you go about defining if it is correct or not? If the player is clearly offside and a blind guy could see it then it needs correcting. If it is so close that you are using technology to determine which pixel belongs to what player it has gone too far.

Because it isn't what Var was supposed to be used for? It has gone from clear and obvious errors to major, mega zoom into trying to determine mm. The problem is it can't do that.

 

The problems we are seeing are that the players are level. It is only when you super zoom in and try and get to individual pixels that these decisions are being given. That isn't what it was supposed to be used for.

 

As some of the pundits were saying if you are going to look so far into detail that way then it is eventually going to creep into the other parts of the game too. Are we then going to look into details of fouls? When the ball hits a shoulder does it slightly touch the arm? When someone jumps for a ball are they being impeded at all? The game is going to be stop start and the flow will be destroyed. The rules need to be set in stone so they can stop all these pauses.

If a player is level and the only way you can determine they are not is by zooming in x300 to see a hair is offside for me that ruins the game.

Agree 100%.

There needs to be a 'too close to call' limit. If we are having to get the cameras to zoom in, looking at a thousand different shots to determine if something is or isn't it should be deemed level.

Going down the whole everything has to be precise road is a recipe for disaster. Mainly because a lot of those decisions have since been shown to be wrong.

Come on Ralph, it hasn't worked for 60 mins. We haven't even had a shot of note. Change stuff about.

6 mins to go and the Ralph changes happen. What a **** manager.

So why are we just letting Antonio cruise around without anyone marking him? There are 4 defenders there. Surely one can get on him?

And why the **** are we banging long balls up the pitch knowing that they are massive physical players?

Sort it out Ralph.

We've spent £108 over the last two seasons.........

 

and brought in about £50 million.

 

Feasibly we should be able to spend about £50-60 million a summer, especially if we shift the deadwood like Forster, Mo, Hoedt, Carillo, etc. like we might be able to make £20 million from Celtic just for the two on loan seeing as they are doing well.

 

Those Leipzig fees show that good players can be found in the £10-20 million bracket, but our scouting over the last 2-3 years has been poor.

We did indeed sell some players for a bit of cash. If I remember rightly they sold players for a grand total of £0 in that 16/17 season. The one where he get's most of his praise from.

We spent £50m this season and sold players for £25m. Last season we spent £55m and sold players for £20m.

But the point is as you say it isn't how much you spend it is how you spend it. We have recruited poorly over the last few seasons.

However as I said before somewhere in here I think Ralph isn't a man to man manager. It doesn't appear based on his time here that he can get players playing decent consistently. What I tried to suggest was that chances are he is going to have the majority of this squad for quite some time. You can't rely on new players being the ones to turn the tide as recently it hasn't worked for us. We don't have a rich backer like Red Bull who are going to go out and spend big every season.

Unless you come from a top job elsewhere where you have won loads of things you won't be getting any of the top jobs in this country. You won't be in one of the ones that will spend heavily both on transfers and wages. You will likely be at a club where you are going to have to show your abilities in getting poor to average players playing above themselves.

We have made some improvement recently. We are playing much better as a team. Which shows the team isn't as bad a some of our results suggest. The question is why did it take so long to see that having 5 defenders was a recipe for disaster? How come when other managers make changes during games we don't make changes to counter them? He tends to make changes only after events have happened. Even when it is obvious that it is about to happen.

Didn't know where to put it but this short tifo football explanation of how Ralph played at Leipzeg makes its super clear how and what we are trying to do in our system.

 

Think the key thing we are missing is a RB and a midfielder who can break the counter press.

 

[video=youtube;NNJ5pcp_m-o]

And the vast amount of money to spend on players.

17/18

Kampl - £18m

Augustin - £14.4m

Bruma - £13m

Laimer - £6m

Mvogo - £5m

16/17

Keita - £27m

Burke - £14m

Werner - £13m

Upemacano - £9m

Bernado - £6m

Can't see us spending £125m in 2 seasons anytime soon.

Just a few gems to start the evening

I actually posted my reply just now before seeing this post.

I'm more than happy to be proven wrong by Ings. My view was based on his last couple of seasons.

Since then he has gone on to become our most important player. And my criticism of us signing him was totally wrong.

But if you think going back through threads and pointing out where people are wrong go ahead. If it makes you feel better about your life then crack on. I am sure I could go through your posts and find countless things to highlight where you were wrong.

I won't do that though because I honestly couldn't care less.

I was wrong about this guy. I thought he would be injured for most the season.

He has shown he is a class player and can put the ball in the back of the net consistently. Many of them being from chances he has created all for himself.

Of all the players we can't afford to lose it is this guy. Without his goals we would be even further in the ****.

I don't think it was a poor performance. Same old mistakes. Ralph didn't know how to adjust to their changes. When our tactic becomes sit deep and hit long balls to Long you know you are in trouble.

He’s not toast. We can’t afford to sack him. Obvs

 

 

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Put him on gardening leave. I will do the job for free and get the same results. 2 wins from what 20 now? I could do that!

Agree with what Townsend was saying. Ralph isn't an adaptive manager more of a keep doing the same thing type of manager. In this league that just won't work.

H45 mins to turn it around, kick some backsides, make some positive changes or he is toast imo.

Apart from that awful shot, I think he's doing okay? Hasn't really lost the ball. Put pressure on ozil just now in the box. Not a 10/10 performance but a real stinker is really harsh.

He has been out of position so many times and so many needless fouls just inside our half.

jwp is having a real stinker. This is the type of game where we need a midfield specialist rather than a jack of trades.

Puel did not have the same squad, he had Fonte and Virgil for half a season. Those two are easily worth six points in six months, compared to our current defence. Take those away and Puel finishes 17th.

 

Nobody has covered themselves in glory here but that’s four managers in a row fighting the drop. Our squad is crap.

I didn't say the same exact squad I said basically the same squad.

In the last few games that season it was pretty much the same players

Utd when it was 0-0 10 of the 11 starting players are still here.

Liverpool when it was 0-0 9 of the starting 11 are still here.

In that season we won the same amount of games in the first half of the season as we did in the second half after the transfer window. And that second half as you mention was without Van Djik or Fonte. We had Stephens, Yoshida and Hoedt.

We all know we have some really bad players. But I think we have a bad manager too.

Based on the last 17 games where we have a 10% win ratio and a 60% loss ratio its clear the squad isn't good enough overall. But its also clear in my view the manager doesn't have the ability to turn it around.

In the real world we won't be getting rid of our owner anytime soon and we won't be spending £50-£60m a season to try and get into the top 6. Right now I think we need a man to man manager who can get players playing above themselves.

For me the worst thing we can do is repeat the same mistakes of the past where we believed going down will get rid of all our problems.

If on the 1st of 2020 we are still doing badly performance wise and there is still no improvement I think people have to accept RH isn't as good as they like to think he is.

Fighting relegation every season with this group of players is as good as it gets until we finally get relegated. This is the third relegation battle season in a row we are basically Sunderland.

 

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Isn't that how half the table operates season to season? Fighting to stay in the league?

Maybe just me but I find some of the defence of our results quite pathetic really. What you are basically saying is for Ralph to be a good manager he needs to have world class players.

Puel had basically the same squad and did a lot better.

Hughes and MP2 had basically the same squad.

By your logic they were actually good managers too as they picked up points in a higher % of games than RH?

MP2 got at least a point in 59% of his games.

MH got at least a point in 49% of his games and RH has got at least a point in 48% of his games.

I think we all agree the players are not very good. Not when you compare them to a team like Liverpool.

But for a club of our standing they are mostly fine.

When the manager isn't picking players in their correct positions and picks players who are not adding anything he is immune from criticism because the players are ****?

I don't buy it. And I do not accept as Marco alluded to that getting so few points in our past 6-7 games is anywhere near acceptable. What it shows to me is that when a team isn't doing well he lacks the know how or tactical brain to turn it around.

You earn your way to getting superstar clubs where you can spend hundreds of millions. You do that by making do with what you have and somehow getting more out of them. Look at Burnley and Sheff Utd.

If he doesn't have the ability to find the solutions to the problems we have than what is the point of him being here?

He looks a beaten man. I feel for him.

 

Reckon he is a good manager, but having to work with a ****-awful and unbalanced squad. I think we should stick by him whatever happens: give him the chance to build something.

I disagree.

Haven't seen anything from him to suggest he is a good manager or has the potential to be one.

We haven't even been close to winning games with him in charge.

Positives - Only 0-1

Negatives - everything else.

I'd love to know what we work on in the week as tactics/coaching wise we are all over the place.

If jwp passes the ball backwards one more time I am going to lose my ****.

We have a **** squad with a **** manager. Recipe for disaster.