No mention of Chiricheș? The guy's a monster.
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On the downside, we lost...
Got to page 31 and couldn't put myself through any more. In summary:
1) the crowd were far FAR better than what I thought they'd be like at noon on a Sunday. Urging the team forwards and showing support when they played fluent attacking football. A few boos at half time but, frankly, what did we expect given that display?
2) their goal was a result of Dembele dwelling on the ball. He cannot play a holding role and we should stop expecting him to. Chiriches, Kaboul...ANYONE defensive should be there ahead of him. Dembele's game is to push on and dribble forwards. With him, Walker, jan, Dawson and Chiriches making runs forward it's no surprise that Newcastle had space to exploit at the back. Note: credit to AVB for switching him for Sandro at half time, though if we'd started with him...maybe things would've gone differently.
3) second half performance was a huge improvement. The double sub (necessity or not) helped hugely. We looked creative and expansive. A few good chances - some went off target (as happens in every game) and some Krul kept out. NB: Krul had a good game, but not a great one. A lot of simple saves - being a great shot stopper isn't enough to make you a great keeper - but he didn't make any errors.
4) Soldado was not in the mood today which is a real shame as we finally had some service he could have benefited from. On another day, he could've had three. Didn't make his trademark runs and didn't make the most of the chances he did have.
5) the game died with AVB bringing on JD instead of Lamela. The obvious sub was Lamela on for Siggy (who has had a few poor games on the trot, now - since that net buster against Hull) and get Townsend to take the left side to make us a bit wider. AVB has to take the blame for our anaemicast 15 minutes.
I'm not at the point of wanting AVB out; when I say we'll have to be patient I know that results like this (and substitutions like today's) will have to be tolerated. My concern is that he'll get good at our expense and then fuck off somewhere else.
1) the crowd were far FAR better than what I thought they'd be like at noon on a Sunday. Urging the team forwards and showing support when they played fluent attacking football. A few boos at half time but, frankly, what did we expect given that display?
2) their goal was a result of Dembele dwelling on the ball. He cannot play a holding role and we should stop expecting him to. Chiriches, Kaboul...ANYONE defensive should be there ahead of him. Dembele's game is to push on and dribble forwards. With him, Walker, jan, Dawson and Chiriches making runs forward it's no surprise that Newcastle had space to exploit at the back. Note: credit to AVB for switching him for Sandro at half time, though if we'd started with him...maybe things would've gone differently.
3) second half performance was a huge improvement. The double sub (necessity or not) helped hugely. We looked creative and expansive. A few good chances - some went off target (as happens in every game) and some Krul kept out. NB: Krul had a good game, but not a great one. A lot of simple saves - being a great shot stopper isn't enough to make you a great keeper - but he didn't make any errors.
4) Soldado was not in the mood today which is a real shame as we finally had some service he could have benefited from. On another day, he could've had three. Didn't make his trademark runs and didn't make the most of the chances he did have.
5) the game died with AVB bringing on JD instead of Lamela. The obvious sub was Lamela on for Siggy (who has had a few poor games on the trot, now - since that net buster against Hull) and get Townsend to take the left side to make us a bit wider. AVB has to take the blame for our anaemicast 15 minutes.
I'm not at the point of wanting AVB out; when I say we'll have to be patient I know that results like this (and substitutions like today's) will have to be tolerated. My concern is that he'll get good at our expense and then fuck off somewhere else.
I think Lloris would've saved the goal. I've never seen anybody round him. He's so quick and smart about coming off his line. Hugo would've probably been a full step ahead of Brad and that's all that's needed to save that.
You're trying to label anyone who has lost confidence in AVB as a group of melts or cowards etc. but the reality is that there is no clicke. Often the same people disagree on all kinds of stuff on here, because thats the point of a forum, it's simply that we can all see the same shortcomings in AVB's displays over the time he's been in charge and more people's patience has been worn away.
We all want whoever the manager is to do well. I doubt any of us actually care who the manager is so long as he does his job well. It isn't some anti-AVB-the-man thing even though you try and paint it as if it is.
Your pretty little stats mean fuck all at the end the day if the points stat doesn't go up. What good are shots if they don't go in? What good is possession if you don't have it in the dangerous areas and translate that into goals?
I don't have a problem with you still favouring AVB - but I do have a problem with you being so disrespectful of other people's opinions and trying to villainize them for it. Your holier than thou attitude is pathetic - why is you're opinion more valid? Well, it's not actually, you just come across like a bit of a narrow minded mong.
The stats show that we are creative, we are producing the efforts on target, we are dominating possession (including possession in the opposition's half), we are dominating every statistic in most games apart from the goals.
Basically, they show that our only real problem is chance conversion rate.
Your solution? To sack the manager.
Fuck the stats. Fuck the bigger picture. Fuck the fact that most of our attacking players have been playing together for only three months.
AVB OUT!!! I WANTZ 3 FLOWING FOOTY NOW!!!
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who would you play in the hole? eriksen or holtby?
:vdvdive:
think i'd go eriksen against city if were playing capoue and sandro as DM's...i love holtby but if we had those three we'd have zero creativity..
Ok, fair enough, that last sentence is true at least. But see what I did with your name? Funny, init!
btw, you're a bore
It was Paulinho who was at fault for the goal, not Dembele.
So let's start with this. I can't speak for all of AVB's critics on this site, but I try extremely hard to keep my criticisms of his management even-handed, explain exactly where I feel the problems in our style of play are and why it is that I have doubts that they'll be addressed. It's you that almost always dismisses me with a cursory negrep and a cry of 'melt', rather than addressing any of my points.
How much time, exactly? I'm sick of these patronizingly vague, dismissive assertions. I need to hear someone quantify them for a change.
It's mid-November, and we're sat in 7th place. Two home defeats in games most would have considered easy points this season. Tactical blunders by AVB, primarily around not starting Sandro, in a large part to blame. How many more weeks of this before you really start to get critical?
Oh yes, I forgot it took Mesut Ozil a good long time labouring away in Woolwich's colours to gel with his teammates and turn them from the League's perenial bridesmaid side into legitimate contenders.
And Osvaldo and Wanyama 14 months to break Southampton's first-team and help to boost their campaign.
And Negredo a whole season of Premiership experience to start banging them in for City.
And Coutinho and Sturridge a full year together to start creating and converting hatfuls chances for Liverpool.
Oh no wait, all those players were integrated rapidly and effectively.
My response to you, @
truetomyself
, is this. You and many other AVB supporters on this site are fantastic at aggressively fighting his corner, which I respect, but pretty lacking at explaining why exactly we should keep the faith. You say the team gelling will come more forcefully every week, but I think most are coming around to thinking that we look shakier than ever as even our formerly formidable defence, the cornerstone of AVB's tenure, has started to make match-defining errors. You say AVB is still learning and growing as a manager, while his team selections and sub choices grow more baffling week to week. Maybe the stats suggest we should be a little more optimistic than we are, and I accept that there's been some bad luck involved with our conversion rates. But the simple eye test should confirm that we are not looking like a cohesive, threatening team yet, that that meagre goal tally doesn't flatter to deceive, and 11 games in to the season that's a really big problem.Every week the way the system fails to get the team clicking, the way our front four looks like a team of strangers playing together, your brash statements about how we should have patience and faith look more ill-founded.
The jam is always coming tomorrow with AVB. Please, at the very least show me where the fruits are. Explain to me what signs there are that Villas-Boas is going to get us looking like a credible, dangerous outfit in time to keep pace with the top four race. Help me see where I'm going wrong. I'm not optimistic; I'll just sit here and await the 'dislike' alert that follows your skim-read of this post.
Rinse and repeat. Same again after the next disappointing result.
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Seemingly we have 6CMS. 2 CAMs - Holtby + Eriksen. 2 Box to box - Dembele + Paulinho. 2 CDMs - Sandro and Capoue.
Capoue first game since august was thursday. He played 60 minutes and wasn't even ready for this game. He is just coming back to health. Sandro came off in his last game with a hamstring injury and is just now getting back from his major injury. Saying if he can't play 90 minutes then he shouldn't make the bench is ridiculous. I'd rather have 45 minutes of Sandro then 90 minutes of today's Dembele. When Neither Sandro nor Capoue can start, we have to start Dembele and Paulinho along side each other. It isn't AVB's choice to play Dembele + Paulinho, it's about not having the health to start a proper CDM. Those saying "Kaboul, Vertonghen, Chiriches, ect." should have played CDM instead of Dembele, then who plays in the defense? Chiriches + Vertonghen started in the defense, and we don't want Naughton there.... Kaboul is coming back from injury and played 90 minutes on Thursday.
Townsend has been our best attacking player all year. Siggy has scored the most goals as a winger. Lamela has had one good performance and many bad ones, although justifiably bad, still bad. You don't drop the leading scoring winger or the best attacking player because another had a good game thursday. Let Lamela build up before throwing him on. I would have been fine with Lamela starting, but it wasn't necessary to start him.
If Paulinho wins one more challenge during that game, then 50% of the people calling for AVB out, aren't calling for him out. AVB has given us a better defense than Harry gave us offense. Our defense is better than anything we've had in a long time. No reason to think that AVB can't give us at minimum a mid-table offense with players like: Soldado, Lamela, Townsend, Siggy, Eriksen, Holtby, Lennon, ect. Levy didn't spend 100m on players suited to AVB's style just to sack him in November. I suspect by the end of the year we will be competing for 3rd and 4th. Give AVB time, and when i say that, that doesn't mean 5 games. Give him a year. He got DANIEL LEVY to break his transfer record three times, and we are only willing to give the man less than 3 months, and in those three months, we are 5 points off the lead. Why does everyone who preaches points never recognize that we are only 5 points off the lead.
Capoue first game since august was thursday. He played 60 minutes and wasn't even ready for this game. He is just coming back to health. Sandro came off in his last game with a hamstring injury and is just now getting back from his major injury. Saying if he can't play 90 minutes then he shouldn't make the bench is ridiculous. I'd rather have 45 minutes of Sandro then 90 minutes of today's Dembele. When Neither Sandro nor Capoue can start, we have to start Dembele and Paulinho along side each other. It isn't AVB's choice to play Dembele + Paulinho, it's about not having the health to start a proper CDM. Those saying "Kaboul, Vertonghen, Chiriches, ect." should have played CDM instead of Dembele, then who plays in the defense? Chiriches + Vertonghen started in the defense, and we don't want Naughton there.... Kaboul is coming back from injury and played 90 minutes on Thursday.
Townsend has been our best attacking player all year. Siggy has scored the most goals as a winger. Lamela has had one good performance and many bad ones, although justifiably bad, still bad. You don't drop the leading scoring winger or the best attacking player because another had a good game thursday. Let Lamela build up before throwing him on. I would have been fine with Lamela starting, but it wasn't necessary to start him.
If Paulinho wins one more challenge during that game, then 50% of the people calling for AVB out, aren't calling for him out. AVB has given us a better defense than Harry gave us offense. Our defense is better than anything we've had in a long time. No reason to think that AVB can't give us at minimum a mid-table offense with players like: Soldado, Lamela, Townsend, Siggy, Eriksen, Holtby, Lennon, ect. Levy didn't spend 100m on players suited to AVB's style just to sack him in November. I suspect by the end of the year we will be competing for 3rd and 4th. Give AVB time, and when i say that, that doesn't mean 5 games. Give him a year. He got DANIEL LEVY to break his transfer record three times, and we are only willing to give the man less than 3 months, and in those three months, we are 5 points off the lead. Why does everyone who preaches points never recognize that we are only 5 points off the lead.
Unfortunately we lost more than a game this afternoon. Many have lost faith and belief in the manager. No matter how anyone feels, for better or worse, we are all most likely going to have to wait and see if we get 4th under AVB at the end of the season. Anything less is a failure