It isn't the rotation at all. It does not matter who is there we play the same robotic way. pass around the back to get to the wings and wait for overlaps so long that 3 players are on that wing now and once we deliver the ball into the box those 3 players are stuck out wide. we never deliver the ball in early, we always wait until we can create more pretty triangles out of the danger area. Simple as that. Every team has worked us out. Sit back because we are useless and we will end up with 3 men on one wing and 5 more on the edge of the box leaving us open to the counter. Sometimes we have one in the box but that doesn't help once they have headed out to the huge space occupied by 2 opposition players with all of ours bar 2 now "ahead" of the ball
Last game made me decide not to renew my Season ticket. This game has almost convinced me not to bother going again this season. Woeful stuff. There is only one thing worse in football than being a bad side... being a boring side. We are slow, predictable and lack inspiration. Almost as if the team reflects the manager, eh? Only one thing for it, get very very drunk. See you next year, my world wide web pals.
Right now I'd accept any boring wins as I can't see anything dramatic happening without new players. However, after so many years of exciting play, I want better next season. Is it Puel's fault or does he just not have the players he needs....I don't know as I am no football expert, but something needs to change next summer.
The board shares a fair bit of the blame for the lack of match-winners, even if I disagree that it was all down to a couple players. Transfermarkt has us selling £214.54m worth of players and buying £166.21m over the past three seasons; to have that kind of turnover and end up with a team that is comprehensively lacking in goal threat is something of a failure.
I've said it before, and I'll say it again ... going into this season, ON PAPER, the attack force looked good, in my (and obviously the people that matter) opinion.
Has to be his fault. He's the one mucking around with the team every single bloody game. It is a running joke now and one that I suspect the players share as well. I just don't see how any player can respect a manager who chops and changes so much, regardless of whether a player has a good or bad game. On the evidence we've seen, I'm actually concerned that Puel would have a say in transfers as I think "dogmatic" would be first on this list of qualities for a new signing.
Every man (without tinted glasses) and his dog could see we were woefully short up top when the window shut. Never mind though, was easier to tell everyone at the time they were having a meltdown wasn't it?
Disagree - an attacking force of Austin (previous PL goal record), Rodriguez (a gamble), Long (exceptional second half of last season), Tadic (similiar to Long), Boufal (ok, injured, but he's coming good), Redmond (raw but lots of potential) to me, was good enough in the summer. Hardly the boards fault none of them have really stepped up!
You can't be serious? What paper were you reading? Can't have been the one with Long, Austin and Rodriguez on it
They've all shown, AT SOME POINT IN THEIR CAREER, they can do it in the premier league. So yes, on paper, they looked fine, but yeah, obviously the board failed to look into their crystal ball.
The boards fault for gambling on J Rod for the second Summer in the row you mean? Long is long, I love the bloke and was brilliant second half of last year but prolific he is not, never has been and never will be. Austin we knew we could have fitness issues with. Boufal was already injured and we knew off to ACON in January. I could go on but the bottom line is that it was criminal to not sign another forward player before the window shut... we're now suffering from that decision.
The thing that worries me is that even if we bought a decent striker in, would it necessarily enhance things under the style of football Puel has introduced? I think Less Reed has got to do his research a lot more thoroughly next time. There is a massive gap between top flight French football and the Premier League. Maybe he should have been looking at the Spanish or Italian leagues or maybe even the Dutch league. Puel seemed ideal and can appreciate his appeal but, unfortunately, it has not worked out. Worryingly , he doesn't seem able to understand that it is what he has brought to the table as opposed to the squad he has inherited that is the source of this season's difficulties.
But I think a lot of these problems you mentioned are partly down to the constant changes. Players not used to playing in the same line up / formation. Look at last season, tadic / Mane & pelle worked well together as they built up an understanding of what each player would and could do. We have nothing remotely like that this season, not even a hint of combinations starting to form and look promisin?
Why not? They had a break of a week before that. The poor little lambs are only professional athletes, after all.
My personal opinion is that the problem is Puel's tactics. He is over-rotating too, but it's the way he has us playing. Why are we aiming long balls into long and jay instead of playing through balls on the counter?! So frustrating. Our midfield and defence have got worse under his leadership.
I disagree, and disagreed at the time. Many of us were rather surprised that we weren't pursuing another good striker, particularly when it became apparent that Puel was (at least then) intending to run with a two-striker setup. Remember the bit where we were expecting a striker, and Puel declared that we had one...in Redmond? Now, has it been worse than I'd have expected on paper? Definitely, and a lot of that comes down to how incredibly slow we play under Puel. We got the most out of Long last year by moving the ball quickly and getting him chances in space. Tadic looked like a world-beater two years ago when attacking early in possessions. Hell, Pelle with all the mobility of an oak scored quite a few with perhaps one or two defenders in the whole of the 18 yard box. Now we prefer to wait and see whether we can get through eleven men, but we're well short of talent to do that with any consistency.
I think we had to rotate this week and with Europe etc. but also think we have taken it a bit too far at times. I hope as the season progresses we rotate less and less. When you're struggling for goals having the same players playing together more and learning each others games can only help.
I agree with some but Koeman did not change to instant success. He changed for about 3 or 4 games until he fell upon something working. I agree on Yoshida, he is a superb no3 but not a first choice. The Martina and Davis comment link for me because Davis is strugglin not playing in his only best position which is central, not left or right and he has minimal options to do anything constructive which is his strength. Martina similarly has Tadic (supposedly a super skilled super tidy player) continually waiting for ages for support instead of taking players on and even then Cedric is just as bad. We are a team where our skilled wingers??? rely on full backs to put the crosses in for us. Cedric is at best equal and in reality worse a full back than Martina. Totally agree on Morgan. If he is less than £18m and would accept our top earner he should be re-signed no matter who says "oo er" he would shore up that midifeld and give some direction for it. Romeu is already playing forward and it would mean 2 CMs that play forwards instead of sideways. I still disagree on the "Puel effect" because we have been complaining on and off about this style of football since Pochettino left. I don;t see a huge amount of difference now than when Koeman was here apart from Mane being able to make a few goals from nothing. It is the same dire football that last year was ignored because of results yet this year is a problem because of results.
