His football could be dull to watch in the extreme; this season has often painful to watch on too many occasions; a recipe that we fans would have scoffed at of other teams and other clubs fan have praised us for our entertaining play. But; he was dealt a sh1t hand by the club; who did not replace Pelle and Mane; our 26 goal strike force - we did not replace the Victor/Morgan midfield (thankfully we have Romeu but he is one half of the equation but not enough. We was robbed in the League Cup Final; by now we would be talking about our Europa League run next year. If he has won that trophy and be sitting in eighth we would not have this negative blog. I maybe not a huge fan of Puel ; but he is getting there with limited time-line and resources.
A lot seem to think this is all the club's doing, but there have been several rumours he's not been overly happy here either.
Ralph "I'm not the football guy" Krueger, and Les Reed, who appointed Claude and asked the impossible of him.
Puel loses both leading goalscorers in mane.and pelle but may still finish 8th and a cup final.still gets sacked.cant happen can it. Unless puel is unhappy and its a mutual thing then thats fair enough
I've backed Puel all season despite the dire entertainment at times. But things do appear to have come to a head particularly with one player allegedly storming out of training mid week. I think we can safely say Fonte wasn't happy either. At the end of the day it really does not matter how good the manager is or is not. If the players don't understand the tactics or simply do not like the style of football that is being asked of them one of two things need to happen. Either you shift out an awful lot of players or you change the manager. I think the board are well aware that the fans have not been won over and that makes the decision an easy one for them. Harsh? Yes. The right way forward? Yes.
The thing is, us fans don't actually know all the facts. We can see the results and the way we play etc. But in terms of what happens behind the scenes we just don't know. Now I'm not saying this justifies him being sacked. My point is that we don't have all the facts so we can only have a very limited opinion. For all know he could either have lost the dressing room or have their full support - the fans just don't know!
Adkins got us back-to-back promotions. I didn't shed a tear when he was removed. Pardew came in on -10 points, on the back of two horrible years, was presented with a threadbare squad, and ultimately got us a top 8 finish and WON at Wembley. I didn't shed a tear when he was removed. I equally won't be sheding a tear if Puel is removed. As with the first two instances, if this is what the board will want to do , then I will support them 100% with absolutely no negativity from me. I wasn't wanting either of those two to go, but I support the club and their decision making. If they think there's a better option out there, great by me.
And he nearly achieved it. But for similar quality replacements of Pelle, Mane and Wanyama, plus what strikers we did have still didn't return to form of old [JayRod] or lost the ability to hit even an occasional barn door [Long]. The only striker/finisher of real quality and in form was Austin, and his fitness and injury tendency continued to concern, so that when he landed on his shoulder, one that he's had trouble with before, we lost the only true finisher in-form in the club at the time, going out of the Europa due to not being able to score enough goals when we were the best team, or at the very least in the top two. Yes, Nathan was learning but there's no way he could bridge the gap until Gabbiadini came along. And while we were negotiating the PL, the Europa and the cups, Claude rotated the squad, struggling to get midfielders to help with what the strikers couldn't do on their own [Welcome to Southampton's well known free scoring midfield, Claude], whilst the squad played every 3 days, putting in some really good performances. In the meantime he progressed the careers of McQueen, Sims, Hesketh and Olomola, etc... and on the whole they all played very well indeed. McQueen and Sims in particular were truly excellent at times. Redmond has come on leaps and bounds now, and JWP is showing us much more of his capabilities and hard work. Then we lost the services of the best player in the club - Van Dijk. So not only were we struggling for goals, unless Gabby scored, but now confidence at the back was hit. Yes Jack Stephens came in alongside a much improved Maya and played very well, but it's just not the same. The sheer dominance over strikers has gone since VVD became injured. He rarely gave anyone a sniff. Now we have to actually stop them within proper scoring situations. So Romeu has had to be utterly brilliant at times, and practically every game he's been the best or very nearly the best player, either on the park or in the Saints side. And Saints have ended up defending deeper and deeper and giving over possession of the ball as a preference on occasion. Even so, at the start of the season the squad were stronger than last season's. But last season's first eleven were a measure stronger than anything we could put out during this, and because of injuries we became weaker, and it was only the overall strength in the squad which kept us in the top half. So when Les, Ross and the board make their assessment of the season, I hope they take a good look at themselves and ask, "did we support this manager well enough from the start.?"
The odd thing is that, on paper, Puel was almost a tailored fit for Southampton. It is difficult to argue that the appointment did not make sense last summer but I think the story about not being given transfer funds is not really accurate. Players like Hjobbjerg and Pied were brought in and have not performed because of either being too inexperienced or crocked for most of the season. When large sums of money have been spent, I think Redmond has been ok but Boufal has not delivered at all - a major disappointment for a major signing. In the January window, we faffed around getting a new central defender yet Puel has, (rightly in my opinion) decided to keep faith with two original players. We have, of course, bought in Gabbiadini as well as well as Hassan. I agree that we suffered with losing mane and Pelle and concur that any team would miss such quality as has been the case with Liverpool. But, in the long run, I feel that Puel has been allowed to supplement the squad yet he has not always picked the new acquisitions as has been seen with Carceres and Hassan. I concede that Puel has been dealt with harshly if he is fired but I have not seen sufficient since the Wembley final to believe that he can turn things around. Recent performances have demonstrated that he is a capable coach, especially with regard to defending yet I feel the players seem incapable of translating his ideas in to effective football on the pitch. The body language of the players at the home matches do appear to show a lack of frustration however if he had more "partisan" players, I think the performances would have been much better at home. I said earlier this week that it may be necessary for Puel to get rid of those players that don't share his vision and this is probably too much of a risk as some of the senior players had performed well for us in the past and we know what they can do. Unfortunately, other than the Wembley final, I do not feel we have seen Puel's full potential and I would take a lot of convincing to believe that he could significantly improve the entertainment value next season. To his credit, I can't see any future manager making Saints such as awkward opponent at Claude Puel. At the end of the day, I would imagine player power, sponsors and season ticket sales are going to dictate the conclusion of the review. I feel sorry for him as he had been dealt a poor hand yet I cannot ever recall the sensation of being bored so often by the style of football I have watched this season.
I agree with much of this until the last paragraph. Reed ensured that new players were brought in but, to be honest, they have not always been selected by Puel even when they have been fit. In the first few months of the season, I feel that we did not select the best teams and quite why Fonte was alienated beggars belief. The rotation policy might have made sense to a limited degree but the wholesale changes did not help up progress in Europe and ensured that Puel quickly lost the backing of a proportion of the supporters. Prior to Christmas, I think Puel should have taken a degree of responsibility from a season that had stared to go off the rails. It is unfortunate as the two most recent home performances would probably have been forgiven had they been played earlier in the season and it is possible o appreciate that he has got some decisions right. In some ways, Puel had made a rod for his own back.
I can understand people being bored, but I state once again, it's as much the players not performing as much as the manager. They are of course, also being asked the impossible but anyone who watched Wednesday's game will have seen Claude urging the players to keep up the pressure on United and create more chances, chances which, surely someone, sometime, is going to finish? Does anyone seriously think that Puel coaches the players to miss goals the way our strikers and midfielders seem to? If Puel is sacked next week some of our senior players need to take a good look in the mirror.
[QUOTE="Ian Thumwood, post: 10557813, member: 1007529"Reed ensured that new players were brought in but, to be honest, they have not always been selected by Puel even when they have been fit. In the first few months of the season, I feel that we did not select the best teams and quite why Fonte was alienated beggars belief. [/QUOTE] There's merit in every side in this argument but my opinion is that fonte would have gone regardless of the coach, he was gone before Puel arrived. He was causing problems and was sidelined accordingly once puel took the reins. Gabbiadini is the only player that was ready to step into the first team. Boufal was signed injured, Caceres was signed as an emergency stopgap, Holberg wasn't quite there and Redmond was a known quantity and has delivered what was expected. He's done a lot with the youth this season, more than we've seen since promotion to the Premier which should be applauded. Then he's had the injuries. Overall he was handed a bit of a **** sandwich Yet, he has failed to get the team playing as a team. Our prolonged experiment with the Diamond was a key failure in the first third of the season and largely to blame for our lack of goals in Europe. We then reverted and had a brief upturn but the final third has been done for by poor team morale in my opinion. When JRod refuses to celebrate a goal you know it's bad. Key injuries, clashes behind the scenes. Its been a pretty awful season and I can totally appreciate why players, Claude and the board wouldn't be happy. I'm assuming bridges have been burnt on both sides if he's heading for the door but the phrase thrown under a bus is a fair one I think.
I'm fairly indifferent to Puel and I certainly don't hate him but I just don't see the youth stuff. The likes of JWP and Redmond - young but relatively experienced players - have certainly improved under Puel and it's hard to say too much about the behind the scenes stuff (although I expect he's much more interested in, and helpful to, the youth players than Koeman) but I really don't think Puel has done that much for the youth players. Certainly not a revolution or anything. Stephens, McQueen and Sims have come into the side somewhat regularly but only because of injuries or player sales. Other than that a few young players have had an appearance or two here and there but nothing exceptional and, again, those appearances have usually been because of injuries to more senior players.
