I would have played them weeks ago, Patterson, Younger, Neil and Hawkes should all be part of our first team squad by now and should have been weeks or months ago in some cases, Its too late to bring them in now, the manager has blown this season big time with his timid approach to team selection, and I expect no more than a three card shuffle on Saturday with the usual suspects and that will be it. And by the way I am told that McFazdean is a midfield player, he certainly isn't a wingback or full back.
I reckon we were winning games without playing particularly well, also Sanderson/09 formed a good CB partnership, we kept clean sheets and nicked the odd goal. Out luck in winning without a good performance would always come to a end. Sanderson was injured ( and played on with a injury) we shipped goals and still only got the odd goal. Thats my take in the last dozen games, the emperor had no clothes.
Look on the brightside, yous would all have been feeling much fcuking sicker if Donald had still been running the gaff.
I hate to sound like a doom merchant, and i admire all the fans that are still optimistic, but in my opinion we are going absolutely no where these play offs with a back 4 of MacFadzean, Flanagan, Wright and Power/Onien. That back 4 is absolutely abysmal, possibly one of the worst in the league never mind top 6. I think it will be practically impossible to keep a clean sheet, even if we do manage to score 2 on Saturday. We're relying on 2 players in that defence (Flanagan and MacFadzean), that shouldn't even be in this league, they should be in League 2. MacFadzean actually stepped up from that League when he joined us, hes never played at a level higher than league 2 and he was released by Plymouth last season. How the feck can we expect him to get us into the Championship? If we do somehow make it to the final then Yates and Simms will have a field day with us. Its really hard to take knowing we have Willis, Sanderson, McLaughlan, Hume and Xhemajli all on the books but unavailable for selection. Injuries and inept management from Parkinson earlier in the season will unfortunately see us having yet another season in the 3rd tier. I really hope i am left to eat my words, but im just trying to be realistic.
i am one who was picking out the small improvements across the park after LJ came while some, probably most, were looking for any excuse to say he had failed...those improvements were there some very subtle and not really immediately obvious, then came that pompey game and i thought 'yessss..finally it all comes together' and not too long after after thought 'feckin typical feckin useless feckin team, why am i not a glory hunter ffs' now i wonder if pompey were just really really awful that day and made us look good.
Just a question I have. The excuse is they aren't his players. Fair enough, but surely a good, quality manager would get the best out a squad rather than hide behind that excuse. In any other Iine of work a manager has to get the best out of his team, yet in football we accept the "it's not his team, give him pre season / transfer windows". What happens if "his" players are ****e, do we continually accept it?
[QUOTE="clockstander, post: 14906660, member: 1026726"]I would have played them weeks ago, Patterson, Younger, Neil and Hawkes should all be part of our first team squad by now and should have been weeks or months ago in some cases, Its too late to bring them in now, the manager has blown this season big time with his timid approach to team selection, and I expect no more than a three card shuffle on Saturday with the usual suspects and that will be it. And by the way I am told that McFazdean is a midfield player, he certainly isn't a wingback or full back.[/QUOTE] Particularly Younger, as he's never let us down when he has come in. Why Neil and Hawkes haven't featured more is puzzling. It's not as if our current midfielders are world beaters.
Particularly Younger, as he's never let us down when he has come in. Why Neil and Hawkes haven't featured more is puzzling. It's not as if our current midfielders are world beaters.[/QUOTE] Totally agree, this talk about them not being ready is a nonsense. What we do know is this current first team squad is not good enough and the signs have been there for all to see, really from day one.
I can see us winning 3-0 on Saturday. Lincoln ran around a lot and passed it nicely, but didn’t create any chances. Their two goals were donated to them by our defence that otherwise looked comfortable. We could have had 3 or 4 goals but for the ringer in goal and some poor finishing. With 10000 fans behind them Saturday will be a different game. HTL
that is a fair statement, maybe he has managed to get the best out of them but this is as good as they can be, which really worries me...that is why i feel we should give him a chance of at least another window under the new set up, then i will happily listen and most likely agree with what people say.
Agree 100%. LJ Has tried to make the players fit into the way he wants them to play, even when it became obvious it \didn’t suite them. A good manager coming into a club assesses the players and devises a method of play to suite their strengths. But he could still come good when he has players that fit his chosen style. This would not make him a good manager, just one who has a single successful way of playing and is lucky enough to have the players capable of executing it. Injuries would disrupt his style and he will be incapable of successfully changing the game plan.
I'm more confident of us scoring 3 goals than I am of us keeping a clean sheet, so it's that that concerns me.
Johnson has got the best out of the squad though. He took a side going nowhere under Parkinson to the brink of automatic promotion and, although we tailed off towards the end, its still better than we were headed for. A manager can only do so much and the majority is down to the abilities of the players. If LJ and Pep swapped jobs and we played Man City who's going to win? Its still going to be City isn't it?
Official highlights: https://safc.com/news/team-news/2021/may/play-off-lincoln-a/highlights-lincoln-a Full 90: https://safc.com/news/team-news/2021/may/play-off-lincoln-a/full-90-vs-lincoln-a Behind the scenes:
He got the best out of the players for a limited time, I agree. My point is that his game plan didn’t suite the players ability. They gave everything they had but couldn’t keep it up, hence the collapse in form. Perhaps asking players to adopt a method that they weren’t comfortable with resulted in so many long term injuries. But that is just a guess. His plan worked but just for a while until other teams sussed them out and then the players had no answers. Even operation Market Garden succeeded for a while. But what do I know. I’m not a manager and I don’t even fully understand modern football. Just my opinion.
He hasn't used the full squad though, even when the teams he was and is still picking had obvious flaws, that's exactly why a lot of people who sincerely wanted him to succeed have started to question him, and even question his value to the club, even short term.
So why do you think he hasn't picked players like Younger? Stating that its arrogance or stubbornness or ageism or anything else of that ilk is just assumption. Logic dictates that you would pick them, under our circumstances, if they were good enough. He must have a good reason not to.
