laudrup is not here anymore, He had his chance and he blew it.....Its all about monk now and his choices and as far as im concerned i totally understand his brave selection and why he made it...
So you think playing our strongest side against Napoli, 3 days before Liverpool, is a better plan? What if we pick up injuries then? I think it is you who is failing to see the big picture around here...Fact!
While working with such a small squad and infested with injuries , Laudrup would never have put out a weak team like we did today, and Monk had a pretty healthy team to work with
Liverpool will be damage limitation. Let's use Napoli to gain credibility for brining in new blood next year.
Here are some more facts. Laudrup had these problems ALL SEASON and he had a far more congested fixture list and far more squad injuries to contend with. That is the BIG picture. Monk had some of the problems for one game and lost it. Nothing wrong with the team's effort for an hour then Monk blew our chances to pieces with a senseless substitution that gave us no chance. I'm not getting at Monk, now he's there he deserves his chance but take the blinkers off.
Personally, with a full week between today and the league match with Liverpool, I'd have selected our strongest possible team today for a competition we could conceivably reach the final of, and played today's weaker selection against Napoli. That I believe would not only have been a more courageous and braver decision but also a smarter decision.
This is what has upset me, I know we have a busy week, and I can understand the starting XI to a point, but second half could have been ours had Monk been brave and given Bony 40 minutes, hell how is that going to effect any game midweek for him, we were so close to a quarter final place? Anyway he's on a learning curve i suppose and after all is still a Rookie!.........
I agree with this, though which competition would our board deem the most important if one had to go, Europe or the Cup? That's probably the issue, and why we did what we did today..............
Out of 104 possible defensive starts I think the 4 defenders that started today had less than 10 starts between them , at defence , in the premier all season , with an outside chance that no two played the same game . Maybe Taylor and Amat played a game together .No matter the outcome of the game, thats careless selection or you don't care of the outcome of the game
What part of monk had to make a decision dont people understand..? Who are we to say what is important and what is not important, we are fans only...Monk is the professional here and he will know what state of fitness the players are in and know what the chairman and board thinks is the more beneficial and more chance of winning....If we had played a strong side today and risk an injury or two that would prevent us from playing our strongest side in the biggest game of the season watched by millions all over the world you would be in uproar. Monk being the sensible guy he is with some advice from people who knows what they are talking about not like you or i who are mere fans looked at the big picture and selected a side accordingly and that side played with pride and never looked out of place for the majority of the game. Right action to take under the circumstances laudrup has left him with due to not having enough players in the squad in the first place....We cant commit our strongest side for everything as its to much of a risk due to the position we find ourselves in, The premiership is our main priority and until we are safe monk will play players as he sees fit, after all who knows about swansea more.....you or me....
This is NOT . You don't put a rookie in the driver seat of a formula 1 car.; or you will likely end up with a dead driver and a wrecked car - or a car/driver that doesn't qualify to start the race. You start him in a car with "training wheels". You let him start as a coach under a really good coach/manager and technical master of the game, to learn. The way say Rogers got into coaching and worked his way up through Chelsea. What happened today is NOT . The result is not the issue. The effort from the players is not the issue. The management of the match is - the intention, the team selection, the tactics, the decisions during the game .... the yelling of "C'mon Jono" on the touch line after the Lita substitution. Nothing like being inspirational or making fine adjustments during the game. Perhaps he could have waved his arms a little - yes, indeed that would have made the difference. You yell at a player to try harder and you bring on Lita instead of Bony ... how about trying harder to win the game from the touch-line by making smart decisions and substitutions designed to win the game not toss it. You send a message to the players by what you do on the touch-line and by bringing on Lita the message that was sent to the players was "we don't want to win this", which screamed louder than anything Monk could have said by voice. Players "heard" that message and translate it into WTF and start to go through the motions.
Spot on Yankee. Can't fault the players effort of the players. It's the decision to send out the 'B' team that overrides any motivational speech in the dressing room. Players are not stupid - they knew this wasn't the first choice. The other edge of the blade is that will it effect players who were hoping to be part of the 'A' team - e.g. de Guzman. Does today send a message to him that he is not Monks first choice ? I just can't stomach what happened in terms of the selection made today. The Kieran n' Dai thread is certainly not mine or many others feelings.
I vividly recall you saying at the end of last summer's transfer window that you were very happy with the squad and it was stronger than ever....I also recall you stating on many occasions that losing players through injury was an excuse as all of the squad players were good enough, laying the blame solely at Laudrup's door. It has been you who has missed the big picture all the way along...injuries to key players was a reason for under par performances...not an excuse. Not wishing to have a go at Monk here but today he was only missing Michu and Shelvey. He chose that line up and made only a token effort to reach our first FA Cup quarter final in donkeys years. He genuinely has no excuses. ...but like you say it was his decision to make and only time will tell if it was the right one. It is you and supporters like you that are the hypocrites.
Just back from the game and just a quick scan of the thread sums up the majority of feelings about today ,Disappointed in a number of things , obviously disappointed in the team selection , change for the sake of change is never good and that was tinkering at it's worse , we played a lone striker who to date hasn't scored a credible goal , 5 changes at the back and the midfield a botch potch mixture. Disappointed in the substitutions ,we had a very good chance of winning today and except for individual errors , dubious penalty decision ( i haven't seen the any match replay yet ) one clear penalty decision against them turned down we could have .Whats the point in putting all that effort into the Utd game to go out with a wimper in the next round.Admittedly Bartley going off altered the game plan for Monk but the other two ,not sure what they were about .We had a very good chance of beating them today but blew it .Final disappointment for me personally was the moronic piss taking of one of our players ( Vazquez ) through out the game it was obvious to everyone he was taking the brunt of the jokes from our own fans , ****ing disgraceful, the lads' confidence must be at an all time low because he'd have heard it (they only sung when they scored ) the ground was that quiet .
Every side monk has fielded has been a credit to the club. If fans cant see the reasons behind the team selection then i cant help you. I fully understand after thinking about it and i fully agree with the clubs decision....god forbid we could have had laudrups full team playing and getting hammered under the system he always plays, How would the players feel then going into 3 high powered games...
I can see your stock answer to any thing going forward is a reference to Laudrup, sorry he didn't pick the side today .If the intention was to throw the game then thats shocking (it could never be proven ) , disappointed when you see the side Everton put out and how if had we competed with a more adventurous attitude to the initial team selection and then the substitutions we may not be having this conversation .
