I think that's the point though isn't it? Largely for this style to work well you need to have one of the strongest squads in the league. Doing it with one of the weakest will see you get exposed regularly for your lack of quality.
Add to that his particular style also seems to be one of the more extreme variations of possession football. I saw quite a lot of criticism for Man City and the way they played in the second half against Arsenal yesterday, but that's a bit unusual for them. It feels like we do that almost all the time.
Only if you have ambitions for the top 6, which we don't. I don't think Russ needs a Chelsea/Bayern type squad to do well. If he had a squad that was at the very least settled, and familiar with the system and each other, then he might start getting a tune out of them. We had 8 players starting on Saturday who have only just come through the door; Ramsdale, Taylor, Sugawara, Lallana, Fernandes, Archer, Dibling, BBD. It's just very unrealistic to expect much more than what we've achieved.
It isn't all down to the manager though. That Dibling goal is one of my favourites from the last few seasons, because of the ball from Lallana. We haven't had a player who would even attempt that type of pass for ages. So its not like Russ is telling the players NOT to attempt that type of play. We just don't have the players good enough to do it.
Ultimately it IS down to the manager though. The manager decides the way we play. If players consistently don't follow his instructions he won't pick them. If a football club doesn't have players good enough to play a certain way then they probably shouldn't play that way. If Martin was playing a long ball game with Jermain Defoe as a lone striker we'd all criticise him for that. Nobody would say "It's not all down to the manager. Defoe just isn't jumping high enough or holding defenders off well enough."
Firstly, we don't know what his instructions are. We can only speculate. There are plenty of examples of players trying to be creative and taking risks, and Russ didn't drop them. Secondly, if a player is successful when trying to be creative, of course he won't be dropped. Your example makes it all sound too simple. Obviously Defoe is not a target man. But with players like Aribo and Smallbone, what can you do? Russ got them playing to the best of their ability towards the end of last season. But higher end Champ is their limit. He can't do much more with them. So now he's back to square one, with a new pair of players in those positions. We don't know fully what Lallana/Fernandes/Dibling/Cornet/BBD etc will bring to the team, or what they will lack. You only find out once those players have had a decent run of games. It's all very well for the fans to see a player play 15 mins as a sub and then write them off as 'sh*t'. A manager can't afford to do that, luckily.
And this. Especially the last two sentences. The binning off of Archer already even by people on here is insane. (BBD is a bit **** though).
Although this is a good post and I do agree with a lot of it; you’ve basically nailed the issue in your own post. Kompany used Burnley to get his dream move to a big club. He didn’t keep them up. He used them to showcase his style and then ****ed off. Russ is basically doing the same. He isn’t being pragmatic and using our squad to the best of its ability. In his time here he has shown a stubborn reluctance to cater to the players at his disposal. (It is commendable how stubborn he is in a lot of ways). But he could have won more points last season if he had been more flexible. I have no doubt about that. However it begs the questions: If he needs World class players to play his style, is it the correct one for Southampton fc to employ? We are clearly not going to be able afford the players to play this style effectively, so why persist? Would we be better off going back to a high tempo pressing game where we disrupt the opposition? Playing % football and sticking it in the mixer a bit more? Dunno. The club have put their faith in Martin so all we can do is hope he’s correct.
So - this is what I was saying about RM on Saturday to Spiderman - using the club as his vanity project. Kompany was a great example off this (and VK is a much better manager by the looks of it).
I guess the hope is that this style is “the correct way to play”, will attract better players and allow Martin to develop with us. I guess it’s working ok so far. When it comes down to it, I still think do he deserves more time , but I would really like to see some of the basic errors cut out.
I think Archer could come good. I’m sure I saw someone recently say he couldn’t hit a cows ares, whereas I think he will be clinical. His goals v Cardiff and even the one that hit the post demonstrate this. BBD I’m not sure about - I don’t think we have seen the best of him, nor perhaps played to his strengths. I’m sure id never have him on the left though - through the middle, or part of a top 2. Maybe Cornet is the one to play LW, but I said before and Sat suggested it again - that RM doesn’t see him as that, only a RW. And wtf was RM doing putting AA on RW instead if he does see Cornet as a RW? Mental.
I isn’t working as we have 1 point. I agree he needs more time, but I would only be giving him until the Oct International break.
I agree that it can't go on forever but Nigel Adkins had 4 points at the 10 game mark and we were bottom of the table. Although we all know that he went on to get the sack, everyone felt it was harsh. He went after the 2-2 game with Chelsea (game week 22). At that stage we were 15th on 22 points. He'd gained us 4 points from the first 10 but then 18 from the next 12. He learnt and improved. I think Russ will do the same.
TBF he wasn't sacked for results reasons. He was sacked because Cortese was ambitious and felt Adkins wouldn't take us to the next level.
Absolutely, no argument there. My point is more that he learnt and began to turn things around (after working out who did and didn't work at the PL level)
It's SRs vanity project too. Look how clever we are by adopting the philosophies of the big clubs so we can act as their nursery. Never mind that the club will bounce around in the Championship. If there's ££ to be made on nurturing players and managers in that style that's all that matters
We don't know exactly what he says but we can listen to what he says in interviews and look at the way the team plays and draw conclusions. If you listen to any professional footballer talk about this sort of thing they will tell you that ultimately you have to do what the manager says. If Martin wanted us to get the ball wide and cross it to a big striker at the back post (as we often used to under Nigel Adkins), we'd get the ball wide and cross it to a big striker at the back post. If he wanted us to press high up the pitch and try to win the ball close to the opposition goal (as we used to under Poch), we'd press high up the pitch and try to win the ball close to the opposition goal. If he wanted us to hoof it long (as we did under Nathan Jones) we'd hoof it long. It's perfectly reasonable to assume the team play the way the manager wants them to play. The Defoe example was intended to be a simple, obvious one. I haven't said anyone is "****" but in the post I was quoting you said: For me, suggesting the manager wants players to play a certain way but they aren't good enough to do it is about as convincing a defence as saying the manager wants Jermain Defoe to win headers and hold the ball up but he just isn't doing it. If a player or team aren't good/tall/strong enough to do something then I'd say the sensible thing is not to ask them to do it. And so far this is all focussed on the attacking element of our game, with no mention of all the goals we concede and that Martin's teams have always conceded. Was it 7 out of 8 goals conceded before this weekend that were a result of self-inflicted errors? And Ipswich's goal came from another set piece where our defensive set up can be questioned.
Arguably, it is a good strategy for a club of our size though. We will never have hundreds of millions to spend. But we can be the academy of the PL again. We also need our scouts to stop being ****ing terrible. The big positive for me is that Martin has shown he can learn and adapt before. So we just have to hope he can again. There were certainly a lot of positives against Ipswich. But as has been said, we are in a very precarious position (whoever manages us) thanks to lack of firepower. He also needs to sort the defence out and iron out the glaring mistakes.
It's all well and good saying what we shouldn't do, but what do you think we should be doing? We've seen with Ralph how bad the pressing style can be when you have a weak squad. What exactly would be playing to our strengths? What are our strengths? Defence? Attack? I'd prefer it if we didn’t pass it out from the back so much, sure. I'd prefer for us to try a few more through balls or be more direct. I'd love to see a few more long shots. But, overall the possession game is probably the safest option we have, believe it or not. If we were trying to be more gung-ho we'd likely get ripped to shreds. Whatever system we decide to play, the team will have to take a while to get better at it. That goes for what we are doing now. The defenders have to get better at passing it around at the back. The midfielders have to get better at helping the defenders (Lallana is already a big improvement over Smallbone). There's no easy fix.
