Perhaps more of a special relationship because of a first language in common and that factor could have been similar with Farke and Wagner. That's natural enough. Should the next Head Coach be British there might be similar nuances in the other direction, but I doubt it would be a major factor in a dressing room in today's football.
We don't "know" that there was trouble in the dressing room but all indications would point to this being fact. Could his treatment of the Danish faction be different to other nationalities? That statement he has made does seem curious.
I think there's some revisionism and backsliding here from Knapper & Co. They surely couldn't be serious in claiming (expecting) the aim for this season was promotion, given the state of the squad at start and mid-points of the year. How could they expect a young, inexperienced side, furnished with a couple of loanees to significantly improve on last season's squad? We already knew how porous the defence was and how weak we were in the middle. The wing play, Sainz aside, has been poor for a while and going into the season with only Sargent as a recognised forward is asking for trouble. Signing foreign players for immediate results is asking for trouble, as is expecting unfit players, Jurasek, Marcondes, Sorenson to immediately make an impact in a struggling team. If these are the quality of players Knapper though would win us promotion, then questions need to be asked.
Doesn't suggest that to me,Suffolk. When he talks, with obvious discomfort, about players being sold the club on the basis of a certain story about "the club's project and ambitions", he says "some of the Danes and also the others" (my italics). I would suggest that the reason he then adds "I have spoken to all the Danish players afterwards" is because he thinks that they, already knowing plenty about him, were maybe particularly influenced by his being the head coach driving the "project". When he talks about players reaching out to him, he says "many players", which clearly doesn't just refer to the three Danes.
I just think it’s interesting that he makes that differentiation, they’re not even all Danes as Slimane is Tunisian, those 3 were the players that had worked under him previously which is an important note I feel. He doesn’t include Lungi as one of the Danes. So perhaps they are the 3 players that he had pushed to Knapper to sign given a previously relationship?
There’s a danger we are reading too much into it. The guy underperformed. Our form was dreadful at a time when we could have made the playoffs. And whatever the ums and ahs about our squad and its weaknesses, we have a squad comfortably in the top eight in the division (and two of the best players in the league). That means the team underperformed. And at a team level, he’s the head coach - team underperformance, the buck stops with him. Maybe you think that’s harsh and brutal and some players should own their mistakes (I don’t wholly disagree), but it’s football. It’s all very well having a long term plan and wanting a head coach to be there for three years to build a system and a project. But if the head coach is doing a bad job after nine months, it’s pretty risky to think he’s going to do a good job later just because that was what your plan was. Hope alone does not breed success.
Exactly, because Lunghi was already here and hadn't been wooed by having the "project" spun to him by Knapper and Thorup (hence his wording "some of the Danes and also others", i.e. some of the Danes (and in particular Schwartau), and others such as Cordoba, Crnac and Jurasek. He had never worked with Schwartau before, and he didn't "push" Knapper to sign Oscar. What happened was that Knapper became aware that, because of developments at Brondby, Schwartau might consider a move, and asked Thorup whether he'd like to pursue it, which he was keen to do. It was considered a real coup at the time, both here, in Denmark, and elsewhere in Europe. Nor had Slimane worked with Thorup previously. Obviously he knew about Thorup, but their only association on the pitch was when Slimane scored for Brondby in a 2:0 win over Nordsjaelland in May 2021 which result won Brondby the Superliga that year. Of the three, only Marcondes was at Nordsjaelland in Thorup's time.
I’m not sure I understand the point of the debate about the three Danes. Schwartau is on a long term contract and seems to have great potential. Nothing’s changed due to Thorup’s sacking. Slimane is on a long term contract, a squad player. He might come good but (at the moment) if we wanted to be promoted he’s definitely not Premier League, his performances would need to improve dramatically. Nothing has changed due to Thorup’s sacking. Marcondes has had some excellent performances, was on a short term contract and after Thorup was sacked we exercised the option to extend for a year. So plenty has changed but seemingly all positive so not sure Thorup’s departure can be said to impact that! What’s the point here?
In my case, simply to correct what I see as unjustified speculation re.Thorup's relationships with his players arising from his Bold interview, as per Suffolk's and GE2's posts #79 and #80. Contrast Rick's far more balanced post #81.
