I'm using your quote because you're the first to mention the Man City / Chelsea game. The parallels between this game and ours is a lot (sorry for poor English). Zabaleta gets 2 cards and is dismissed with the score still at 0-0. The next thing Pellegrini does is bring on Sagna to fill the gap left by Zabaleta and who gets taken off....the striker (Dzeko). Man City attempt to complete the match with 10 men without a striker, presumably to get a point. So is Pellegrini making the same 'mistake' as Monk by not having an outlet up front?? One minute after he takes Dzeko off, Chelsea score! Terrible strategy and substitution! The only difference between the two games is that Lampard semi-mis-hits a shot that ends up in the net and they salvage a point. Comments, anyone.
Actually not so simple. City conceded on a rapid break out by Chelsea not from a deep lying position that we were adopting. It was a very well taken goal, but could be argued that City were a tad unlucky based on the run of play. City were starting to dominate Chelsea at that point not the other way around. After conceding the goal, City replaced Kolarov with Lampard - they replaced a LB for CM. Milner then plays wing back on the left side (BTW - he played a great game in three different roles). They also sub out a tired Fernandinho (DM) with Navas a more offensive midfield type. So what they had done since the red card was to: a) use ALL of the subs and replaced three tiring players with three fresher players b) adjusted their setup to 3 at the back (Sanya, Company, Mangala) and a wing back in Milner c) loaded up their midfield with fresher players in Lampard and Navas. Sounds more like a variation on Terror's idea than what Monk did, which was practically nothing in comparison.
Here's my final offering on this topic: Pellegrini's side only lasts 5 minutes before conceding a goal when down to 10 men. Monk's side lasts 45 minutes (10+35) before conceding a goal when down to 10 men. My conclusion is that Monk is a much better manager than Pellegrini. {There's no need for anyone to respond to this post}
The managers of every club are not daft, they know the reasons why they sub a player that we definitely don't know. they are not deliberately trying to lose any game...Do we know what was discussed at half time ...no we don't and as sure as eggs are eggs monk will have given the players some instruction and decide who will be coming off at some point. for all we know gomis might be nursing a knock and with bony out then it was deemed not to risk playing gomis as he will be needed in the next game....the fact is we don't know. Monk is the boss he makes the calls and that should be enough for anyone....
Monk is inexperienced and sometimes it shows. As fans we have every right to question decisions and indecisions. If, as you say, 'the boss he makes the calls and that should be enough for anyone' did previous managers get hammered on this board and others for their decisions? Like every manager he'll be judged on his decisions by fans, players and the board. Emnes was a good choice, he's an attacking midfield player who has experience of playing up front on his own therefore providing an attack and defence player, and most people can accept that decision. What is perplexing is why he didn't bring on a third sub, why he didn't take off an obviously shattered Siggurdson when Ki looked far stronger at that point, why he didn't shore up a tiring defence. Others would ask why did Taylor and Shelvey stay on, but that is more personal choice. (I think it is a waste of Montero's talent to play him in front of Taylor.)
Remind me of the results again? But even so - different games, different personal, different opposition.
Can't help it! To even remotely reach your conclusion .... you have to assume that: a) Soton are as creative and dynamic as Chelsea - which they not. b) we tried to be as attack minded as City - which we did not - we could barely get the ball over the half way line. Keep reaching. The point to be taken away from the comparison if there is one is that: City used all their subs, we didn't; City radically changed their setup we didn't. City earned a point, we lost all 3. Different approaches to a similar problem (10 v 11) yielded significantly different results. Resource management is what this "case study" is about. How to deploy your resources to maximum benefit. Comparing Monk and Pellegrini is nonsense - there is no comparison.
Now this really IS my final offering: If, tomorrow night against Everton in the C1 cup, we go down to 7 men on the pitch like we did against Scunthorpe a few years ago, would anyone on here still keep Gomis as an 'outlet' up front? (Assuming he's not one of the 4 sent off.)
Was going to post the same as post 383 ( adamswan ) , but he beat me to it . So...if Bony is out for the league cup game , does that mean he's available for our next Premier league game ?
I wonder why you said that. Pellegrini is a better manager because of his experience and his record. Simple really.
Pellegrini is a richer manager because he has more money . The whole arguement between our game and the Man City game is a mixture of apples and oranges with a healthy dose of hindsight sprinkled on top .
If you cannot see the absolute perfect irony of your last sentence there is nothing I can say to help. This is a forum people will have different views, if we are just here to agree then no point. It was a difficult situation but we played sooo deep and failed to use fresh legs available. It just seemed a little defeatist / unimaginative against an avowed intent of always going for it. More concerned about what made Bony behave so out of character.
That's a totally different situation isn't it, an outlet would be impossible in those circumstances.....if you sacrificed every attacking player in order to hold out you'd end up; ---------------GK---------------- RB-------CB------CB--------LB ----------DM------DM---------- ....but in reality the other team would have so much space that they would be able to commit more men into the box in order to break us down, the inevitable consequence being an attack v defence exercise which we would need a miracle to escape from...they would have to be s**t not to capitalize on this set of circumstances. Re: your earlier points. City played without a striker but adjusted their team shape. We played without a striker but the only thing Monk did to alter the shape of the remaining 10 players was to ask Siggy to do more running and push forward when we needed a front man to aim at.....when their centre halves cut out the delivery to Siggy (or their full-backs dispossessed our winger with Siggy already having made the forward run) this created 3 v 2 in midfield. So the extra space they would inevitably find was in the centre of the park where they could use it to orchestrate attacks, keep possession easily and control the game....this is why we couldn't get out and why the stats show we had 1 corner and 0 shots on goal whilst they put countless balls into our box. If Monk's thinking was "it's better to play without a striker (so the extra space Saints had was in their centre-halves area) and defend the point".....then he should have sacrificed Siggy for Jazz and subbed Shelvey off for Carroll (I would also have brought on Montero and asked he and Routledge to play narrower) and gone; Rangel-------Fede------Ash------Taylor ---------------Jazz------Carroll---------- ----------------------Ki-------------------- --------Routledge-----Montero-------- .....this would have meant we would have retained our 4 man defence, matched them up in midfield (crucially with 2 pairs of fresh legs just in front of them) and given Southampton something to think about further forward with Ki trying to put Routledge or Montero in 1 on 1 with a defender in the channels. but essentially none of what I've suggested or what any other manager has done in these situations matters anyway....all that matters is Monk's failure to recognise that what we were doing wasn't working and the fact he didn't try to rectify it. Sitting deep, surrendering the midfield, camped in our half, hoping to defend all those crosses and cut out all those through balls for the remainder of the game was always asking for trouble. It nearly came off because individual defenders and Ki just in front of them played so well! But it didn't.
It wasn't a serious suggestion, Yankee, hence the add-on "There's no need for anyone to respond to this post". I should have added a face as you could take it different ways. Sorry for that.
This topic is still going on? Okay, I'll join If any Swansea fans are accepting that Monk doesn't have to shoulder blame for this defeat, they're wrong. Bony must take the first set of blame. We were dominating and looking like we'd go on for a comfortable 1 or 2 goal victory until his sheer stupidity. But then Monk did not react accordingly. When you're down to 10 men, you must always give the opponents something to think about. We didn't. So all Southampton were thinking about was scoring a goal. They literally didn't have to worry about us scoring a goal because, to be quite frank, even we weren't thinking about scoring a goal. Or even trying to score a goal. I didn't see the Chelsea vs City game, but from the sounds of it, City were still capable of keeping the ball and attacking Chelsea. Heck, we only had about 25% of the ball in the second half! In my opinion, be it 11 vs 11 or 11 vs 10, if you play for a draw you deserve to lose. I remember last season, Sam Allardyce was saying that his tactics worked perfectly against Chelsea when they drew 0-0. Chelsea had about 30 efforts on goal and missed 5 or 6 embarrassingly-bad sitters. In my view, that is not perfect tactics because on any other day he'd have lost 3-0 or 4-0. He was just dumb lucky and had the cheek to claim that luck as his own doing. You can't legislate for players missing chances that 9 times out of 10 they'd score. They should score, and if they miss, after the game, those moments must still be treated like a conceded goal. So my point? If you don't intent on making the other team defend, you will always give the other team a few high quality chances to score. That team will either take them, or miss them. If they miss them, you're lucky. If they take them, you lose. No such thing as 'deserving a point' if you play in such a manner. I expect a more positive approach from Monk if we ever end up in the same situation again.
Did you say you had a son, Terror? My God, the poor lad must live in perpetual fear having you as his father {That's a joke. But, there again, he might. I think that's a joke too.}
We have been falling back and not playing particularly well in the 2nd half most of the season with 11 men including a striker , why would it change with no striker and 10 men . We almost held for a point , but we didnt , simple .
It's good that you joined in. Terrorwit, Bob the Slob and Yankee Jack write more column inches on this forum than the rest of us put together, their views are very similar and they put their point across very forcibly. It's like being brainwashed - if you read their comments for long enough, you start believing what they write. (For the avoidance of doubt, I will add a smiley at this point). So, come on the silent majority. What's your opinions?
Don't know if I qualify because I'm rarely silent I agree with BK, and said the same thing after the game. Bony has to shoulder most of the blame for the loss but Monk got his tactics and subs wrong second half so we had little chance of getting anything from the game. I put this down to inexperience and I really hope he learns from it. I think that maybe his defensive mindset kicked in and he looked to hold on to what we got. Anyone who thinks otherwise is wrong in my view. As BK says, we didn't threaten at all second half and this was solely down to tactics and subs and that comes from the manager. Playing Siggy up front sent a clear message to the opposition that we weren't expecting anything more than a point. You can win a game when you go down to 10 men but even if that's not possible at least you'll give the other side something to think about with, say a Gomis turning defenders and running at goal. But that didn't happen and we just invited the inevitable pressure which usually proves costly at this level.
