An overview of our current predicament

First off congratualtions to all those die hard fans that braved the freezing conditions and saw us win at Bloomfield Road last night. My hat goes off to you all. Great to get a result, I know some will say we should be beating eams like Blackpool, but on a cold night on a rutted pitch there are no guarentees of wins.

I have been reading loads of the recent comments about our poor run of games and that the performances have not been upto scratch. I can only go on the little I have seen. It has been said before that we need leadership in the team. Brede seems to have been hit by the ' captain's curse ', that that was bestowed on Luis Boa Morte when he became captain. Some people are meant to be leaders whilst for others it does not suit them. Brede is a great footballer, but not such a great captain. Diarra, as an example, is a natural leader and his return is very much needed, that said Kara looks as though he has the qualities. The key area is still central midfield. We need a danny Murphy,someone who can see a pass and deliver. Too much sideways football is being played. We have lost the benefits that Ruiz and Berba bring to the team and until we sort this out the problems will continue.

From reading reports on here, it seems there is a lack of urgency and commitment to our performances. Why is this ? Once again, the lack of a leader of a leader on the pitch does not help, someone to rally the players. Is there a lack of belief amongst the players ? Who knows the answer to this but a lack of desire could be attributed to this. If this is the case then Big Mart needs to start earning his money and get the players motivated. That said he likes to promote possession football and this does not have to be played at a fast pace. However, if you lose the ball too much then it looks as though there is no urgency.

On everyone's mind is who will be bought in the transfer window. We all know what players we need but there is clearly not much available in the kitty. This obviously makes it difficult to be in prime position to sign anyone worth signing. We need to find someone who has gone under everyone else's radar. Most of our targets, those we know of, have been interesting other clubs who may be offer better wages etc. I cannot see us getting many in, if any. Loan signings are the most probable outcome, in which case these will happen later in the window when clubs know who they can release. The other issue that Jol and the club have to deal with is what kind of player we go for. It is clear from the recent pursuit of young talent that the club are trying to develop talent early to get a cache of players from whom to develop a team. So do we sign mid 20's players and potentially stop the prospects of our youngsters ? Or do we sign older players who are in their twilight years to cover until the youngsters are ready ? I cannot help but feel that the club are finding it hard to get the balance. Boateng fits the bill perfectly, experienced but young enough to give us 3 seasons before the youngsters mature.

Where is the money from the summer sales ? So we sold Dembele, Dempsey, Zamora and generated good money from them. As fans I guess we would love to that money ploughed back into the squad but there are other issues to consider. The development of the club is a big issue. I am sure that Big Mo and Ali Mac have a very clear picture of where they would like the club to be in 5 years time. As mentionned before the youth development is a big undertaking for the club. Considerable investment has taken place and it is great to see the likes of Frei, Kaka, Briggs breaking into the first team, whilst Grimmer was on the bench last night as well. Increasing the capacity of the Cottage with the new Riverside Stand. This will generate more income for the club long term and help us to be able to offer better wages etc. Finally, our chairman has been extremely generous in the past and he will need some of his investments paid back. It is possible that a lot of our income from player sales is being pumped back into the club in order to improve our club long term and put us in a much better position financially.

Whether people chose to believe it, we are a club that is in transition. Martin Jol was brought in because of his vast experience and his ability to manage and to bring to the table his ethos of bringing young talent through. He is part of the bigger picture. No-one can deny that our performances of late have been below par, and yes we need to rectify this as soon as possible. Jol has a massive job on his hands to do this. We are lacking a certain quality in some players but he has to work with what he has and get the best out of them. Not an easy challenge. If anyone thinks we re going to shell out big sums then they are mistaken. Part of the transition requires us to remain financial stable. For now at least, the short term future is about premiership survival whilst developping the future players. Frustrating as this may sound, it has to be the future of our club. We are never going to be a big club financially, but we can become a self sufficient club, we just need to be patient and above all get behind the team and management whatever the results.

Sorry for the long winded post.

Come on you whites

 

Froggy, that is one long post. My eyes are not the best so could you possibly BOLD the stuff that's most important?

 

Along with the limited funds Jol's also got to compete in the transfer market with maniac clubs like QPR. They are paying £50k a week or more to Remy, SWP, Barton, Zamora, Julio Cesar, Esteban Granero, Jose Bosingwa and Park Ji-sung (I'm sure I've missed a couple more).

It's a tough job trying to follow a sustainable model, it's not helped by the mad spending happening elsewhere.

 

Agree froggy and specifically the two points I’ve highlighted.

On the first, it’s not so much that we lack the quality of player it’s more that the existing players cannot play the way he wants them to. Consequently our football has lacked shape, speed and left the defence more exposed.. Set pieces not defended well and in attack we lack creativity. I’m sure Jol is as frustrated as we are.

.However, as the manager it’s his job to adapt to circumstances. Sure there have been injuries and unfortunately, mostly in the key midfield area where there were question marks to start with. Instead of asking players to play out of position or expecting them to fulfil a role their not capable of he should change his approach. In other words, try a different system. Just as an example, he said this week that we’ve been vulnerable because we like to play with two wingers - if true, then he should consider changing the format.

The second though I think is the more telling for our future. We know money is not going to be lashed out on marquee signings and that’s why we’ve invested in the Academy. And this is where I’ve got a problem.

The U18s are in great shape and, in my opinion, play ‘the Jol way’, so I’ll park them. The U21s, who are meant to be our feeder group, however do not. They play as individuals rather than as a team. That’s okay if as an individual a player they can slot into a position the first team system. It’s also okay in that those who don’t make it, we can sell on. An over simplified ’business model’ obviously but, in my view, one that is not being followed.

Jol perpetuates the ’individual’ approach and even then he doesn‘t properly integrate them with the main squad. The outcome is that we don’t have young players who can step up and fill first team gaps caused by injury or (perhaps worse) be seen to challenge first team players for places. The strategy at U21 level is lacking in my view.

 

An overview of our current predicament
Lack of Confidence, Unsettled side, No Creative Midfield, slow build-up, No outstanding striker.

I don't understand the complete turn around we've had in our style of play from the beginning of the season when we seemed to have sorted the defense out with letting few goals in and being able to take our chances up front, to letting in goals and being unable to create from midfield and get sufficient players in scoring positions.

My observation is we now play a very slow build up allowing teams to regroup and hard to break down.
Like a lot of teams we are trying to play possession football, but don't have the players who put
in the effort. The defensive qualities of some of players are very poor, Kacaniklic, Ruiz, Berbatov, Rodallega, Riise and Dejagah can't tackle properly.
Teams have been able to control our possession play to their own advantage, they close us down at the back, leaving Schwarzer to kick up field,
the likes of Ruiz, Karagounis and even Berbatov are having to fall back too deep to collect the ball and teams just pressure them.
We try to use the wings, but this is easily blocked by doubling up, and because we want to keep possession, the ball invariably goes backwards.
Apart from Petric (once in a while) I've not seen a froward trying to bust a gut to get into the box after playing a pass (a bit like Berbatov did for his WBA goal).

I know I'd like to see us move the ball forward quickly and get rid of the slow build up. Do we have the players to do that ?

 

C58 / SBM both of you make some very interesting points. SBM you are right to point out how slowly we play and I think it is what makes us predctable now. When oppo managers are planning to play against us that must be one thing that they work on. For the opposition, if you lose the ball against us ( Fulham ), just drop back into position quickly and negate our strengths. To be able to play a slow game you have to keep hold of possession and we are struggling to do that at the moment. I point back to the influence of Diarra in this. He has the composure and ability to be the distribution point for possession football. He has been a big loss. Without him, do we have the players ? No. They are good players but alone are not capable of the stlye of football Jol wants.

C58 hits the nail on the head when it comes to our under 21's. I have no knowlegde of the under 21 players really, but from reading reports and our curremt league status it seems that we are not doing too well. Interesting point about the players playing as individuals, I wonder if that means they are looking to impress on a personal level. If so a team mentality has to be worked on. I hope that they can step it up as hopefully they will be the future of our club.