Always happy with your opinion Matt, whether I agree with it or not
I can't speak for others but I wanted Guidolin out because I thought his management style was stifling our team and I thought his selection policy was guiding us to defeat in most games under him.
It is only in the last three games that we've played a recognizable formation. Pre Citeh the formation was unrecognizable, we were all over the place. No one knew their roles or the roles of others and e looked lost, clueless. This has to be laid at Guidolins feet because as coach it is his responsibility to prepare the team sufficiently enough to at least be able to compete and this obviously was not the case.
The Citeh cup game we did revert back to something a little more recognizable. On paper at least, the formation was a good one and catered to our strengths, wing-play as well as a central midfield threat but, imo Guidolins selection in both Citeh games and against Liverpool completely negated the attacking prowess the team possesses.
Imo, Guidolins first selection error was to move Siggy, our best player, away from the area where he is most effective, attacking midfield, out of the way on to the left flank, where he is completely ineffective. This selection decision greatly compromised the attacking threat we had through the middle as well as on the left flank.
The ill-effects of this move Guidolin compounded by a tactical error of changing Sigys vacated AM position into a CM position and giving the role to Fer. So we've lost an attacking midfielder in Siggy and replaced him with a central midfielder Fer and again, our attacking options were are reduced. We also do not gain any defensive benefit by replacing Siggy for Fer because Fer is not a box to box player and doesn't track back effectively.
With our attack on the left and through the middle neutered, defenses could simply concentrate their efforts on snuffing out the right. It didn't matter who played there, Routledge, Barrow, because they were double teamed out of the game.
Imo, Guidolins poor selection completely blunted any attack the formation offered and with no penetration down left, through the middle and with the right winger marked out of the game the results were inevitable imo.
But still we could have got something out of the Liverpool game but alas, the best chance fell to a central defender, but good on him busting a gut to get there, where was every one else? van der Hoorn did get a goal nicked off him when Fer kicked his goal bound effort over the line, so I think some of the criticism he got for his miss was a little unfair. I do think the criticism Guidolin got was completely justified though as he didn't change any thing or make any decisions that would have got us a goal. He just flapped his arms about incomprehensibly on the touch line.
This happened almost every game imo while Guidolin was in charge. I could see our best players played out of position, I could see our players were out of sorts with the system as well as with him and I wanted things to change, for the better. Unfortunately might not have happened with rather uninspiring change at the top.
That's what I saw Matt and why I thought Guidolin wasn't good enough for us. Time tells all so we'll see what happens with Brad but I'm not impressed and to be honest I feel that I'd prefer Guidolin to have been given longer than have Brad here now.
