8TH best defence and 7th best attack and he still ****ed up promotion As we know stats can be made to prove anything, i read one that said Gary monk was the quickest defender in the premleague over 10m a few months back, think we all know the truth about that one
Because people are referencing where this style of total football came from, and it didn't come from Rodgers, and he should acknowledge that fact, you might not see the need for it, but our style is unique, and it would be wrong of Rodgers to deceive, by claiming all the credit for it! If he went tomorrow we would still play this way................. please log in to view this image
From all teams in the Championship , top to bottom , promoted or relegated , you'd have to go back 6 or so seasons to come up with a team scoring less goals than " The Sousa Swans "
He doesn't do enough ! I know I watch the games , sorry mustyfrog you are in Australia and don't get to see the reserves or training sessions, I go when I get time and it's pretty dismal at times, there is a lot of improvement needed, and quite a few players either let go or put out on loan.
..True i think its also true that the big boys and established teams have a lot more strength in depth than us the Manc chelski scouse can feild reserve sides worth more than most first teams
Breezy you can say what you like about Sousa, and I watched every home game that season and a few away, including the Bristol city game at Ashton gate, and while Sousa was not perfect, one thing we should all appreciate is the defensive legacy he left us with, his remit after Martinez was to keep us in the championship, well he did that very well, I'm not getting into his man management skills or the lack of them, we are talking here football style and philosophy!............ please log in to view this image
Don't think there is any deception, there is no need justify anything at all , he got us playing at a different level to Martinez team, the direct comparisons are in the table with 17 point difference and -33 goal difference. If people can't be bothered to do their research it's their problem, like the article where they say we are copying Blackpool's style despite holloway saying he copied the style of Martinez and that also got them relegated! The style we play now is much advanced than martinez's or sousa's , we are at a completely different level now.
Part & parcel of the problem Valley , wish we would have had few less clean sheets under Sousa & we might have made the playoffs playing more .. wait for it ... offensively Lol !! . Sorry all , I'm a huge Martinez fan & I try to stay out of these type events , just can't seem to contain myself . Cheers ! P.S. Clean sheets the way Rodgers is getting them in the Premier are better clean sheets than Sousa's IMO
Agree valley, its what im trying to say aswell, Rodgers doesnt need to justify anything ,there have been plenty of pluadits for Bobby when he was here ,he used it to get himself a a move to the premier league. As i origionally said i beleive there has been a progression from flynn onwards ,Bobby took alot of the plaudits from Kenny Jacket which people forget about, he made the players fit and professional enough to be able to play the way bobby wanted i never heard Martinez talking about the hard work kenny put in when raising fittness and diet standards !! This was bucks promotion and bucks team,he deserves all the plaudits, i dont hear alan pardew give cris houghton any credit for Newcastles fine season...the list goes on
We might not have made the playoffs playing...wait for it ,offensively though cracker ?? sousa's style like it or not gave us our highest finish for 30 odd years, he finished higher than bobby with out scotland,gomez and bodde to bang in the goals!! if he had these players then i think he may well have took us to promotion RM couldnt finish higher than sousa with all that firepower, kinda tells a story dont ya think ?
Valley and you too Norway, what bit above don't you two understand? Ivor is spot on, and while Rodgers doesn't have to reference his predecessors, I'll wager you , that if Rodgers went anywhere else, he'd flop like Reading! Sorry but I don't care what level we are at, the point is this, Rodgers did not develop our total football, and he couldn't do it at Reading, and to me it's disingenuous to take credit for something you did not do! If Rodgers left Swansea City, he would get found out................... please log in to view this image
He wasnt given any time to develop it at reading so its wrong and unfair to bring that up IMO. Whatever your personal views are about the guy its about him and what he is doing now, i saw the program too and he didnt sit there and say what he did he sat there and talked about how he coaches, a slight difference. I see your point Dragon, you think that rodgers should pay homage to the past, but why talk about the past when all people are intrested in is the future ??
Dragon they said that we would be found out by being promoted to the premier league, and Rodgers was unfortunate at reading he needed time to sort out that situation, and was in truth making progress there, as mentioned the right manager at the wrong time. It's actually disingenuous to not credit rodgers with what he has achieved, yes he inherited a team, doesn't every new manager at a club do that ? He has vastly changed aspects of play to the previous managers and has put his own stamp on things, and brought in a number of new players who he has adapted them to fit in with our play now. We are a work in progress and the last 4 managers can be thanked for what we have achieved, Martinez probably most to be honest, but the man we should thank now is Rodgers , he got us where we are today by his design.
I agree Phil, it would take him a long time and possibly a lot of money to assemble a team like ours elsewhere from scratch. That said, he's a first class coach.
You've got the point, Phil, about "total football" or the "continental style" for which we were already known for BEFORE Buck turned up. What he did do, as I pointed out, was take it, develop it and craft it into what it has now become and massive credit to him for that. Undoubtedly, his job was made easier because we were ALREADY playing the style of football so dear to his heart. He didn't have to introduce a concept that was foreign to our players because they liked to play that like that anyway and were comfortable with it. Had he had to start from scratch I doubt very much that we would be where we are now. Look at what happened at Reading. He had a good professional squad there and tried to get them to play as we did. They couldn't do it because they weren't used to it. Result? Reading plummeted down the table and were facing relegation when he was sacked. The present manager stepped in, reverted to the game his squad was used to and they shot up the table nearly gaining promotion - with the same group of players, incidentally. Square pegs and round holes? Absolutely! But Buck fell lucky with us because our team was already educated in the style of football that he wanted to play. What he had to do was improve the way we did it and he has been brilliant in doing that - but the seeds had already been sown, all he had to do was propagate them. In recent years it can be argued that Brian Flynn started the footballing ethic. Kenny Jackett had some input but, imo, it was Martinez who introduced us to the continental possession game - the embryo of what we do today. It was defensively flawed as many posters have correctly pointed out which is where Sousa comes in. At the expense of goals, he taught us to defend and to become difficult to beat. Enter Buck and, for me, he elevated the team's performance so that we attack like RM's team and defend like Sousa's with no little enhancement of the team's all round skills, movement and thought. Hansen inadvertently hit on it when he said it takes a great deal of time and effort to learn to play the way we do. Agreed. In fact it takes a lot longer than the time Buck has been with us and I feel that he should acknowledge this in his interviews. He has played a huge part in getting us where we are now but it would be nice to hear him say that the tools were already there and the groundwork had been done. Anyway, I've enjoyed your input on this, guys. There's been many interesting points of view expressed and isn't it great that they have arisen because of the great success and, dare I say it, the fame our team is enjoying?
Martinez lost 10 games , Sousa 11 . 7th place under Sousa's rule had 68 points , 7th under Martinez reign had 74 . Martinez brought in such gems as Scotland , Rangel , Dobbie , Williams ( I think ) , Dyer , Bodde ... Sousa brought in .....
