Lallana's Captaincy

M

Mikey

Well-Known Member
Aug 20, 2012
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In my general musings after the West Ham game, I was mulling over our lack of organisation and the lack of concentration, and at the end of the day during a game the main person responsible for leading a team through a game is the captain, and that got me thinking about Lallana. I'm sure there was some discussion about this when Lallana was named as captain, but I decided I want to make a thread to reflect on how I, and everyone else is feeling about Adam's captaincy 8 games into the season.

Lallana is a great player, and has been a great servant to the club and his loyalty deserves to be rewarded, but I'm not sure rewarding him with the captaincy has panned out for us. He is a good example in his professionalism and his play, but when we really need our captain to knock some heads together, chew some people out and get everyone focused and organised, I'm not sure Adam is the man for the job. This is partly due to his personality which is not particularly dominating, and partly due to his great levels of inexperience at the top level, and just his general youth. Personally I think there was one clear candidate for the job, Steven Davis, experience at the top levels of every kind of football, League, Europe, and International, captained his club and country, and practically Javier Zanetti in terms of his experience compared to the rest of our team. Even if it was deemed that due to him only just arriving at the club that making him captain was a bit premature, then I think a choice of Fonte or even Schneiderlin who has a head on his shoulders with wisdom beyond his years, would have been better. I've always favoured defensive captains, as I think as I said earlier the main job of a captain is organisation and concentration, and these qualities are most important in the defence. I think you can get away with attacking captains but only if they are really a hugely experienced wily old campaigner, the Giggs, Tottis, the Kloses of this world.

Too often this season we have conceded in bunches, when we concede and we need to concentrate, get everyones heads together and regroup, we haven't done that, and it's happened too much and happened yesterday, which cost us the game. You could clearly see our players were shellshocked after the first goal, which lead to some dreadful play for the second, and whilst I'm sure Nigel was shouting from the sidelines trying to get the team together, at the end of the day the responsibility of that falls on the captain.

But even if all the things I say are true, that leaves us with a conundrum, what do we do? Do we stick with Adam and believe in him, or do we say enough is enough and rock the boat, give someone else the captaincy and risk upsetting a player who has been fantastically loyal to us? Of course you may disagree altogether and think Lallana is the man for the job, so feel free anyone to make a case in his defence, but in general, what are everyones thoughts?
 
Good shout. Having a captain in the back line might do a better job of keeping the team tight and organised. It worked for Napoleon! I think Fonte would be the right man for the job as he's a level-headed professional and he's pretty good with his positioning. Lallana is a model professional as well, but I don't think he's very vocal and he's a long way from the back line.
 
For me the captain should be Schneiderlin or Davis. I prefer defensive midfielders for captains. Especially hard tackling ones that run all game for the team. I understand why he didn't go for Davis as he'd just walked into the side but I'd have gone with Schneiderlin, Fonte or Lambert before Lallana.

I think either of them would get the defence organized. After all they are both sitting right infront of the defence most of the game and must recognize the defence are often all over the place and extremely prone to concentration loss. I think I'd go with Schneiderlin because he's constantly very switched on and running even in the 90th minute of games.

However, we aren't in the position to know whether changing the captaincy would hurt team morale and Lallana's morale heavily. Adkins is in a better position. It's one of those things where he's made a mistake (in my opinion) making Lallana captain and is probably going to have to deal with it (ie hack it and keep him as captain now).

Thinking further I'd have gone with Morgan at the start of the season but I feel at this stage actually that switching to Davis would be the most sensible if a switch is made and would upset Lallana the least so the best option for everyone. After all Morgan is 22 years old whereas Davis is 27 and captains his country. I'd still be happy with it changing to Morgan.
 
Was thinking the same thing myself...although there should be nothing stopping the more experienced players doing the talking and keeping the show together just because they don't have the title of captain
 
There are different ways to lead on the field. If you want the captain to keep the defense organized, then obviously Lallana is not a good candidate.

On the other hand, if you want your captain to lead by example and try to pull the team back up when they are down then I don't think you can do much better than Lallana's goal yesterday.
 
I would've expected anyone who just scored and was racing back to the halfway line to be bellowing at his team mates.

Didn't notice much to do with that...
 
I'm liking these suggestions of a change in captaincy. When Lallana is doing his thing deep in the opponents half on the left hand side he is perhaps slightly disconnected. The captain should be right at the heart of the game, and all the talk seems to be around our defence at the minute as we are shipping a record number of goals. When things aren't going our way, when we are lacking in organisation or one of our defenders is having a shocker and he needs an arm round his shoulder and a good shake, it would be beneficial to have a colossus at the back organising, dictating. I'm not sure Lallana is giving us what we need as a captain. If I was giving out the armband I would be deciding between Fonte, Davis or Morgan (and I would be having a hard time doing it).
 
thebronze14 said:
Was thinking the same thing myself...although there should be nothing stopping the more experienced players doing the talking and keeping the show together just because they don't have the title of captain
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Of course, I would expect Fonte, S. Davis, Lambert and Schneiderlin to all contribute as senior members of the team through the games, but whilst I'm sure they do on a small level, there's no one person really pulling the team together and leading them in the right direction, and I almost think that some of the players might not want to try and take control and pull everyone together because it would undermine Lallana. I think personally the best course of action would be for Nigel to take Adam to one side, and say that he is valued, loved and respected, but that at this time we need a change and that Steven Davis with his vastly super experience, who I'm sure Lallana also greatly respects, is going to take the reins. Then when it's announced make sure to place an emphasis on how much we value Adam and that he is very much at the centre of our plans for the future and that one day he will lead Southampton FC to great things, but at this time we need someone of greater experience in the shape of Davis.

But this is all speculation and classic wannabe-manager talk, I think the likeliest thing to happen is that Lallana will be the captain for the rest of the season.
 
If theres a leader on the pitch they'll lead anyway, regardless of whether they have the armband or not. Be pointless to take it off Lallana he's played well this season and it would feel like a punishment.
 
ThatThereSaintsFan said:
If theres a leader on the pitch they'll lead anyway, regardless of whether they have the armband or not. Be pointless to take it off Lallana he's played well this season and it would feel like a punishment.
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Well in theory you'd think that yeah, but like I said before I just don't see anyone doing it and can't help feeling it might be because they feel they shouldn't take over and appoint themselves captain and undermine Lallana. You don't see them on the pitch issueing changes in formation and play and ignoring and underminding Adkins, because that's his job and they respect him. I'm sure Fonte barks orders at corners, I'm sure Davis guides JWP and Schneiderlin through the game, but overall it's Adam's job to lead the team, and I don't think anyone else will do it because it's his job and the rest of the players respect him. So giving the armband to someone else and placing the responsibility on them I think would not be a pointless endeavour. That said, the only thing that does make me doubt it, is the fact that Lallana may be upset by it, so I think it is only possible if it can be done in a manner that doesn't insult or upset Lallana and does not make him feel unvalued. But I think he's a big boy, and I think Nigel is a good man manager and motivator, so I think it could be achieved in a respectful and painless manner.
 
Makes ZERO difference who the captain is. Players don't look to captains to tell them what to do or to gee them up.

All a captain does is call heads or tails and thats it.

Some teams will have natural leaders that players look up to, as in any group of lads, there will be an alpha male or two.

Adam, as great as he is..... is not an alpha male. If I was to give the armband to anyone for that reason alone, would have to be Rickie Lambert.


(but then only when he's deemed good enough to start games... ahem)
 
As a sandal-wearing happy clapper I don't think we should have a captain at all, it's far too militaristic man. The players should all join hands and sing Kumbayah and they'll be fine.
 
CBK said:
Makes ZERO difference who the captain is. Players don't look to captains to tell them what to do or to gee them up.
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I don't see our players as unguided children wandering around the pitch wanting to be picked up by daddy and given a cuddle, but at the same time do you not agree we have lacked a voice keeping the team together, concentrated and motivated especially in defence? And do you not agree that despite a captain's job having a lot to do with some formalities, silly traditions and a small paragraph in the match programme, that a captain is usually the player who's job on the pitch is to do those things I listed? To me, those are the key qualities we are missing, and the key qualities which a captain can provide, and unfortunately despite Lallana being a fantastic player and good lad, he does not bring those qualities to the table, if you disagree on us needing that then fair enough.
 
I'm with CBK - it's not like Fonte is saying, "well, I WOULD organise the defence, but I don't have the arm band so better shut up"
 
CBK said:
Makes ZERO difference who the captain is. Players don't look to captains to tell them what to do or to gee them up.

All a captain does is call heads or tails and thats it.
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I agree. If I was Nigel I would hold a "guess the coin flip" competition, the winner can be captain.
 
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