This is no knee jerk reaction to a loss as many of you will know, I thought he should have been kicked out sometime ago. I'm going to explain why this man is not the correct one to take us forward. Past and Present Lets take a look at where we were as a club and see if its developing The former coaching staff was very intent on attack, self expression and desire to win. I don't think anybody would doubt that. As a result we had a team that was entertaining to watch (if a bit direct for my own tastes), full of vigour and endeavour. Whilst we did resort to long ball on a regular basis, there was certainly a freedom in movement from the midfield in CENTRAL positions which resulted in a lot of goals both for and against. 1. Emphasis on winning 2. Emphasis on self expression 3. Emphasis on pressing opposition I think they were very strong and focused elements that came though both from the managers interviews and performances on the pitch. Now for me, I find it incredibly strange to willingly and deliberately take out all those elements on arrival at the club. In the name of what? to stop the goals against column. The very foundations of 3 years of success that had brought together the players and the huge momentum we had built at the club. Every manager has to have there own voice and way of playing, I've heard a few comments about transition, a transition is a gradual process. Hughton gave no acknowledgement to what the team was about, how it had developed, where its strengths lay. It was a full on negative, spoil the game, gut wrenching, stagnant, rigid team he made, from one which was the absolute opposite. That's not what a good manager does, I very much view Hughton as thinking it was the players fault for not changing to his way when it was him who could not adapt to the staff he had. This is exactly what the previous manager didn't do, he built the team around Holt, Hoolahan and Martin because he knew that was where the strengths lie. Hughton just ripped the fabric of that side out, the momentum was soon lost. Signings Now this is where Hughton has mostly got it right but in my opinion also wrong. These are my opinions of the signings and the attributes. Hooper- good movement, powerful, stocky (just for you Rob) Snodgrass - powerful, hard working, good crossing, slow for a winger, cannot pass Garrido- no real stand out attributes but has deteriorated from an excellent start Tettey- quick powerful, good in tackle Kamara- tall rangy, quite frankly rubbish Fer - powerful, good tackle and can pass reasonably well Whittaker- good attacking, rubbish defending Redmond- Quick, can run with the ball, cannot pass RVW- intelligent, good movement, not a creator, finisher Ollsson - quick, powerful Bassong - Powerful and good leader and reader Turner - Powerful but slow, cannot pass Butterfield - Not sure if this was his signing so I'm not blaming Hughton Becchio - I'm not even sure Hughton wanted him such was his concern to offload Morison Thes players offer a distinct lack of two things. Intelligence and passing ability. Now Fer can keep possession but I don't think he can create other than to set formulas to pass to others to create. I have no doubts RVW is intelligent but he's not a ball player, and he's not the just a cross feeder that Hughton has him rubber stamped as (and i think the reason he wanted Toivenen as well). Last seasons tactic to score goals was on the basis of free kicks, long crosses from Snodgrass to 1 up front which for the vast majority of the time never worked and was horrible to watch. Holt was blamed and was shown the door. I don't have any room for sentiment but lets face it, he had **** all to score from or work with. Now Hughton pointed to the strikers on numerous occasions for this failing, despite appalling possession figures and an obvious and deliberate intention to deny the opposition at all cost. A little humility and understanding of the cause and effect of tactics wouldn't have gone amiss. I don't expect anyone to score many goals on your own from a diet of long crosses. I heard alot of pro Hughton fans saying we didn't have the creative players needed (despite the previous season) to score goals so the defensive approach was best (because we conceded so many). The defence had to be improved. Now, this is a massive bug bare that sticks in my craw, the idea that Hughton might be seen as this defensively astute manager. He's not. He bought some better players (which frankly was easy to do), put FIVE in midfield and asked them ALL to focus on defense. Now that is not a good manager, the trick is to improve your defense WITHOUT destroying the attacking element. All he did was build up the numbers and constrain the players, a pure numbers game stuck in a rigid framework. That is not difficult to do or in the slightest bit clever, its what you do at the end of the game when your away with a point to protect. Not an entire season, an absolute disgraceful approach to the game which is mean spirited and just sticks the middle finger up at paying supporters. It really was a nasty approach to the game that nobody wants to see. Hand on heart, and it pains me to say it given Pullis and Allardyce were working, I think we were the worst team to watch last season in the entire division. This from being one of the best. Many will point to our final league position, which was eventually very good. It was attained through a run of good results and a final two wins. I remained critical of the tactics even during the good run and was lambasted by all and sundry. What actually happened, narrow wins became narrow defeats, narrow defeats could not be turned back to narrow wins, a rut was developed. This rut, grew and grew and yet NOTHING was done to change it, Hughton stuck with the negativity, kept losing, kept with it and still carried on losing. GOOD managers realise when there side has been worked out and change, but we couldn't, because the life had been sucked out, we could not revert back to the things that had made us successful before. We were incredibly lucky Wigan had more important things on their plate and West Brom and Man City were a shambles. I would defy anyone to say they could not see the life gradually being sucked out of that team. It had the same effect on most of the supporters. Anyway, this season, the signings and the change in playing style which is undoubtedly better. I've established (in my own mind anyway) that Hughton (and he's not the only one) is appreciative of the physical traits of a player, be it speed, power, height or strength. I personally am mostly biased against these types of players, they should be secondary traits to look for. If I asked anyone to quickly name a trait of those players, I don't think many would name a skillset first. Whilst our possession stats have improved, is this again down purely to numbers or a genuine desire to pass the ball. The passing is undoubtedly better and we are more attacking but why are we not scoring any goals. We have better players, but do we have the right type of players? I don't think so. Whilst I don't have any objections to any of them, the focus should have been on the element we were lacking in so much, creativity. I like five in midfield and one striker but you have to sign the right type of players. None of them are serious passers!!! Redmond is atrocious at creating anything other than for himself (and thats not alot), Fer is steady but not inventive, Snodgrass does not know the meaning of short and precise and while this shambles is gong on RVW is making all these nice, selfish striker movements and NO-ONE has a clue what he's doing. Unbelievable, you sign this intelligent player and then fail to sign anyone to help him, all they want to do is continue to whack a cross in or ignore his opportunity and play it wide. You have two inverted wingers (which ironically should suit playing a striker in), one cannot pass for toffee and either shoots or runs into players, the other is not capable of picking a pass. Makes no sense at all, and its why RVW is AGAIN (like Holt) not getting any chances. Its bad tactics, inappropriate players playing a system they are not suited to. Its always cross, not pass into the box, how predictable. When do you see players playing a ball to Redmond into good position as opposed to the constant feed of out wide early, run, cut in, shoot/cross? It doesn't, same with Snodgrass, same as last year, same as this year. Its not inventive or clever or genuine worked opportunities. The best way to score goals is winger running into goal and pulling the ball back, perfect for RVW, NEVER happens, unworked chances created from wide, over and over and over again. Easy and basic, and the real kick in the teeth is we are STILL conceding goals. I'll go back to the term "rut", it's very apt, I can't think of many managers I have as little faith in to get us out of one than Chris Hughton, and the sad thing is I can't think of many more likely to get us into one. He's **** on both counts. So where are we going with this team? I have no idea, I assume some sort of counter attack was planned but that seems to have fallen flat on its face when asked to keep the ball and earn space rather than have it handed on a plate. Think about where we were, and where we are now, has the money spent seen a real change in what was before. How is the midfield/ striker interaction going to be solved? New manager would be nice. Hughton out
Wow, have you been saving that post up? , your a truly dedicated member of the I hate Chris Hughton Club!, I think it's too soon to talk about sacking, give him another five games I say!
I liked the bit where you said something about something being ironic, or something... Top post through!
Carrabuh, this is clearly and intelligent and well thought out piece and one that should hopefully promote good debate. I've often disagreed with some of the things that you've said but i disagree more with you vision of what our team should be than what is wrong at the moment. The difference i would say is that in an ideal world you would like to see us play like Barcelona and I would like to see us play like Borussia Dortmund, two very good exciting attacking teams and styles of play but a matter of taste I'm sure you'd agree. The issues that you identify in our team are clearly valid ones, we are not attacking enough, i though on saturday the best player we had going forward was Russell Martin, several times he made the defence splitting pass we seemed utterly incapable of otherwise and overlapped with Snodgrass well and passed into the box looking for someone to get on the end of low balls across the face of goal. Snodgrass is slow, he needs a full back pushing forwards to play little 1-2s with to get round players, however when it works, and we have 2 good attacking right right-backs, it can be very dangerous. Snodgrass is clearly out of form, but last season he created the 2nd most chances in the league after Baines so we need him fit. With regards to defending, it was an issue in our first season, however we have gone too far the other way and your right some players clearly feel as though they are being shackled by the manager. Attacking wise I do think he is trying to change, we only played 1 DM and 2 strikers on saturday, It didn't work though. Our real problem is that we think of our main threat as ariel. Villa were playing a pretty high defensive line and RVW was ready to run of the back of it every time we had the ball, a little dink over the top or a low ball for him to run on to would have produced lot of opportunities. It is vital we start to play the ball in for RVW. Redmond - He's young and talented, being asked to play on the side he feels least comfortable on. In the England U21 games he's played on the left he was very good at getting into the box and pulling the ball back to the strikers low along the ground. He will be great. Needs time. The thing that is making me most nervous is the body language on the pitch, they all look cross with each other and frustrated, soon RVW will stop bothering to make his nice little runs we do need a man-manager. I wonder if we need a dedicated attacking coach would be a better solution. A week ago i would have defended Hughton, now I'm not sure I do think he deserves slightly more time though.
I am going to give it another 5 games before I make my mind up. I think there have been some good signs this season which would signal improvement on last season. But as Carrabuh points out, not signing a creative midfielder was a huge oversight which could cost us a lot of points this season. I also completely agree about the smacking the ball into the box whenever we have a chance and not making the most of RVW's movement. The one concern I have is, who is actually available to replace Hughton? I've seen Poyet mentioned who honestly, I would steer well clear from. Perhaps Zola or long shot Di Matteo. Who would you look to replace Hughton Carrabuh?
A very good and closely argued post. As I've said elsewhere, I'm starting to think it's just a matter of time now. He's losing the fans and I get the feeling he's losing the players. The lack of creativity is crushing us. He has already totally marginalised Fox, our one midfielder who could definitely pass with vision. Everyone forgets that at the start of last season, he tried to marginalise Hoops, but injury then forced him to start playing the guy and we suddenly went on that unbeaten run. The signs at the start of this season are that he is again trying to marginalise Hoops. I know I'll get slated for talking about things I cannot see or prove, but I'll say it anyway. Hughton mistrusts creativity. For me this is his key failing which will always keep him at the level of the second tier in management. When he leaves us, he will probably go to a Championship club, he will organise them and sort them out, probably even get them promoted, then he will hit the same wall.
Well, I'm not good at tactics and stuff like that, so I often talk about the psychology of players. Over the last year I've said on several occasions that Hughton is having a dreadful negative effect on the psychology of the team, but other posters are then quick to point out that this is pure supposition on my part because I can't know what is happening inside a player's head. So I've become rather defensive when I make comments now about Hughton putting mental shackles on the team, making them scared to try something different because it might fail, etc. I still think I'm right, though.
Made my mind up last season and nothing has changed. I think CH is about as good for Norwich as Roeder was, in fact maybe a little worse, Roeder didn't have any money to spend. He persists on playing Snodgrass who has been awful since the beginning of the season. Garrido looks less than his best but Olsson is not getting any game time. Redmond is very young and needs guidance, doesn't look like he is getting any. RVW just looks pissed off because he isn't getting the sort of service he needs. CH has been negative since he arrived here in his attitude towards the players and his game plan, the players are not to blame. He is in charge he should take all the blame. I do not want to give him another 5 games because nothing will change and it just gets harder for another manager. DM is no mug, I am sure CH days are numbered, five wins in almost a year, that does not keep people in jobs in the PL. Sunderland have the right idea and Di Canio had 3 wins in 13 games. makes CH look. even worse. I am not as eloquent as Carrubah but agree with everything he says. I think CH never was the man for the job, after all no one else in the PL wanted him. I now await the font of all football knowledge that is Supers to tell me my opinion is not valid. I am not sitting on the fence Supers, i stick by what i say. i have been following Norwich since the early 70's and have seen quite a few good managers and many clueless ones, CH is one of the latter. He rates alongside Hamilton, Rioch, Grant, Roeder and poor old Gunny as being completely useless. Please don't start telling me about finishing 11th in last years PL, we lucked into that after being so close to being relegated. WBA game was a **** or bust, they were already safe, so didn't really care and Man City was the same. we were **** last season but were lucky that a few other teams were worse than us. At this time we are the worst team in the PL in footballing terms, this must change and soon!!!
Interesting arguments from Carrabuh about Hughton and buying players. Like everyone else, I've always said Hughton has a good eye for a player, and I still think he does. He doesn't seem to know what to do with them when he has them, though. I am beginning to think buying RvW was a waste of money. Not because RvW isn't good - he is. He shows all the signs of being a great player with the right players and tactics behind him. But if all we are going to do is either cross high from the wings, or hoof it up from defence in away games, then Holt was actually better at dealing with that kind of delivery. In fact, Holt was almost as good as you get at that kind of delivery (except for really top guys like Drogba). This leads to another point Carrabuh made which is so true. Hughton has a system and tries to squeeze the players into the system. A better, more flexible manager would look at the players he has and then build the system around them. RvW's body language and facial expressions on Saturday suggested he'd be chatting to his agent over the weekend. Who can blame him? He's a thoroughbred who's being asked to pull a cart.
Hughton should have been let go at the end of last season, & if it had not been for the fact we had two wins at the end against two teams " on the beech" I believe he would have. He and his back room team are totally out of there depth in the prem, Sunderland have acted this morning to erase there mistake and stand a chance of turning it around now it's time we did the same, if he has five more games as many are saying he should get then its a full quarter of the season gone. Our run in suggests that if we don't have the points on the board by the end of March then we're screwed !
I wouldn't imagine they will give CH that long, I think if he's still pants by the end of October his job will be in jeopardy. In fact I think all he needs is a run of losses, we have two so far if that increases then he could be in serious trouble. Two of the upcoming fixtures are against teams that should be on our level, if he loses them he is going to be in the crap.
I am still unsure on the Hughton out situation - partly because I want it to work out with him and for the club to have stability. The issue I have is that I think we still need a great team spirit and to get the best out of the players we have and I really dont think we are getting that at the moment. Since the start of this season I have seen 3-4 instances of players being very frustrated with each other which is not a good sign at all. The match was there for the taking at the weekend and for me it just wasnt good enough. Too many easy to defend crosses and corners and a lack of ideas or ability to play the killer ball when around the opposition box. I really want this to work out but something has to change.
It's odd though, against the Saints we really had good team spirit, played great but in the last two games we have been really flat and lacked confidence. Not sure why, but I think Hooper will give everyone a boost and Olsson when he finally plays.
But he had the chance to start with Hooper on sat but went with Elmander ???? This is exactly why he hasn't got a clue ! The team was crap at spurs yet he started the same team again? Snoddy irrespective of the pen miss should not have started sat but should never have finished either !
i don't agree with any of that! i probably wouldn't have gone with elmander, admittedly, but i'd have stuck another body in the midfield. snodgrass didn't play great at spurs and likewise on saturday but why is he suddenly the scapegoat? he was a real threat and linked very well with martin down the right - sadly when he got into a good position his final ball let him down - he was not alone in that respect. he played far better than redmond yet i haven't seen him criticised anywhere. hooper is being eased back in to things - the manager has said this and even the player in question said it. he had a nasty little injury and we don't want to risk him this early in the season if he could suffer later in the campaign. that's common sense management and sensible thinking from the player. i thought he did well when he came on though and he will hopefully start at watford.
Also he didn't start with the same team as against spurs, Martin and Howson came in, he went for a more attacking midfield! ah well he gets slagged for things he didn't do as well.
I read your whole post and your whole argument revolves around the fact that his team doesn't or can't play attacking passing football. But if he keeps us up, the football doesn't bother me so much. Why should he be sacked if he gets us to 11th again?
