I mentioned in an earlier post that if i was Sandgaard i'd potentially be looking at how the 6 games go between now and January. 4 of those are at home. Only 2 of the 6 games are against sides in the top half.
So here's a question. If (for arguments sake) we won just 1 of those 6, picked up a couple of draws and lost 3, taking 5 points which would then be 15 points from 15 games, where would people sit with sacking him?
For me personally i don't want him sacked now, but if things haven't improved by the end of January, i'd say he'd have to go.
I'd probably have to agree that his position becomes very untenable if we have such a bad run of form
Even though I'd be loath to get rid what with injuries and depends how straightforward it is we lose those games in question
e.g. My biggest complaint at times isnt the Manager and his choices but when the managers job becomes untenable, the players appear to get away scott free
I think if Bowyer is to go then the end of January is the worst time to do make the decision
It doesn't matter if it's a clapped out Escort or a Rolls-Royce if the bloke behind the wheel is going to drive it straight into a tree every time. The driver (manager) is the single most important person at the club in terms of dictating whether it moves onwards and upwards or stays stuck in a ditch.
I'm sorry, but I came to a rather disappointing conclusion probably a couple of weeks back.
Namely, sadly, LB is just not a very good manager.
Now, there may be things that he is good at; but he appears if not tactically inept, then either unwilling or unable to adapt to different circumstances. His approach is an overly negative, one-size-fits-all defensive ethos which makes having creative options in the squad almost pointless. It is a demonstrative point-loser as we have seen time and again in recent months.
His line-ups and substitutions - so inept as to appear bizarre. Not much more to be said.
Game management - demonstratively terrible. Yet he persists with banging his head against the same wall, time after time. If we can't see it, why can't he?
The more he trains them in 'Bowyer-ball', the worse they have become; ergot he is not improving players. Do you remember when our injury crisis reached its zenith not long after the season started? Now, to be fair, he had a hastily assembled squad thrown together under very difficult circumstances. We did not mind cancelled matches as we assumed it would give LB and his coaches more time on the training pitch to gel the players together and instil LB's ethos. The results? Poorer performances and confused looking players. Good managers improve players; ours are going backwards. I'm not saying that we have a team full of superstars, but we do have some good players who are capable of playing much better than we are seeing. With the right tactics and man-management, they could be performing better, without doubt.
So, man management - staggeringly bad. Play well and get dropped. We see them get thrown under the bus and, unsurprisingly, their confidence ebbs away and they play even worse. It's not rocket science, FFS. Now, he may have lost the dressing room, or that might be bullshit. But given the above, what do you think is the likely outcome of alienating player after player, week after week? Do they look like they are busting a gut for him out there to you?
Bringing youth through the ranks - we have young players who could step up into the first team and bring not only enthusiasm, but pace and fearlessness. One of the reasons we are so bad at the moment is that we are so slow. Also, we could be developing e.g Davison, who did creditably well last season in the Championship, yet has been pushed aside by Bogle, who is a really poor player with very low confidence (which is a discussion point in itself). What would we have to lose by giving him a chance? Why stick with Bogle? It clearly isn't working.
We all like LB. His loyalty to the club is without question and we have a lot to be grateful to him for, without doubt. If he had cut us loose, then we would have been in an even worse place than we were without him, although ultimately we went down anyway (that's another discussion in itself). I dislike the trigger happy owner stereotype that we see at clubs like the Massives and Watford; let's face it, it makes them a laughing stock. However, no manager should be free of legitimate criticism and LB needs to take responsibility for his many lapses of judgement, as any manager should.
I don't buy all this 'armchair manager' business. The majority of posters on this site (being of a generally higher intellectual standard than many other messageboards, ahem) would not be making the same obvious mistakes that LB has been recently (check any match thread for evidence). Why? It is a simple matter of intelligence - you don't need to be a genius to see some hugely obvious errors that have been made, yet LB makes them again and again despite repeatedly bad outcomes. That's not very bright.
If you can't learn from your mistakes, then you are either stupidly stubborn or just stupid. LB's inability to admit his own mistakes and his scapegoating of players doesn't fill me with confidence that this is going to change. He needs to understand that he doesn't need to be right all the time and that to change is not weakness if it is done from a position of intelligent. Everyone makes mistakes and everyone learns every single day of their lives, yet LB seems to regard this as an admission of failure. Perplexing.
I don't see how this can end well, barring a 'road to Damascus' style conversion by LB. Much as I would like this to happen, I just can't see it based on LB' recent behaviour. Such a shame.
So, it looks like we will just have to sit back and watch LB drive into the same tree, week in, week out until TS finally loses patience, it seems.
Come back to the light, Lee. And lay off the ayahuasca
If you have managed at some capacity or not it doesn't matter to me. I know if I was appointed Charlton manager, I would be a disaster. But we do sell ourselves a bit short as fans sometimes. If you watch games for a long time, I have been doing so before Bowyer was born, you do pick up on certain things. You can easily gain an insight as when something is wrong and something is right.
For instance, I know the best approach when we played Sheffield Wednesday, a team at the time that was bereft of any confidence, was to have a go at them. I know that yesterday was a perfect game for a player like Maddison, coming off the back of a MOTM performance with something to prove against his old club. I know that if you sit back on a lead when opponents go for broke, you will lose more points than you gain. I don't have to be a football manager to know that, I just have to have had enough experience of watching the game.
A food critic doesn't need to be a Gordon Ramsey, An art critic doesn't have to be Leonardo Da Vinci and a theatre critic doesn't have to be Laurence Olivier. They have to have an experience of what is good and what is not so good. Football fans who have been watching the game for years have the same sort of knowledge. On occasions it is not unreasonable to suppose it can even be greater than some who are involved in the game.
It doesn't matter if it's a clapped out Escort or a Rolls-Royce if the bloke behind the wheel is going to drive it straight into a tree every time. The driver (manager) is the single most important person at the club in terms of dictating whether it moves onwards and upwards or stays stuck in a ditch.
I'm sorry, but I came to a rather disappointing conclusion probably a couple of weeks back.
Namely, sadly, LB is just not a very good manager.
Now, there may be things that he is good at; but he appears if not tactically inept, then either unwilling or unable to adapt to different circumstances. His approach is an overly negative, one-size-fits-all defensive ethos which makes having creative options in the squad almost pointless. It is a demonstrative point-loser as we have seen time and again in recent months.
His line-ups and substitutions - so inept as to appear bizarre. Not much more to be said.
Game management - demonstratively terrible. Yet he persists with banging his head against the same wall, time after time. If we can't see it, why can't he?
The more he trains them in 'Bowyer-ball', the worse they have become; ergot he is not improving players. Do you remember when our injury crisis reached its zenith not long after the season started? Now, to be fair, he had a hastily assembled squad thrown together under very difficult circumstances. We did not mind cancelled matches as we assumed it would give LB and his coaches more time on the training pitch to gel the players together and instil LB's ethos. The results? Poorer performances and confused looking players. Good managers improve players; ours are going backwards. I'm not saying that we have a team full of superstars, but we do have some good players who are capable of playing much better than we are seeing. With the right tactics and man-management, they could be performing better, without doubt.
So, man management - staggeringly bad. Play well and get dropped. We see them get thrown under the bus and, unsurprisingly, their confidence ebbs away and they play even worse. It's not rocket science, FFS. Now, he may have lost the dressing room, or that might be bullshit. But given the above, what do you think is the likely outcome of alienating player after player, week after week? Do they look like they are busting a gut for him out there to you?
Bringing youth through the ranks - we have young players who could step up into the first team and bring not only enthusiasm, but pace and fearlessness. One of the reasons we are so bad at the moment is that we are so slow. Also, we could be developing e.g Davison, who did creditably well last season in the Championship, yet has been pushed aside by Bogle, who is a really poor player with very low confidence (which is a discussion point in itself). What would we have to lose by giving him a chance? Why stick with Bogle? It clearly isn't working.
We all like LB. His loyalty to the club is without question and we have a lot to be grateful to him for, without doubt. If he had cut us loose, then we would have been in an even worse place than we were without him, although ultimately we went down anyway (that's another discussion in itself). I dislike the trigger happy owner stereotype that we see at clubs like the Massives and Watford; let's face it, it makes them a laughing stock. However, no manager should be free of legitimate criticism and LB needs to take responsibility for his many lapses of judgement, as any manager should.
I don't buy all this 'armchair manager' business. The majority of posters on this site (being of a generally higher intellectual standard than many other messageboards, ahem) would not be making the same obvious mistakes that LB has been recently (check any match thread for evidence). Why? It is a simple matter of intelligence - you don't need to be a genius to see some hugely obvious errors that have been made, yet LB makes them again and again despite repeatedly bad outcomes. That's not very bright.
If you can't learn from your mistakes, then you are either stupidly stubborn or just stupid. LB's inability to admit his own mistakes and his scapegoating of players doesn't fill me with confidence that this is going to change. He needs to understand that he doesn't need to be right all the time and that to change is not weakness if it is done from a position of intelligent. Everyone makes mistakes and everyone learns every single day of their lives, yet LB seems to regard this as an admission of failure. Perplexing.
I don't see how this can end well, barring a 'road to Damascus' style conversion by LB. Much as I would like this to happen, I just can't see it based on LB' recent behaviour. Such a shame.
So, it looks like we will just have to sit back and watch LB drive into the same tree, week in, week out until TS finally loses patience, it seems.
Come back to the light, Lee. And lay off the ayahuasca
‘Playing players in their position is the most arm chair view of them all’
Im sorry but WTF?!!
Team meetings and individual instructions about how the opposition play or what the player your marking does (ie comes inside) is the absolute norm. You still play players in their natural position. Not a talented left back at right midfield whilst you’re playing two right footed players down the left. It’s just fucking madness.
‘Playing players in their position is the most arm chair view of them all’
Im sorry but WTF?!!
Team meetings and individual instructions about how the opposition play or what the player your marking does (ie comes inside) is the absolute norm. You still play players in their natural position. Not a talented left back at right midfield whilst you’re playing two right footed players down the left. It’s just fucking madness.
Wingers who play on the opposite flank so they cut in must confuse the fuck out of you then!!
But yeaaa just because someone is left-footed they have to play that flank dont they
‘Playing players in their position is the most arm chair view of them all’
Im sorry but WTF?!!
Team meetings and individual instructions about how the opposition play or what the player your marking does (ie comes inside) is the absolute norm. You still play players in their natural position. Not a talented left back at right midfield whilst you’re playing two right footed players down the left. It’s just fucking madness.
Wingers who play on the opposite flank so they cut in must confuse the fuck out of you then!!
‘Playing players in their position is the most arm chair view of them all’
Im sorry but WTF?!!
Team meetings and individual instructions about how the opposition play or what the player your marking does (ie comes inside) is the absolute norm. You still play players in their natural position. Not a talented left back at right midfield whilst you’re playing two right footed players down the left. It’s just fucking madness.
Wingers who play on the opposite flank so they cut in must confuse the fuck out of you then!!
Maatsen is a fucking left back!!!!!!!!
What does he do when he's facing a winger who cuts inside... Suddenly he's got Maatsen on his wrong foot!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
‘Playing players in their position is the most arm chair view of them all’
Im sorry but WTF?!!
Team meetings and individual instructions about how the opposition play or what the player your marking does (ie comes inside) is the absolute norm. You still play players in their natural position. Not a talented left back at right midfield whilst you’re playing two right footed players down the left. It’s just fucking madness.
Wingers who play on the opposite flank so they cut in must confuse the fuck out of you then!!
Maatsen is a fucking left back!!!!!!!!
What does he do when he's facing a winger who cuts inside... Suddenly he's got Maatsen on his wrong foot!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
That’s a natural situation for a defender, Dealing with defensive duties. Not playing on the wrong side of the pitch in midfield. Jesus, I can’t believe you wanna be that much of a defender of everything Charlton that you cannot see playing a left back right midfield is just plain weird.
‘Playing players in their position is the most arm chair view of them all’
Im sorry but WTF?!!
Team meetings and individual instructions about how the opposition play or what the player your marking does (ie comes inside) is the absolute norm. You still play players in their natural position. Not a talented left back at right midfield whilst you’re playing two right footed players down the left. It’s just fucking madness.
Wingers who play on the opposite flank so they cut in must confuse the fuck out of you then!!
Maatsen is a fucking left back!!!!!!!!
What does he do when he's facing a winger who cuts inside... Suddenly he's got Maatsen on his wrong foot!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
About half the premier league wingers are "inverted" how many full backs are?
Regarding wingers that play on the 'wrong' side and cut in (presumably to shoot)... At this level how many times does it end up in a goal? For me even that is overcomplicating things. Just get a right footer on the right wing and put balls into the box. Surely there's a greater chance of scoring that way.
If it works do it but if it doesn't don't. Simples. The only reason why I think Bowyer hasn't tried the more conventional approach is that it might make him look like he has got it wrong. of course, we don't care about that but he probably does.
‘Playing players in their position is the most arm chair view of them all’
Im sorry but WTF?!!
Team meetings and individual instructions about how the opposition play or what the player your marking does (ie comes inside) is the absolute norm. You still play players in their natural position. Not a talented left back at right midfield whilst you’re playing two right footed players down the left. It’s just fucking madness.
Wingers who play on the opposite flank so they cut in must confuse the fuck out of you then!!
Maatsen is a fucking left back!!!!!!!!
What does he do when he's facing a winger who cuts inside... Suddenly he's got Maatsen on his wrong foot!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
About half the premier league wingers are "inverted" how many full backs are?
Sterling, right footed, as going to play on the left wing for Man City today. Do you honestly think Frank Lampard is going to play a right back at left back?
‘Playing players in their position is the most arm chair view of them all’
Im sorry but WTF?!!
Team meetings and individual instructions about how the opposition play or what the player your marking does (ie comes inside) is the absolute norm. You still play players in their natural position. Not a talented left back at right midfield whilst you’re playing two right footed players down the left. It’s just fucking madness.
Wingers who play on the opposite flank so they cut in must confuse the fuck out of you then!!
Maatsen is a fucking left back!!!!!!!!
What does he do when he's facing a winger who cuts inside... Suddenly he's got Maatsen on his wrong foot!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
About half the premier league wingers are "inverted" how many full backs are?
Exactly. I can’t get my head around having to even explain it.
A left footed player will feel more at home playing left back because when they receive the ball, they open their body and have the whole pitch in front on them. A right footed player there, as we saw with Matthew’s yesterday, will always instinctively come inside onto their stronger foot, therefore minimising their options into congestion.
When defending, a left footed left back will try and show their winger inside, where usually, midfield support awaits. If their winger wants to go down the outside, they will feel much more comfortable tackling with that foot. That’s like defending 101. If you play a right footed player left back, then their instinctive, natural body shape, will be totally wasted.
‘Playing players in their position is the most arm chair view of them all’
Im sorry but WTF?!!
Team meetings and individual instructions about how the opposition play or what the player your marking does (ie comes inside) is the absolute norm. You still play players in their natural position. Not a talented left back at right midfield whilst you’re playing two right footed players down the left. It’s just fucking madness.
Wingers who play on the opposite flank so they cut in must confuse the fuck out of you then!!
Maatsen is a fucking left back!!!!!!!!
What does he do when he's facing a winger who cuts inside... Suddenly he's got Maatsen on his wrong foot!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
About half the premier league wingers are "inverted" how many full backs are?
Exactly. I can’t get my head around having to even explain it.
A left footed player will feel more at home playing left back because when they receive the ball, they open their body and have the whole pitch in front on them. A right footed player there, as we saw with Matthew’s yesterday, will always instinctively come inside onto their stronger foot, therefore minimising their options into congestion.
When defending, a left footed left back will try and show their winger inside, where usually, midfield support awaits. If their winger wants to go down the outside, they will feel much more comfortable tackling with that foot. That’s like defending 101. If you play a right footed player left back, then their instinctive, natural body shape, will be totally wasted.
You mean every manager that has lost to Liverpool over the last 3 seasons could have avoided defeat simply by swapping the full backs round?
When the team was announced there were immediately posts saying how wrong it looked and gave there reasons behind their views. The fact is we aren’t all experts but still saw red flags, and the majority were proven to be correct, although there were posts saying that a lot of egg were to be put on faces. If so many people saw what was coming and it did come!!!, why did our expert of a manager not recognise such an obvious problem. Bowyer is not doing the business at the moment and is in the main being supported by sentimentality. Those being so sentimental in your views will hopefully be as forthcoming in saying they were wrong if indeed this season turns into a damp squib. I still think the squad is good enough with the additions coming to be at least top 6. Our manager needs to shape up and prove he is up to it, as his management has taken a step backwards.
The past few matches have been disappointing to say the least. Some of that is down to losing the key central defender pairing which had stood us in good stead during that run of excellent results. The defense recently has been a mess. Losing Doughty and Shinnie have also had an important impact in robbing us of pace, width and creativity. Another factor is that some of the players brought in over the summer have either lost their form or not really been good enough in the first place. The manager needs to sort it and sort it fast.
But LB hasn't suddenly become a bad manager. He has already shaped a promotion side (although via play offs) and was somewhat unlucky last year given the resources available to him (nothing much of consequence) during the Championship campaign. He has protected and guided the team through major disruption and done it with style and good grace. The next four weeks are going to be the crunch. Our Chairman has already stated his ambitions for the club and the way he wants the team to move forward and develop. He is no doubt willing to put money behind the words. It will be up to LB to use these new found resources well and get the players in January who will instill some pace and guile into the team, both in midfield and, if possible, up front.
Perhaps then we will see another 'form team' springtime drive similar to two years ago. I sincerely hope so, and I am sure so do all fans - and the Chairman. So over to you Mr B.
Bowyer used to get booked on purpose to miss Christmas games.
My theory is i wouldn't put it past bows to want us to have a bad couple of games at xmas just in time for the transfer window to convince sandgard to action.
We were never going to beat hull anyway.
Caveat; haven't watched any games over xmas period. Please don't get your nickers in a twist.
When the team was announced there were immediately posts saying how wrong it looked and gave there reasons behind their views. The fact is we aren’t all experts but still saw red flags, and the majority were proven to be correct, although there were posts saying that a lot of egg were to be put on faces. If so many people saw what was coming and it did come!!!, why did our expert of a manager not recognise such an obvious problem. Bowyer is not doing the business at the moment and is in the main being supported by sentimentality. Those being so sentimental in your views will hopefully be as forthcoming in saying they were wrong if indeed this season turns into a damp squib. I still think the squad is good enough with the additions coming to be at least top 6. Our manager needs to shape up and prove he is up to it, as his management has taken a step backwards.
I named two players who should be playing but also said I didn't expect them to.
Absolutely staggered how willingly trigger happy people are. Embarrassing given how fawning most supporters were of him up to a few weeks ago. Football has got so short-termism it’s unreal.
Thank god the Internet wasn’t such a thing for Curbs when he went 8 games without a point, 13 games without a win. Pretty sure we would be told now he hasn’t a clue, had lost the dressing room etc.
Our current form in that comparative 13 game period?
6 wins 4 draws 3 defeats
During a unique national crisis, and accompanying injury crisis.
Embarrassing lack of loyalty to Bowyer and Jackson. They deserve better support than that and I’m gutted it appears we’re collectively not tuned that way. I thought we were.
Give this man a promote.
How many Promotes can one man take for gods sake
I'd be content with one tbh.
Begging'll get you nowhere Elfsborg
I should have got the sympathy vote after the constipation thread.
‘Playing players in their position is the most arm chair view of them all’
Im sorry but WTF?!!
Team meetings and individual instructions about how the opposition play or what the player your marking does (ie comes inside) is the absolute norm. You still play players in their natural position. Not a talented left back at right midfield whilst you’re playing two right footed players down the left. It’s just fucking madness.
Wingers who play on the opposite flank so they cut in must confuse the fuck out of you then!!
Maatsen is a fucking left back!!!!!!!!
What does he do when he's facing a winger who cuts inside... Suddenly he's got Maatsen on his wrong foot!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
About half the premier league wingers are "inverted" how many full backs are?
Exactly. I can’t get my head around having to even explain it.
A left footed player will feel more at home playing left back because when they receive the ball, they open their body and have the whole pitch in front on them. A right footed player there, as we saw with Matthew’s yesterday, will always instinctively come inside onto their stronger foot, therefore minimising their options into congestion.
When defending, a left footed left back will try and show their winger inside, where usually, midfield support awaits. If their winger wants to go down the outside, they will feel much more comfortable tackling with that foot. That’s like defending 101. If you play a right footed player left back, then their instinctive, natural body shape, will be totally wasted.
You mean every manager that has lost to Liverpool over the last 3 seasons could have avoided defeat simply by swapping the full backs round?
You mean the Liverpool who have played the right footed James Milner at Left-Back over 50-times?
Surely they had another Left-Back they could have played there instead of him on those occasions...
Comments
Even though I'd be loath to get rid what with injuries and depends how straightforward it is we lose those games in question
e.g. My biggest complaint at times isnt the Manager and his choices but when the managers job becomes untenable, the players appear to get away scott free
I think if Bowyer is to go then the end of January is the worst time to do make the decision
I'm sorry, but I came to a rather disappointing conclusion probably a couple of weeks back.
Namely, sadly, LB is just not a very good manager.
Now, there may be things that he is good at; but he appears if not tactically inept, then either unwilling or unable to adapt to different circumstances. His approach is an overly negative, one-size-fits-all defensive ethos which makes having creative options in the squad almost pointless. It is a demonstrative point-loser as we have seen time and again in recent months.
His line-ups and substitutions - so inept as to appear bizarre. Not much more to be said.
Game management - demonstratively terrible. Yet he persists with banging his head against the same wall, time after time. If we can't see it, why can't he?
The more he trains them in 'Bowyer-ball', the worse they have become; ergot he is not improving players. Do you remember when our injury crisis reached its zenith not long after the season started? Now, to be fair, he had a hastily assembled squad thrown together under very difficult circumstances. We did not mind cancelled matches as we assumed it would give LB and his coaches more time on the training pitch to gel the players together and instil LB's ethos. The results? Poorer performances and confused looking players. Good managers improve players; ours are going backwards. I'm not saying that we have a team full of superstars, but we do have some good players who are capable of playing much better than we are seeing. With the right tactics and man-management, they could be performing better, without doubt.
So, man management - staggeringly bad. Play well and get dropped. We see them get thrown under the bus and, unsurprisingly, their confidence ebbs away and they play even worse. It's not rocket science, FFS. Now, he may have lost the dressing room, or that might be bullshit. But given the above, what do you think is the likely outcome of alienating player after player, week after week? Do they look like they are busting a gut for him out there to you?
Bringing youth through the ranks - we have young players who could step up into the first team and bring not only enthusiasm, but pace and fearlessness. One of the reasons we are so bad at the moment is that we are so slow. Also, we could be developing e.g Davison, who did creditably well last season in the Championship, yet has been pushed aside by Bogle, who is a really poor player with very low confidence (which is a discussion point in itself). What would we have to lose by giving him a chance? Why stick with Bogle? It clearly isn't working.
We all like LB. His loyalty to the club is without question and we have a lot to be grateful to him for, without doubt. If he had cut us loose, then we would have been in an even worse place than we were without him, although ultimately we went down anyway (that's another discussion in itself). I dislike the trigger happy owner stereotype that we see at clubs like the Massives and Watford; let's face it, it makes them a laughing stock. However, no manager should be free of legitimate criticism and LB needs to take responsibility for his many lapses of judgement, as any manager should.
I don't buy all this 'armchair manager' business. The majority of posters on this site (being of a generally higher intellectual standard than many other messageboards, ahem) would not be making the same obvious mistakes that LB has been recently (check any match thread for evidence). Why? It is a simple matter of intelligence - you don't need to be a genius to see some hugely obvious errors that have been made, yet LB makes them again and again despite repeatedly bad outcomes. That's not very bright.
If you can't learn from your mistakes, then you are either stupidly stubborn or just stupid. LB's inability to admit his own mistakes and his scapegoating of players doesn't fill me with confidence that this is going to change. He needs to understand that he doesn't need to be right all the time and that to change is not weakness if it is done from a position of intelligent. Everyone makes mistakes and everyone learns every single day of their lives, yet LB seems to regard this as an admission of failure. Perplexing.
I don't see how this can end well, barring a 'road to Damascus' style conversion by LB. Much as I would like this to happen, I just can't see it based on LB' recent behaviour. Such a shame.
So, it looks like we will just have to sit back and watch LB drive into the same tree, week in, week out until TS finally loses patience, it seems.
Come back to the light, Lee. And lay off the ayahuasca
So many back passes and poor passing to players on the touchline when surrounded by 2 or 3 of the opposition. (Pearce is also guilty of this.)
Hopefully, Charlie Barker will have to return to the team. If he's good enough he's old enough.
The inspiring confidence boosting comment along the lines of "we only have Deji left so he'll have to play"
Im sorry but WTF?!!
Team meetings and individual instructions about how the opposition play or what the player your marking does (ie comes inside) is the absolute norm. You still play players in their natural position. Not a talented left back at right midfield whilst you’re playing two right footed players down the left. It’s just fucking madness.
But yeaaa just because someone is left-footed they have to play that flank dont they
Lee Bowyer has it all under control , we have nothing to worry about .
Just realised I am arguing with myself 😂😂
A left footed player will feel more at home playing left back because when they receive the ball, they open their body and have the whole pitch in front on them. A right footed player there, as we saw with Matthew’s yesterday, will always instinctively come inside onto their stronger foot, therefore minimising their options into congestion.
But LB hasn't suddenly become a bad manager. He has already shaped a promotion side (although via play offs) and was somewhat unlucky last year given the resources available to him (nothing much of consequence) during the Championship campaign. He has protected and guided the team through major disruption and done it with style and good grace. The next four weeks are going to be the crunch. Our Chairman has already stated his ambitions for the club and the way he wants the team to move forward and develop. He is no doubt willing to put money behind the words. It will be up to LB to use these new found resources well and get the players in January who will instill some pace and guile into the team, both in midfield and, if possible, up front.
Perhaps then we will see another 'form team' springtime drive similar to two years ago. I sincerely hope so, and I am sure so do all fans - and the Chairman. So over to you Mr B.
100%
I should have got the sympathy vote after the constipation thread.
Surely they had another Left-Back they could have played there instead of him on those occasions...