I was a big advocate for Jones from before he joined.
He turned it around last season and then had a full pre-season and control of transfers.
We also started well. The football was effective. Dull but effective and we did the most important thing which is "just win games".
Early games we had a system- work hard, press high, defend well. It wasn't pretty but it mostly worked.
Then NJ started tinkering. Dropping Mitchell was weird and since then few of the changes have made sense from the outside. Dropping Docherty, his captain, and Berry, one of our few scorers, was strange but not an isolated incident.
The late introduction of three Luton players (Potts, Hylton and A Campbell) has had no positive impact and perhaps behind the scenes has caused upset within the squad.
The lateness of the Luton signings also hints at some internal battles to get them signed. Was that budget or a fight for control with Scott.
We now seemed to be drifting, rigid style, constant changes of line up but not in formation, no creativity in midfield and six defensive outfield players including two wing backs who can't/won't/don't give us effective width and no midfielders to find them or to play an incisive through ball to forward runners.
And our set pieces are poor time and time again.
Jones manages in such a way that players have to buy into what he is doing and doing what he wants. He is fixated on a particular style of play. All great when he gets that buy in and the team is getting results, but terrible when it's not.
His "passion" on the sidelines has also started to grate with those that originally praised it when we were winning.
I don't know what the answer is. Four defeats was enough to get Holden sacked but constantly sacking managers isn't the answer either. We need stability but we also need points.
I wanted Jones sacked after Crawley - we were steadily getting worse and playing some awful football. If we'd continued playing the same way we would have been dragged into a relegation fight.
NJ deserves credit for turning things around and I'm delighted that he has improved things. Not in my wildest dreams did I expect this run of results.
I'm not being Captain Handsight here because I said this a couple of months ago. NJ is marmite. I'm talking about the players specifically in that respect. When he gets they totally "buy into" his ways, then he is hugely successful as he was at Luton. At Southampton (won 5/14) and Stoke (won 6/38), they simply didn't. His passion works both ways - it either galvanises or it upsets. His tactics only need to be scorned by a few in the dressing room and that place is lost unless he is given time to turn things around and get the squad he wants playing the way he wants them to.
This happened at Southampton and is courtesy of The Athletic:
Naturally, each coach has their own strengths and weaknesses and from Jones’ standpoint, there was friction with what he was trying to implement. Many believed he was working towards playing his preferred 3-5-2 shape. He ultimately played the system in his final game in charge against Wolves, making good on his promise after Brentford that he would no longer compromise.
Curiously, Ainsley Maitland-Niles was deployed as the third centre-back, while Duje Caleta-Car and Armel Bella-Kotchap — international-level defenders — were left out of the squad altogether. January signing Mislav Orsic was in the same boat, having been part of the matchday group at St Mary’s. It served as a sign of the growing animosity between Jones and a handful of players. Some thought they fell out of favour because they were not, in Jones’ opinion, diligent enough defensively.
No one can say that our players haven't bought into his ways. It's taken a while but we can now see the shape, solidity and commitment that the players are demonstrating. And the results have followed. We need to enjoy it all the times we can.
Let’s just be clear. The reason we’ve gone on an improved run is not because the players bought into his ways; it’s because Jones changed his ways.
He deserves huge credit for that. But you can’t revise history and pretend that the approach adopted for the first four months of the season and the results and performances it brought about didn’t happen.
Fans were absolutely right to lose faith in and criticise what was going on. They were wrong to assume he wouldn’t be able to change things for the positive.
Jones hasn't changed his ways. Not in the slightest. He's changed the on-pitch setup to a point where he's getting what he wants but he's still conducting his methods in exactly the same way, which is what the above post was about.
From the first game of the season Jones was critical about the quality on display in performances and responded to complaints about long ball football by pointing out that he wasn't telling the players to play that way and they weren't doing what they'd worked on. Everything was static and narrow and rubbish and eventually he found a way to add width higher up the pitch that let us keep our solidity and now we're in good form. His ways are the same though; he's demanding, specific and focused on a very certain way of playing, which is based on aggressive pressing, defensive shape and maximum fitness levels so that tiring opposition teams can be pounced on.
Nothing has changed in that respect and by all accounts he's still an absolute lunatic in the way he goes about things but the players are buying into it. At Southampton and Stoke he had too big a job because he came into teams where players didn't like the focus on total effort-based commitment to the cause and the sidelining of maverick creativity. Jones has always been a manager to change up his on-pitch approach - he famously made multiple formation changes across matches at Southampton and they ended up using 55 players across the course of the season - and the setup we're using now is our 4th of the season, but his ways have remained consistent throughout that. The only revising of history is to think that Jones has changed anything about his management style. He's the same and so is his approach, it's just he's found a shape that works for the team.
I'm not being Captain Handsight here because I said this a couple of months ago. NJ is marmite. I'm talking about the players specifically in that respect. When he gets they totally "buy into" his ways, then he is hugely successful as he was at Luton. At Southampton (won 5/14) and Stoke (won 6/38), they simply didn't. His passion works both ways - it either galvanises or it upsets. His tactics only need to be scorned by a few in the dressing room and that place is lost unless he is given time to turn things around and get the squad he wants playing the way he wants them to.
This happened at Southampton and is courtesy of The Athletic:
Naturally, each coach has their own strengths and weaknesses and from Jones’ standpoint, there was friction with what he was trying to implement. Many believed he was working towards playing his preferred 3-5-2 shape. He ultimately played the system in his final game in charge against Wolves, making good on his promise after Brentford that he would no longer compromise.
Curiously, Ainsley Maitland-Niles was deployed as the third centre-back, while Duje Caleta-Car and Armel Bella-Kotchap — international-level defenders — were left out of the squad altogether. January signing Mislav Orsic was in the same boat, having been part of the matchday group at St Mary’s. It served as a sign of the growing animosity between Jones and a handful of players. Some thought they fell out of favour because they were not, in Jones’ opinion, diligent enough defensively.
No one can say that our players haven't bought into his ways. It's taken a while but we can now see the shape, solidity and commitment that the players are demonstrating. And the results have followed. We need to enjoy it all the times we can.
Let’s just be clear. The reason we’ve gone on an improved run is not because the players bought into his ways; it’s because Jones changed his ways.
He deserves huge credit for that. But you can’t revise history and pretend that the approach adopted for the first four months of the season and the results and performances it brought about didn’t happen.
Fans were absolutely right to lose faith in and criticise what was going on. They were wrong to assume he wouldn’t be able to change things for the positive.
Jones hasn't changed his ways. Not in the slightest. He's changed the on-pitch setup to a point where he's getting what he wants but he's still conducting his methods in exactly the same way, which is what the above post was about.
From the first game of the season Jones was critical about the quality on display in performances and responded to complaints about long ball football by pointing out that he wasn't telling the players to play that way and they weren't doing what they'd worked on. Everything was static and narrow and rubbish and eventually he found a way to add width higher up the pitch that let us keep our solidity and now we're in good form. His ways are the same though; he's demanding, specific and focused on a very certain way of playing, which is based on aggressive pressing, defensive shape and maximum fitness levels so that tiring opposition teams can be pounced on.
Nothing has changed in that respect and by all accounts he's still an absolute lunatic in the way he goes about things but the players are buying into it. At Southampton and Stoke he had too big a job because he came into teams where players didn't like the focus on total effort-based commitment to the cause and the sidelining of maverick creativity. Jones has always been a manager to change up his on-pitch approach - he famously made multiple formation changes across matches at Southampton and they ended up using 55 players across the course of the season - and the setup we're using now is our 4th of the season, but his ways have remained consistent throughout that. The only revising of history is to think that Jones has changed anything about his management style. He's the same and so is his approach, it's just he's found a shape that works for the team.
I get you, I think we're clearly talking about different things:
1 - the playing style and tactics; 2 - how he handles himself and manages players.
1 has changed drastically. That is what I was referring to. 2 hasn't changed as you say, but actually I never felt that was the major problem, the players clearly bought into him last season and early season in terms of his man management etc, and it only started to look like it might be an issue when it became clear that 1 was causing us huge issues.
Anyway, whatever. I'm loving the run and hope to the high heavens that Jones' continues to make the doubters like me look foolish!
I'm not being Captain Handsight here because I said this a couple of months ago. NJ is marmite. I'm talking about the players specifically in that respect. When he gets they totally "buy into" his ways, then he is hugely successful as he was at Luton. At Southampton (won 5/14) and Stoke (won 6/38), they simply didn't. His passion works both ways - it either galvanises or it upsets. His tactics only need to be scorned by a few in the dressing room and that place is lost unless he is given time to turn things around and get the squad he wants playing the way he wants them to.
This happened at Southampton and is courtesy of The Athletic:
Naturally, each coach has their own strengths and weaknesses and from Jones’ standpoint, there was friction with what he was trying to implement. Many believed he was working towards playing his preferred 3-5-2 shape. He ultimately played the system in his final game in charge against Wolves, making good on his promise after Brentford that he would no longer compromise.
Curiously, Ainsley Maitland-Niles was deployed as the third centre-back, while Duje Caleta-Car and Armel Bella-Kotchap — international-level defenders — were left out of the squad altogether. January signing Mislav Orsic was in the same boat, having been part of the matchday group at St Mary’s. It served as a sign of the growing animosity between Jones and a handful of players. Some thought they fell out of favour because they were not, in Jones’ opinion, diligent enough defensively.
No one can say that our players haven't bought into his ways. It's taken a while but we can now see the shape, solidity and commitment that the players are demonstrating. And the results have followed. We need to enjoy it all the times we can.
Agree with the above. Although this season will have to be considered a failure should we not go up, regardless of what Charlie boy will pipe up with.
I don't think this is a case of assessing things in hindsight, it assessing things with a totally different set of circumstances and evidence.
At the end of November all the signs were bad. The results were unsatisfactory. The style of football was ineffective and very very tough to watch. The fans were losing patience and the manager was getting increasingly chippy and confrontational in interviews and towards the fans. The calls from the fans for a change in approach only seemed to make the manager double down and become more stubbornly attached to the way we were doing things. Everything felt like it was coming to a head that was likely to be Jones getting sacked. I was frankly quite surprised that he was not fired after Crawley as the whole situation and the nature of the performance felt so similar to when previous managers had finally come to the end of the road. If we'd had the good form first and then hit a sticky patch it would've changed the context and the narrative, but, at the time, it was bad form on top of multiple bad seasons and even the better results in August and September were not backed up by impressive performances. That all played its part in casting a very negative light on where things were at.
To suggest that the idea it was time Jones went or any concerns about where things were heading were somehow stupid or unreasonable is an oversimplification of the situation and very disrespectful to some of the people expressing such concerns. Read back on this thread and post-match threads around that time, it's not just your usual knee jerk over-reactors - there's people like Henry Irving, Scoham, Covered End, and AFKA expressing serious concerns and struggling to see a light at the end of the tunnel - these are respected posters and people who tend to express considered and objective opinions based on evidence not emotion. That is the position we were in.
The people who were still calling for patience deserve credit and have been proven right. No arguments there. However, I'm not sure anyone can really claim to have been smarter than everyone else in this situation because when you look at the tone of those posts calling for patience it wasn't so much people saying NJ deserves more time because of this improvement or that improvement, or because we can see this is improving because whatever reason; it was more people saying we can't just keep sacking managers and we need to stick with one at some point and hope it works out. Yes, there was the argument that NJ's previous record at Luton suggested he might be our best hope in a while, but again it was more hope than evidence-based expectation. Callum is perhaps the shining light who might be able to claim some "told you so" points on this one, but he admits he was losing faith after the Crawley game and I don't believe even he saw the form of the last 13 games coming. Any lingering hope we might still make the play-offs was that we might sneak in round the back late in the season. No one was predicting we'd have smashed the front door down and be sat on the couch with a cup of tea and a plate of biscuits with a third of the season still to go.
If anything, I think you could argue that the turnaround vindicates those expressing reasonable concerns because a common theme of those posts was a call to switch to a less long ball style and introduce some pace into the team; it's really since we've started to do those things that performances have improved. Credit to NJ for making those changes. He's shown himself to be less stubborn than his post-match demeanor in November suggested he is and it's probably saved our season. Now we have recovered to a good league position, hopefully we can sustain solid form and by the end of this season that dreadful form and football played in October and November is a distant memory and an irrelevant footnote to the story of a successful season.
The change in style was part of Jones plan all along. He’s said a few times his first focus was the defence and being hard to beat, and that we would then get more fluent with a bit more time. If he’d tried to do it all at once I don’t think we would be as good a side as we are now
The process was disrupted by injuries so it appeared more of a sudden change as our players returned than it would have been had they remained fit
The hoofball was at its worst when we had the most injuries. To me that was just jones trying his best to pick up points with what he has available, it wasn’t a good idea and that Crawley game was dreadful, but people jumped the gun way too quickly to call for his head
I'm not being Captain Handsight here because I said this a couple of months ago. NJ is marmite. I'm talking about the players specifically in that respect. When he gets they totally "buy into" his ways, then he is hugely successful as he was at Luton. At Southampton (won 5/14) and Stoke (won 6/38), they simply didn't. His passion works both ways - it either galvanises or it upsets. His tactics only need to be scorned by a few in the dressing room and that place is lost unless he is given time to turn things around and get the squad he wants playing the way he wants them to.
This happened at Southampton and is courtesy of The Athletic:
Naturally, each coach has their own strengths and weaknesses and from Jones’ standpoint, there was friction with what he was trying to implement. Many believed he was working towards playing his preferred 3-5-2 shape. He ultimately played the system in his final game in charge against Wolves, making good on his promise after Brentford that he would no longer compromise.
Curiously, Ainsley Maitland-Niles was deployed as the third centre-back, while Duje Caleta-Car and Armel Bella-Kotchap — international-level defenders — were left out of the squad altogether. January signing Mislav Orsic was in the same boat, having been part of the matchday group at St Mary’s. It served as a sign of the growing animosity between Jones and a handful of players. Some thought they fell out of favour because they were not, in Jones’ opinion, diligent enough defensively.
No one can say that our players haven't bought into his ways. It's taken a while but we can now see the shape, solidity and commitment that the players are demonstrating. And the results have followed. We need to enjoy it all the times we can.
Agree with the above. Although this season will have to be considered a failure should we not go up, regardless of what Charlie boy will pipe up with.
Any season we don’t get promoted from the third tier is failure. Full credit to Jones for getting this run of results but let’s not too get gooey eyed. What we endured before this run began was awful. Let’s not forget that. Everything about us was just dreadful from team selections to tactics. I’ll even bring up recruitment which by all accounts was very much Jones driven. I didn’t want him sacked but I won’t easily forget some of the worst football I’ve seen in 65 years of supporting.
Jones needed to change his tactics and the vast majority knew this and voiced this.
Whether he did so under his own volition, fan pressure, SMT pressure or owner pressure is unknown. It was possibly a combination of the above.
The hoof ball tactics were terminated. The introduction of width finally happened. We started to play football, passing the ball, players moving into space, running at the opposition, getting in behind them.
We started to score goals.
Jones is an oddball and clearly holds grudges. Even this week he was commenting on a fan criticising him at the Leyton Orient game in the Vertu trophy.
We look like a promotion challenging team now. I think we’ll make the playoffs and have a decent chance of winning at Wembley.
I'm not being Captain Handsight here because I said this a couple of months ago. NJ is marmite. I'm talking about the players specifically in that respect. When he gets they totally "buy into" his ways, then he is hugely successful as he was at Luton. At Southampton (won 5/14) and Stoke (won 6/38), they simply didn't. His passion works both ways - it either galvanises or it upsets. His tactics only need to be scorned by a few in the dressing room and that place is lost unless he is given time to turn things around and get the squad he wants playing the way he wants them to.
This happened at Southampton and is courtesy of The Athletic:
Naturally, each coach has their own strengths and weaknesses and from Jones’ standpoint, there was friction with what he was trying to implement. Many believed he was working towards playing his preferred 3-5-2 shape. He ultimately played the system in his final game in charge against Wolves, making good on his promise after Brentford that he would no longer compromise.
Curiously, Ainsley Maitland-Niles was deployed as the third centre-back, while Duje Caleta-Car and Armel Bella-Kotchap — international-level defenders — were left out of the squad altogether. January signing Mislav Orsic was in the same boat, having been part of the matchday group at St Mary’s. It served as a sign of the growing animosity between Jones and a handful of players. Some thought they fell out of favour because they were not, in Jones’ opinion, diligent enough defensively.
No one can say that our players haven't bought into his ways. It's taken a while but we can now see the shape, solidity and commitment that the players are demonstrating. And the results have followed. We need to enjoy it all the times we can.
Agree with the above. Although this season will have to be considered a failure should we not go up, regardless of what Charlie boy will pipe up with.
Agree, although I think Charlie has recently said in one of his interviews, may be the last fans forum update (?), that "it's hard to talk about success when we are in League 1". Or something along those lines.
Jones needed to change his tactics and the vast majority new this and voiced this.
Whether he did so under his own volition, fan pressure, SMT pressure or owner pressure is unknown. It was possibly a combination of the above.
The hoof ball tactics were terminated. The introduction of width finally happened. We started to play football, passing the ball, players moving into space, running at the opposition, getting in behind them.
We started to score goals.
Jones is an oddball and clearly holds grudges. Even this week he was commenting on a fan criticising him at the Leyton Orient game in the Vertu trophy.
We look like a promotion challenging team now. I think we’ll make the playoffs and have a decent chance of winning at Wembley.
I was at that game, and the 'fan' in question gave NJ absolute dog's abuse...
To say it was 'agricultural', is putting it politely!
The football isn't recognisable from earlier in the season. If we had carried on as we were, we would be closer to relegation than the top6.
I was watching the highlights yesterday and it felt we pummeled their goal, similar to Stevenage. How quick we make moves at times and exploit the width. If our finishing was better we could be putting 4 or 5 past teams every game it feels like now.
A few of these players have progressed individually and the tactics have changed. That's a credit to Jones where it looked very much like he was going down the Southampton/Stoke route.
Jones needed to change his tactics and the vast majority new this and voiced this.
Whether he did so under his own volition, fan pressure, SMT pressure or owner pressure is unknown. It was possibly a combination of the above.
The hoof ball tactics were terminated. The introduction of width finally happened. We started to play football, passing the ball, players moving into space, running at the opposition, getting in behind them.
We started to score goals.
Jones is an oddball and clearly holds grudges. Even this week he was commenting on a fan criticising him at the Leyton Orient game in the Vertu trophy.
We look like a promotion challenging team now. I think we’ll make the playoffs and have a decent chance of winning at Wembley.
Doubt that. If he doesn't have the confidence to manage without letting fickle fans influence his team and tactics, I think the SMT should save money by ditching him and have us managed by a fan representative instead for less money.
What is our formation? It really is baffling me. It's listed as a 3-5-2, but I really don't think that's the case. It's a kind of hybrid. As far as I can see, Ramsay tucks into the centre with Jones and Gilesphey. Edwards plays as an old fashioned left back and doesn't venture up the pitch too much His counterpart Small spends much of the time higher up the pitch than TC.....And TC is a supposed to be in the two up top!..... that does most of his work out on the left flank. It's working, whatever it is. If I'm honest, I'm amazed we manage to keep our right side so well protected such is the vast gap between Ramsay and Small.
What is our formation? It really is baffling me. It's listed as a 3-5-2, but I really don't think that's the case. It's a kind of hybrid. As far as I can see, Ramsay tucks into the centre with Jones and Gilesphey. Edwards plays as an old fashioned left back and doesn't venture up the pitch too much His counterpart Small spends much of the time higher up the pitch than TC.....And TC is a supposed to be in the two up top!..... that does most of his work out on the left flank. It's working, whatever it is. If I'm honest, I'm amazed we manage to keep our right side so well protected such is the vast gap between Ramsay and Small.
It’s 5-3-2 when we defend and moves to 4-2-3-1 in attack. It’s great how it fits together and suits our players so well, despite the shift to 4-2-3-1 in attack not being the original plan.
It gets more out of TC as although he works hard he’s not a natural defender. It means his defensive weaknesses aren’t really an issue and he can focus on improving the attacking side of his game.
Small has the legs to get up and down the right, and he’s less predictable than on the left where the easy option was to drive down the line to get crosses in.
It suits Ramsay because despite his pace and close control he’s not great at offering width and getting crosses in. He’s better at sitting deep or cutting in and picking out a dangerous pass than he is bombing down the line, and he’s strong and good enough in the air for the hybrid RCB/RB role.
Then you have Docherty who is now playing to his strengths, he can support Coventry defensively and only has to get forward occasionally. It’s no surprise the midfield three look better now they’re getting on the ball more, and have outlets on both wings in TC and Small.
Edwards suits it too, he’s decent going forward which we still use at times, but sitting back gives TC space to work in.
The much better football also means Godden can play as the main striker, we don’t need a big target man as we not as direct as we were.
The rest of the team all benefit from us having a more balanced style. Jones is playing the best football of his career and Coventry would probably think so too.
Not going to quote to clog up the thread but I was looking at heat maps for the Pboro game and if my memory is right then one of Edwards red zones was halfway in the attacking half and in the inside channel. He’s still playing as a wing back. In possession Ramsay becomes a RB, Jones covers the right and centre and Gillesphey covers the left
Not going to quote to clog up the thread but I was looking at heat maps for the Pboro game and if my memory is right then one of Edwards red zones was halfway in the attacking half and in the inside channel. He’s still playing as a wing back. In possession Ramsay becomes a RB, Jones covers the right and centre and Gillesphey covers the left
That’ll vary game by game, I’m sure the average over the last few months would show Small spends a lot more time higher up the pitch than Edwards. Earlier in the season our RWB and LWBs were probably a lot closer in the areas they player on their flanks.
What is our formation? It really is baffling me. It's listed as a 3-5-2, but I really don't think that's the case. It's a kind of hybrid. As far as I can see, Ramsay tucks into the centre with Jones and Gilesphey. Edwards plays as an old fashioned left back and doesn't venture up the pitch too much His counterpart Small spends much of the time higher up the pitch than TC.....And TC is a supposed to be in the two up top!..... that does most of his work out on the left flank. It's working, whatever it is. If I'm honest, I'm amazed we manage to keep our right side so well protected such is the vast gap between Ramsay and Small.
It’s 5-3-2 when we defend and moves to 4-2-3-1 in attack. It’s great how it fits together and suits our players so well, despite the shift to 4-2-3-1 in attack not being the original plan.
It gets more out of TC as although he works hard he’s not a natural defender. It means his defensive weaknesses aren’t really an issue and he can focus on improving the attacking side of his game.
Small has the legs to get up and down the right, and he’s less predictable than on the left where the easy option was to drive down the line to get crosses in.
It suits Ramsay because despite his pace and close control he’s not great at offering width and getting crosses in. He’s better at sitting deep or cutting in and picking out a dangerous pass than he is bombing down the line, and he’s strong and good enough in the air for the hybrid RCB/RB role.
Then you have Docherty who is now playing to his strengths, he can support Coventry defensively and only has to get forward occasionally. It’s no surprise the midfield three look better now they’re getting on the ball more, and have outlets on both wings in TC and Small.
Edwards suits it too, he’s decent going forward which we still use at times, but sitting back gives TC space to work in.
The much better football also means Godden can play as the main striker, we don’t need a big target man as we not as direct as we were.
The rest of the team all benefit from us having a more balanced style. Jones is playing the best football of his career and Coventry would probably think so too.
Great tactical analysis, like a young Steve Brown. Jokes aside, this is a genuinely great explanation of the way we play.
Trusting the process wears a little thin when you've already had to trust it with Appleton, Garner, Peeters,Holden, Adkins,Robinson,......
Football supporters are known for having a short fuse. Ours is/ was longer than most. But when you've been served up shit year after year, you do tend to bang the table a little bit quicker than you would have done before.
Not going to quote to clog up the thread but I was looking at heat maps for the Pboro game and if my memory is right then one of Edwards red zones was halfway in the attacking half and in the inside channel. He’s still playing as a wing back. In possession Ramsay becomes a RB, Jones covers the right and centre and Gillesphey covers the left
That’ll vary game by game, I’m sure the average over the last few months would show Small spends a lot more time higher up the pitch than Edwards. Earlier in the season our RWB and LWBs were probably a lot closer in the areas they player on their flanks.
Totally, sorry should’ve made it clear that was more a response to the post above yours. Small definitely more advanced
If you want to catch a moment in time when things were looking grim check out Charlton live after the Crawley defeat. Plenty of people in the chat calling for Jones head and one comment stuck out to me in particular: "I've been following charlton. for many years, 60 years the football Jones playing is the worst I've seen... he needs to go now."
If the Crawley game were a standalone performance it would have been wrong to call for NJ's head. Instead we'd seen ten months of atrocious, grinding football. It was getting worse by the game, NJ was refusing to acknowledge how bad it was in post match interviews, nothing was changing and it didn't sound like he intended on changing anything. Like many others, I was calling for his head, in fact that was my position long before the Crawley game because I didn't even want to attend matches given our style of play.
I'm as delighted as anyone to have been proven wrong. NJ has found a formula that works and allows us to play his 'front footed' football. From what I've seen, the key change was the return of Thierry Small to the team. Ever since his return, the team have two pacey outlets on either side of the pitch. Previously we were so one dimensional and the players looked clueless in possession. Small on the right and TC on the left has put defences on the back foot. It has also stretched opposition defences and midfields because we can attack down either flank which has created more space for the central midfielders to start exerting themselves going forward (notably Berry). Godden also appears to have benefited with more pace in the box now that opposition defences are getting pulled to the flanks.
The danger now is the over-reliance on those two wide players. An injury to either one will severely upset the balance of the team. They are both playing extremely athletic positions and are exerting huge effort in every game. I felt January required at least one alternative pacey wide option. I hope the failure to get the lad from Sunderland does not come back to bite us, because there is a lot of football left to play in a short period of time.
I was certainly wrong about NJ. I thought he'd be too stubborn to change anything and felt we were heading nowhere with him. There is now a squad shaping up, which with some Summer additions, could be very strong next season. I think very few in this squad can step up to Championship level (unlike the class of 18/19), so I can handle another season in League 1 if it allows us to strengthen this Summer, but you never turn down a promotion if it is in the offing.
Some on here are quick to judge when there's no evidence of any progress, but hesitant to acknowledge it when there is, saying wait until the end of the season to form an opinion, but they're the ones who also said it was over before December and laughed at those arguing it wasn't.
Didn’t Jones himself admit he tried Small at RWB after someone said it in a Christmas card? Even Curbs in our PL heydays sometimes struggled to land on the right formation and combination of players early on. It takes time and sometimes a bit of luck before it clicks.
Two things that have most impressed in the turnaround:
Fitness levels, as many have said, enabling a settled team and late, late goals
Less remarked upon but equally as important - we are not overly reliant on just one or two players or a fixed system. If opponents double up on Small and TC, it just creates opportunities for Edwards, Ramsay, Berry etc. There is a fluidity and flexibility now in how we play - though sometimes it needs the occasional Jones reset eg after 30 mins when Ash gets injured 😃
Think some credit must go to the ownership / SMT for sticking with the plan. Maybe we will come to look back on this as the “new chair bounce”? It coincides directly with the appointment of Gavin Carter to that position.
After seasons of drudgery and despair it’s fantastic to be looking forward to the matches. Some big tests ahead over next few weeks but it’s wonderful to be back in contention and a million miles away from the feeling during and after Crawley.
If the Crawley game were a standalone performance it would have been wrong to call for NJ's head. Instead we'd seen ten months of atrocious, grinding football. It was getting worse by the game, NJ was refusing to acknowledge how bad it was in post match interviews, nothing was changing and it didn't sound like he intended on changing anything. Like many others, I was calling for his head, in fact that was my position long before the Crawley game because I didn't even want to attend matches given our style of play.
I'm as delighted as anyone to have been proven wrong. NJ has found a formula that works and allows us to play his 'front footed' football. From what I've seen, the key change was the return of Thierry Small to the team. Ever since his return, the team have two pacey outlets on either side of the pitch. Previously we were so one dimensional and the players looked clueless in possession. Small on the right and TC on the left has put defences on the back foot. It has also stretched opposition defences and midfields because we can attack down either flank which has created more space for the central midfielders to start exerting themselves going forward (notably Berry). Godden also appears to have benefited with more pace in the box now that opposition defences are getting pulled to the flanks.
The danger now is the over-reliance on those two wide players. An injury to either one will severely upset the balance of the team. They are both playing extremely athletic positions and are exerting huge effort in every game. I felt January required at least one alternative pacey wide option. I hope the failure to get the lad from Sunderland does not come back to bite us, because there is a lot of football left to play in a short period of time.
I was certainly wrong about NJ. I thought he'd be too stubborn to change anything and felt we were heading nowhere with him. There is now a squad shaping up, which with some Summer additions, could be very strong next season. I think very few in this squad can step up to Championship level (unlike the class of 18/19), so I can handle another season in League 1 if it allows us to strengthen this Summer, but you never turn down a promotion if it is in the offing.
With the power of hindsight though and reading his interview, was that refusal to acknowledge how bad it was not just protecting the players? Until recently we went through a phase of people being quite shitty about anything positive that Jones (or anyone) would say about our players. There was a running line on here where Jones once described Gillesphey as one of our best technicians and it came out in just about every post-match thread where we didn't win. Was Jones not just trying to give him a bit of confidence in the face of a bad run and the fact he's usually one of the targets for fans? Looks like it's paid off. He kept saying we were so close to being a good side and while that was incredibly hard to see at times, in the end wasn't he right?
It wasn't just adding pace to the side, it was figuring out a way to add real width to the side without compromising our defensive stability. We started the season with Edwards at LWB but he was injured 30 mins
into the second game and it meant we had pacy options on both flanks in
Ramsay and Small from then on. The balance wasn't right though and it's taken Jones a
while to find that, not helped by Ramsay going down injured against
Stockport and Watson straight after. In the old 352 our wingbacks just couldn't manage to carry out the two sides of the game. Ramsay is too defensive-minded and Edwards needs to join attacks later rather than start them off. Small was terrible at LWB this season and a lot of that was that he pushed high into the space where you'd ideally want someone like TC to be pulling into, meaning we had one viable wide option forward, TC could only really receive the ball with his back to goal and the right was occupied by a defensive RWB or a re-purposed centre back most of the time. Creating a lopsided formation that allowed us to use Small and TC's pace without them getting in each others' way and creating width on both sides of the pitch to force teams to spread themselves thinner, while still ensuring that our best defenders are on the pitch and playing as defenders has been the key and Jones deserves a lot of credit for arriving there even if it took longer than we would have liked. It's not a simple fix but it allowed the team to start showing what they're good at without throwing out the key requirements he's been hammering into them since he arrived.
I think Jones' biggest problem is that he's not always the best communicator. There's a way to protect your players and try and keep the fans onside in the face of growing criticism and I think he gets too prickly and defensive when he's asked about it. I don't think it would have hurt for him to acknowledge the poor performances a bit more rather than going down rabbit holes about the level of abuse he was receiving from fans. He's not wrong, some reactions have been way over the top this season, but in the end by focusing on that and not meeting fans at the level of their concern he added to the problem. I think he's also very much a "I can criticise my team but you can't'' sort of bloke. He was happy to acknowledge that the team weren't playing the way he wanted, that he didn't ask them to play a hoofball tactic and that it's not what was worked on in the week but not to give the fans any space to be upset with them. Even when we'd win he'd sometimes use that time to remind fans they'd been mean to him rather than enjoy the win. It's a pettiness that means when the chips are down he can get the whole world turning against him, but then that kind of uncontrolled passion is also what gets players bleeding out of their eyes on 94 minutes trying to get a goal for the team and sweeps fanbases along with him when it's going well. He's a weird guy basically, I think if he could moderate some of his behaviours he would be managing at a much higher level, but then he also wouldn't be our manager. We're also probably just one dip in form and a bad month away from the cycle repeating as well. I think it's a bit early for some of the humble pie people have been insisting on shoving in their faces in recent weeks. The season isn't over, we should just follow the way of Curbs and not let the highs get too high or the lows too low and all fight about it when the season ends.
Comments
NJ deserves credit for turning things around and I'm delighted that he has improved things. Not in my wildest dreams did I expect this run of results.
From the first game of the season Jones was critical about the quality on display in performances and responded to complaints about long ball football by pointing out that he wasn't telling the players to play that way and they weren't doing what they'd worked on. Everything was static and narrow and rubbish and eventually he found a way to add width higher up the pitch that let us keep our solidity and now we're in good form. His ways are the same though; he's demanding, specific and focused on a very certain way of playing, which is based on aggressive pressing, defensive shape and maximum fitness levels so that tiring opposition teams can be pounced on.
Nothing has changed in that respect and by all accounts he's still an absolute lunatic in the way he goes about things but the players are buying into it. At Southampton and Stoke he had too big a job because he came into teams where players didn't like the focus on total effort-based commitment to the cause and the sidelining of maverick creativity. Jones has always been a manager to change up his on-pitch approach - he famously made multiple formation changes across matches at Southampton and they ended up using 55 players across the course of the season - and the setup we're using now is our 4th of the season, but his ways have remained consistent throughout that. The only revising of history is to think that Jones has changed anything about his management style. He's the same and so is his approach, it's just he's found a shape that works for the team.
1 - the playing style and tactics;
2 - how he handles himself and manages players.
1 has changed drastically. That is what I was referring to. 2 hasn't changed as you say, but actually I never felt that was the major problem, the players clearly bought into him last season and early season in terms of his man management etc, and it only started to look like it might be an issue when it became clear that 1 was causing us huge issues.
Anyway, whatever. I'm loving the run and hope to the high heavens that Jones' continues to make the doubters like me look foolish!
Agree with the above. Although this season will have to be considered a failure should we not go up, regardless of what Charlie boy will pipe up with.
At the end of November all the signs were bad. The results were unsatisfactory. The style of football was ineffective and very very tough to watch. The fans were losing patience and the manager was getting increasingly chippy and confrontational in interviews and towards the fans. The calls from the fans for a change in approach only seemed to make the manager double down and become more stubbornly attached to the way we were doing things. Everything felt like it was coming to a head that was likely to be Jones getting sacked. I was frankly quite surprised that he was not fired after Crawley as the whole situation and the nature of the performance felt so similar to when previous managers had finally come to the end of the road. If we'd had the good form first and then hit a sticky patch it would've changed the context and the narrative, but, at the time, it was bad form on top of multiple bad seasons and even the better results in August and September were not backed up by impressive performances. That all played its part in casting a very negative light on where things were at.
To suggest that the idea it was time Jones went or any concerns about where things were heading were somehow stupid or unreasonable is an oversimplification of the situation and very disrespectful to some of the people expressing such concerns. Read back on this thread and post-match threads around that time, it's not just your usual knee jerk over-reactors - there's people like Henry Irving, Scoham, Covered End, and AFKA expressing serious concerns and struggling to see a light at the end of the tunnel - these are respected posters and people who tend to express considered and objective opinions based on evidence not emotion. That is the position we were in.
The people who were still calling for patience deserve credit and have been proven right. No arguments there. However, I'm not sure anyone can really claim to have been smarter than everyone else in this situation because when you look at the tone of those posts calling for patience it wasn't so much people saying NJ deserves more time because of this improvement or that improvement, or because we can see this is improving because whatever reason; it was more people saying we can't just keep sacking managers and we need to stick with one at some point and hope it works out. Yes, there was the argument that NJ's previous record at Luton suggested he might be our best hope in a while, but again it was more hope than evidence-based expectation. Callum is perhaps the shining light who might be able to claim some "told you so" points on this one, but he admits he was losing faith after the Crawley game and I don't believe even he saw the form of the last 13 games coming. Any lingering hope we might still make the play-offs was that we might sneak in round the back late in the season. No one was predicting we'd have smashed the front door down and be sat on the couch with a cup of tea and a plate of biscuits with a third of the season still to go.
If anything, I think you could argue that the turnaround vindicates those expressing reasonable concerns because a common theme of those posts was a call to switch to a less long ball style and introduce some pace into the team; it's really since we've started to do those things that performances have improved. Credit to NJ for making those changes. He's shown himself to be less stubborn than his post-match demeanor in November suggested he is and it's probably saved our season. Now we have recovered to a good league position, hopefully we can sustain solid form and by the end of this season that dreadful form and football played in October and November is a distant memory and an irrelevant footnote to the story of a successful season.
The hoofball was at its worst when we had the most injuries. To me that was just jones trying his best to pick up points with what he has available, it wasn’t a good idea and that Crawley game was dreadful, but people jumped the gun way too quickly to call for his head
Whether he did so under his own volition, fan pressure, SMT pressure or owner pressure is unknown. It was possibly a combination of the above.
The hoof ball tactics were terminated.
The introduction of width finally happened.
We started to play football, passing the ball, players moving into space, running at the opposition, getting in behind them.
We started to score goals.
Jones is an oddball and clearly holds grudges.
Even this week he was commenting on a fan criticising him at the Leyton Orient game in the Vertu trophy.
We look like a promotion challenging team now.
I think we’ll make the playoffs and have a decent chance of winning at Wembley.
To say it was 'agricultural', is putting it politely!
I was watching the highlights yesterday and it felt we pummeled their goal, similar to Stevenage. How quick we make moves at times and exploit the width. If our finishing was better we could be putting 4 or 5 past teams every game it feels like now.
A few of these players have progressed individually and the tactics have changed. That's a credit to Jones where it looked very much like he was going down the Southampton/Stoke route.
It really is baffling me.
It's listed as a 3-5-2, but I really don't think that's the case. It's a kind of hybrid.
As far as I can see, Ramsay tucks into the centre with Jones and Gilesphey.
Edwards plays as an old fashioned left back and doesn't venture up the pitch too much
His counterpart Small spends much of the time higher up the pitch than TC.....And TC is a supposed to be in the two up top!..... that does most of his work out on the left flank.
It's working, whatever it is.
If I'm honest, I'm amazed we manage to keep our right side so well protected such is the vast gap between Ramsay and Small.
It gets more out of TC as although he works hard he’s not a natural defender. It means his defensive weaknesses aren’t really an issue and he can focus on improving the attacking side of his game.
Small has the legs to get up and down the right, and he’s less predictable than on the left where the easy option was to drive down the line to get crosses in.
It suits Ramsay because despite his pace and close control he’s not great at offering width and getting crosses in. He’s better at sitting deep or cutting in and picking out a dangerous pass than he is bombing down the line, and he’s strong and good enough in the air for the hybrid RCB/RB role.
Then you have Docherty who is now playing to his strengths, he can support Coventry defensively and only has to get forward occasionally. It’s no surprise the midfield three look better now they’re getting on the ball more, and have outlets on both wings in TC and Small.
Edwards suits it too, he’s decent going forward which we still use at times, but sitting back gives TC space to work in.
The much better football also means Godden can play as the main striker, we don’t need a big target man as we not as direct as we were.
The rest of the team all benefit from us having a more balanced style. Jones is playing the best football of his career and Coventry would probably think so too.
The football was awful before the turn around, plenty of managers have been sacked for less.
Football supporters are known for having a short fuse. Ours is/ was longer than most.
But when you've been served up shit year after year, you do tend to bang the table a little bit quicker than you would have done before.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=naKlQoCD_kc
Also the table makes for interesting reading after that game, never imagined we could be sitting here in 5th a couple months later!
I'm as delighted as anyone to have been proven wrong. NJ has found a formula that works and allows us to play his 'front footed' football. From what I've seen, the key change was the return of Thierry Small to the team. Ever since his return, the team have two pacey outlets on either side of the pitch. Previously we were so one dimensional and the players looked clueless in possession. Small on the right and TC on the left has put defences on the back foot. It has also stretched opposition defences and midfields because we can attack down either flank which has created more space for the central midfielders to start exerting themselves going forward (notably Berry). Godden also appears to have benefited with more pace in the box now that opposition defences are getting pulled to the flanks.
The danger now is the over-reliance on those two wide players. An injury to either one will severely upset the balance of the team. They are both playing extremely athletic positions and are exerting huge effort in every game. I felt January required at least one alternative pacey wide option. I hope the failure to get the lad from Sunderland does not come back to bite us, because there is a lot of football left to play in a short period of time.
I was certainly wrong about NJ. I thought he'd be too stubborn to change anything and felt we were heading nowhere with him. There is now a squad shaping up, which with some Summer additions, could be very strong next season. I think very few in this squad can step up to Championship level (unlike the class of 18/19), so I can handle another season in League 1 if it allows us to strengthen this Summer, but you never turn down a promotion if it is in the offing.
Some on here are quick to judge when there's no evidence of any progress, but hesitant to acknowledge it when there is, saying wait until the end of the season to form an opinion, but they're the ones who also said it was over before December and laughed at those arguing it wasn't.
Two things that have most impressed in the turnaround:
Fitness levels, as many have said, enabling a settled team and late, late goals
Less remarked upon but equally as important - we are not overly reliant on just one or two players or a fixed system. If opponents double up on Small and TC, it just creates opportunities for Edwards, Ramsay, Berry etc. There is a fluidity and flexibility now in how we play - though sometimes it needs the occasional Jones reset eg after 30 mins when Ash gets injured 😃