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Postao/la osgood » 12 feb 2019, 09:38
covjek fino objasnio
I wake this morning with a dull ache of anger mixed with resignation. We are now onto our third manager with a similar scenario. The players seem to lose faith in the manager and seemingly down tools on the pitch. But I think the problems lie much deeper than that, as do most of you.
We have now lost from the squad the players from the Ranieri/Mourinho squad era, fashioned under Hutchinson/Birch/Kenyon. As Darren put, the players brought in, supposedly in the Guardiola mould, too much reliance was put on technical ability, rather than character. As the great Peter Osgood said about the 1970/71 team, they had the right blend of Dogs and Assassins. That can't be said of the current team.
Abamovich has surrounded himself with Yes men; gradually divesting the club of anyone who might know more about a subject than him, and who may potentially say NO to one of his decisions. Emenalo is a case in point. He has been lauded for the quality of the players he brought in. I say that anyone associated with football can spot a decent player. Someone with genuine knowledge can work out if that player has the right character to bring something extra to a team. At Monaco they made short work of sussing him out.
Under Conte and Mourinho the Board seemed to fail to bring in the key targets that the managers had identified, or make the wholesale squad changes they had asked for. That seems to be the case with Sarri. But, and this is why I wanted Conte and Mourinho to be sacked, and why I want Sarri to go the same way - even when they complained and almost downed tools themselves, why did none of the managers drop all the players they complained about? Why did they keep the same selections with the same results? If they knew they'd get sacked over results, performances and league positions, why did none of them change starting 11s from available personnel, and change formation, if necessary, to suit? Why did none of them chuck in a number of youth players, to prove a point? And I don't mean the 6 kids chucked on in a League cup game which we lost by Benitez. I mean in the fashion that Conte did in the FA Cup, with Chalobah, Lofus Cheek and a spine of 1st teamers. We won. We played well. Then he sold Chalobah.
Sarri deserves the boot for saying that he doesn't understand the players' mentality; he doesn't understand where it went wrong on the pitch; he will not consider Plan B until the players understand Plan A; it's HIS football or nothing; his refusal to see that his football is not working in the Premier League and that it has been sussed by every coach and manager. He also fails to see that the players don't like working to his instructions and like Conte and Mourinho he fails to take action and drop those who considers the biggest culprits, and bring in others, no matter how little experience they may have. If you know what the ending is going to be, why not make the best job of getting results, by changing as much as you can, rather than doing the same old thing and getting the same poor result?
Yes, we have won 15 major trophies in 16 years. It's been awesome, Beyond imagination. Yet we are run worse than a 2nd rate Sunday League team, with selection based on who owns the minibus and provides the kit and balls. It's no good talking about a Director of Football, which any rational team at our level would want, because of the Personality of our owner. The fact that our owner has chosen to stay away because of the Visa problem, in spite of him being allowed to visit under his Israeli visa, might be indicative of other problems. As Tariq Panda has pointed out on twitter, the club still retain the Bank who could advise on any potential sale, yet as Peter said, what would the British Government's attitude be to any money changing hands?
Sarri cannot be allowed to carry on selecting the same old team, with the same substitutions at a similar time, with a similar series of results, after using the same old tactics, whilst changing absolutely nothing. No flexibility. More worrying is that he is the 3rd manager in a row to follow the same course. The solution? After reading the above, and with Roman not selling, I have no idea. Win or Lose, Up the Blues. And fuck the owner, board, manager and players.