Gubbins

If the weak mentality in big games is a real thing then I think wel blow the title. Should still manage to go up automatically but I really think next season in the prem will be a horror show. We won't have the massively superior quality anymore which our style of play ideally needs and it seems we still won't be able to grind out results.

Its surely a mixture of both the opposition and the way we play. We could try something different rather than relentless controlled possesion but choose not too and even when we do it is often eventually abandoned for more cb passing drills. Even if you're right I still find the thing exhaustingly dull to watch which just goes to show that it's modern football and not just maresca ball that I don't like.

Haha I actually brought up that man utd game the other night with my dad citing it as one of the main reasons teams now almost exclusively play with inverted wingers rather than getting to the byline and crossing it in. Forgotten it was as high as 81 failed crosses though. Hoofball wise I remember back when puel was taking loads of abuse on here sticking up for him and comparing what he was trying to achieve favourably to Shakespeare who had his team playing a style that could best be described as 'defend for your lives and hoof it for vardy to chase'. They would rarely make it past 3 touches of the ball before giving it away. Watching Howard flick a hoof on to the opposition/give a foul away alway used to enrage me as well so I'm def not pining for a return to an at this point prehistoric style. Someone made the point earlier that we have now been playing a similar possesion style since 2018 now and whilst there's been differences particularly in the early Rodgers years I think some people just want a more obvious change. Maybe there is more purpose to marescas football but on the surface which is what the majority of people will see, vestergaard to faes to Doyle to hermanson to vestergaard is very similar to faes to amartey to Justin to ward to faes. I appreciate you trying to get people to look at the game differently but certainly in my case and i suspect many others my eyes generally follow the ball. I'm at the game to hopefully see leicester try their best to get that ball in the opposition net and even if I could start following the oppositions lines movements I'm doubt I'd find it particularly exhilarating and thinking multiple steps ahead is just not how I watch football and why I can't really enjoy our current play style.

I do think a large part of the dissatisfaction that I and many others feel is just to do with the current stage of football evolution (God that sounds rubbish!). Not being a tactics nerd I'd often in recent years watch us fail to get past a low block or get pressed into mistakes whilst in possesion and be completely clueless about what we could do to counter these tactics. I fully understand how our endless passing about in our half is supposed to eventually both draw out the low block, get past the press and eventually tire out the other team. Its proven (against poor quality opponents) to work well, sporadically it looks really good and goodness knows I can't think of another method to do it. This is probably the way most top clubs will move towards playing for the next few years. However I hate it. When the opposition aren't drawn out far enough it is literally just the cbs and goalkeeper passing to each other, yes eventually itl work but it's a drag having to wait for it to happen and frustrating as all hell when we do break the press only to quite often turn around and start over again, sometimes out of necessity, sometimes seemingly not. The comparisons to chess have been made a few times on this thread and there is a reason why it's not a big spectator sport. Part of me would honestly like to give up on football as not really enjoying watching us when we're winning combined with the cheating, greed, VAR, media bias and all the other awful stuff that makes up football nowadays should be the final nail in the coffin. It's just very hard to kick a 30 year habit.

It's hardly that new a style, it's a more successful variation on Rodgers 'horseshoe of doom' as much as anything and i expect it to flop hard in the prem next year. I fear this is the way modern football has gone at the top levels though. It's now quite often the better quality team hogging the ball whilst the other team sits in an organised low block frustrating and hoping to hit on the break. Ferocious pressing often adds some chaos and fun but overall I and it seems a good percentage of us don't really enjoy it and go more out of habit and the eternal hope that things will get better. Can def see myself not bothering at all within the next 10 years if football continues on this course.

But we pass teams to death primarily with our defenders in our own half. Effective or not it isn't possible to make that entertaining to watch. It's painfully similar to how we played under puel and latter years Rodgers. The main difference being we are no longer playing teams with enough quality to press us into mistakes and then successfully exploit them.

Thought we looked really good for the first 15 to 20 mins but looked dull and at times quite poor after up until we scored again. There is a real joyless feel to this season both on the pitch and in the stands. I think its partly just a symptom of the way modern football has gone but the possesion at all costs style play really isn't a fun watch even though its effective. Its made worse by the fact we are clearly levels above most of teams we play. I'm also more convinced than ever that we will be annihilated by most prem sides if we keep playing this way next year. We won't play any side as bad as Swansea in the prem and their pressing had us under the cosh for most of the 2nd half until we got a dodgy pen to pull away from them. Gonna have to be some major changes to our style of play if we're to have a chance of staying up.

Never really got the dislike for True Detective s2. Obviously a step below s1 but it's still got that hbo standard quality.

As far as I'm concerned if we rigidly stick with the current version of Enzo ball in the prem we will be well adrift at the bottom of the league and probably looking for a new manager this time next year. It is telling that whenever the shortcomings this style represents in the prem are brought up the stock replies are 'let's worry about/enjoy getting out of this division first' or 'well wel just sign better players', of which we'd need well over a half a dozen of much much better quality without breaking the bank to even stand a chance. Given the wages he'd prob want and how atrocious he was at prem level previously it would be nuts resigning vestergarrd given that the system he thrives in would absolutely have to change.

Wish people would stop using that bloody 'on another day...' excuse. May as well be chatting about the butterfly effect or the infinite universes theory. Yes on another day their keeper let's those shots in and we win but equally on another quite different day he still saves them, the defender clears rather than scores an og and we lose the game rather than draw. Again on another another day almost every shot we have goes in and we completely stuff them which is much better than the another day when the ref sends one of our players off and we lose to a really dodgy penalty, similarly on another day... ad infinitum.

The first goal , Chilwells low power shot at his near post is easily the worst of the Chelsea game. Could make the top 5 of his blunders for the season, strong competition though! Will believe this transfer when I see it. Surely no one at any half decent level would be genuinely interested in the hopeless prat, it just makes zero sense.

Will be sad to see him go but he's way past it now and is barely up to it at Championship level which is mostly Godawful. Think the people calling for him to get a final big payday from either ourselves or abroad seriously underestimate how much dough he's made over the last decade. He must be worth at least £30m!

I know he's playing a character but dear God I hope Leon retires that twat Covington at the weekend. He's like the personification of a youtube keyboard warrior. You know hel bring trump into the ring If he wins as well. I just won't be able to watch!

Is it possible for this group of players to 'master' this system (regular 85% possession each match, several hundred completed passes per centre back per game, winning most games by 2 goals rather than 1?) bearing in mind it's only got another 30 odd games together as a team? If we go up the turnover of players will be huge and they will all have to learn how to master this system all whilst being pressed into oblivion by far far better sides. If we don't go up theyl still be a high player turnover and itl show that marescas all out possesion tactic is horribly flawed anyway. Exclusively mastering this one way of playing is daft given wel just have to go through the whole process again next season regardless.

Are we still trying to apply the fundamentals? Bar the first few games the level of performance has been pretty consistent all season. I genuinely believe this current group are playing this style of football about as well as they can. They have in effect 'clicked', there's not gonna be some massive improvement where we start annihilating teams.

It was to promote Saudi Arabia as the next home of heavyweight boxing and make Fury, Ngannou and their various hangers on shit loads of Saudi oil money and grifted ppv buys. The event really should have been called 'The Cash Grab in Riyadh.'

How do people see the fights going this weekend? As a big volkanovski fan I really hope he gets the job done but the short notice against someone as good as makhachev doesn't fill me with confidence. If anyone can though its volk! Bit more hopeful that usman so long as he's in decent shape can derail the chimaev hype train. Dana White privilege is against him though as its depressingly obvious that DW is desperate for chimaev to be a champ so he can milk the Islamic coin some more. Suspect Usman will need a finish as much like the Burns fight a reasonably close decision only goes one way.

I think there is a chance that some fundamental VAR changes might come from that Liverpool offside blunder. If it happened against say Wolves or Brentford I'm sure it would be swept under the carpet after a day or so but such a blatant mistake happening against the darling Scousers means it will get far more media attention. Liverpool themselves are also gonna complain harder than most clubs (it means more remember!) and are less likely to be fobbed off by the authorities with them not wanting to offend one of their golden geese.

I'm not having that Liverpool were a team with low possesion or didn't face countless low blocks yet they didn't play anything like man city and could overwhelm teams incl man city themselves. The question was what tactics could we use other what we have been so far this season. If we are going to try and copy another side then I strongly believe we'd be more entertained and no worse off aping liverpools style rather than man city. It is more reliant on energy and fitness as opposed to technical skill which many of our players lack and as I said would be more useful in the prem assuming we go up. Playing the current style in the prem remotely successfully would require multiple expensive upgrades across the entire squad.

Good teams for sure but the majority of championship teams are garbage, so it would still work in this division and probably involve significantly less passing between our centre backs. And whilst some teams may have worked out how to play out from the press the majority figured out how to deal with possesion football long ago. Itl work in this division more often than not due to the inferior opponent's but if we go up itl just be Rodgers ball all over again. Teams presses will panic our defenders and defences will just sit in and wait until we inevitably lose possesion and break on us. With the quality of players we're likely to have I just don't see how heavy possesion football will work for us certainly in the medium term.

Surely the alternative to a lidl version of man citys relentless possesion would be an aldi version of Liverpools relentless press which most prem teams seem to use. Its definitely more entertaining to watch and assuming we go back up will see us carved open by prem teams a lot less.