cityfanlee23

If we get promoted I'll be really excited to see how his game can transition, feel like he can offer so much more going forward but often is not able to get the space to do so because of the low block we often face. I still think he has more in the tank if given the space and freedom to play.

It almost feels like maybe Winks has misspoken or not really given context, surely there must be drills right? I'd be shocked if up to this point, we did not have a consistent attacking routine being put in place, but then when you look at the amount of times we waste transitions it almost seems like we don't. As much as I'm critical of Enzo something inside me refuses to believe it's as cut and dry as it sounds. Creative freedom is perfect especially given just how tricky our wingers can be, but you need a foundation understanding and then you allow the freedom to innovate.

I was very intrigued by this until I saw that it was a 10 man Sheffield United lol. Will be interesting to see if there are any extended results to see how they setup

Yeah, and I'm happy to concede that and I was not trying to say that it was concrete as all I could mention was what I saw and the LCFC commentary was just supplementary to my point and did seem to align with what I was seeing in that moment. It could be any reason obviously, but given we have been doing this in every game it seemed logical to me that he was applauding the recycling of possession but I could easily be wrong, it's impossible to prove or disprove so I'm just basing it on what I've seen so far, and to add some more balance to this, I noted in midweek there was a few moments where Enzo was jumping on the sideline screaming for them to get forward and transition, which I think is why I have taken the position I have since I've seen him screaming them forward before. This is something I saw with Puel too where he had a very possession-based system but often players ended up recycling for the sake of recycling and Puel was left visibly angry on the sidelines screaming them forward. On a side note, and not a criticism at all because I think your posts have been balanced for a long time and this season you've been quite critical but also understanding of Enzo and the style, it seems in the last couple of games you've warmed to it a bit more? I'm not saying you've moved position significantly, just noticed your posts seem to be arguing a bit more in favour than they you were before, has anything changed for you?

This is a typical Foxestalk response, by me suggesting not applauding and seemingly encouraging recycling possession when we have a clear overload and loads of space behind the full-back, that obviously means I'm saying shout and scream at players and promote bad man management. Seriously? We've been doing this exact same thing in most games this season where we have a clear chance to attack and we break down our own attack by making the decision to pass it backward or second guess taking on a full back, I'm not saying we should full attack every situation, but so many occasions this season we have wasted transitions by slowing it down and killing the move off, it seems very clear to me that Enzo has a very similar approach to "choosing the right moment" as Puel did, Puel frequently frustrated fans by insisting that we endlessly recycle play until the perfect opportunity comes, and it rarely did. It seems obvious to me that the amount of "patience" we play with is being drilled into the team, I'm fine with having patience but amount we have is stifling so many opportunities.

Possibly, but I don’t see why you’d want Fatawu controlled in those situations, we wasted so many great opportunities and very nearly paid the price.

So the commentators were lying then. I watched Fatawu stop an attack and pass it back and the commentators immediately noted that Enzo was encouraging it and said he had done it multiple times. all I can say is what I saw which was players opting to stop a clear dangerous opportunity to pass it backwards and kill it off, maybe they saw something I didn’t but it happened multiple times. I can then only add what was said by the commentary who noted the same thing as me, but with their perspective being that it was being encouraged by the manager, that part i didn’t see but I have no reason to believe the commentators were making it up since it happened multiple times. respect your posts a lot but these “nuh uh” responses don’t really add much. Given the sheer amount of times we have absolutely wasted attacks with sideways and backwards passing throughout the season I really struggle to find any other logical reasoning other than it’s being encouraged. Agree with the last part though, it’s exactly what Puel wanted, Puel constantly referenced picking the right moment and that we should encourage recycling to be ball until a better opportunity arises. Unfortunately for Puel those opportunities rarely came, thankfully they have come for us so far this season, I don’t believe it’s the system that has been primarily responsible for that, a mixture of system tiring teams out and having the quality to grind out games.

Most managers in the world would say not taking advantage of an overload when your opposition our out of position is the wrong decision. Just because Enzo applauded it doesn’t make it right, according to commentators he was seemingly encouraging it on multiple occasions but obviously I can’t confirm this. Im making my point based on what I’m seeing players actually doing on the pitch and the commentators spotting it also and then adding that Enzo seemed to be encouraging it. your argument against that is “nuh uh” And that’s fine we are all entitled to opinions but you’d be hard pressed to find someone on the forum that doesn’t think we often give good chances away to pass it backwards.

If that was the case we would be scoring far more easily than we are now, far more often than not we pass it backwards rather than look for the killer ball, although today we were more progressive. Doesn’t seem logical to clap a player making the wrong decision though.

Maybe, but if that wasn’t the case why does he applaud passing the ball backwards when Fatawu has their right back out of position and Ndidi had bombed forward unmarked? Surely if he just wanted to score he would be jumping up and down gesturing him forward rather than applauding passing it back?

Fundamentally it sounds great, but in reality we had multiple occasions today where we either had Ndidi creating an overload for Fatawu or WBAs right back out of position and Enzo was shouting instructions to pass it backwards then applauding it according to LCFC commentary. It seems counter intuitive for Enzo to not want us to attack when WBA are in a vulnerable position so I don’t think he genuinely wants that, but at the same time I think Enzo seems like a perfectionist who wants to counter in a very specific way, created by the passing, and when chances that were not a direct result of drawing players out arise he doesn’t think it’s valuable to attack them. It makes no sense for him to not want to attack but it also makes no sense for him to be visibly applauding Fatawu passing the ball backwards when he has a defender out of position with Ndidi in the channel ahead of him on his own.

Compared to the last few performances we did have a few periods where we looked progressive but across the entire match I still believe we stifle ourself more than we unlock our potential. The moments where we just went for it we looked great, then immediately reverted to “control” where we do absolutely nothing and constantly lose possession. we need to find a balance between control and attack, Right now it’s either on or off and it isn’t effective. WBA were well drilled but we had the quality to put this game to bed.

Both goals today scored when we just went for it. In the 72nd minute when we scored, from that moment on there was about 4-5 occasions where Fatawu and Mavididi got the ball and Ndidi/Winks made themselves available in strong positions and they opted to pass backwards, commentary claimed that Enzo was seemingly instructing that and applauding them passing it back instead of killing the game off. Inevitably WBA stole it back at the end and we looked to be buried, once again we scored when we dropped the system at the end and were forced to go for it. When we attack we can be incredible, when we follow the system we completely stifle ourselves. At the moment it seems like an ON/OFF switch rather than a dial and we need to find a balance between the two and we might actually produce some good football. For the majority of that match I was actually having to stop myself turning it off to go out into the -1c weather to go and pull out a broken heater fan in the car and replace it with the new one. Glad we got the result, but only when we went for it. These players would be far more dangerous under a lot of other managers even from this league. Half of me keeps saying Enzo needs time, the other half says he isn’t learning and if he goes tomorrow I’ll be thankful for him turning the ship around but wouldn’t be that sad if he left. Please fix this Enzo, the system isn’t working to maximize our players or potential, and an 8 isn’t going to solve it.

Enzo has been purposefully instructing us to pass the ball backwards. Don’t ****ing forget that. Bored of this shit.

Can’t see Enzo so can’t confirm but commentary saying that multiple times Mavididi and Fatawu have chosen to pass the ball back and been applauded by Enzo.

And this is exactly why I don’t like Enzo ball. We are capable of fantastic play, but the system will take over again and stop it happening again.

And to accompany that based on the match some really overcooked potatoes with no seasoning?

We are learning on the job, beat everyone with that free kick

Any suggestions for dinner tonight?

Atleast we can say the fans are learning from mistakes 🙃

We have a team more than capable of playing fantastic football that is solid and exciting that would create clear cut chances, but they cannot do that in this system. If the players are not good enough to play the system effectively then what is the point? I really don’t think signing a #8 is going to resolve this. We play so slowly the 8 is not going to have any space to run into anyway. ffs I’m yearning for a 442 😭

I thought first 15 was a positive sign but it’s just pretty negative again since. I’m open to changing my mind over the rest of the season but at this point just give me Jesse 😂

I’m not sure what’s worse, Nacho or Enzo’s refusal to try Cannon.

Yeah the opening 15 minutes of us pushing into WBA’s half seems like a long time ago now 😂

I think we’ve actually been far more progressive today and needed that for a while now, but it’s scary how fast we switch off.