old koppite

I expected/hoped he would improve our midfield - he didn’t. For me we need a fresh coaching team .

I wonder if the board will look at the draws we got against Boro away, Ipswich Hull and Millwall ( some of which we could/should have won), and as they were all teams pushing for promotion at the time, see GR as the man for the job.

Why? I only saw the last 20 minutes and it looked to me like they wanted to win it , their fans were singing in the sunshine and happy they were staying up. It’s just speculation and ifs and buts. If we had needed a win and they did too, we could speculate GR would have risked JJ from the start, and gone for his favoured “experience “. Our last few games when we had enough chances to win each one, might have given us confidence to give it a good go today. Anyway, such a depressing season.

It’s such a lame excuse to say he hasn’t had players around him to trust. I don’t believe he has thought that anyway. He’s been too greedy for too many games this season. There are enough players in our team with sufficient skill to play a simple pass and move with and he’d get the ball back in space ( which most of the teams we lost to did with ease). His crossing in the last free weeks has been atrocious ( that’s supposed to be a basic strength of a good winger). He has been mostly poor this season ( his goals were great) due to his own lack of application and/or a failure by each manager and coach to control him.

But I thought we were blaming him for the Portsmouth goal, and for not being commanding enough generally on crosses and corners?

I know there were so many other games, but another 2 points against Hull and 1 at Portsmouth, and we’d have had WBA , Charlton and Portsmouth bricking it with us. I’m not watching tonight. Hope JJ gets a great send off and Ramsay shows his real talent ( embarrassing on Tuesday but clearly not match sharp). Ah well….

I can’t decide if it would harm a young player or not. Thinking back to a long time ago when I moved up from youth to men’s football at 16/17 I was just proud to be playing with the men, and chuffed to bits if I got a tiny bit of praise. If I was playing in a poor side which was losing, it didn’t matter to me as I was only interested in my own performance and contribution. I just wanted to play as much as possible. If I beat an oldie on the other team, often simply by being fitter and quicker , I’d be over the moon. I think at times Page and the others brought that fearless energy and youthful turn of pace which gave us a bit of hope. Remembering a young Rooney when he first hit the headlines ( against Arsenal?). On balance, I’d include some in tonight’s squad and try to get them on in the second half depending on the situation, and definitely involve them more at Blackburn

He said today our xG had been through the roof- is that true?

Yes

He is technically the best though? I thought he might be at one time, but on reflection his shooting is poor ( again last night he wasted an attacking move when we needed a winning goal by a poor shot from distance) , he rarely tackles, doesn’t win headers, can’t sustain high energy over 90 minutes, doesn’t dribble. He does have good control and first touch, usually finds a pass out of a tight space but rarely produces a defence splitting pass. I’d say JJ is better technically and all round. (Oh, and last night he failed again with a half hearted effort to stop the pass into our box for their equaliser).

Blimey we’ve made the BBC 1 lunchtime news .

Yes, he had a torrid first half against their winger. Luckily for Luke their lad didn’t come back out for the second- maybe that’s partly why LT had a good 2nd half, and really gave it his all! Still overall he had a crap season.

Couldn’t believe he was jogging at times when we were on the attack , but had only come on as sub 10 minutes before !

Luke T breathes a sigh of relief

I can see what you mean, but I’m not convinced so far. I stick by what I’ve said about his midfield knowledge though, and expected to see some or more improvement at least, but we’ve continued to be woefully lacking in that area. We all love him and want him to succeed - he seems to be a genuinely nice bloke. Yes, you’re right about bosses, and I’ve also ignored suggestions from my employees when I was a boss as well 😂!

No he doesn’t.

He said he didn’t want to be a manager and looked worried to death in the pressers. The bigger issue for me is he’s been a coach from pre season, was in Martis ear and GRs ear during the games, was a central midfielder himself for years with his strengths as a grafter yet our midfield is awful! It’s a definite no for AK for me.

I’d define the best model to aim for as a dm as our brilliant Kante. Protect the back line consistently ( Winks doesn’t), great engine (Winks hasn’t ), always available for a pass (Winks isn’t) always moving (Winks strolls most of the game), gives 100% every game (Winks doesn’t) , has a positive effect on team mates . Yes, I’ve just watched the LCFC highlights- that was a good cross in for the Daka header, but I didn’t see any of the long forward passes you’re talking about , and the free kick near the end was dreadful ( I think the comms on my stream were gobsmacked).In fact the best forward passes was by BDCR first half to Abdul (both also crap yesterday). I didn’t say the loss was his fault. I just don’t agree he , or anyone, had a good game. I believe he plays most games without showing his full potential, so implying a weak mental attitude.

I didn’t notice him having a good game. Are there any stats to check? His terrible free kick in the 2nd half sticks in my mind- I think it was after we were 1 down and when we needed players like him with his reputed great technique to deliver but again he failed. As to his shooting for one with so much talent, jeez 🙄

Enzo liked it.

So poor wasn’t it, and Abdul was part of that huddle but wasn’t facing the corner taker and instead was looking in the opposite direction at one of their big lads!

Well done for speaking up- you spoke for thousands of us. Sorry you had the expense of watching that gutless performance by them

Completely agree. I’ve been saying the same about Skipps effort for a while on here, but some others laughed and said Winks is much better and should always start before Skipp. If the others had put as much effort in we’d be mid table comfortably ( just like those teams we’ve lost to and who have players with his application and team spirit). We could have seen this season out and look to bring in the right type of players and some academy lads in the summer.

And Winks, after all the effort to run back from their box , didn’t anticipate their lad might pass to the scorer , so Winks had slowed his running! LT feeble again- that was the moment we needed him to do his trademark jump on the oppos back !

I’m not buying into this excuse of “the players can’t play any other way”. They are pros, they’ve played the game from an early age, they have the best fitness facilities, support of paid fitness coaches and physios, and access to all manner of aids to improve their skills and game. So GR, AK and the rest should be able to coach them to press properly, contest every second ball, mark their man or their zone, run hard, raise their effort when the team is struggling, accept and follow a change in formation or structure etc etc. Why can’t we do that as a team? Other teams in this division have over the course of this season. In our great escape season I remember we’d start games at full throttle, maintain it until about 60 minutes - although we’d often be knackered , with fresh legs on and everyone giving it their all we’d manage to hang on.