Saint1983

It was another of the many holographic goalkeepers we’ve had, Angus Gunn.

It’s weird that Seagrave has consistently proven to be counter intuitive to players attitudes. You’d think they’d be cock-a-hoop with having those facilities and they’d step it up, not ease off. From my perspective, the recruitment has been the most baffling. I don’t see Russell Martin signings. Maybe we’ve not seen enough of Bristric, Chaplin, Kangasniemi and they might end up proving that they are but based on his current selections and the players we have seen play, I can’t see it. McCarthy was ok for us but for Martin to sign him for you was baffling. Martin benched him for most of our promotion season for Bazunu the ghost. O’Hora doesn’t seem comfortable with the ball at his feet. Lundstram I can understand. Burns is one paced (conversely, if that’s your ‘Fraser’ signing, Fraser had pace). Riis looks decent but isn’t given the service. Then there's the young players who’ve signed on loan who I don’t actually see how they ‘fit’ his system (Watson, Howell, McFarlane etc). It’s very hard to draw the parallels with this recruitment vs the ones he made at Saints when it was evident ‘why’ those players were signed and for what purpose. I’m not even a Leicester fan and I’m perplexed. I was thinking if you ditch Martin, who would be a good choice? Personally, I’d go get Simon Grayson to get you out of L1. That might be his ceiling, but he does at least know how to get fallen giants out of the league.

We got away with shellacking lesser sides in the division that season but when we came against yourselves, we got found out defensively. Could have racked up a cricket score against us on both the home and away games. Sunderland pumped us for 5, we conceded multiples vs Huddersfield, Brum etc. We got dug out a lot of the time by our forwards.

I watched a little of him at Rangers. He was on a hiding to the nothing there but he made the job for himself at Rangers impossible with his infamous stubbornness. Oh, and isolating Nick Raskin from the first team didn’t help his cause, either. What I would say is that the fragilities at Saints, Rangers and now Leicester still seem to be evident. Instead of making 4 passes for goal, he’d prefer 40. Defensively, it’s to same story all over (though he was fortunate enough to have a team that should have steamrollered that league with the exception of Celtic).

we conceded over 60 goals when we went up with guys in 23-24. Swansea fans warned us of the same. A combination of having a ghost in goal (Bazunu) and the weird, obsessive ‘collateral damage’ football Martin pursues leading to silly giveaway goals when the passing out breaks down is infuriating. If he just ditched that part of the formula we’d probably have conceded 4-5 goals less than we should have done alone. It’s pointlessly self inflicted.

I’m a Saints fan but ever since the 3-4 last season, I’ve held a curiosity on how you guys get on. This interest was piqued furthermore when Russell Martin was appointed. Quite frankly, I feel like I’m viewing a horrific accident and I’m rubbernecking the disaster, over and over. Thanks to a lack fixture clashing, I’ve been able to watch 6 of the league games this season for Leicester so I’d like to think I’ve got a good sample size now to give my observations. This looks NOTHING like a Russell Martin team. With the exception of a few flashes and dominant display at Barnsley, by now you should be seeing orchestrated patterns of play. This isn’t evident at all. Smallbone will help with this if/when he breaks into the team but in its current form, there’s no one there knitting the aimless over-cooking of the ball. Lack of leadership. At Southampton, we had some proper shithouses who would rally the team and manage the on field attitude. Stephens, Bednarek, THB, Downes. From what I have seen so far, it looks like Lundstram is the only natural leader. Recycling of the same tired players: Thomas, BDCR - I just don’t see what they offer. They remind me of players that a team ‘carry’. When they’re in a successful side, these type of players look level par with the rest out there. In a poor team, their inadequacies show. Also IMO, some of the players simply aren’t ready or good enough yet. There’s been a lot of talk about the youngsters at LCFC and whilst they’ve shown some promise in spurts, I can’t say in the games I’ve seen the level of consistency required to play this type of football. Page has been the most solid, Alves the most exciting (though with less end product than I’d have hoped for) and Braybrook for all his bustling energy seems a little too lightweight at the moment. Lack of energy (this is two-fold): I’m not going to fob you off and say that it’s all sunshine and roses on the south coast under Martin. With the ball, we had our moments of overplaying the ball and ponderous build up many times. Eventually, when we had worked our way up the field with the ball, there was always an ‘explosive’ outlet which enabled us to go up the gears in the game; Armstrong, Adams, Fraser, Brooks, Edozie etc. Without the ball, we pressed with far more gusto. Downes would usually sit infront of the defence and would guard us laterally (this sometimes was overrun) and the remaining forward players would be far more energetic and close the opposition down a lot quicker. What I’m seeing here is… a complete lack of energy and maybe effort. Perhaps there isn’t ‘buy in’ from some of the squad? The most baffling thing for me though has been the recruitment. This should be Martin’s team as he’s overseen the squad overhaul. Leicester effectively started the season without a recognised defensive midfielder until Lundstram arrived. A key component of Martinball is to have that defensive shield against counter attacks yet it wasn’t until part way through the season that one arrived. That should have been the first acquisition Martin made. Truly mind boggling. There’s been a lot of talk about ‘giving someone a hiding soon’ but I’ve yet to see any evidence of that in the previous games. There still seems to be a fragility in adversity and a lack of attacking nous when going forward. I feel for you guys as it’s been a really, really disappointing watch so far. Still, it’s a long season but Martin really needs to figure out his best eleven or he’ll be out of another job by the next international break. Best of luck; apologies for rubbernecking.

He does understand how to change it up, that’s the frustrating part. He just cannot show any flexibility for any length of time for the betterment of the club - he’d prefer to revert to his vanity project at the very first opportunity of doing so. He doubled down this season, even after 11 goals of what we’d already conceded had been down to completely avoidable defensive errors in the first part of the season. He went full Russell Martin. if he’s not learned from that, he’s doomed to repeat the same mistakes.

Yeah, ahaha, spot on - that’s what I mean. He shows tactical nous - and then drops it and reverts to his “philosophy” again. I don’t know if it’s ego, arrogance but it’s quite frustrating as he shows that he can organise a side and innovate, just stubbornly refuses to do so.

Enjoy 😉 can’t say I ever warmed to him; I think it’s a bit of a media driven facade about what a nice guy he is. Some people will buy it, some people won’t - same with the players. If enough players do and you don’t get battered with a points deduction, I think he’ll do ok for you. If he gets you back up though, get rid. Immediately. He’ll go full Russball on you and before you know it, you’ll have more “goals conceded due to defensive errors” than actual goals scored your own team. and you won’t be allowed to criticise him or he’ll get a bit prickly.

Good post that.

Saints fan here. its a difficult one to get excited about, aye? I think there’s quite a few caveats, variables and nuances that need to be considered when appointing Russell Martin. For me, he’s probably a one or two shifts away from being a very good manager. If you put the tactical inflexibility aside, there were times where he showed his nous by changing the formation for some of our games to suit the opposition (vs Leeds twice and vs West Brom twice. He genuinely showed he ‘could’ switch it up tactically and get results - that’s the bit I would hope he’s learned from; it’s not a crime to move away from your philosophy for a game or two. What holds him back is just that - his overriding, pig headedness to change when his vanity project is falling apart. He takes things very personally when questioned and can be a bit spiky also. that said, the players seemed to ‘buy into’ his philosophy and if they do, you’ll be ok. Have my doubts about him being a nice guy though, much like the Swans fan above. The portrayal is different from the reality. also - can’t see him liking Fatawu or Mavididi; way too front footed and direct for him.