kingfox

2-0 loss, Dykes & Coady with the goals

As someone who knows the guy, I 1000% agree.

Bring him home!

This Alcaraz vs Zverev match is a bit epic.

Only just got round to seeing this. Thanks for the memories Bouba, I’ll miss your energy 💙

Glen Kamara on loan to add depth to our midfield? Knows the division. I also see the underwhelming name of Joe Rothwell being linked to a loan move back to the Championship 😕

Out of touch in some aspects, very much so. Out of touch regarding the change of football operations, from Owynn’s interview I wouldn’t say so. Around 9-10 minutes into the interview, I actually thought he made some valid points, he clearly knows what needs to change in that regard and what appointments need making. I just think that particular point comes back to why did it take so long? Fan pressure clearly changed something.

Doesn’t help matters that his English is extremely broken, it got to certain points where I thought Jon Rudkin should be doing this instead. Regarding the reconstruction of football operations and getting back to an identity, I could actually see where he was coming from. But the comments regarding PSR and Rudkin’s role were just bizarre. Just started banging on about signing players, rather than getting a real answer as to why we’ve been dishing out ridiculously underserved contracts.

Just google “Lucy Pinder Nuts magazine” and there you go

Just been down Aylestone Meadows and spotted Russell Martin taking a dip in the Grand Union Canal

Pete O’Rourke climbed the mountain to tier 1 on Sunday, now he’s back to being tier 4 in my book.

After listening to the full interview with Owynn, it’s such a mixed bag of communication. Top’s points on PSR compliance and Jon Rudkin’s role in the day-to-day running of the club was complete and utter nonsensical waffle. Banging on about how we tried our hardest to comply with PSR, but not understanding what went wrong regarding PSR in our relegation season. Clearly didn’t try hard enough then did he, surely someone realised that they were on the brink of the PSR threshold, but they just allowed it to happen, incompetent madness. Only thing that made sense was the realisation that the structure needs to change, how important a sporting director will be, and the forthcoming vision for the football club. What that vision is remains to be seen. He mentioned Enzo’s clear identity, but identity has been lost over the past three appointments. He did also mention that football has changed, from the peak of Guardiola ball to more teams opting for directness. At least he seems a bit clued up from that point of view. But if he appoints a sporting director who’s main vision is to carry on being like a poundland Man City, you’re left fearing the worst because 1. Fans are getting bored with that style and 2. You fully expect Russell Martin to be appointed at some point.

Knowing how lazy he is, it will probably take him until after the transfer deadline to reach the airport.

Naive is a word that will constantly be used, still astonished by some of the comments in that Percy interview. He isn’t a football person, there’s ownerships scattered across English football that are exactly the same as ours. Nowadays you have to get the right group of people around you, we simply haven’t done that and it’s hindered us for years. It’s baffling that he’s only just realised that a restructure of our football operations is needed. What is also baffling is how Rudkin has let this continue to happen, also who the fvck was controlling our accounts, surely they could see we were on course of breaking certain rules. I said it the other day, it’s as if we got too big for our boots, now we’re paying the price. Fail to get the appointments right of a new sporting ceo and technical director, then we’re only heading one way…

The snippets from his interview with Owynn came across as naive, after reading the interview with Percy, it paints an even more naive picture. As a few others have said, the quote of “I still do not understand why we go down, I have no idea”. That is a seriously concerning choice of words. That clearly shows that there was no review. We as fans knew the problems, yet he was too oblivious to see them. The interview comes across like James Maddison’s mindset in the relegation season, “We’ll be absolutely fine”. His comment to Owynn regarding promotion next season just indicates that mindset. The only paragraph of hope in Percy’s article is the realisation that Rudkin needs help, but you could say why on earth is he being so loyal to Rudkin. The appointment of a technical director will either build us back up or break us even further.

If it happened, of course they’ll be a wave of for and against arguments, you’re already seeing that debate with Carrick at Man Utd. I just think our aim right now needs to be short-term stability. If Rowett came in and made us harder to beat, that’s probably the biggest ingredient we need right now. Looking at Oxford last season, he did manage a run of four clean sheets in nine games, with a few 1-1 draws thrown in the mix. As I’ve stated above, first and foremost we need to be harder to beat, if Rowett could bring those credentials then it’s exactly what we need right now. I’m starting to get sick of mentioning just how bad our defensive statistics are He’s proven to be a solid unspectacular manager, a bit like Alex Neil, Paul Heckingbottom, John Eustace. It might not end up being attractive, but you know what you’re going to get. Unfortunately we’re not as attractive as we once was, being linked to the likes of Rowett just shows how far we’ve fallen, right now as depressing as it may be, his previous credentials make him a realistic candidate. Don’t worry mate, just defending him on certain aspects like I did with Dyche in the summer. I won’t be changing my display pic to Rowett anytime soon

Is Rowett really comparable to Cifuentes? Not that I want him, but his record is better than people give him credit for. Back-to-back 10th place finishes at Birmingham. Took Derby to the play-offs. 8th, 11th, 9th, 8th at Millwall, just missing out on the play-offs by a whisker on two occasions. Did the job Oxford was hoping for and kept them up last season. His stint at Stoke is the only real stain on his CV. If the reports are correct about experience, that leads to candidates like Rowett, Mowbray, Carvalhal. Rowett on a permanent basis, no thanks. Rowett until May, could be better, could be worse.

Rarely ever steps out to Europe for a signing. Seems to prefer tried and tested Premier League/Championship players. His signings at Derby - Curtis Davies, Andre Wisdom, Tom Huddlestone, Tom Lawrence and Cameron Jerome. Can’t get more Championship than that bunch On an interim basis with a few experienced leaders on loan coming through the door, it wouldn’t be that bad. But giving Rowett more than the end of the season, then having reigns of permanent signings, he’d replace Jordan Ayew with Tom Bradshaw.

Wonder if the charity shop still has my Leicester 01-03 yellow away shirt with Rowett on the back 🤔

But on the other hand, you could easily say where is our current approach getting us? I’ve been calling for a more fast direct approach myself, because more teams are adopting it and having success in doing so. Coventry, Millwall and Ipswich all rank in the top 8 for direct speed. If you’re going to persist with a possession based style approach, something needs tweaking somewhere. Getting our defence fixed would also help matters

But you have teams like West Brom and Swansea who favour a more possession based approach, both struggling in the bottom half with us and Southampton. Middlesbrough are clearly doing something right in their approach, while certain other teams aren’t. In terms of forward passes & final third passes, there’s separate stats for them… Forward Pass% Southampton - 24th Middlesbrough - 23rd Leicester - 18th Final third passes Middlesbrough - 1st Southampton - 5th Leicester - 10th Southampton rank 2nd for xG, which they are underperforming on, but very much like ourselves, their defensive stats are just as shit. Have teams just worked out the likes of Leicester and Southampton, to the point where we’re just too predictable in our approach. There’s been many calls for us to ditch our laboured style of play, something’s not working somewhere and the stats prove it.

Excellent stat this

I like to bang on about how much we need to get with the times. I just look at certain statistics and how much we correlate with Southampton, what are Leicester City and Southampton doing so wrong, but a club like Middlesbrough with similar statistics are doing so right. 10+ passes (1) Southampton - 365 (2) Middlesbrough - 344 (4) Leicester - 310 Passes per sequence (1) Southampton - 3.84 (2) Middlesbrough - 3.70 (4) Leicester - 3.51 Sequence time (1) Southampton - 10.24 (2) Middlesbrough - 9.87 (3) Leicester - 9.02 Build ups (1) Middlesbrough - 79 (2) Southampton - 77 (3) Leicester - 62 Middlesbrough have shown that playing in a certain possession based way can still bring success, but for us and Southampton why has it become so messy? Maybe it just boils down to have the right culture, successful recruitment and actually having the ability to defend, which Middlesbrough have been very successful at this season, while Leicester and Southampton have sucked.