How much longer does Claudio get a pass?

[Barky]

Can't believe people are still talking about Pearson. Did you not see the absolute state of a job he did at derby?? The man is nothing without Steve Walsh.

[norwichfox]

10 minutes ago, Barky said:

Can't believe people are still talking about Pearson. Did you not see the absolute state of a job he did at derby?? The man is nothing without Steve Walsh.

Sadly, we are in the same position without Walsh, it seems

[Dan]

I maintain I couldn't ever call for the bloke to go, but I'm becoming less and less convinced that he's taking this team forward. Yesterday was yet another new low for this season. I rarely moan about line-ups, I wait to see how it pans out before I go mad about it because he may have a trick up his sleeve to justify it. Did he yesterday? Not at all, it was even worse than Watford. It was hilariously bad.

 

He took out the work rate of Okazaki and replaced it with someone who gets in Vardy's way and vice versa. Neither of them drop deep and do anything productive. Slimani is a good goalscorer but a pretty poor footballer, he's a bit like a Lukaku type of player, Vardy's a shoulder of last defender forward, the two of them are never ever going to be effective together, not in this formation anyway.

 

In not picking Okazaki, even more pressure was put on our struggling midfield. Two players who aren't good enough to start in a midfield two in this league yet it's what we've ended up with despite our biggest ever transfer budget. Okazaki at least takes some pressure off them but he's nowhere to be seen until late on.

 

Demarai Gray needs to stop being a baby on Twitter but I can absolutely see why he's down. While he's picking up a reputation as a whinger I think he's got a good case here, the amount of times he's been ignored while we've played Schlupp and Musa (who my patience is wearing thinner by the week with) is criminal, and we could lose him if we aren't careful.

 

I honestly do think in hindsight he should've done a Rosberg. He hit the pinnacle of his career and he was never going to top it. Every week now he's just looking like the bloke the media promised us.

 

I think he's at least earned a shot at turning this around in January because I can't say for sure if he's the reason our squad is so imbalanced, and I do want to know what he's got in store for us, but the manner of the entire league campaign has been piss poor. We all saw Hull as a freak opening day result but with each passing week I think that was actually the tone-setter that we've never really recovered from. That's our level now. We saw it again yesterday.

 

At least two years ago, you never thought we were far away. Right now I think we're looking like we'll be not just relegated, but relegated comfortably.

[Donut]

I do think to be honest this will be Claudio's last season, probably ever.

 

The pressure he must be feeling now would be taking a huge toll at his age. And hes had a stellar career, there isnt a lot left for him to really achieve now.

 

Hes still the man to manage us of that i have no doubt at all, but i do feel like this season will have aged him a lot.

 

We can all bemoan the signings, the tactics, the preseason. But this is all with hindsight.

 

At the time, the prospect of such high profile friendlies was genuinely exciting and we were all up for them. The vast majority of us. We were all happy with the players that were coming in mostly. Of course, we could have added more depth to the back 4 but Morgan and Huth seem to have aged over night so badly, but generally, we were happy with Hernandez who Simeone regarded so highly, Musa we thought would be direct and tricky.

 

Hes still going to deliver us the biggest game in our history, a knockout champions league game against, who knows, Bayern Munich? Sevilla? Borussia Dortmund?

 

I dont think ive ever wanted a man to turn a situation around so badly.

[erlee]

http://www.thesackrace.com

 

ranieri is 7th.. i thought he'd be on top-4

[NotTheMarketLeader]

6 hours ago, Col city fan said:

Some interesting posts in here amongst some garbage.

This is it for me..... as well as naff recruitment and amazingly poor form from many players, we've also been unlucky. Mendy ain't played and Drinkwater was either gonna get banned or injured with all the fookin games he was being told to play.

So, we've had to play a very poor midfield at this level.

I'll judge Ranieri If and when we have a proper midfield (I find it amusing even having to say this..we are a Premiership football team and Champions of England, having to field both King and Amartey). If Mendy gets fit and when Drinkwater gets back we STILL look as shocking, we need to be thinking about making a change of manager. That would tell me that there's something else going on.

What I'm hoping is that we do get these two back quickly and then we start to look a proper football team again. It's my feeling that if we weren't fielding a Mickey Mouse midfield, the whole team would look better. It might be the kick up the arris they all need.

Agreed.

 

I'll also add something that is not based on fact or knowledge on my part in connection with your comment "something else going on". 

 

My gut is telling me there is "something else going on".  This 'run' is too bad to be true - to use a racing term. 

 

My suspicions are there has been a major bust up somewhere. 

 

As I said no facts behind this - just a gut instinct based on many many years watching football.

[Buzzell]

33 minutes ago, erlee said:

http://www.thesackrace.com

 

ranieri is 7th.. i thought he'd be on top-4

Couple more losses and he may well be. 

[Fox92]

1 hour ago, Abrasive fox said:

How long does the director of football get a pass???

 

This is not Claudio's fault....

Director of football doesn't get a free pass for me. There are many issues at the club that obviously need addressing. The summer was a disaster in terms of losing Walsh off field, that's an obvious statement I know, but how Rudkin maintains this DOF role is beyond me. He should just stick to academy work as he is good at that.

 

But on field issues are Claudio's fault, he's the manager.

[shen]

6 hours ago, cityfanlee23 said:

If the team pick it up it's pretty evident. 

Are you saying video evidence of laziness is not true?

 

We didn't close anyone down for the most part, gave everyone a mile of space.

You seem to be one of the only ones on the forum who think otherwise. 

I'm saying it's easy to show videos where he (and others) are 'lazy'. I use quotation marks because being lazy is not the same as demotivated, which in my book is an important distinction. As I mentioned, I saw at least two instances where he personally tackled and retrieved the ball in or near the area, but showing the full picture would muddle the 'lazy' argument, wouldn't it?
 

And it's classy trying to make me out to look like a black sheep. I try to be a bit more constructive than just calling players lazy and indifferent when I see signs they're not. You can be energetic as fook and still be shite on a football pitch, but I get the feeling that some English football fans are obsessed with energy levels being the main parameter of measuring success on the pitch. That's bloody retarded.

[AyewJoking]

why should ranieri or the players get a pass?

 

its not like they're doing everything right but are just unlucky....total disgrace at the minute

[TheLittleBigMan]

Let's see how things go in the transfer window. He does deserve this season with us but for our owners relegation is simply out of the question as it should be for the fans. Can't believe some people actually don't mind if we go down - idiots.

[NeilLCFC]

5 hours ago, thursday_next said:

Nobody's taking the title win away from Ranieri, relax your socks about that. 

 

However, Pearson never got the chance to pick a side with Kanté, Okazaki and Fuchs in it. To be entirely fair, you'd have to ask yourself how Claudio would have go and Morgan (without Huth, for the majority of it) in their first Premiership season. Both Drinkwater and Schmeichel were astonishing last season, and it's my contention they had to go on a steep learning curve in an unforgiving league to get there. Be fair.     

Excellent point

[Arriba Los Zorros]

8 hours ago, bovril said:

Nonsense. Absolute hogwash. Whether or not you think he is the man to get us out of relegation trouble is one thing. But to dismiss him as 'very lucky' when he won the fvcking Premier League for Leicester City is insane.

Pisses me off, in honesty.

Yet the fact remains he was incredibly lucky. inherited a team where years of planning and hard work had just clicked, with an incredible team spirit and bond not forged by him. We just won 9 out of 12 games and were on a huge high, hardly relegation candidate form! inherited Kanté. managed during a season where every other top team were off the pace. last season was a perfect storm and he was the lucky beneficiary, and like it or not what we are witnessing now is the real work of Claudio and it's not good enough.

[Aidan]

7 hours ago, Shaggy said:

I still think Mahrez & Vardy want out

And why wouldn't they? They've both been badly managed!

[Aidan]

Very well said!

[inckley fox]

15 minutes ago, TheLittleBigMan said:

Let's see how things go in the transfer window. He does deserve this season with us but for our owners relegation is simply out of the question as it should be for the fans. Can't believe some people actually don't mind if we go down - idiots.

People who didn't mind us going down with Pearson were also silly. The question was put just under two years ago - would you prefer to stay up without Pearson or go down with him? Plenty went for the latter. History shows that we were wiser to stick with him, but the logic some used to support him was baffling.

 

The sentimental argument along the lines of 'but we won the league, what more could you ever wish for?' / 'we're only Leicester' / 'the man's untouchable' etc. is equally silly.

 

With Ranieri; a Tony Blair (sorry) analogy springs to mind. He shook the kaleidoscope in the most fantastic way ever, the pieces are still in flux. People haven't yet found their new place, re-aligned their objectives since the enormity of what happened in May. He deserves the chance to help those pieces fall back into place, and fill in the chinks.

 

Clearly, he's done a lousy job of it so far. And I think it's right that the club demand answers and changes, rather than bask in past glories. But it's possible for Ranieri to oversee these short-term changes, rather than Sam Allardyce, or Pearson or whoever. So long as he begins now.

 

Pearson's reign went from being pretty damn decent to out-and-out legendary when he said to himself 'oh my god, the **** really has hit the fan, it's all or nothing.' The Great Escape wasn't a case of 'at last, we get our just desserts', it was the result of an abrupt realisation that it was do-or-die time, and serious changes needed making.

 

Survival isn't an appropriate objective for title winners. If you'd told us in June 2015 that, come December 2016, our dream would be to scrape 17th then it would have been disappointing then too. Aims change in accordance with events, even if you're the guy who upped expectations in the first place. So, right now, scraping survival is yet another case of setting the bar far too low.

 

These players respond to demands. 'We need to win 6/10' as of April 1st 2015. 'We need 40 points' / '79 points' and so on. Ask it of them again. But Ranieri should have the chance to make the changes, on the condition that he recognises - now - that they need to be made. And that someone, somewhere, nudges that bar up a notch or two.

[inckley fox]

57 minutes ago, Arriba Los Zorros said:

Yet the fact remains he was incredibly lucky. inherited a team where years of planning and hard work had just clicked, with an incredible team spirit and bond not forged by him. We just won 9 out of 12 games and were on a huge high, hardly relegation candidate form! inherited Kanté. managed during a season where every other top team were off the pace. last season was a perfect storm and he was the lucky beneficiary, and like it or not what we are witnessing now is the real work of Claudio and it's not good enough.

That's not fair. As a top flight manager in summer 2015, I'd have felt lucky if I'd inherited one of the five or six best-funded sides in the top flight, with a squad worth ten times what ours was worth. Nobody was breaking a leg to become Leicester City manager.

 

Ranieri's success owed a huge amount to Pearson, obviously, and it goes without saying that the run which took us to the title was initiated by the run which kept us in the Premier League, but we can't put it down to fortune. Which I think is the reason why everyone found our story so beautiful in the first place.

[bpfox]

I think it is time for ranieri to either change his tactics or to move on. however would give him till after the transfer window, if he buys a CB OR TWO AND A COUPLE OF MIDFIELDERS he may be able to turn around the club if he buys nothing that will help he needs to be sacked A.S.A.P

[Donut]

1 hour ago, Arriba Los Zorros said:

Yet the fact remains he was incredibly lucky. inherited a team where years of planning and hard work had just clicked, with an incredible team spirit and bond not forged by him. We just won 9 out of 12 games and were on a huge high, hardly relegation candidate form! inherited Kanté. managed during a season where every other top team were off the pace. last season was a perfect storm and he was the lucky beneficiary, and like it or not what we are witnessing now is the real work of Claudio and it's not good enough.

Carlo Ancelotti was lucky inheriting Bayern Munich. World class players with absolutely no competition (and managed to lose to Rostov and not have Bayern top of the league).

 

Zinedine Zidane was lucky to inherit Bale, Benzema and Ronaldo at Real Madrid.

 

How the actual fvck can you say that Ranieri was lucky to inherit Wes Morgan, Robert Huth, Andy King and basically all the players you are now like the others slagging off as completely useless?

 

Your logic and anyone who thinks Ranieri was lucky is ridicuolous. By your logic West Ham would have had a realistic title shot because Curbishley won a few games at the end of a season once. Do you realise how ridiculous that sounds?

 

There was no incredible team spirit till those last games. Look at some of those away games. Look at that Hull game where we were desperate for a win and pissed about like clueless twats.

 

Every other top team were off the pace? We went to Man City away who fielded Silva, Fernandinho, Aguero and won 3-1. We played Chelsea who fielded Costa, Hazard, Fabregas and beat them too.....they were off the pace because we were tonking everyone.

 

Anyone who discredits the achievement of last season can royally fvck off because youre a complete idiot

 

 

[robski]

The way I see it is...........We are playing like a team that is devoid of any real strategy each week and lacking a coercion or fluency like last year.

I always suspected that the loss of Kante would have dire consequences as he was pivotal to our campaign last year and was the heart of the engine room which has now been disabled and Drinkwater alone cannot to be expected to match this.

As for this Mendy chap, we are yet to see what he is about but I doubt very much he will improve matters significantly and on the recent showings where it is blatantly obvious the team is in disarray and I am fully convinced that Ranieri will not be capable of reversing this situation.

It should be remembered that Ranieri inherited the side that won the Premiership and the team had just secured Premiership survival which people forget was the ' greatest escape ever recorded ' in the manner of it and that spirit was under the guidance of Pearson.

It reminds me of when Di Matteo won  Chelsea the European Cup ( I believe it was more the team playing for each other ) than Di Matteo imposing his managerial skills..........in not such a similar way to the Foxes and Ranieri kind of riding his luck and the team simply playing out of their skin...........For sure Ranieri was influential and kept a cool hand on it all and for that he must be applauded...............but he has singly handed prepared the same team along with £70 million of new players managed to oversee some of the most disjointed and appalling football seen in many a year and more disturbing is the fact that relegation is not necessarily a concern but on current form and management a very likely scenario.

Leicester lost heavily in preseason games and I would compare the standard of competition in our European Group on par with a good Championship Team ( eg Brighton ) so it is all quite deceptive if we are brutally honest.

A month ago, I was trying to convince myself that we were going to be very erratic this season in the Premier League but outstanding as a cup side in the European Cup.......................but I did not expect the dreadful performances that have taken place and I let it be known 5 weeks ago that Claudio Ranieri will get Leicester relegated this season and I continue to believe this to be the case.

The main reason is because I have always been alarmed at the pigeon English that he speaks at match reports and his command of any meaningful dialogue is so limited and coupled with his nice guy image.................I do not see anything positive in that Ranieri will stop the rot and the longer this situation continues then the bigger the hole will be and further we fall.

The fact is I really like Claudio Ranieri but I genuinely think that the players are struggling with him and it is imperative that action must be taken before Xmas to allow someone enough time to sort out the mess and restore our Pride and ambition.

 

 

That's my take on it folks!!!!!!!

 

 

[volpeazzurro]

1 hour ago, Arriba Los Zorros said:

Yet the fact remains he was incredibly lucky. inherited a team where years of planning and hard work had just clicked, with an incredible team spirit and bond not forged by him. We just won 9 out of 12 games and were on a huge high, hardly relegation candidate form! inherited Kanté. managed during a season where every other top team were off the pace. last season was a perfect storm and he was the lucky beneficiary, and like it or not what we are witnessing now is the real work of Claudio and it's not good enough.

They won 9 out of 10 games and those games  before them? Now that was crap management and tactics!

[inckley fox]

9 minutes ago, volpeazzurro said:

They won 9 out of 10 games and those games  before them? Now that was crap management and tactics!

I really hope this doesn't all end up being a big Ranieri versus Pearson event. As far as our history is concerned, both are incomparable.

 

[Dan]

4 hours ago, Donut said:

I do think to be honest this will be Claudio's last season, probably ever.

 

The pressure he must be feeling now would be taking a huge toll at his age. And hes had a stellar career, there isnt a lot left for him to really achieve now.

 

Hes still the man to manage us of that i have no doubt at all, but i do feel like this season will have aged him a lot.

 

We can all bemoan the signings, the tactics, the preseason. But this is all with hindsight.

 

At the time, the prospect of such high profile friendlies was genuinely exciting and we were all up for them. The vast majority of us. We were all happy with the players that were coming in mostly. Of course, we could have added more depth to the back 4 but Morgan and Huth seem to have aged over night so badly, but generally, we were happy with Hernandez who Simeone regarded so highly, Musa we thought would be direct and tricky.

 

Hes still going to deliver us the biggest game in our history, a knockout champions league game against, who knows, Bayern Munich? Sevilla? Borussia Dortmund?

 

I dont think ive ever wanted a man to turn a situation around so badly.

I also wouldn't be shocked if he retired after this season. He must wonder himself where he's actually taking this team. I think he's hoping that it clicks into last season's form by trying to recapture it but there's just no way on earth you can do it with this current squad.

 

I can't believe he thinks we were unlucky on Saturday. Sunderland had a blatant penalty in the second half and apparently another good case in the first, and still beat us. This is Sunderland as well, they're as bad as ever but they'll probably survive again.

 

The standard at the bottom of this league is appalling. I cannot believe we've ended up back amongst it this quickly.

 

I think if it wasn't for the CL he may well have called it a day.

[Dan]

3 hours ago, Fox92 said:

Director of football doesn't get a free pass for me. There are many issues at the club that obviously need addressing. The summer was a disaster in terms of losing Walsh off field, that's an obvious statement I know, but how Rudkin maintains this DOF role is beyond me. He should just stick to academy work as he is good at that.

 

But on field issues are Claudio's fault, he's the manager.

I'm amazed how little gets made of the DoF situation. Like it or not they're a big part of football these days and the bulk of Southampton's continued success is down to their DoF Les Reed who always has an answer when they get picked apart.

 

We hit a high they haven't yet but structure wise they're streets ahead of us and they're who we need to look at for the long term. A similar sized club who are constantly worrying the big boys. If Rudkin isn't trying to improve the overall set up of this club then what's he doing here? I can't help but feel we've thrown him in as a tick box.

[Struwwelpeter60]

49 minutes ago, robski said:

It should be remembered that Ranieri inherited the side that won the Premiership and the team had just secured Premiership survival which people forget was the ' greatest escape ever recorded ' in the manner of it and that spirit was under the guidance of Pearson.

And before the  "greatest escape ever recorded" took place , " the greatest downfall ever recorded" happened.

For Christ's sake, thanks to Pearson, we spent 145 days at the bottom of the table. 

That is something you seem to forget.