Puel

[Fox92]

Instead of positing in "what will Puel era bring us" thread I just want to say what Puel has already brought us. The man can have a thread.

 

I love how we're playing. I cannot recall a top flight Leicester City team playing like this. Our football is great to watch and we're dominating sides - 60%(+) possession yesterday - in an away game at Newcastle - unbelievable. We dominated at Stoke, okay didn't win that one.

 

Believing in youth. I posted other day how pleased I am to now have a manager that has a record of promoting youth! All Gray needed was a run in the side and a manager that was actually brave enough to give him that chance. It's good to see Chilwell retain his place too - he played well yesterday too (apart from that stupid ball across his 6 yard box but it led to nothing).
 

We're now attacking sides instead of concentrating on defending. One of my biggest problems with Shakespeare (along with the shite football) was he was always safety first. I knew we could get Gray alongside Mahrez, instead of one or the other, and now our front four is looking electric. Even Albrighton, and yeah I've been one of his biggest critics, has looked good (somewhat revitalised) under Puel. That front four of Mahrez, Gray, Albrighton and Vardy looks good and must be one of the best forward line ups outside of the top six.

 

I was quietly confident when Puel took the job (I posted several times about being satisfied with his appointment) but now I am just very pleased he's here and I enjoy watching us.

 

 

(And he wouldn't have looked out of place in Duran Duran with that hair).

 

Edited 10 December 2017 by Fox92

[SheppyFox]

I was loudly confident when we got him, he even got my immediate avatar approval, prior to all the early success  

[foxes_rule1978]

Just now, SheppyFox said:

I was loudly confident when we got him, he even got my immediate avatar approval, prior to all the early success  

Same looked at his record and felt he can do well here, never really seen his teams play but so far I’m entertained the football is quick and sharp 

[AKCJ]

I didn't think we'd be "boring" as the media would have you believe but I didn't think we'd be this entertaining. I was firmly sat on the fence and I think that a lot of City fans were.

 

I think he played with what he had at Southampton. They don't have a goalscorer and haven't replaced Mane and Lallana in terms of creating. Playing with defence first meant they could win games because they didn't have the personnel to blitz teams like he does now with us.

 

[Chico1958]

I was 50/50 but he's winning me over

[The whole world smiles]

When the players were interviewed about the impact of Claudio and Shakespeare (when he was manager) they would often say "he hasn't changed too much" which I always thought was damming them with feignt praise. 

 

With Puel the players aren't saying that at all I've heard Wes say they are are slowly taking on more and more of his ideas which can only be a positive. 

 

Also despite all his 'quiet man' reputation Wes has said what a firm disciplinarian he is and looking at his face in the opening 10 minutes you can well believe him.

 

So basically in a nutshell the players seems to like and respect him. The fans love him, the football is scintillating, what's not to like?

[Corky]

He has also proved that the players are capable of playing a style that is designed to use the ball better. It isn't perfect by any means but the players aren't just looking to get rid of it asap any more.

 

I don't expect, or even want, us to become a team obsessed with possession stats but just developing away from thumping it hopefully towards Vardy as the default thought is encouraging.

[SheppyFox]

31 minutes ago, foxes_rule1978 said:

Same looked at his record and felt he can do well here, never really seen his teams play but so far I’m entertained the football is quick and sharp 

Yep me too mate, the thing is Southampton had a huge chances created statistic, they just had a poor chance/goal ratio, which typically comes down to individual errors, that Puel couldn’t have done much about  

[Gerard]

I wanted Puel here as soon as he went odds on and I looked into his history. He won the French title with Monaco, took Lyon to a Champions League semi after knocking out Real Madrid, got Nice to top four and he done well at Southampton without having the firepower he had here.

 

In his first game he dropped Albrighton and Okazaki for Gray and Chilwell, to me this was a huge statement that he was his own man and would do what he believed was right. The safe thing would have been to play our reliable workhorses but he didn't.

 

Also despite us having an abundance of strikers and light on attacking midfielders he still plays the one striker other supporting players behind him. Hardly any top sides ever play two strikers and he's already recognised we have an imbalanced squad.

 

You can tell he has hidden qualities as he comes across as so dull in his interviews but he's took our squad from playing counter attacking and defensive football to a team of ballers. Even though we won a title without possesion it will only take you so far in the game. I love him already and this was the type of appointment I wanted us to make in the summer as we needed someone who had no allegiance to the players and came in with fresh ideas.

[Gerard]

7 minutes ago, SheppyFox said:

Yep me too mate, the thing is Southampton had a huge chances created statistic, they just had a poor chance/goal ratio, which typically comes down to individual errors, that Puel couldn’t have done much about  

 

IIRC Southampton were 7th in the created chances last season but 20th in finishing them. That says more about the attacking players at Southampton than the manager I would suggest.

[SheppyFox]

9 minutes ago, Gerard said:

 

IIRC Southampton were 7th in the created chances last season but 20th in finishing them. That says more about the attacking players at Southampton than the manager I would suggest.

Yep definitely, Puel now has a lethal attacking frontline to work with  we’ve got depth too, looking good, would love a Europa    League spot ?

[weller54]

Like the way he's discarded the likes of King and Musa... Sometimes you've got to be Puel to be kind! 

[ian_marshall]

I was a little hesitant when we appointed him, but the work he has done in the short space of time is encouraging especially when you factor in that the player's he has right now aren't his own and with respect there's several of the old guard who aren't technically strong yet he has them playing reasonably good football - what a prospect we have in store when he's had the opportunity to bring in player's who are comfortable on the ball! 

 

Having said all of the above, let's not build him up too much to the point where any decline will see him fall from grace very hard. We know the mentality of this group of player's, they turn it on and off at will. Let's not get carried away it's still early days and only been 7 games. We were all singing the praises and marvelling at our return to form and fast counter attacking football under Craig Shakespeare, but that didn't last long until the player's lost interest and reverted to hoof ball every five minutes. 

 

I'm not trying to be negative, just cautious at this early stage. Long may this form continue. 

Edited 10 December 2017 by ian_marshall

[murphy]

I was underwhelmed.

 

I was also wrong as usual, like I was wrong about Shinji.

 

Love the way he has started to get us to play and love the confidence he is putting in youth.

 

 

[lestajigs]

I was gutted when he was appointed, but looks like there was no need

[katieakita]

Like a breath of fresh air, feel for shakey but he had to get the job after winning his first 6 or so games with as good a list of fixtures as you could pick and then perversely bad about as hard a set of starting fixtures this season to begin with. Hindsight suggests even during the summer we were looking beyond him and we are where we are at now and would take him over the other realistic names we were linked with. Also the media by and large are pretty lazy when it comes to Leicester City and seem to do more copy and pasting than actually. This Puel was crap at Southampton where is the evidence to back this up? They had an awful season apparently reaching a cup final and finishing 8th a team that constantly loses its best players and were missing their best defender and goal scorer for much of the season. Realistically like us can they challenge and finish above the likes of Man City,Man Utd, Chelsea,Arsenal,Spurs,Liverpool,Everton that makes 7 to me, so not so hard to argue 8th is actually a good finish. Good for us though as the negativity aimed at him seems to have galvanized us as a team. As for the quiet not very vocal side to him a picture says a thousand words and his face at times yesterday was saying a Malcolm Tucker style rant

[Rogstanley]

It’s just great to have a manager who seems to know what he’s doing again. It hasn’t felt that way for 18 months.

[Kitchandro]

Sorry but not convinced. I think he's riding his luck at the moment. We're making football look a complicated game when we used to be experts and exploiting it's simplicity and we're getting breaks like comedy own goals, bad golkeeping and multiple open goal misses. This reminds me of Shakey's honeymoon period - despite concerning patterns in our performances (which everyone ignored) we had a few good results and his refusal to learn from his mistakes began the downward spiral.

 

Dominating possession does nothing for me. We are clearly a far superior side to Newcastle and yet we made very hard work of beating them and in some ways were pretty fortunate, considering 2 of our goals were complete gifts.

 

I've never, ever understood why people are impressed by teams keeping the ball. It's boring to watch. The aim of the game is to score goals and despite dominating possession we had few moments. We should have been creating a hatful with that much of the ball but we didn't. There were some good passages of play, flashes of promise if you will, as we saw in the 1st half against Spurs, but the majority of the time we were making heavy weather of playing the ball forward. Sideways and backwards passes don't get you any points.

 

They'd have got a severe bollocking for me at half time if I was the manager. Every time a player gets the ball they should be getting their head and looking for a forward pass immediately, or alternatively to drive into space. First touches should be positive and the ball should only go sideways or backwards if there are no forward options. T

 

When we did move the ball quickly (i.e. the 2nd and 3rd goals) we had success, but there was far too much messing about - slowing things down and showboating. Ignoring teammates in acres of space. Pointless backheels. The usual suspects trying to beat players twice instead of getting a cross in. The amount of space we had in the first half, they were there for the taking yet we went in level.

 

As soon as we went in front we again tried to slow the game down and keep a 1-goal lead instead of going for the throat. Guess what, we conceded again. He isn't learning lessons. His philosophy is bound to cost us points because no team can keep the ball forever, and when they do get it we are easy to create chances against.

 

Let's see - where did our goals come from? Was it passing it sideways in our own half? No, those were the spells that brought us nothing. First goal was someone taking responsibility and having a shot (and poor goalkeeping). 2nd goal was an early ball forward and a 4-touch move. 3rd goal was from a counter attack. Apart from that we had the Vardy penalty appeal (another quick move) and Gray's shot from outside of the box.

 

So for all this possession bollocks, our good play came from keeping it simple. I can assure you that all of our effective football came from quick, incisive football in moves that lasted about 5 seconds. I'm not being funny, but we should be absolutely hammering teams like Newcastle. Individually we are so much better. You think it's good we had 60% of the ball? I say we wasted almost all of that. That's not attacking football, keeping the ball and not going forward with it is negative football.

 

If you have 60% possession and need poor goalkeeping and an own goal to get a win then that is surely irrefutable evidence that you didn't make the most of it and didn't play particularly well. If we had played a decent side yesterday we'd have been well beaten. Our defending is still all over the place.

 

And why is Simpson pushing so far up? There is absolutely no reasonable explanation for that. I actually thought he played really well in the circumstances but there's just no way he can contribute in an attacking sense and it leaves us exposed at the back. There was one point where he and Vardy were the only ones in the box, the ball was cleared and they had acres of space on the break. So where was our midfield?

 

We are clearly a team with ability but we knew that already, Puel hasn't brought that to us.

 

Next you'll get people lauding us for doing freestyle keep-ups in our own box.

 

 

Edited 10 December 2017 by Kitchandro

[5waller5]

3 minutes ago, Kitchandro said:

Sorry but not convinced. I think he's riding his luck at the moment. We're making football look a complicated game when we used to be experts and exploiting it's simplicity and we're getting breaks like comedy own goals, bad golkeeping and multiple open goal misses. This reminds me of Shakey's honeymoon period - despite concerning patterns in our performances (which everyone ignored) we had a few good results and his refusal to learn from his mistakes began the downward spiral.

 

Dominating possession does nothing for me. We are clearly a far superior side to Newcastle and yet we made very hard work of beating them and in some ways were pretty fortunate, considering 2 of our goals were complete gifts.

 

I've never, ever understood why people are impressed by teams keeping the ball. It's boring to watch. The aim of the game is to score goals and despite dominating possession we had few moments. We should have been creating a hatful with that much of the ball but we didn't. There were some good passages of play, flashes of promise if you will, as we saw in the 1st half against Spurs, but the majority of the time we were making heavy weather of playing the ball forward. Sideways and backwards passes don't get you any points.

 

They'd have got a severe bollocking for me at half time if I was the manager. Every time a player gets ball they should be getting their head and looking for a forward pass immediately, or alternatively to drive into space. First touches should be positive and the ball should only go sideways or backwards if there are no forward options. They need to be getting their head up early and looking for a pss before the ball even gets to them.

 

When we did do that and moved the ball quickly (i.e. the 2nd and 3rd goals) we had success, but there was far too much messing about - slowing things down and showboating. Ignoring teammates in acres of space. Pointless backheels. The usual suspects trying to beat players twice instead of getting a cross in. The amount of space we had in the first half, they were there for the taking yet we went in level.

 

As soon as we went in front we again tried to slow the game down and keep a 1-goal lead instead of going for the throat. Guess what, we conceded again. He isn't learning lessons. His philosophy is bound to cost us points because no team can keep the ball forever, and when they do get it we are easy to create chances against.

 

Let's see - where did our goals come from? Was it passing it sideways in our own half? No, those were the spells that brought us nothing. First goal was someone taking responsibility and having a shot (and poor goalkeeping). 2nd goal was an early ball forward and a 4-touch move. 3rd goal was from a counter attack. Apart from that we had the Vardy penalty appeal (another quick move) and Gray's shot from outside of the box.

 

So for all this possession bollocks, our good play came from keeping it simple. I can assure you that all of our effective football came from quick, incisive football in moves that lasted about 5 seconds. I'm not being funny, but we should be absolutely hammering teams like Newcastle. Individually we are so much better. You think it's good we had 60% of the ball? I say we wasted almost all of that. That's not attacking football, keeping the ball and not going forward with it is negative football.

 

If you have 60% possession and need poor goalkeeping and an own goal to get a win then that is surely irrefutable evidence that you didn't make the most of it and didn't play particularly well. If we had played a decent side yesterday we'd have been well beaten. Our defending is still all over the place.

 

And why is Simpson pushing so far up? There is absolutely no reasonable explanation for that. I actually thought he played really well in the circumstances but there's just no way he can contribute in an attacking sense and it leaves us exposed at the back. There was one point where he and Vardy were the only ones in the box, the ball was cleared and they had acres of space on the break. So where was our midfield?

 

We are clearly a team with ability but we knew that already, Puel hasn't brought that to us.

 

Next you'll get people lauding us for doing freestyle keep-ups in our own box.

 

 

 

I love our super-quick counter attacking style of the last few years. However, when it becomes your only style of play it's easier to defend against.

 

For me, Puel has bought in alternatives, slowing it down when necessary and playing the ball around teams not over them. The result is that we can still use the incisive counter-attack when suitable and it's even more devastating because it's not predictable.

 

I'm no massive fan of possession stats either, but the advantage possession gives you is - The opposition can't score when you have the ball, and it's a time when you can fill your lungs ready for the next burst of attack.

 

Think about possession this way - 60% of 90 minutes is 54 minutes with the ball at our feet, 30% is 27, that's 27 minutes less that the opposition are dictating play, we are having to chase the ball and work harder, and 27 minutes of them creating opportunities and not us.

 

 

 

[Gerard]

6 minutes ago, Kitchandro said:

Sorry but not convinced. I think he's riding his luck at the moment. We're making football look a complicated game when we used to be experts and exploiting it's simplicity and we're getting breaks like comedy own goals, bad golkeeping and multiple open goal misses. This reminds me of Shakey's honeymoon period - despite concerning patterns in our performances (which everyone ignored) we had a few good results and his refusal to learn from his mistakes began the downward spiral.

 

Dominating possession does nothing for me. We are clearly a far superior side to Newcastle and yet we made very hard work of beating them and in some ways were pretty fortunate, considering 2 of our goals were complete gifts.

 

I've never, ever understood why people are impressed by teams keeping the ball. It's boring to watch. The aim of the game is to score goals and despite dominating possession we had few moments. We should have been creating a hatful with that much of the ball but we didn't. There were some good passages of play, flashes of promise if you will, as we saw in the 1st half against Spurs, but the majority of the time we were making heavy weather of playing the ball forward. Sideways and backwards passes don't get you any points.

 

They'd have got a severe bollocking for me at half time if I was the manager. Every time a player gets the ball they should be getting their head and looking for a forward pass immediately, or alternatively to drive into space. First touches should be positive and the ball should only go sideways or backwards if there are no forward options. T

 

When we did move the ball quickly (i.e. the 2nd and 3rd goals) we had success, but there was far too much messing about - slowing things down and showboating. Ignoring teammates in acres of space. Pointless backheels. The usual suspects trying to beat players twice instead of getting a cross in. The amount of space we had in the first half, they were there for the taking yet we went in level.

 

As soon as we went in front we again tried to slow the game down and keep a 1-goal lead instead of going for the throat. Guess what, we conceded again. He isn't learning lessons. His philosophy is bound to cost us points because no team can keep the ball forever, and when they do get it we are easy to create chances against.

 

Let's see - where did our goals come from? Was it passing it sideways in our own half? No, those were the spells that brought us nothing. First goal was someone taking responsibility and having a shot (and poor goalkeeping). 2nd goal was an early ball forward and a 4-touch move. 3rd goal was from a counter attack. Apart from that we had the Vardy penalty appeal (another quick move) and Gray's shot from outside of the box.

 

So for all this possession bollocks, our good play came from keeping it simple. I can assure you that all of our effective football came from quick, incisive football in moves that lasted about 5 seconds. I'm not being funny, but we should be absolutely hammering teams like Newcastle. Individually we are so much better. You think it's good we had 60% of the ball? I say we wasted almost all of that. That's not attacking football, keeping the ball and not going forward with it is negative football.

 

If you have 60% possession and need poor goalkeeping and an own goal to get a win then that is surely irrefutable evidence that you didn't make the most of it and didn't play particularly well. If we had played a decent side yesterday we'd have been well beaten. Our defending is still all over the place.

 

And why is Simpson pushing so far up? There is absolutely no reasonable explanation for that. I actually thought he played really well in the circumstances but there's just no way he can contribute in an attacking sense and it leaves us exposed at the back. There was one point where he and Vardy were the only ones in the box, the ball was cleared and they had acres of space on the break. So where was our midfield?

 

We are clearly a team with ability but we knew that already, Puel hasn't brought that to us.

 

Next you'll get people lauding us for doing freestyle keep-ups in our own box.

 

 

 

FFS, give the man a break.

 

Whilst I agree with a few of your points he's come here and completey changed our style with the same players. Our previous style was only going to work to a point and needed changing. He's managed to pick up 14pts from 7 games and has only worked with what he inherited. He has a proven track record and will stamp his style even more on the team inthe next few transfer windows.

 

He's already acknowledged the imbalance in the squad and I'm sure he's looking to ship out some of our expensive strikers. He's started to play our young talented players in Gray and Chilwell and given Choudhury his debut. I'm confident he'll get rid of older squad players and replace them with the best youngsters at the club which will give the whole club a lift. Who knows what will happen in the future but I see exciting times with what I've seen so far.

[HighPeakFox]

I won't get stuck into poor old @Kitchandro, it must be hard being himself without the likes of me reinforcing the point.

 

What I will say is, having possession means a hell of a lot less chasing after the ball.

[Tuna]

I have to say so far it's looking like a very shrewd appointment, my misgivings were simply based on the fact he appeared to be uncharismatic and that Southampton sacked him after one season, but his overall record is very good, he enjoyed success in the Champions League and was highly rated when he went to Southampton and they are a club who choose their managers very carefully.

 

I like the way he's brought youth into the side, I like the fact he's given Gray the opportunity that thankfully he has taken, and we look great going forwards - 62% possession away at Newcastle was fantastic compared to the horrendous performances at Huddersfield and Bournemouth,

 

Lets see how we get on for the rest of the season. 40 Points first, then maybe a good cup run would be nice. It will be interesting to see what he does with regards to bringing in new signings and evolving the squad over the next few transfer windows.

 

[lgfualol]

I love watching us at the minute. I actually lost my interest quite a bit under Shakespeare, I wasnt pissed off when I had to miss games. Now I love football again. 

 

It's so ****ing REFRESHING to have a Leicester team be so comfortable on the ball. This is without even having Silva in the team yet. We pass around a bit but still have massive threat with counters. We seem to be waiting for that ball in behind for Vardy rather than just lumping it even if Vardy is heavily marked and the other team are sitting deep. Anyone who claims it is boring must be mental if they prefer hot potato hoof shite.

 

Good times to be a Leicester fan.

[Steve Agnew]

I have to say that he is winning me over. Some lovely spells of possession and attacking play yesterday. Lots of young players looking better than before (Gray, Chilwell and Ndidi.) 

 

It's not a finished product yet but  I am excited at the quality in the squad. Let's hope we see more of Iheanacho at appropriate times.

 

I am confident that we should have a solid season and then build next year.

 

 

Edited 10 December 2017 by Steve Agnew

[StriderHiryu]

Is this the end of my thread? Nooooooo! 

 

It’s cool the man does indeed deserve his own thread!

 

It’s still early days but in a short space of time he’s fundamentally changed the way we’ve played, restored Mahrez to somewhere near his best, brought Gray and Chilwell into the team, given Chodhury his debut, beaten one of the top 6 teams and taken us from 14th to 8th. And we are so much better to watch. 

 

How can you not be impressed? I’m hoping this is just the start of something beautiful.