defence of Puel by John Collins

[The Doctor]

1 minute ago, Ric Flair said:

Ok so if we lose to another 3 last minute goals in the next 4 games, at what point would it become a problem? When the stats dating back to October swing in the favour of 2nd half goals being conceded?

 

I get your defence here but Collins article was completely let down when he made these two judgements that it's not as if we concede early goals or late goals and yet the former has been a huge problem most of the season and the latter has actually cost us points or cup games 3 times in the last month alone!!!

 

I was enjoying his article until then as it was one of the more reasoned articles I'd read in a while, but it just ended with him not really getting what our problems are with Puel, which seems to be common amongst those in defence of him.

Once you've started getting into a long run of conceding late goals, yes it's a problem but declaring something that currently isn't a problem to be one because there's a couple of examples (even when in that time, even if you include the cup game it's still 4 of the 9 conceded coming in the first 15 minutes) recently is nonsense. That a problem could appear in the future doesn't mean it is one now. Collins is right in that article. We don't tend to concede as the game goes on, it's not a lack of fitness showing, we just start slowly.

[Oxfordfox83]

The main reason for remaining Puel in is this:

 

”A lot of managers go and buy experienced players, 28 or 29-year-olds just to keep them safe in a job for a year and a half, not caring about the future of the club. It’s easier to go and spend money on experienced players.”

 

Whether you like what he’s doing or how he’s doing it, I truly believe he’s trying to improve the club, regardless of how that affects his own career. That is such a rare thing in any field, let alone football management.

 

Plenty of people on here have said they don’t really mind crap football for a year if we phase in some new/young players who aren’t as consistent as experienced pros. But then Ndidi or Maddison make a mistake and it’s unacceptable. 

 

Then after the events after West Ham plenty stated that it’s unreasonable to expect more than survival given how vital Vichai was to everything the club was doing. But draw flaccidly at Everton...

 

I don’t believe he’s doing everything right, and I will really worry for this season if we don’t sign a striker to cover the injured/incapable pair of Vardy/Nacho. But I am confident that by the end of the season, Hamza, Barnes, Maddison, Chilwell will be established, experienced and ready to a be bigger part of next term. He won’t gamble their development on saving his job. He won’t wring one more performance from an old pro to ensure we don’t concede through an error. We won’t resort back to hoofball just to appease some loud fans. And that reminds of Pearson rather than Sven...

[Wymsey]

Fake news.

[Babylon]

2 hours ago, Bert said:

We regularly concede early John

 

“If they were leggy or poorly prepared, they’d be losing a goal early in the game and then they’d be losing more goals as the game wore on,” said Collins. 

 

We’ve also won one game in our last four. When was the last time we had a really good decent run of form?

 

Be interesting if in 3 games time when we are potentially 12th on the end of a 6 game losing run for all these people that watch week in week out (!) to be saying “they should be grateful, look where they were last season” Er well we are currently in a position worse than we finished last season.  

 

Granted he makes a few fair points but some of what he says is very debatable. 

You've missed the point with that bit I think, he's saying we'd concede early and then continue to concede rather than coming back into game or winning games and getting points from losing positions. He's addressing the stuff about being "over trained" on a Friday. I don't think he's attempting to suggest we don't concede early.

[KFS]

Who?

[Babylon]

1 hour ago, Mark said:

Stopped reading at sitting ninth in the league like it automatically makes everything ok ?

Serious question, has there ever been a midtable team producing safe but functional football that has ever made a change to "push on" or have a more "entertaining" style and actually managed in doing so without getting worse?

 

I think of the likes of Bolton, West Brom, Stoke, Blackburn, Newcastle all quickly relegated when they got rid of their managers. The likes of Everton, Saints and West Ham have done the same and not improved.

 

I think that's why people say look at your position, because it could be a damn site worse. These dreams of wonderful to watch midtable football rarely happen or rarely last even if they do.

 

I'm not attempting to suggest it's not a valid reason for people to be fed up with it, at the end of the day nobody wants to be bored to death year after year after year. But this is really so far our only comfortable season in this league, the manger has been here about 13 months. Lets be careful what we wish for and not jump the gun on these things.

 

 

[Mark]

8 minutes ago, Babylon said:

I think of the likes of Bolton, West Brom, Stoke, Blackburn, Newcastle all quickly relegated when they got rid of their managers.

Not sure which era you're referring to but the first four, when you give the job to Gary Megson, Alan Pardew, Paul Lambert and Steve Kean what do you expect, not improvement for sure.

[Tuna]

Couldn't care less what John Collins thinks. Typical "Leicester are 9th so what's the problem?" attitude.

 

He doesn't have to watch us week in week out.

 

Bore off mate.

[HankMarvin]

Asked him to be his assistant no huge surprise his backing his old friend 

[ealingfox]

7 minutes ago, Mark said:

Not sure which era you're referring to but the first four, when you give the job to Gary Megson, Alan Pardew, Paul Lambert and Steve Kean what do you expect, not improvement for sure.

 

Who do you think we'd be getting in then? The next Guardiola, Klopp or Pochettino?

[Tuna]

!

[Japanfox]

Read the article.  Fair points I'd say.    I know that we have progressed since the the times I saw them regularly in the lower leagues, but imo I'd like to see Puel given at least 3 seasons to make his impact.   One thing you can't argue about is that he is getting the kids in and they are doing alright.

[TheLittleBigMan]

He's right. But were still boring to watch. That's the problem. The clubs going through a transition and the fans lack the patients for it.

[Russell sprout]

To be fair we do get the occasional great game win or lose,but there in the minority compared to the boring dull games

[turtmcfly]

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[Babylon]

28 minutes ago, Mark said:

Not sure which era you're referring to but the first four, when you give the job to Gary Megson, Alan Pardew, Paul Lambert and Steve Kean what do you expect, not improvement for sure.

A fair point

[MC Prussian]

2 hours ago, AlloverthefloorYesNdidi said:

When was it, November to December ish when we went something like 10 games unbeaten?

It was seven games.

 

West Ham (h) - 1-1 (late, late equalizer by Ndidi after a one-man advantage for a full 50 minutes)

Cardiff City (a) - 1-0

Burnley FC (h) - 0-0

Brighton & Hove Albion (a) - 1-1

Southampton FC (h; League Cup) 1-1 (6-5 after penalties)

Watford FC (h) - 2-0

Fulham (a) - 1-1

 

Do you see the issue with your argument? Yes, we were unbeaten for this period of time. But the performances were again mostly mediocre to abysmal. Rather poor results against lesser teams in the same league, teams on a particular losing run (West Ham had lost six out of their first nine matches before the draw; Burnley had lost seven out of their first ten matches; Brighton had lost their previous two matches, six from their first twelve, Southampton had won only once before we met in the League Cup; Fulham had won only twice before we played them).

Did we at any point actually raise our game against any of these outfits? Do you remember?

 

IF the self-proclaimed goal (and Maguire allegedly mentioned this at one point) is indeed finishing 7th, then at some stage, the impetus must be on willing to beat teams that can be perceived as "weaker" or "less established" or "further down the table", regardless of how you put it. I have rarely seen that intent, instead we are treated to catch-up football all too often. With the personnel at our disposal, there is no way we can play any better/more proactive/more attacking/more fluid? Really?

 

[AlloverthefloorYesNdidi]

2 minutes ago, MC Prussian said:

It was seven games.

 

West Ham (h) - 1-1 (late, late equalizer by Ndidi after a one-man advantage for a full 50 minutes)

Cardiff City (a) - 1-0

Burnley FC (h) - 0-0

Brighton & Hove Albion (a) - 1-1

Southampton FC (h; League Cup) 1-1 (6-5 after penalties)

Watford FC (h) - 2-0

Fulham (a) - 1-1

 

Do you see the issue with your argument? Yes, we were unbeaten for this period of time. But the performances were again mostly mediocre to abysmal. Rather poor results against lesser teams in the same league, teams on a particular losing run (West Ham had lost six out of their first nine matches before the draw; Burnley had lost seven out of their first ten matches; Brighton had lost their previous two matches, six from their first twelve, Southampton had won only once before we met in the League Cup; Fulham had won only twice before we played them).

Did we at any point actually raise our game against any of these outfits? Do you remember?

 

IF the self-proclaimed goal (and Maguire allegedly mentioned this at one point) is indeed finishing 7th, then at some stage, the impetus must be on willing to beat teams that can be perceived as "weaker" or "less established" or "further down the table", regardless of how you put it. I have rarely seen that intent, instead we are treated to catch-up football all too often. With the personnel at our disposal, there is no way we can play any better/more proactive/more attacking/more fluid? Really?

 

I wasnt too sure about the details tbh, I just remember it being talked about being on an unbeaten run at the time

 

Yes, its hardly an impressive run by any stretch of the imagination

 

I guess we havent had a great run then.  Just patchy performance levels throughout the season

[walkerleeds]

2 hours ago, Ric Flair said:

Most of those were draws though against very mediocre teams at home.

 

Ah right, do those games not count then? They're in the top division in English football for a reason...

[MC Prussian]

2 minutes ago, walkerleeds said:

 

Ah right, do those games not count then? They're in the top division in English football for a reason...

You're circumventing the issue. It's not about the results per se, it's the fact that we should get more out of games against "lesser" teams, performances during that seven-game unbeaten streak weren't overly convincing, were they? Do you see room for improvement or are you just perfectly happy with the way the team is set up right now?

This unbeaten streak put(s) a wool over people's eyes - "as long as we don't lose, we're fine and we'll put up with whatever football is served, particularly at home, in front of 25'000+ home fans".

[Guest]

4 minutes ago, walkerleeds said:

 

Ah right, do those games not count then? They're in the top division in English football for a reason...

 

Of course they don't count. It doesn't even matter if you're sitting in the top half of the table with an evolving team and style and a lot of young players. We need exciting football where we can chew on our fignernails while we wait until the last match of the season to see if we're relegated or not.

[AlloverthefloorYesNdidi]

1 minute ago, MC Prussian said:

You're circumventing the issue. It's not about the results per se, it's the fact that we should get more out of games against "lesser" teams, performances during that seven-game unbeaten streak weren't overly convincing, were they? Do you see room for improvement or are you just perfectly happy with the way the team is set up right now?

This unbeaten streak put(s) a wool over people's eyes - "as long as we don't lose, we're fine and we'll put up with whatever football is served, particularly at home, in front of 25'000+ home fans".

Nobody says there isnt room for improvement

[CosbehFox]

Interesting counter argument from someone whose been on the same training pitches as Claude and stands nothing to gain either way 

[Dames]

Am I actually reading that people are using less goals conceded in the second half as a defence for Puel? Really scraping the bottom of the barrel there.

 

The real problem is the amount of goals we concede in the first half or first in games in general and that Puel has gotten no closer to fixing the issue despite all the lip service and sound bites he gives (another favourite of his defenders) but what he says and what his team is doing is different.

 

Its nuts that the people are using the fact we concede less in the second half as a defence. The fact is most teams have shut up shop after going ahead in the first half and are happy to negate our style of play at that point, easily for the most part might I add. 

 

[Captain...]

3 hours ago, blaaklint said:

I think the point he’s making is that, if training is too much, we’d expect to concede more later on as well. The tiredness would build up through the match, whereas (for the most part) we just seem to concede early rather than through the whole match - our record in second halves is one of the best in the league I believe.

Nobody has said the training is too much, they’ve said it’s too long and not intense enough. Fitness levels aren’t the issue it is preparedness levels which are different and as much mental as physical.

 

Chris Kirkland gave an interesting insight in an interview. When at Liverpool and Wigan as soon as a foreign goalie coach came in and changed his training and warm up routines he felt underprepared in every game and his form dropped off instantly. When he left Liverpool for Wigan his form picked up instantly because they had an English goalie coach. Then as soon as a foreign one came in he went off form again.