Marti Cifuentes appointed new manager

[5waller5]

21 minutes ago, Collymore said:

Yeah but with our wage bill we should be walking the league whether you like it or not. 

That assumes we are getting value for money on that expenditure. Is that what you think?

[Collymore]

7 minutes ago, 5waller5 said:

That assumes we are getting value for money on that expenditure. Is that what you think?

No but teams playing us will  see us as a massive scalp so rocking up to the KP and picking up a point is a result. 

Edited 5 October 2025 by Collymore

[foxes1988]

1 hour ago, Collymore said:

If you're an opposition coach you'd be licking your lips playing us wouldn't you? Basically take out wingers out of the game and that's all our attacking threat gone.

 

I think playing away we'll get more points this season because teams like Swansea will feel pressure to play their own way at home which is going to play into our own hands. 

 

I hope Marti can learn to mix it up at home. 

 

 

I think you could say the same for the vast majority of teams in this division tbh (not necessarily wingers but what ever their major attacking threat is).

 

Only Middlesbrough and Coventry have been pretty good consistently and considering we were largely the better team against Coventry I think you have to say it's been a decent start.

 

 

[Trav Le Bleu]

22 minutes ago, 5waller5 said:

“Take our wingers out of the game”

 

Presumably by man marking and having someone on cover, or basically doubling up on them…. Freeing up loads of space in the middle of the pitch. 
 

Taking our wingers out of the game comes at a cost to the opposition, and for once I think we have a manager that would adapt and exploit the tactic’s cost

Yeah. Practically every team, even some of the best in the world, if you took their key element out of their team, would look very average.

[VG Fox]

2 hours ago, winteriscoming said:

I think he’s done well in the short time he’s been here. Yes he’s made mistakes but we’ve still only lost 1 game. 
Imagine the mess we’d be in if Russell Martin had been appointed. 

please don't, what a nightmare that would have been

[Blue ROI]

It's a shame we didn't close out the Wrexham game as it would be a great way to head into the break.

 

3rd is about expected for a club of our  stature but a better than expected position given the running of the club over Marti and post vardy blues.

 

Bit early to give definitive judgement good or bad but he's done OK so far.

 

 

[ajthefox]

4 hours ago, Collymore said:

Yeah but with our wage bill we should be walking the league whether you like it or not. 

I don't agree, and I think you are taking for granted the fact this lot actually look like a team.

 

We were historically bad last year, we looked utterly lost. We looked like 11 blokes just gathered on a pitch, no togetherness, no confidence, no direction.

 

We've arguably got more talent than any other team in the league despite some glaring weak spots, but I think it's been taken for granted that Marti has turned the ship around. Confidence,  togetherness and hard work go a hell of a long way, I find it baffling that of all the fanbases that should never underestimate it, we often seem to ignore the role it plays. 

 

There's a long way to go and plenty of room for improvement, but things feel like they are heading in the right direction and Marti does deserve credit for that. I don't think many of our fans are really suggesting he's done anything special.

[HankMarvin]

9 minutes ago, ajthefox said:

We were historically bad last year, we looked utterly lost. We looked like 11 blokes just gathered on a pitch, no togetherness, no confidence, no direction.

Yet managed to beat a championship team 6-2, don’t underestimate the gulf in class.

[HankMarvin]

11 minutes ago, ajthefox said:

I don't think many of our fans are really suggesting he's done anything special

Probably the ones that have watched the majority of the games. Special is a bit of a stretch 
 

 

[Bourbon Fox]

4 hours ago, 5waller5 said:

“Take our wingers out of the game”

 

Presumably by man marking and having someone on cover, or basically doubling up on them…. Freeing up loads of space in the middle of the pitch. 
 

Taking our wingers out of the game comes at a cost to the opposition, and for once I think we have a manager that would adapt and exploit the tactic’s cost

Now we have a bit of spice in the middle that will be a different proposition.

 

No coincidence Fatawu got his goal when we had JJ and Ramsey on the pitch.

[Mike1983]

8 hours ago, winteriscoming said:

I think he’s done well in the short time he’s been here. Yes he’s made mistakes but we’ve still only lost 1 game. 
Imagine the mess we’d be in if Russell Martin had been appointed. 

Think the fella has got bigger problems to worry about tonite than just football.

[Guest kristianity77]

Thing with Marti is, is that you can see that he is SLOWLY starting to figure it out. Whilst the performances aren’t great, you can see he’s putting some pieces together properly.  It’s not his fault that a lot of the pieces are plain broken and we didn’t buy replacements we needed. 
 

I’ve said it before weeks ago.  Even if the performances are diabolical, you can’t really argue with the points tally we have when you consider the amount of deadwood we are carrying AND having to play. 
 

End of the day if he has us in the top 6 whichever way it comes in January AND then is allowed to address our other problems, he’s doing as well as anyone can in my book. 

When others say we should be walking it with the players we have, we embarrassed ourselves last season week after week after week.  We have 2 or 3 premier league quality players at best currently.  And even then it’s only bottom half players.

 

Our players aren’t as good as we think they are. We just expect more because they are nearly all overpaid for what they are capable of.

Edited 5 October 2025 by kristianity77

[Claridge]

7 hours ago, Collymore said:

Yeah but with our wage bill we should be walking the league whether you like it or not. 

That’s how we won the prem, blew those cheapskates away.Simple game football, spend loads on wages and win everything, just like Utd

[Dan]

What I will say is bar the centre back situation (which is ridiculous) he's at least starting to put some of the right players in. Was worried that Ayew and Soumare were simply being rested v Wrexham due to the schedule but pleasantly surprised that neither started at Swansea.

 

The centre back situation is a red flag though. Been done to death but Nelson not even being in the squad is so poor.

[brookfox]

14 hours ago, Mike1983 said:

Think the fella has got bigger problems to worry about tonite than just football.

You just know that bag is rammed with grooming products; aftershave, manscaping tools, just for men, under eye serums etc. Guy can’t manage a football team, but I bet he smells nice!

[HoustonFox]

I’m firmly on the Marti train but have a question: what happened to our pressing? During preseason, and vs Fiorentina in particular, we seemed to have a coordinated full front line high press but now it seems to have gone away and back to cooper/RvN levels of just one dude pressing and then others leaving a pass on.
 

With the fact that we have the lion’s share of possession, play most games in the opposition half and want to overcome the low block, why aren’t we doing this some more? @StriderHiryu or others, anyone care to share your thoughts on this? 

[AjcW]

34 minutes ago, HoustonFox said:

I’m firmly on the Marti train but have a question: what happened to our pressing? During preseason, and vs Fiorentina in particular, we seemed to have a coordinated full front line high press but now it seems to have gone away and back to cooper/RvN levels of just one dude pressing and then others leaving a pass on.
 

With the fact that we have the lion’s share of possession, play most games in the opposition half and want to overcome the low block, why aren’t we doing this some more? @StriderHiryu or others, anyone care to share your thoughts on this? 

I replied to a similar comment a few weeks back.

I wonder if it's a player thing, and also whether it was more of an impress the boss situation rather than an actual tactic.

 

As mad as it sounds we pressed West Ham loads in Ruud's first game, especially first half an hour..... never to be seen again  

[Clever Fox]

I always feel sorry for any Manager who has to work with what he's been given.

 

You can only really judge him when he makes a few signings of his own.

 

So far he's doing ok and seems to have the Players playing for him.

 

What  he wants and we need is more quality and a smaller squad.

[Gamble92]

Love how I was reading literally post after post talking about double relegation in the summer and now it's likely the same users who are saying we should walk the league. 

 

I think most of us could see we'd still do well if we could get players like Winks on side. Stuff like that isn't easy to do either. 

 

There were some abysmal performances early on with Enzo but we got through them. We haven't done it to quite that win rate, but there's nothing I've seen to suggest we can't go on and have a similar season now. 

[kingfox]

4 hours ago, HoustonFox said:

I’m firmly on the Marti train but have a question: what happened to our pressing? During preseason, and vs Fiorentina in particular, we seemed to have a coordinated full front line high press but now it seems to have gone away and back to cooper/RvN levels of just one dude pressing and then others leaving a pass on.
 

With the fact that we have the lion’s share of possession, play most games in the opposition half and want to overcome the low block, why aren’t we doing this some more? @StriderHiryu or others, anyone care to share your thoughts on this? 

Since my last post on the topic of pressing, nothing much has changed. According to Opta, we’ve gone from 24th to 23rd for pressing sequences and 20th to 21st for PPDA. 

 

Maybe it’s down to a personnel thing or Cifuentes has decided to do things differently tactically, but as I mentioned in my post a few weeks ago, our pressing statistics are pretty much identical to what QPR were producing under Cifuentes. 
 

We’ve certainly not been as intense as we were against Fiorentina, which is probably the thing that has disappointed me the most with Marti’s reign so far.

[Collymore]

4 hours ago, HoustonFox said:

I’m firmly on the Marti train but have a question: what happened to our pressing? During preseason, and vs Fiorentina in particular, we seemed to have a coordinated full front line high press but now it seems to have gone away and back to cooper/RvN levels of just one dude pressing and then others leaving a pass on.
 

With the fact that we have the lion’s share of possession, play most games in the opposition half and want to overcome the low block, why aren’t we doing this some more? @StriderHiryu or others, anyone care to share your thoughts on this? 

 

4 minutes ago, kingfox said:

Since my last post on the topic of pressing, nothing much has changed. According to Opta, we’ve gone from 24th to 23rd for pressing sequences and 20th to 21st for PPDA. 

 

Maybe it’s down to a personnel thing or Cifuentes has decided to do things differently tactically, but as I mentioned in my post a few weeks ago, our pressing statistics are pretty much identical to what QPR were producing under Cifuentes. 
 

We’ve certainly not been as intense as we were against Fiorentina, which is probably the thing that has disappointed me the most with Marti’s reign so far.

Just to add - Marti was asked in an interview (well into the season) out of all the games so far which game would he say resembles the way he wants to play and the best he's seen us.

 

He mentioned Fiorentina as his game! 

 

[Stadt]

Fiorentina were completely undercooked as they were about 2 weeks behind - I don’t think that can be used as a barometer really.

[Sol thewall Bamba]

2 minutes ago, Stadt said:

Fiorentina were completely undercooked as they were about 2 weeks behind - I don’t think that can be used as a barometer really.

Notts couldn't score against them two days later tbf.

[Long Eaton Fox]

Easy to play a high pressing game  v fiorentina when you play a different team in each half

[Sol thewall Bamba]

33 minutes ago, Long Eaton Fox said:

Easy to play a high pressing game  v fiorentina when you play a different team in each half

Scored both the goals in the first half.