Marti Cifuentes - Style of Play, Tactics and Analysis

[Finnegan]

12 hours ago, Aleksz said:

And saved from Cooper and Ruud’s poor imitations of it. 

 

Ruud came in and immediately talked the talk and we all get excited for about twenty seconds. 

 

It became very quickly apparent he had no idea how to actually set up. 

 

[coolhandfox]

36 minutes ago, Finnegan said:

 

Ruud came in and immediately talked the talk and we all get excited for about twenty seconds. 

 

It became very quickly apparent he had no idea how to actually set up. 

 

Always easier to talk the talk, rather than walk the walk.

[JimJams]

Coady likes this.

[SafewayFox]

1 hour ago, Finnegan said:

 

Ruud came in and immediately talked the talk and we all get excited for about twenty seconds. 

 

It became very quickly apparent he had no idea how to actually set up. 

 

100% this.

 

Ruud’s first press conference has to be considered as fraudulent.

 

Didn’t he mention that he isn’t a football romantic so will tweak his ideas accordingly?

 

Yet, this was the same manager that trotted out a front three of Vardy, Ayew and Reid whilst in the middle of our non scoring at home run.

 

Ruud might have been let down by Top and Rudkin but his absolute lack of coaching ability was on full display.

 

Don’t even get me started on the passive Cooper, at least we hopefully don’t have those buzz words up behind the players hangers in the dressing room anymore.

[Bordersfox]

Interesting watching that friendly after seeing @StriderHiryu youtube video about Cifuentes preferred style. 

 

In terms of risk there was more than one occasion where there were huge spaces behind Hamza as he pushed forward.  I wonder if he'll prefer at least one very mobile CB (Okoli, who I thought pressed well yesterday) so we can cover that off a bit.  Even if that player is not so comfortable on the ball. 

 

We haven't seen much of Coulibaly but again, he's very mobile.  Is he injured or something (sorry if this has been covered elsewhere) as I am surprised he didn't get any minutes yesterday.  

[Taz_The_Fox]

Makes you wonder if Aluko and JJ junior will get game time this season as they are both very mobile and athletic and will be able to cover for some of our less than mobile defenders...

[lcfc sheff]

3 minutes ago, Taz_The_Fox said:

Makes you wonder if Aluko and JJ junior will get game time this season as they are both very mobile and athletic and will be able to cover for some of our less than mobile defenders...

They need to be really, there is going to be some big changes in defense over next two seasons with contracts running out

[coolhandfox]

25 minutes ago, Taz_The_Fox said:

Makes you wonder if Aluko and JJ junior will get game time this season as they are both very mobile and athletic and will be able to cover for some of our less than mobile defenders...

Unlikely we are going to field a team of 16-18 year olds, I suspect Monga will be the only one that gets serious game time.

 

 

[Muzzy_no7]

24 minutes ago, coolhandfox said:

Unlikely we are going to field a team of 16-18 year olds, I suspect Monga will be the only one that gets serious game time.

 

 

I think we would be stupid to not have Evans, Monga and Page all involved this season.

 

Aluko and JJ junior would be best served  with the 23s and then loaned out when they are ready  

[coolhandfox]

6 minutes ago, Muzzy_no7 said:

I think we would be stupid to not have Evans, Monga and Page all involved this season.

 

Aluko and JJ junior would be best served  with the 23s and then loaned out when they are ready  

Nothing wrong with have them involved but people are being a bit silly expecting the all to start league games.

 

We need to feed them in at the right times.

[kingfox]

As @StriderHiryu pointed out in his analysis, on yesterday’s evidence, Marti clearly wants at least one of his CB’s to have long range passing ability, someone able to switch play and get our wingers in 1 vs 1 scenarios. 
 

After doing some statistical digging, at QPR, both Steve Cook and Morgan Fox ranked in the top 10 for long passes per90. While they both ranked in the top 3 for long passes completed per90. 
 

Will be interesting to see who operates this role under Marti, or whether he uses both our CB’s in this manner.  

[FoxFossil]

Imagine Mavididi and McAteer to start, Monga and Fatawa with half an hour to go. These last two need to be introduced carefully imo. 

[LCFCJohn]

33 minutes ago, coolhandfox said:

Nothing wrong with have them involved but people are being a bit silly expecting the all to start league games.

 

We need to feed them in at the right times.

I’m not seeing people demand that they all start. We have 9 sub spaces, absolutely no reason we shouldn’t have 3/4 of those with the youngsters. You can still choose not to bring them all into the game but in many cases they will be good for minutes. 
 

Let’s say Fatawu and Mavididi start. McAteer is possibly on the bench, is there any point having BDR there as well or Monga/Evans? Just examples in terms of the names.

[cityfanlee23]

LET'S GO BOYS THE MARTI PARTY IS UNDERWAY

[Bluearmyfox28]

10 hours ago, Taz_The_Fox said:

Makes you wonder if Aluko and JJ junior will get game time this season as they are both very mobile and athletic and will be able to cover for some of our less than mobile defenders...

Throughout the first half I couldn’t help but think Aluko was perfect for the left back role both in attacking phases and defensive phases. 
 

Personally I think based of the roles the fullbacks have, it should be Ricky, Nelson, Okoli, Aluko.

[StriderHiryu]

21 hours ago, Bordersfox said:

Interesting watching that friendly after seeing @StriderHiryu youtube video about Cifuentes preferred style. 

 

In terms of risk there was more than one occasion where there were huge spaces behind Hamza as he pushed forward.  I wonder if he'll prefer at least one very mobile CB (Okoli, who I thought pressed well yesterday) so we can cover that off a bit.  Even if that player is not so comfortable on the ball. 

 

We haven't seen much of Coulibaly but again, he's very mobile.  Is he injured or something (sorry if this has been covered elsewhere) as I am surprised he didn't get any minutes yesterday.  

It can happen on both sides. There were times where both Hamza and Luke Thomas were inverting into an attacking midfield position at the same time!

 

 

But Marti is no idiot, I don't think he will invert both players like that against teams with fast wingers. He beat Leeds 4-0 at home when they had Summerville, Gnoto, James, etc so he understands the game well. That said, I do think we will concede quite a few goals similar to the way Spurs conceded under Ange by being reckless. But remember that in Scotland, Ange crushed it, because his squad was so superior to everyone else's, and as we saw 2 seasons ago, our squad is by and large too good for this division. 

 

You are right about having fast and mobile CB's (and fullbacks) though. That's why Ange signed Micky van de Ven and utilised Romero, because both are super quick. So when Vestergaard plays, that will be a vulnerability we have. I don't think Vestergaard will be the starting CB, but in a 46 game season he will get games, and I think you can still use him against teams that sit back and don't have too many fast players. 

 

 

19 hours ago, kingfox said:

As @StriderHiryu pointed out in his analysis, on yesterday’s evidence, Marti clearly wants at least one of his CB’s to have long range passing ability, someone able to switch play and get our wingers in 1 vs 1 scenarios. 
 

After doing some statistical digging, at QPR, both Steve Cook and Morgan Fox ranked in the top 10 for long passes per90. While they both ranked in the top 3 for long passes completed per90. 
 

Will be interesting to see who operates this role under Marti, or whether he uses both our CB’s in this manner.  

Coady was used in the first half, Vestergaard in the second. Nelson was doing it against OHL and Faes was effective doing it to find Mavididi under Enzo. With the QPR players, that came about because Marti was telling them to pass the ball long.

[LCFCCHRIS]

22 hours ago, coolhandfox said:

Always easier to talk the talk, rather than walk the walk.

Well good job this ad showed up, get Marti a pair and he can do it all day long

[AjcW]

****ing "JJ Junior" winds me up. Not exactly difficult to type Jayden or Joseph is it  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yes... yes it did take me far too long to realise who the **** people meant...

Edited 21 July 2025 by AjcW

[ACF]

1 hour ago, AjcW said:

****ing "JJ Junior" winds me up. Not exactly difficult to type Jayden or Joseph is it  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yes... yes it did take me far too long to realise who the **** people meant...

 

 

You're absolutely right, it is annoying. I declare from here on in he's referred to as JJJ, or Junior JJ.

[filbertway]

48 minutes ago, ACF said:

 

 

You're absolutely right, it is annoying. I declare from here on in he's referred to as JJJ, or Junior JJ.

Triple J?

[Bluearmyfox28]

Compared to Enzo’s style I feel our use of fullbacks pushing forwards into the attacking role’s that they did on the weekend, will make it a lot easier for us when we come against teams that mark man to man. Something that we struggled against under Enzo.

[Lesta2014]

2 minutes ago, Bluearmyfox28 said:

Compared to Enzo’s style I feel our use of fullbacks pushing forwards into the attacking role’s that they did on the weekend, will make it a lot easier for us when we come against teams that mark man to man. Something that we struggled against under Enzo.

Feel they will be expected to get more crosses into the box but we need the bodies in there 

[Vindaloo FOX]

12 minutes ago, Lesta2014 said:

Feel they will be expected to get more crosses into the box but we need the bodies in there 

Big target man like the Cardiff lad.

[urban.spaceman]

On 16/07/2025 at 09:20, Finnegan said:

 

Mavididi is a bit of a dick, Winks thinks he's better than the squad, it's amazing how good some of you lot are at deep psychological analysis of people you've never met before.

 

Really wish FoxesTalk would ****ing knock it off sometimes. We don't actually know what goes on at the club and I can't really blame anyone for having their morale hit by the year we've just had, in particular them having to work with two absolutely honking managers.

 

Enzo came in and turned Jannik Vestergaard - who had been completely frozen out - in to one of our two or three most important players on the way to promotion. Who knows who Cifuentes will like and be able to get a tune out of? Everyone pretty much just gets a clean slate, as far as I'm concerned. 

 

Absolutely gutted we've lost this guy:

 

[Finnegan]

1 hour ago, urban.spaceman said:

Absolutely gutted we've lost this guy:

 

 

I absolutely cannot wait for the episode where Rob, Ryan and Humphrey are doing their absolute hardest to talk up how exciting it is that Wrexham have not only signed a Welsh International but a home town boy with over forty caps who played for Wales at the world cup. 

 

Then two episodes later Phil Parkinson is having a stroke screaming his lungs out at the fifteenth goal Danny Ward has let in in the last three games. 

 

Edited 21 July 2025 by Finnegan