Martin Out

[indierich06]

**** me, I really wanted to believe this one would work, what an idiot I've been. I really wanted Martin to come in, and for us all to be wrong about our misgivings, and for us to hit the ground running. But no, it seems to be playing out just as we all feared it would.

This appointment was probably the most crucial one the club has ever had to make, and they have well and truly gambled with it. Martin was already an unpopular choice with the fans, and was coming to us on the back of being sacked by Southampton before going through a turbulent time at Rangers - he was always going to need to get off to a good start - he needed a better start than we would have afforded someone like Dave Challinor, or Nigel Pearson.

 

Instead we've drawn with two clubs coming up from LEAGUE TWO, we've been beaten by Burton, we've been thrashed by Oxford, and we managed to get a win over the line - just - against Plymouth. It's been a truly horrible start. And the problem is, I can't see how it improves. What does peak Martin-ball look like? This obsession with possession over everything else is just ludicrous.

 

Yes, we average 70% possession each game, but there's no intention behind it. The majority of our possession is the two CBs passing to eachother, out to midfield, then back to the CBs. It puts our defence under so much pressure, every single game, and leads to multiple easy chances against us. At the same time, it nullifies our attack too - by the time we have ponderously worked the ball forward, the opposition box is flooded with opposing players, and there's no room to do anything other than to take a snap shot that never looks like going in. There's no pace to it, there's no urgency, there's seemingly no plan.

 

This style of football at the top level has arguably had it's day - fewer and fewer clubs are focusing on this Pep-ball possession style - I don't understand why we are so wedded to it? The smash and grab, blood and thunder style that won us the league - THAT is our identity. This desire to evolve us and turn us into an 'elite club' with an 'elite' style of play basically started in Ranieri's second season, and was cemented with Rodgers' appointment. I will give him his due, some of the football under him was genuinely very, very good to watch. But then we had an embarrassment of riches in terms of playing staff at times under him, and even then it quickly soured. We've been clinging onto the idea that this is how we MUST play ever since then, and I just can't for the life of me understand why Top and Rudkin think like this. Why they think that chasing this 'standard' season after season will somehow stop the rot and take us back to our glory days, when it was never what got us there in the first place.

 

We averaged 42% possession the season we won the league - we did more with that 42% than we ever look likely to with Martin's 70%. He has to go, but so do the board and the ownership who appointed him - this was last chance saloon stuff, and to give Martin a three year contract, presumably on higher wages than most League One managers, is tantamount to negligence. And if they don't go, even if Martin is sacked, the root problem is never fixed.

[indierich06]

16 minutes ago, BenTheFox said:

I don't give a shit if it is terrible to watch but gets results. I don't think other people care that much either. I'd take 30 1-0 this season if offered. 

I guess it depends on whether you see football as something you watch for entertainment, or whether it's purely about the numbers in the league table. I can honestly say that, apart from a short period under Brendan Rodgers, I have never enjoyed watching a Leicester game where we have played this 'style' of football - it's tedious, it's onerous, it's ponderous. Nothing happens for long periods of the game, there's no spark, no excitement. Even under Maresca when we won the Championship, the football was very, very dull.

[CosbehFox]

It's not so much the possession style. It's more he has a formation/system that he uses to encourage possession football.

 

When opposition work that system out which is highly reliant on the midfielders getting time to turn, he doesn't have a secondary tactic. We could still be possession based but build the play through other parts of the pitch. Or as Enzo did have a defender who can occasionally cut the midfield out and spray it, that makes the opposition less likely to press our deepest midfielder. Enzo's other answer was the inverted full back to get around it or occasionally another midfielder comes deep. 

 

If you look at our performances, the results largely correlate to the performance of our deepest midfielder. The start of the season was poor cos we had Skipp there, it picked up with Page's introduction and on Saturday, Oxford completely snuffed him out. 

 

He's just a bad manager because he's not flexible enough to take stock. Enzo wasn't and isn't particularly either but he was clever enough to spot foolish tactics as he did with Martin twice when played Southampton where we went far more counter attacking. 

 

Aiyawatt and Rudkin live a romantic world that managers are going to introduce a system and it just works. The manager above all else can adapt a squad to make it work. The reality isn't like. The reality is a manager needs to be flexible. Tweak and alter. Martin just doesn't have it in him despite it failing him repeatedly now for months onto years. 

[Tuna]

13 hours ago, adejo92 said:

Its worrying, the survival of this football club could literally depend on us getting promoted.

 

Yet here we are, fully willing to burn these points.

I know right? Not to be arrogant, but with our resources, recruiting the right players and playing a basic style of play we would walk this league, it's completely pathetic, our future being pissed down the drain for a ludicrous, unnecessary vanity project.

[john ridley]

Bit off topic ,but what does Lucy see in a hated /failed multimillionare football manager?

[adejo92]

23 minutes ago, john ridley said:

Bit off topic ,but what does Lucy see in a hated /failed multimillionare football manager?

The answers in your question.

[LCFCCKEANO]

I think if we had the same start but minus the suicidal defensive passing and slow football, it wouldn’t have turned quite as badly. I expected a slow start but a slow start means dropping points and looking a bit disjointed with moments of high quality attacking/defending, right now is the opposite. Every single year we end August wishing we’d hired the obvious choice, we’ve had Corberan, Rohl, Carrick, Challinor, and god knows who else and ended up with RVN, Cooper, Marti, Rowett and Martin.

 

I really believe in giving managers time etc but with RM, especially after the weekend, I feel more time may be more damage in terms of the work it’ll take to get the squad up to fitness for a new manager

[Patrick]

He's had a full preseason, he's been allowed to sign his own crap players who we're going to be stuck with on long contracts, there are no excuses for him. He's just a terrible football manager, his appointment is the latest in a long list of ****ups so bad they seem like they are being done deliberately to destroy the club. 

Edited 7 September by Patrick

[foxinsocks]

30 minutes ago, LCFCCKEANO said:

I think if we had the same start but minus the suicidal defensive passing and slow football, it wouldn’t have turned quite as badly. I expected a slow start but a slow start means dropping points and looking a bit disjointed with moments of high quality attacking/defending, right now is the opposite. Every single year we end August wishing we’d hired the obvious choice, we’ve had Corberan, Rohl, Carrick, Challinor, and god knows who else and ended up with RVN, Cooper, Marti, Rowett and Martin.

 

I really believe in giving managers time etc but with RM, especially after the weekend, I feel more time may be more damage in terms of the work it’ll take to get the squad up to fitness for a new manager

I seen enough

[Tuna]

32 minutes ago, Patrick said:

He's had a full preseason, he's been allowed to sign his own crap players who we're going to be stuck with on long contracts, there are no excuses for him. He's just a terrible football manager, his appointment is the latest in a long list of ****ups so bad they seem like they are being done deliberately to destroy the club. 

On this point, Cullen already discarded.

[Motiv8a]

I know this has been discussed a million times, but it is still remarkable to me that we’ve been so far off achieving a new manager bounce in living memory that I think we need some kind of national inquiry 

 

it’s probably something to do with the fact we keep picking shit managers 

[Pita]

Has he ever watched a match. He just does not have a clue how to set up a team. 

[Motiv8a]

2 minutes ago, Pita said:

Has he ever watched a match. He just does not have a clue how to set up a team. 

If you watch him carefully he is just standing on the sideline laser focused on the sexy sideways passing, because he gets a sick satisfaction out of it. He’s not noticed anything else on the pitch and passes out when the other team have the ball so he didn’t even know we were losing on sat

[st albans fox]

5 minutes ago, Motiv8a said:

I know this has been discussed a million times, but it is still remarkable to me that we’ve been so far off achieving a new manager bounce in living memory that I think we need some kind of national inquiry 

 

it’s probably something to do with the fact we keep picking shit managers 

Maresca was the nearest we had pst few years 

before that, Rodgers did 

 

probably because the players are all too secure with their connection to the owner. They don’t need to try and impress a new coach 

 

[Stadt]

It probably didn't even occur to Top and Rudkin this was a gamble, that it's shit or bust. We could just outplay teams like it was 23/34 and he's an ersatz Enzo - it'll just click.

 

Absolutely no mind paid to 'What if it doesn't work out?' because otherwise the Cullen signing wouldn't be sanctioned. He's been sacked early on in the season in his last two jobs so it was ways feasible we might have to do so as well.

[Reg Vardy]

Maybe mentioned prior or elsewhere on here, but today’s Times football supplement Dominic Akiboye Page 13 carries an honest appraisal of where we are at as a club, the likelihood of a buyer, and cuts through a lot of “sell the club,” comments on here. We are not an attractive proposition, and our facilities are the only thing Premier League we have. This is gonna be a long tough ride back, and really raises the question just who in their right mind would look at buying us.

[Motiv8a]

5 minutes ago, Reg Vardy said:

Maybe mentioned prior or elsewhere on here, but today’s Times football supplement Dominic Akiboye Page 13 carries an honest appraisal of where we are at as a club, the likelihood of a buyer, and cuts through a lot of “sell the club,” comments on here. We are not an attractive proposition, and our facilities are the only thing Premier League we have. This is gonna be a long tough ride back, and really raises the question just who in their right mind would look at buying us.

We are going to have to bank on the fact that a new owner will be someone who is mental and has more money than sense. Which is probably a reasonable percentage of people who are thinking of buying any football team.

 

We are also going to have to rely on top dropping the price… 

[SB87_LCFC]

As I did with Cifuentes last season, I remained neutral on the appointment, with what we have endured the last two seasons it was almost as if - ah f**k it lets see what happens - who else could we possibly have got given our predicament. 

 

Sadly, the boards appointment is rinse and repeat, we haven't evolved as a team since Rodgers, we still play 1 up top, we still try to play possession based football with players in important areas of the pitch who cannot play that type of football, the rebuild of our club is going to take a hell of a lot longer while we have people involved in it that are only in it for business purposes or to massage their own ego. 

 

Our recruitment this season is raising eyebrows, as others have mentioned older players on lucrative long contracts, signing unknown entities and then not utilising them either to their style of football or even at all - its abundantely obvious that our better players are products of our academy because they want to fight for the shirt. 

 

Not impressed with Watson, despite him being one I thought would come good here, Cullen is useless, Chaplin is crocked and Burns I am not seeing anything near that he will have an impact at all. Want to see more of Howell and I would say McFarlane is probably the stand out of the players in this summer and while we still continue to play the geriatric McCarthy and Bobby 'I played in the Prem for Fulham' Reid as a false 9 (if you can call it that) I cannot see us improving. Top needs to get a grip if he is still in charge here, show the fans some respect and handle his shi*.

 

Russell ball doesnt work, we dont have a plan B, fans go to work all week looking forward to seeing their team win and be successful not to fail to beat newly promoted teams and get spanked in your own bank yard to Oxford.

 

Time to go Russell

Edited 7 September by SB87_LCFC

[indierich06]

1 hour ago, Patrick said:

He's had a full preseason, he's been allowed to sign his own crap players who we're going to be stuck with on long contracts, there are no excuses for him. He's just a terrible football manager, his appointment is the latest in a long list of ****ups so bad they seem like they are being done deliberately to destroy the club. 

I actually think the transfer business is fairly good, I just think he's a shit manager. It's a strong squad for this league, I reckon someone competent could get a lot more out of them.

[CosbehFox]

21 minutes ago, Motiv8a said:

We are going to have to bank on the fact that a new owner will be someone who is mental and has more money than sense. Which is probably a reasonable percentage of people who are thinking of buying any football team.

 

We are also going to have to rely on top dropping the price… 

I’d say the opposite the owner wouldn’t be mental, he’d be smart. 
 

No one wants to buy a finished product. They want to buy something they can develop and recover in their own shape. Then build its value up themselves. 
 

You buy assets a lower value to make money. The attractive proposition outlook looks at the wrong way. 

[Motiv8a]

6 minutes ago, CosbehFox said:

I’d say the opposite the owner wouldn’t be mental, he’d be smart. 
 

No one wants to buy a finished product. They want to buy something they can develop and recover in their own shape. Then build its value up themselves. 
 

You buy assets a lower value to make money. The attractive proposition outlook looks at the wrong way. 

Yes I agree with you but the problem is the club is expensive for what it is and has financial problems and high running costs. Or maybe it doesn’t?

Edited 7 September by Motiv8a

[RoboFox]

4 hours ago, Rubbersoul said:

Pretty special they appointed someone that has managed to unite the fanbase in something. These days everything is so split but it does seem like the majority of our fans hate him.

 

 

It's pretty much the only thing a majority of fans have been pretty much united on for some time. Even the family are trying their best™ brigade can't stand his style of football. 

 

The club knew the opinion of the vast majority of the supporters and they still appointed him regardless.

 

Edited 7 September by RoboFox

[Bob Weasel Fox]

The answer I got when I put watching history into Chat GPT

I can absolutely see why you’re fed up. If you’ve been following Leicester since 1979–80, you’ve endured some proper dross, so saying this is worse than even the Levein era is quite the indictment. 😂

The frustration isn’t necessarily about wanting “route one” football. It’s that possession without penetration is soul-destroying. If the ball is going sideways and backwards, opponents get 10 men behind it, and there’s no urgency, you end up watching football that feels completely disconnected from what supporters actually want.

And I agree with the principle: attack with intent, and defend with intensity. Get the ball forward quicker, run beyond people, make opponents uncomfortable, and when possession is lost, absolutely bust a gut to win it back.

There’s a huge difference between controlling a game and controlling the ball while doing absolutely ****-all with it. 😄

[foxpleasure]

1 hour ago, Tuna said:

On this point, Cullen already discarded.

Probably back on Saturday when he drops the youngsters who were 'to blame' in the last match.

[jbflcfc]

I’ve always come on here to be fair with my posts regarding results managers player performances etc, but I actually can’t quite fathom what I’m seeing on the pitch.

 

I cannot think of literally any club I’ve watched over the past couple of seasons, defend so poorly as we have, this stuff wouldn’t look out of place on a Sunday league U8s game.

 

Whether it’s a confidence thing or the players aren’t buying into the style of play, I have no idea, but to be losing 4-0 to an Oxford side with a novice manager, to be so easily found out in the first 10 minutes, is an absolute disgrace.

 

Top & twat face now need to be held accountable for their actions & I feel it needs to get hostile in the ground before anything can change. 
 

At the end of the day, I’m not even angry anymore, I’m just gutted that someone can neglect the club so badly that we are now talking about surviving in league 1, it’s unforgivable. Nothing changes if nothing changes!