What next for Sven?

[Kitchandro]

What I meant by that, is that at the rate he was scoring for us he would have comfortably got past 20.

 

 

 

It might be one statistic but its a pretty significant one...

 

He didn't go games and games on end without scoring like Nugent and Wood do, and when he didn't I think he did more than you give him credit for i.e. v. creative assist for King at Sheff Utd.

 

I like Nugent a lot but some matches he wastes more chances than Yakubu did in his whole half-season.

 

With Yakubu fitness was the issue. I think playing with us every game helped, as he went to Blackburn for the next season and was doing what he does at full pelt, bagging 17 in an utterly dreadful Blackburn side. The guy scored and scores goals and it really doesn't matter if that's all he did.

 

In modern football it does. Part of the reason our form drifted off towards the end was because Yakubu became increasingly lazy and erratic with his finishing.

 

I was at the Sheff Utd game and we were absolutely battered and should have lost. Had we done so, Yakubu would have been one of the reasons for it. He was so pathetic and lazy it was like playing with 10 men. We were desperate for an outlet and he did nothing at all (bar the assist).

 

Sorry but scoring is not all that matters, there are 90 minutes in a match, contributing one goal or assist in a match is really not good enough if you're utterly useless and a detriment to your team for 89 minutes. And it doesn't make any difference whether you go a run of games without scoring or you score every other game if a) you score the same amount of goals or b) you're useless for the same amount of games.

 

Nugent may well be as wasteful as Yakubu on average but despite how annoying he was in the last few months of this season, he's mostly contributed far more to the team than Yakubu did when he was here. And I don't think he wastes more chances. I'm really surprised more people don't remember how wasteful Yakubu was at times.

 

I didn't watch many Blackburn games when he was there, I'm only judging his time here. For me it didn't look like fitness (do you mean an injury or he was just knackered?) it looked like a lack of motivation.

[Soar Fox]

He has never scord twenty in a season in his career.

Wrong. He scored 21 goals in the 2007/08 season for Everton.

[ealingfox]

In modern football it does. Part of the reason our form drifted off towards the end was because Yakubu became increasingly lazy and erratic with his finishing.

 

I was at the Sheff Utd game and we were absolutely battered and should have lost. Had we done so, Yakubu would have been one of the reasons for it. He was so pathetic and lazy it was like playing with 10 men. We were desperate for an outlet and he did nothing at all (bar the assist).

 

Sorry but scoring is not all that matters, there are 90 minutes in a match, contributing one goal or assist in a match is really not good enough if you're utterly useless and a detriment to your team for 89 minutes. And it doesn't make any difference whether you go a run of games without scoring or you score every other game if a) you score the same amount of goals or b) you're useless for the same amount of games.

 

Nugent may well be as wasteful as Yakubu on average but despite how annoying he was in the last few months of this season, he's mostly contributed far more to the team than Yakubu did when he was here. And I don't think he wastes more chances. I'm really surprised more people don't remember how wasteful Yakubu was at times.

 

I didn't watch many Blackburn games when he was there, I'm only judging his time here. For me it didn't look like fitness (do you mean an injury or he was just knackered?) it looked like a lack of motivation.

 

Guess that explains why Berbatov never made it then...

 

So he was pathetic and useless, and all he did was make the winning goal? Ok then  . Another one for the Yakubu quotes pile, along with 'Yakubu was awful today. He scored a hatrick, but apart from that...' and 'Yakubu did absolutely nothing today. He may have scored twice, but that's all he did'. Football is decided by one or two goals in the vast majority of matches, if as a striker, you contribute one or two in a match, that's your job done. There are 10 other guys to defend your own goal. You can defend from the front and track back til the cows come home, but if you don't score a goal you can't win a match.

 

You've got blinkers on if you seriously remember Yakubu as being just as or more wasteful than Nugent. And with us, I meant he was pretty fat, and thus less mobile, and slower (and lazier). But 11 in 20 isn't bad for a fat guy. Oh if only he'd had a Pearson pre-season.

[Soar Fox]

Who was it on here who came out with "all Yakubu does is scores goals"

[Nod.E]

He had the 'golden generation' in their prime and kept getting outsmarted by Big Phil. Hodgson achieved the same as him with a right shower of shite.

I'll give Sven one thing, his timing is always perfect, fcuking useless as a manger though since the 90's. ven his Lazio achievements were with someone elses side before he ran them into the ground.

Agreed.

__________Robinson__________

_Neville__Campbell__Terry__Cole_

Beckham_Lampard_Scholes_Gerrard

________Owen___Rooney

Heskey, J Cole, and Hargreaves available options, too.

Only David James and Ian Walker in that Euro 2004 squad were aged over 30. We had our best generation of players mostly aged 23-29, with a fresh faced Rooney in the form of his life. We were young, but mature enough to deal with expectation. The perfect bunch of players at the perfect age.

Compare that with what we had last year. Bold highlights the better option for a tournament. I've tried my best to liken players to their style of play/role in the team, however it wasn't always possible.

Robinson/Hart - Hart is regarded at the top of his game. Robinson was never a keeper held in high regard on the world stage.

Neville/Johnson - Never rated Johnson. Decent going forward but nothing like solid. Neville was always solid.

Cole/Cole - A 24 y/o Cole is sharper than a 31 y/o Cole.

Terry/Terry - A 24 y/o Terry is sharper than a 31 y/o Terry.

Campbell/Lescott - No words needed.

Beckham/Milner - No words needed.

Gerrard/Gerrard - A 25 y/o Gerrard was much more dynamic than the Gerrard at 32.

Scholes/Parker - Scholes is widely regarded one of the greats of world football. Parker is a decent Prem midfielder, nothing more.

Lampard/Young - No words needed.

Rooney/Rooney - You'd think a 26 y/o Rooney would be hitting the heights of his career. I believe that actually he will never be as good as when he burst on the scene. At 18 years old Rooney seemed like a genuinely world class player. I don't think you can say that now. Besides, Rooney was banned for some of the 2012 campaign.

Owen/Welbeck - One of the finest finishers the game has ever scene, or a player yet to show goalscoring form at club level?

Heskey/Carrol - Our Emile. Got stick but there's a reason Owen is famously quoted as saying he was his favourite strike partner.

Joe Cole/Ox - Difficult one really. Cole always had the potential to amaze with his skill, but that never seemed to happen on a consistent basis, so I suppose Chamberlain's promise just shades it. Arguable either way, though.

Hargreaves/Jordan Henderson - Sums it up really. Hargreaves was actually a mainstay in that team and yet I've listed him out of what I would have expected to be the starting 11. Henderson, meanwhile, was nowhere near the first 11. Not sure who he replaced in the starting line up, but he was widely regarded a great success in 2004. He got MOTM in the Portugal game in which we were knocked out. A real class act. Henderson, on the other hand, is mediocrity personified.

So two 2012 players I'd choose over their 2004 equivalents. A goalkeeper to replace Robinson, who himself was actually a very decent keeper anyway, and an option off the bench. That is some significant difference. I think the differences between Beckham and Milner, Owen and Welbeck, Campbell and Lescott, and Scholes and Parker say it all really. We're talking world class players compared with run of the mill players here.

Those differences, unbelievably, did not translate in terms of result. Both teams crashed out in the quarter-finals on penalties.

Don't get me wrong, as others have said we have had countless managers at Leicester worse than Sven (and I was actually against his sacking at the time) but to cite his performance as England manager as a consideration for why he is a successful manager is simply ludicrous.