Really? As fans are you really surprised at the position of the team? It was always going to be a survival season. The squad is exceptionally weak. The possibility are; Gino will sell the club. His main business is buying and selling football players, but his cupboard is bare. His time will soon be at an end. We will probably avoid administration as we are spending as little as possible. We get relegated this season. If we survive, we will be big favourites to be relegated in 2024/25. No parachute money, no money from the Pozzo Family, the money they made from selling up to Bosch is now getting very thin. We have played only two decent sides so far and we were easily beaten by both of them. Ismael should be sacked, but he will stay on as there is no one else .
Geoff Doyle Ismael kept players in dress room at end for 50 mins. He was fuming. But instead of ranting, asked every player to say what they thought had gone wrong. Doesn’t want blame game going on. Wants players taking responsibility. Wants more character from them. #WatfordFC @BBCSport3CR I can imagine what they would say. “There were a lot of fans there and I got scared” ; “It was raining and I got cold and wet”; “It was a long way to go and I was tired” ; “do we get overtime for this dressing room lock in?”
So does that mean some players will now rally against him and rush to complain to the hierarchy as we have seen before? Usually only ends one way .
This was something his stats pointed towards before he came and it certainly appears to be the case - as was commented in his signing thread, he's one of those players who seems all f@rt and no 5hit.
One batch of exclusive zoom interviews with a couple of players for their latest pod will quickly see them back in line.
Well considering Deeney was the main reason the players' revolted against Ivic I doubt it. Bachmann hasn't the balls to organise such a feat. Whatever was said I do hope some of it lingers and they attempt to play football on Saturday. Cardiff away is another long journey - we've won on our two previous visits - hatrick of wins?
One of the things which has disappointed me the most in recent games is how less brave we've become with our passing. For the first few games of the season we seemed to at least try to pass forward or at least play a sideways pass which set up a team-mate to break forward with the ball when the opportunity presented itself. Now we've reverted back to the first thought of most players as soon as they receive the ball being to ping it backwards; even when if they just took a second to consider what's around them there are often other players in space who could be found. It's getting similar to one of the crap things about us under Edwards. A few more general notes about the game today. Lewis played as if he didn't want to be there. RB keeps showing itself to be the huge hindrance it obviously would be (plus could you imagine Ngakia in a million years scoring a goal like their RB did today?!). Please ban Ngakia from using his left-foot unless it's a 2 yard pass. Please ban Bayo from shooting outside the box.
I think it’s fair to say some down tools last season too though after a telling off or two though. Bachmann will probably say we’re mentally weak again .
That has to be one of the most infuriating games of football I've seen in a long while. Sunderland looked like a very bog standard championship side, one which we had found relatively easy to keep at arms length while offering no real attacking threat ourselves. Other than one routine save, Bachmann had very little to do and towards the end of that first half Sunderland where getting frustrated. Then out of no where we gift them two goals, almost gift them a third and promptly fell apart. There arnt words to describe the defending for either of the goals we gave away. Almost as bad was our decision making and final ball up the other end. Several times we got ourselves into some very promising positions around their box in the first half and shot ourselves in the foot every time. And it wasnt just one or two players but collectively we seemed incapable of making the right decision or play the final ball. I dont think that the players dont care but they do look shot of confidence and they look frustrated. The team spirit that was evident at the start of the season has started to be replaced by arm waving and gestures at team mates. I thought the red card was harsh, but then again the ref had been atrocious for both teams most of the game anyway. And what was all that nonsense at the end of the first half, stopping the game because a Sunderland player got hit on the back of his shoulder by the football. Why are we so averse to crossing the football? If the winger cant step in and shoot then the ball comes backwards. I dont know if they keep stats for such things but I would bet we mush near the bottom, if not rock bottom, for cross attempts. If we're trying to control possession then why do we continually insist on giving the ball away so cheaply so often. I'm not sure the constant rotation every game is helping. I get VI wants to keep players fresh and mitigate the injuries that have plagued our recent seasons but we dont have the depth for it and there doesnt seem to be the partnerships developing between players that we are seeing in other teams. Go back to the system we were playing at the start of the season and pick your best 11 and stick with it for a couple of games. I completely agree but we've made such a pigs ear out of it the last 3-4 seasons the club have managed to gets its self in a position where we have to reset but dont have the resources to do anything more than plug the gaps this season. The reset should have happened when we were first relegated and then promptly promoted again. Instead the money that could have been used to build the foundations of the squad for a good number of years was wasted on players like Rose in an attempt to stay up at the first attempt. And we have to stick with a manager, we cant keep sacking managers and expecting their replacements to magically build something here when they only get a handful of games.
We just don’t have the midfield tools to put out any capable side! So for pure vibes. Bachmann; Andrews, Hoedt, Sierralta, Porteous, Lewis; Kayembe, TDB; Asprilla; Martins & Bayo. Louza and Asprilla to rotate whilst Louza bucks his ideas up. Sema in for Lewis if he doesn’t sort himself out. Somehow convince Tom Ince to play some games as a slightly more defensive winger than he currently does and voila you have yourself a makeshift attacking right wingback when chasing a game
During the match on Saturday you could get 20/1 on relegation. By Sunday evening this had shortened to 15/1. After tonight's debacle we've dropped to 11/1.
The only time I raised a smile during the match tonight was when Jobi MacAnuff said Asprilla struggles with the physicality of the Championship. Oh, the irony!
And he is probably our most lively attacker . Says it all ! McAuff is another one who seemed to do well everywhere else but failed to deliver here .
I had to turn the sound off in the end. The performance was bad enough, but listening to HadAnuff drone on about a lack of quality given his 'efforts' during his time with us just grated.
This, from Andrew French's transcript of Val's post lock-in presser, sounds actually quite desperate. Almost like a plea:
As sad as it seems that second half was just like Ivic, Bilic give up type performances. Good shape, poor discipline. Why do the players always think they can get away with it again and again with each head coach. Even more the ones that expect more from them.
The players are, bar a couple ( Martins, Asprilla) , League 1 standard and no manager is going to get a tune out of them. I don't believe the players aren't trying, just low on confidence and we are desperately lacking leaders/ characters. He might get it wrong at times but we gave to stick with Val now, the usual chopping and changing coaches will make things even worse imo. Last night was absolutely desperate, showed where we are atm and we are in for a long hard season.. The current bottom 5/ 6 ( think Blackburn will be ok) will stay the sane all season
Bookies continue to have faith. Before Sunderland our points quotes remained at level of WBA and above Hull/Cardiff who have looked decent. Even now quoted to finish 11th. Think I’ll have a big old sell.
I don’t understand how we have got to this from that first half performance against QPR. It’s not as though we’ve lost half of that team to injury. Chalk and dare I say it, cheese.
It was inevitable where we were heading. The warning signs were there for everyone to see if people would only open their eyes to look. I find it surprising that it’s taken this long for fans to finally understand what’s happening at the club. Last night seems to have been a penny dropping moment for the entire fanbase……for that I am actually grateful.
This sums it up nicely from VI, and emphasises how vital it is we (Gino) don't panic right now and sack him. “The only thing I think is the old habits in the club and in the players are there when things don’t work well, there’s always the excuses about what happened with the manager. Maybe they will change the manager so we don’t need to force anything. “Or we have relied on top players but they are not here anymore. They try to find any excuse. “There is no excuse. There is no excuse. You are able to do the job at the beginning and now you are not able to do the job."
It blows my mind how our supposed world class scouting network and all the talk from Ben Manga still manages to pick out these players. I wouldn't have them in my Sunday league team. It's obvious Pozzo is still lining the pockets of Bayat but you'd think if you're going to do business with him at least get adequate players for this level. Furthermore what happened to the loans from Udinese when we need them? The first few seasons we got some absolute gems from them now all of a sudden they are just a dumping ground for all the crap we don't want anymore. I don't get where the Pozzos are going with this apart from league 1?
That really shows the transparent smoke and mirrors nature of this contract. People are lauding Gino for some kind of long term thinking, when in fact it's a pure stunt to attempt to trick the players into applying themselves a bit longer.
We started the season superbly in the first game and to be fair played well the next few games and didn’t get the results we deserved. Now we have just fallen apart. Are the players as good as those first few games and have just lost confidence/direction or were the players just playing out of their skins ? VI has gone from being a motivating tactical genius to seemingly clueless in the space of 10 games. That’s what I don’t understand. Do we have a mid table team and crap manager, a crap team and a mid table manager, or crap team and manager ?
This has to be the worst game we've played since Millwall away last season. Thought TDB and Asprilla did just about alright but the other 14 (!) players involved were simply not good enough. To be fair, Andrews was OK until the stupid red card. This has to stop now. If we want to continue with this "shape" that VI keeps banging on about we need to do something to stop the rot at Cardiff. Maybe try to create a solid midfield three of Livermore, TDB, Kone/Kayembe and get the wingers to help them out. Just try to stay in the game ffs and hopefully snatch something. I would even consider playing Ince up front as a false nine to get Asprilla on the pitch. Bayo and Rajovic are useless anyway, it's like playing with ten men.
Maybe we just got lucky with those loans signings ? As usual things/people get hyped up and then they don’t live up to expectations. Who said Manga was a World class scout ..
