24 Dec 2017 13:22:37
Can not belive people are asking for sams head because were not good to watch get grip
He has got us defending again an not leaking goal we are on an unbeatin run draw at anfield draw against chelsea an wins swansea newcatle huddersfield
Not to forget he has players like bolasie baines mori coleman ross mcarthy and no natural striker with what he has got infront off him am saprised we are were we r big sams doing a really good job get of is back judge him when the players are fit an see what football we play then and we get a striker come on people give ya heads a wobble.
24 Dec 2017 14:12:42
I don't think anyone is calling for his head. I believe all that is being said is that people calling what we are being served up "good form" are mistaken. Nine men behind the ball and when in possession kick it in the general direction of Calvert-Lewin is not what the club should aspire to. In the short term it may be a necessity and should be appreciated as such. Allardyce has a proven ability to do what he has so far. It is what happens next that concerns people. Allardyce's statements may be encouraging but his track record of delivery of more expansive football is more limited. He may prove doubters wrong but has yet to do so. However, if the same as we are seeing now was being delivered in March I doubt that fans would be so sanguine. What is 5being served up currently has a limited shelf life.
24 Dec 2017 15:04:33
Blimey Evo, i hate to be judgmental about spelling, punctuation and what have you, it's not everyones strong point, but that really is poor! I almost resorted to google translate.
I don't see people calling for him to be sacked at all. A few, perhaps fair, comments about our current style of play but on the whole i think everyone is happy about our turnaround in form. I doubt he will be our long term solution but he has certainly won me over from my initial thoughts upon appointment. Please don't attempt to cause dissent where none exists in the first place.
24 Dec 2017 15:37:31
Glennk
His track record at Bolton was amazing with the finances and players he had to work with. You mention March being when fans will turn, just what are you expecting out of the January transfer window? Not a great deal will change this season, we will churn out results and bolt the door firmly shut when required.
We wanted fancy football with RK and came away from the transfer market with high hopes, look where that led us to, now you want the same thing with big Sam.
Everton are not ( nor have we ever been ) a club to buy our way into league positions, unlike the 2 Manchester teams and Chelski, we are a building club, and at the moment we are building from the back, like it or not Sam is doing it that way and with the correct backing from some of our so called fans he will get it right.
We don't want fans who are waiting for the slightest thing to go wrong so they can shout out that they are one's who never liked Sam. We are a team that will make mistakes, get used to it, don't slag off the management team because of it.
Sam was in a no win situation yesterday with some fans, If he had played a side that was going to go all out for a win you would of moaned about it as we would of been hammered, He plays for a draw and you moan about it because you think it unattractive, Personally I am dreading the January window because you will be so quick to condemn him if we are not up to Man Cities level of playing within 5 weeks of it closing (First week in March) .
Start supporting him and start enjoying what we are doing instead of gloating about how we are not playing attractive football.
24 Dec 2017 15:42:01
And so say all of us cheers mate.
24 Dec 2017 16:09:39
All I can say is that you must be too young to remember the "Merseyside Millionaires" John Moores era and record purchases like Gordon West, Tony Kay and Alan Ball.
24 Dec 2017 17:47:10
I do indeed remember, I remember it being totally different to todays game. We were not setting records with our purchases every season.
Anyway Happy Christmas to yourself and your family.
24 Dec 2017 18:15:12
I do remember Tony Kay, one of the best midfielders I have ever seen. Hard as nails and a great player. He signed for us in 1962 (I was 22) and his career was cut short because of the life ban he received for betting on his Wednesday team. Nothing to do with us but we lost a great player. Wish we could get another one like him (without the problems) .
25 Dec 2017 05:12:21
In reply to Grumpy Toffee
1. Historically we have been a team that has been prepared to purchase success. In recent years we have not had the means to do so
2. In the January window I expect a net spend of around £25 million and a gross spend of not much more
3. I expect the style of play to have expanded earlier than March. I put March as the limit of fans being prepared to argue that no shots on target in a home game represents "good form"
4. I accept that some more pragmatic approach was necessary but to state that a nine man defence and "tippy tappy" are the only alternatives seems extreme to me. Is our squad that much worse than say Huddersfield or Brighton both of which seem to want to have shots on target in home games?
5. Allardyce's record at Bolton was one that allows him to be seen as the man to revive the School of Science? Do you refer to the Bolton side spearheaded by Kevin Davies?
6. The Okocha's of this world now choose to spend their declining years in China or America rather than struggling English teams
6. Is it too much for you to read what I actually write e. g. "Allardyce may prove doubters wrong" rather than overlay it with the filter of your own prejudices
Have the very best kind of Christmas. The kind that cures grumpiness.
25 Dec 2017 13:01:09
Actually Glennk when Sam took us over I would say yes to number 4 we were a lot worse than them teams, they may have shots on target but come the end of the season they will both be near the bottom of the league, If Everton are there you will no doubt whinge again about Sam. Try to remember we have had the same players that both RK and DU could not knock into shape. Sam is doing that yet you are not happy. 6 games no defeats and two of those games against top tier teams.
Now to put a time span on that with a net spend of £25m (your guess) is absolutely ridiculous, We all want us to play better but it will take time, RK left the club in a bad way and that will take more than a few months to turn around.
It is apparent that no matter what he does (Sam) you will always dislike him and anything he does. If Silva or Dyche had joined us and done the exact same thing you would be saying how great they are, Don't bother replying that they would of done it different as the point is if they had done the same.
I would say that our form is OK as we have only dropped points against Chelski and those across the park, that's 2 games by the way that everyone expected us to lose and we didn't. The fact that we gained 2 extra points from those 2 sides fills me with hope, and I hope and pray we do the same when we play the other top sides at least until the end of the season, If we can get a 0 - 0 against the top sides both at home and away, and we don't have a single shot on target then I am happy. Had we 0 shots on target playing a team like Westham then I would worry, but for crying out loud it was a top team.
I sadly do not understand your logic that you would want us having attacking football against these top sides, when other teams do this against them they tend to lose yet YOU want us to do this. Please explain to me why you would be happier with us playing like this against the TOP sides especially the league champions, is your desire to watch us play attacking football that great you don't mind us losing? or is it something different? ( You probably won't answer that )
As for the grumpiness you will find none in this household today as we are too busy laughing at all the doubters and those people crying we did not play attacking football against the current champions. You cry when we lose, you cry when we draw and you cry when we win, To think they call me grumpy but I don't have a tenth of what some people have.
Fancy having some humbugs with me I have plenty to spare?
26 Dec 2017 12:10:49
Grumpytoffee,
Give it a rest with telling everyone else what they would say and what they will think regarding Allardyce and other managers. Your words say more about you than they do about anyone else.
The vast majority of people are not sniping at Allardyce and fans sharing their opinions on how poorly we are playing in an attacking sense isn't "gloating". Yes, there probably could be a little more patience throughout the game but the fan base is far more unified behind Allardyce now than they were at the time of his appointment. He has generated that feeling because of how effective he has been and long may the results continue.
These posts attacking all the "gloaters", "negative influences", "so called fans", etc, etc are more divisive than any posts people are making about our style of play. Just because people have different views to you does not make them less worthy fans or their opinions less valid. It certainly doesn't make them harmful to the club that your insults infer.
We can all have different opinions about what we want to see on the pitch and more widely in our club. Sites like this are about expressing those opinions but more usefully they are about listening to other people's opinions that may differ from our own without us resorting to the disparaging labels you throw around.
In my opinion, so far Allardyce has been fantastic for the club and in the short term he has won me over through both what I have seen on the pitch and what he has said when he has spoken. I also think he has brought in a top class team around him and when coupled with the coaching, personnel team and young talent we already have at the club it should be a real strength for us.
Yes the style certainly hasn't been pretty yet, but it has been effective. For now that is enough for me, very quickly I will want to see improvements in our attacking play against the weaker teams. As unbalanced as our squad is we still have much more quality than the weaker teams in the league and by Feb/ Mar we still shouldn't be struggling to play attacking football for 45-60 mins in matches against the weaker teams because Allardyce will have had time to get his footballing philosophy across to the squad.
If I see that small improvement before the end of the season then I will still be aboard the Big Sam train over the summer. We will then see what next season brings against the better teams and whether he should get a new contract at the end of the 18 months. I think he probably will deliver the improvement this season and I hope he does.
Looking longer term Allardyce may prove to be the answer in the long run, he may not. The first year under Martinez was positive and the first year under Koeman was positive. I was extremely optimistic at the start of this season, things can change quickly!
Allardyce hasn't been in this sort of position before in his career. Harking back to the days of Bolton is unrealistic, the game both on and off the pitch has changed drastically. He needs time to show us whether he can take us forward or not and I am relatively confident he will get that time.
Do I think he will deliver effective attacking football (irrespective of whether it is in a counter attack or possesion style) against the top teams in the long run so that we are a genuine competitors to them? Ignoring the fact that he will need to rely heavily on the recruitment team to achieve the successful recruitment on a budget that only Leicester and Tottenham have managed in the last 15 years to enable him, I really have no idea.
I have a niggling worry (60/ 40) that he was a progressive and forward thinking manager 15 years ago but that the game has moved on slightly without him since then and the best we can hope for in the long run is organised and difficult to beat against the best teams with good effective football meaning we get good results against most of the other teams and end up fighting for seventh - not a bad position to be in just not something that truly excites or takes us to where we dream of under Moshiri.
I truly hope that niggling worry is completely wrong (very possibly as it is based on zero inside knowledge) and Allardyce is as innovative now as he was 15 years ago. I hope things will turn out better for him than it did for the last 2 managers because that will mean things have turned out better for us fans but only time will tell.