08 Apr 2018 13:26:39
Belief or self-confidence - call it what you will - is clearly not as evident as it should be with the current squad. Look at the City/ ManUtd game. City were rampant first half and could/ should have been 5 or 6 up before half time. Did Man Utd heads drop? No. Did they come out in the second half and let City continue to roll right over them? No. Why? One word. Belief. The Utd players kept faith in their ability to play and in the end they got their reward. I don't know if our lads simply don't have enough faith in themselves or if they are feeling shackled by the current management. I personally think it's the latter.
08 Apr 2018 14:00:38
There is some truth in that, BigH, but talent and ability comes into it as well. We are a million miles away from the two clubs you mentioned. Look at our bench compared to theirs, they have players waiting to come on who can change games whereas we don't.
08 Apr 2018 14:15:02
Everton have amassed the 3rd highest points return from losing positions this season, so self belief isn't an issue.
08 Apr 2018 14:32:55
To be fair Smit it's usually because we're a goal down due to our negative tactics and have to go more attacking to claw something back!
If only we started with attack in mind.
08 Apr 2018 14:33:57
Is that only because we have had a lot of opportunities to come from behind. The telling stat would be number of games in which a team goes behind against number of points gained in those games.
08 Apr 2018 14:42:20
Our objective against Liverpool should have been to get three points. We are safe from relegation so one more point does not help us much. We need to try to overcome Leicester and Burnley to maybe get into Europe. I still think playing an attacking formation gives us more of a chance of winning than a defensive one with the hope that we can nick one at the end. If we had played like we did during the last 15 minutes the whole of the game we would have won IMHO.
08 Apr 2018 16:04:04
You can only play as well as your opponent allows as the old saying goes. I also believe we are a million miles behind the 2 clubs mentioned. 10 years ago we had been averaging 6th position for a while. We actually were starting to look like we might break into the top 4. Now we are looking like mid table. But we have 3 of our best players reaching retirement and will have to find some quality players just to stand still.
{Ed025's Note - i think we had gone as far as we could under moyes degsy and a change was the right call, unfortunately the managers we have had since have all flattered do deceive mate and now this club is broken and it will take at least a few seasons to fix, getting the right man is paramount but we should not expect him to wave a magic wand and everything will be ok, it will take time and patience but you know as well as anybody that our supporters want immediate results..
08 Apr 2018 16:50:08
Regardless of whether it is because of the amount of chances we have had, what it shows is we have belief and don't always crumble.
08 Apr 2018 17:40:13
Been looking into the points from losing positions deal. It turns out to be really quite like the league table but with some interesting anomalies.
Best are Man City who average 1.67 pts per game from losing positions but have had only 6 deficits
then Man Utd 1.25 pts avge per deficit
Liverpool 1.00 pt
Spurs 0.92
The first outlier is Bournemouth who are fifth at 0.78
Everton are 8= with Chelsea 0.62 just ahead of Leicester 0.61
The most anomalies are the disaster areas
West Brom are worst 0.05 from deficits but they don't get many points altogether
WBA, Huddersfield and Brighton have not won from behind. The surprise being Brighton, tipped for survival, who average only 0.13 from behind but Brighton have relatively few deficitis (15 same as Burnley 0.67) .
Newcastle, also tipped to survive, only realise 0.33 from behind which is the same as seemingly doomed Stoke.
Swansea are a bit of a surprise on 0.43 and at 0.39 Southampton are better than you might expect.
09 Apr 2018 07:17:37
ED025 Thanks for understanding my post and not seeing it as another praise the Moyes one. you got exactly what I was saying. we are a club in a mess. We had lots of change and need some stability somehow. Unsworth is a good start. He should be made 100% to feel wanted and valued. He obviously wanted to manage us desperately and probably still does. That should be the bedrock for the future. He should be groomed exactly for that position. He should know that in the future that job is likely his. I hope Moshiri/ BlueBill make him aware that this is the 5 year plan! Then the rest of the club can start to be built around that bedrock!
{Ed025's Note - i would certainly be happy with that degsy, unfortunately with the clamor for instant success i cant see that happening anytime soon, wenger is the last of the long time managers i feel and the future looks like being managers having short term contracts and it becoming a merry-go-round, maybe its the likes of us being out of touch with reality in our old age mate..
09 Apr 2018 08:53:30
Pochetino and Klopp are both young managers (well young to me) who have stayed at their clubs for several years.
They are now beginning to see the fruits of their labours. If they decide to leave it will be their decision, not the clubs.
Both haven't yet won a lot but their board and the fans have shown patience.
There are other young managers out there who want the opportunity to build something and I believe we can find one. Then, it will be up to us to show the same patience/ understanding.
San Allardyce is not the one to take us forward long term. We need to thank him and move on. It is not being disrespectful - it is the only decision to make.
09 Apr 2018 18:33:11
Klopp has only been there 2 1/ 2 years so not a long standing appointment yet.