08 May 2024 04:27:27
West ham parting with Moyes has got me thinking about expectations and the vast disparities in squad depth and quality between the top of the table and the bottom.
I was thinking about SD and how there have been calls for him to be sacked throughout the season. And hey I get it to a degree, waiting til April for the first league when of 2024, was brutal.
Looking back over the fixtures for that period, and it was a really tricky schedule. City and Spurs twice each, Villa, Palace twice to name a few, but what stuck was how long the run went on regardless.
I think there is a section of fans, many of whom are Dyche out, that can’t accept the reality of our situation. Let’s look at the quality of squads in the league, player for player where do we really think we rank? I’d put, Sheffield, Burnley, and Luton well below us. I think beyond that, we probably just edge Forest, maybe Brentford? But even those sides have star quality in the likes of Gibbs-White, Elanga, Toney, Mbeumo, and this seems true as we continue up the table. We really don’t have that flair kind of player that can take a game and win it with a moment, unlike many other similar strength squads after you get beyond the bottom 3.
I’d have our squad as 16th on paper, player for player. So what should that say about our expectations of a manager at the club? Undoubtedly, I think we all believe EFC should be way above this position in reality (we all want to get back to fighting for Europe) , but there is only so much a manager can do when he has one of the weakest squads in the league. I think we can sometimes conflate our historical expectations of EFC, with what our expectations of the present should and it’s easy to pin that on the manager.
In todays game, how many places does a strong manager gain for his team? What’s reasonable? Take away our deductions and we’re on 45 pts in 13th with 2 to go. To me, that’s 3 places higher than where I’d rank our squad strength.
I think Dyche is the man that we have to attribute that to. He has this squad of players overachieving if you look at it this way. The man has had to sell his best players and not be able to properly replace them. As long as this remains the case, sacking Dyche and bringing in a new manager does not resolve the issue. We need to keep backing Dyche in my opinion, despite often not playing the prettiest football, and he will make mistakes like any manager, but he is doing well with the squad that our finances is affording him. He’s doing what he has to do to secure us in the league given the financial and points deduction circumstances.
What do you guys think it a reasonable expectation of Dyche going into next season if we presume the squad at best stays at the same overall strength?
08 May 2024 07:41:40
As most are aware I am not a fan of 'pretty' football and also would debate what constitutes entertaining football. Often hear/ read "We pay good money to be entertained". I always played to give my best but ultimately to win, it is after all a competitive sport. Now if we had leagues based on most entertaining I could understand the disappointment. Dyche has (in the end) done well. The guy was a defender and his first thought has been to make us difficult to score against. My argument with him is his hesitancy and on the surface tactical naivety.
Never the less he has achieved what most of us would have thought not possible with (at the time) 3 games to go.
08 May 2024 08:04:23
Tmh I agree, dyche has been left with a bag of dog turd of a squad, with out deductions we would be above Brighton , how anyone can say he's not done a fantastic job also under the pressures he's under as are the team, he is the right man for the job, we are in a worse position than when Moyes arrived many years ago and look where we ended up, dyche may not win anyone over with some of his play, but he got us over the finish line with games to spare and 8 points deducted, now you tell me who could under those restrictions could of done any better, no one that's who, we have the right man and people need to get behind him until he has money to splash and then is getting it wrong we need to be happy with what we have.
08 May 2024 08:38:59
Good posts above we can hope that this present team gets dismantled and new come in, then give Sean a few seasons he has done well with some of the tripe he been left with, time to move on really looks like he will stay but that depends on new owners arriving if ever looking forward to this summer.
08 May 2024 10:37:28
Dyche out there's better about.
08 May 2024 11:01:09
We are not disputing that Nick of course there’s better out there but we can’t afford them, Sean has done a good job with a very bad Team get them gone give him a few seasons and all will be good.
08 May 2024 13:28:48
We can't keep repeating mistakes of the past or this cycle will continue, I've got less socks than the amount of managers we have had.
08 May 2024 15:15:04
GB I respect all your posts as others, but if we can't look beyond Dyche, we might as well be contempt with being a bottom half club for the foreseeable future. Sorry but Dyche is not the future. I worked in Burnley for 11 years and made friends with many claret fans. Not all were Dyche fans and many glad to see him go.
08 May 2024 20:30:27
Problem is nick we are a bottom half team and will remain a bottom half team until the finances improve. There is no magic wand and no manager however young will turn us into a top half team without significant backing. Wether people like Dyche or not he's proven manager for what we need now.
10 May 2024 00:24:50
With the way we have been run for the last several years, we are a club in the bottom half of the table. With aspirations and ambition to climb the league, it will take time to recover from our present ordeal.
What will a young, hungry manager bring to the table, especially in our predicament? I think we need experience more than anything right now, someone who knows when to give out a rollicking or when to put an arm round a player. Someone who knows how to grind out results when the going gets tough. Please name me which young and up-coming managers fall under this remit? And, if things don't go as expected under this mew young manager, will the fans show him any patience? I highly doubt it! Silva was a youngish, progressive manager, so too Frank, but they both had plenty of detractors. Maybe that type of manager will be good when the club is in a more stable condition but, for now, we can't afford to have a manager who is, effectively, learning on the job.