The Hawk

Between him and Mings, you can see they are both technically good players (particularly for their size!)

You’d swear we were running down the clock 1-0 up in the dying minutes the way he left the pitch. 

1 hour ago, Skruff said:

We struggle whenever teams press us high. It's the way to beat us. The first few matches under Smith we were given far more time on the ball. 

I imagine we train to play our way out. But our players are currently unable to do so in a real match situation.

You can see patterns of playing out of defence, pass and move, 1-2s. But they are easily disrupted or poorly executed. 

When the tempo and intensity of our opponent is too high compared to that of the abilility of our players. They revert to long balls. I don't think that's what we practice, or how we try to play. Hence we're unsucessfull at that as well. 

The discrepancy between our players ability and what Smith is trying to do is too high. 

It's Smith's job to coach them and make them sucessfull at it. Not every player has the ability/is coachable. Most of them are past their prime and have been playing a certain way for most of their career. I believe many of them are too limited to adjust. And it's a huge part of our current issue. 

However it's Smith's responsibility to set up the team in a way that suits them. And adjust the instructions, training and tactics accordingly. I understand why criticism comes his way, he isn't above it. 

That said. It takes a long time to go from the way we've been playing to the way we want to play. Insisting on doing it with our current squad might in hindsight be naive, if our goal is to get as many points as possible. However, if the long term goal is to implement the style. The sooner he starts the better(that he continues). If another transfer window and a squad clear out is what's needed, so be it. I'm all for giving him time to get in the players he needs. 

It's also important to remember we're missing the most important cog in the machinery. And, in the current squad, there's no spare part. 

If we look anything similar come 1/4th into the next season. It's time time to consider things. Until then. I think patience is in order. He has my support. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

One of the few rational posts on this thread. 

Whenever things start going south, it’s human nature to look for reasons why and to attribute blame to something. Unfortunately, when the reasons aren’t entirely apparent (and I mean on a deeper level than just “the players are shite”), the obvious response as fans is to blame the person who’s job it is to know how to fix the situation, the manager. 

Often the logic is along the lines of “well if Leicester can go from nowhere to premier league champions, why can’t we?” - which isn’t a bad argument. It’s possible. But Leicester were an anomaly. The number of clubs in dire situations that very quickly turn it around are few and far between. It takes wholesale changes and time. 

Dean Smith is not the reason we lost to Brentford. Nor is he to blame for our current situation. Like the post above pointed out, Dean is setting the foundations for our style of play, but just because our players have been TOLD how to play, doesn’t mean that they are instantly going to be able to like many fans seem to expect. It’s a mid-to-long term strategy by Smith, but one that every successful business would agree with. There is clearly a payoff in the short term with the players we have, but slowly but surely things will start to turn around. Good things come to those who wait.

8 minutes ago, Dave J said:

Are we really at this stage ?  I feel if we were to lose the dissapointment would be palpable - but toxic I would hope not.?

Yeah toxic is when the cabbages come out. 

I do agree though that it won’t be a pretty sight if we lose our next game. The media will jump on the fact we’ve lost 3 on the bounce and that’ll churn up irrational public hysteria in no time. 

9 hours ago, privateer said:

What I posted in the SHA match thread back in November

I should add Elmohamady in that, too. Taylor and Elmo are two players I have long seriously disliked and get irritated by their mere presence on the teamsheet before the whistle even goes.

The difference with Whelan - and why I don't actually dislike him - is an attitude thing. He was a better player than he is now, time has caught up with him and the body doesn't do what the brain wants now.

Those pair of shitehawks, though, have always been pointless, useless, spineless inadequates. The only thing Elmohamady does occasionally is swing in a decent cross but the decent/crap ratio is unacceptable. As a FB he has zero value.

As for Taylor, I get seriously concerned when a professional football team manager hands him a start. He's utterly brainless and devoid of heart. And I can't decide if that's worse than the fact that he's utterly devoid of ability.

He can't defend because he doesn't have the ability. And then doesn't have the brain or heart to make up for any inadequacy or mistakes.

He can't attack because he doesn't have the ability, heart or brains to do that either. His first instinct always seems to be stop, check back, pass sideways or backwards thereby stifling any and every move he's involved in. The other scenario is, for him and everyone else the worst case scenario, to swing in a guaranteed useless cross but he'll only do that when he literally has nobody else to pass the ball to.

It's like he just about has enough brain to understand he can't cross and shouldn't so contrives to play in a way to avoid it, as above, with the check back and short pass.

A wretched excuse for a footballer.

Perfect summation 

1 hour ago, Dave-R said:

I see what your saying, but one thing that Smith said is that he got another keeper to make the competition for Nyland and the other keepers better as well.

It’s not like Smith can say in a press conference that he “bought Lovre because Nyland is useless”, his competition comment is just a political response but the reality is he’s spent 7 million on a keeper to replace a keeper we signed 6 months ago. He’ll go straight in. 

Hello everyone,

im a keen villa fan from Australia. Have watched most games live back home dating back to the beginning of the O'Neill era (the good days). Went to the Walsall friendly last night and I used to be a keen forum poster on soccerpulse and tikitaka.

hope to become part of the group.