Steve Bruce

[Dr_Pangloss]

Bruce's problem last season was the negative football and setting us up far too deep with a kick and rush mentality. If this isn't corrected we will not go up this season. It's too negative given the players we have. 

[Guest av1]

4 minutes ago, TRO said:

I think it is more a case that posters simply don't all agree.

 

Agreed. And i will never, ever take issue with someone simply because they have a different opinion. I take issue with accusation that my negative opinion on Bruce is premature. That isn't aimed at you by the way mate. 

8 minutes ago, TRO said:

I seen improvements today, the passing was snappier and we was closing down and tracking better......I also seen a decent Watford team,from the premier league  who failed to score ( should have in my view).

 

I think that is down to the fact that we have improved the quality of the squad. I agree that Terry and GW are good signings. 

11 minutes ago, TRO said:

I think there is still a concern about the creativity, but I tend to think that is more player, than manager.

 

This is where we start to disagree. Lansbury, Hurihane, Hogan, RMC, all scored goals for their former employers. Bruce has to take responsibility for that due to his tactics. 

14 minutes ago, TRO said:

The players have to do the business......Kodjia will do it when he returns.......and it will be the same manager.

 

All due respect mate, i think thats a bit of a cop out. As for Kodjia, he's an enigma, he's the sort of rouge player that does what he wants. I don't give Bruce massive amounts of praise for what Kodjia does. 

17 minutes ago, TRO said:

As for Steve Bruce not making it until Xmas......only results will do that......If he is getting them he will still be here.

If he is getting the results but the football is dour and unconvincing, he will go back to the market and get players in who can do that.

 

So if the football is still shit come January you would give him even more money to try and correct it? 

If the football is still shit after 18 months and entering a 3rd transfer window, I'd suggest the issue is with the manager rather the players. 

[terrytini]

Compared to, for example, the Boro' friendly at the same stage last year we look far more experienced, far less shell shocked and fragile, and more solid defensively and in midfield.

We look, if anything, considerably less creative.

Whether that 'swap' around in the relative departments will be the difference between, for example,10 points from 11 games ( last year) and 22 as needed this year is unclear to me.

But I rather suspect it just might be, which of course would be enough. 

But I'm by no means as sure of that as I ought to be considereing the squad we have and the time the Manager has now had.

Fingers crossed.

[Guest av1]

13 minutes ago, AntrimBlack said:

To be fair to Bruce - Terry, Elmohamady and Whelan all seem to be very astute signings.

Lansbury, Hurihane, Hogan, and Bree where all very astute signings. The issue isn't the lads he's signing, its how he's setting them up. 

[terrytini]

11 minutes ago, av1 said:

Agreed. And i will never, ever take issue with someone simply because they have a different opinion. I take issue with accusation that my negative opinion on Bruce is premature. That isn't aimed at you by the way mate. 

I think that is down to the fact that we have improved the quality of the squad. I agree that Terry and GW are good signings. 

This is where we start to disagree. Lansbury, Hurihane, Hogan, RMC, all scored goals for their former employers. Bruce has to take responsibility for that due to his tactics. 

All due respect mate, i think thats a bit of a cop out. As for Kodjia, he's an enigma, he's the sort of rouge player that does what he wants. I don't give Bruce massive amounts of praise for what Kodjia does. 

So if the football is still shit come January you would give him even more money to try and correct it? 

If the football is still shit after 18 months and entering a 3rd transfer window, I'd suggest the issue is with the manager rather the players. 

Agree 100%.

Its abundantly clear now, friendlies or not, that his overall approach is going to be very similar to last season.

Although if the football is shit in January and we are in the top 2 he will have done his job.

I think he is a clever man. He is very experienced. IMO He knows it is his tactics that cause the creativity issues ( in fact the only person I hear saying that's not the case is TRO ! ) but is prepared to go down that route because he thinks his way will work.

As I've said above I suspect he might be right.

I think he's mistaken taking that approach though.....I think with the squad we have we could dominate games ( even RDM had us doing that) and having fixed (IMO) our mental fragility and improved our defence get better results that way.

 

Edited July 29, 2017 by terrytini

[TRO]

11 minutes ago, av1 said:

Agreed. And i will never, ever take issue with someone simply because they have a different opinion. I take issue with accusation that my negative opinion on Bruce is premature. That isn't aimed at you by the way mate. 

I think that is down to the fact that we have improved the quality of the squad. I agree that Terry and GW are good signings. 

This is where we start to disagree. Lansbury, Hurihane, Hogan, RMC, all scored goals for their former employers. Bruce has to take responsibility for that due to his tactics. 

All due respect mate, i think thats a bit of a cop out. As for Kodjia, he's an enigma, he's the sort of rouge player that does what he wants. I don't give Bruce massive amounts of praise for what Kodjia does. 

So if the football is still shit come January you would give him even more money to try and correct it? 

If the football is still shit after 18 months and entering a 3rd transfer window, I'd suggest the issue is with the manager rather the players. 

as you would expect I simply don't agree......where you said you don't agree.

 you say you don't give massive amounts of praise to Bruce for what Kodjia does and I can see where you are coming from, but you can't have your cake and eat it......Managers only have so much influence on what a player does he can't think and make decisions for them.....or beat a man.

He has just bought Whelan and surely you can see the difference.

I didn't happen to think the football was shit.....I thought it had offensive weaknesses, yes.......and equally I think he will fix them.......when? I have no idea.

Edited July 29, 2017 by TRO

[Guest av1]

1 minute ago, terrytini said:

Although if the football is shit in January and we are in the top 2 he will have done his job.

 

I think we can all agree on that. I don't care if his tactics make my eyes bleed, if we are in the top 2 in January, and that results in promotion, i will laud Bruce for a job well done. 

I just think he's too bloody negative. Look at all the teams that did well last year. I'm not just talking about the 3 that went up. Fulham, Reading, Leeds, They all took the American military approach (attack first ask questions later). 

Yes he got Hull and Sha promoted, his tactics worked for those 2 teams. But it isn't working here. 

 

[theboyangel]

We've seen in the championship that there will always be an opportunity to score.

so far this preseason, we look a lot more robust but calm at the back so I imagine we'll have one of the best, if not best defensive records this season.

the trick is to take our chances when presented them. 

Today showed we are progressing as a team (from the back upwards) but still miss that one player who can play that killer ball.

[Guest av1]

11 minutes ago, TRO said:

Managers only have so much influence on what a player does he can't think and make decisions for them.....or beat a man.

 

RMC, Hogan, Lansbury, Hurihane, and Bree (who, bar RMC, were all Bruce's signings), were all able to make decisions and beat a man at their former clubs. So whats changed?

Bruce is the common denominator.

[Guest av1]

Just now, theboyangel said:

We've seen in the championship that there will always be an opportunity to score.

 

Agreed. And yet with about £45m worth of strikers, we did very little of that scoring thing last season. 

We have players that are proven at this level who looked crap last year. That has to be down to the manager?

[skarroki]

I think we would have won today in the formation we were set up in, if Grealish hadn't gone off injured and Hogan/Kodjia was playing instead of Gabby.

The killer ball needs to come from the player in the hole and I don't think Lansbury was given enough freedom to roam in that position as much as he should have had. 

I do think it'll come good and if we play like that against Hull we will create enough chances, and have the best 11 on the pitch to put the ball in the back of the net on at least 1 occasion. I can't see Hull breaking our defence and they've only just signed Hector on loan who hasn't had any pre season game time, he'll have to play next week because they don't have any other options at the back. They also haven't replaced Robertson so I don't even know if they have a natural LB in the squad. 

I think on paper the games look hard but I see Hull as pushovers and a routine win in the 1st round of the cup, 2  more games under the players belts and we'll start to get into the groove by the time we come up against more dangerous or defensive opposition. 

 

[VillaChris]

Attack is still heavily dependant on Kodjia who I doubt we'll see until September (and he'll need a month or so to get match fitness).

Like others the defence dosen't worry me at all, it's clear we have plenty of nous there to snuff out opposition attacks but there really isn't many goals until Kodj gets fit again. Think it will be a similar mentality to what we start by beating Derby at home in late Feb, score a goal and then hang on to the 1-0.

Can see us drawing a few early on which wouldn't be great news as we did that under RDM and loads of teams got comfortably ahead of us and we will struggle to claw back points difference on a fair few of them if that happens.

[VillanousOne]

We are starting to look like a decent side and there are a lot more chances being created going forward, just not really being converted, Hogan and Gabby look too isolated in the penalty area but it feels like we now have the depth to put together a more attacking eleven. We now have Amavi, Elmo, Grealish, Green and Adomah all capable of putting a decent cross in. There really is no excuses anymore.

Still don't think we will score enough goals under Bruce but we should easily have enough in the tank to get into the playoffs.

[TheAuthority]

47 minutes ago, av1 said:

Lansbury, Hurihane, Hogan, and Bree where all very astute signings. The issue isn't the lads he's signing, its how he's setting them up. 

Lansbury had the majority of the game today in the number 10 role, just behind the striker. He played there with both Gabby & Hogan in front of him.

He was anonymous.

[Farlz]

I didn't see any negative football today, have to say I was pleased with what i saw. The constant hoofing from defence has eased up and we had a good few attacks, the final ball just let us down today.

[AntrimBlack]

51 minutes ago, av1 said:

Lansbury, Hurihane, Hogan, and Bree where all very astute signings. The issue isn't the lads he's signing, its how he's setting them up. 

I agree and they are astute signings. And you are correct in that Bruce has not been using them properly. Terry, Elmohamady and Whelan, however, have settled in immediately. The reason - they are being played in their proper positions.

[Junxs]

1 hour ago, TRO said:

I think there is still a concern about the creativity, but I tend to think that is more player, than manager.

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still think we need a schemer who can open teams up.

You seem to have changed your tune somewhat!

Just a couple of weeks ago you were debating with me until the cows came home that we didn't need more creative players, you were saying Glen Whelan was the key that would bring the balance to allow the creative players the freedom, you even listed 11 of them saying that was more than enough once we had Whelan. So i'm very surprised you have changed your tune before the season has even started. 

I have been saying all summer we lack creativity and you (along with a couple others) have been arguing with me that we don't.

 

[Guest av1]

6 minutes ago, AntrimBlack said:

I agree and they are astute signings. And you are correct in that Bruce has not been using them properly. Terry, Elmohamady and Whelan, however, have settled in immediately. The reason - they are being played in their proper positions.

Absolutely. I think though tactics are less important with defender's than in other positions. As a defender your job is simply to mark the bloke infront of you. It doesn't really matter if you're playing for Tony Pulis or Arsene Wenger, your job is largely the same. 

The issue with Bruce is how he deals with offensive players. 

 

[VILLAMARV]

1 hour ago, TRO said:

I think there is still a concern about the creativity, but I tend to think that is more player, than manager.

I don't buy this notion that SB is inhibiting them from scoring......I also I believe JT for one would have something to say about that.....I also think Steve Round would be having a quite word too, if there was any mileage in it.

As ever TRO I agree with a lot of what you say but for me this is where we diverge. The manager is a negative manager. He's alright and a good bloke n that and you, I and others have a lot of time for what he's doing especially considering the horror show that he inherited.

Will it be enough for promotion? well we'll start finding out in a weeks time eh?

1 hour ago, av1 said:

Me to pal. It doesn't matter if you are pro Bruce or anti Bruce, we are all Villa fans, we all want the same, so we all have hope. 

I just don't see that much has changed since last season. The issue is Bruce's tactics, and he's been the same for his entire career. 

Well said AV1. Nail, head and all that.

Why anyone expects anything else from him is beyond me.

He's here to do what he does. He doesn't care about free-flowing football. He might grind out enough results though.

Best thing is the talking stops now.

[Eastie]

34 minutes ago, VillanousOne said:

We are starting to look like a decent side and there are a lot more chances being created going forward, just not really being converted, Hogan and Gabby look too isolated in the penalty area but it feels like we now have the depth to put together a more attacking eleven. We now have Amavi, Elmo, Grealish, Green and Adomah all capable of putting a decent cross in. There really is no excuses anymore.

Still don't think we will score enough goals under Bruce but we should easily have enough in the tank to get into the playoffs.

Getting into the play offs would be failure in my view - the squad we have we should be targeting automatic promotion and anything less than that will mean we have underachieved.