Dean Smith

[foreveryoung]

3 minutes ago, KenjiOgiwara said:

We've done good this season. Disappointing finish, but all clubs will struggle with the key attacking player out, except maybe Barca and City. Take Bruno F. out of Man Utd or Salah out of RS and it's not so hot.

But utimately we just have a shockingly shit squad. Was watching Everton just now and their midfield and attack is so far ahead of us it makes me nauseus. Without Grealish we're poo.

This has been a reality check for most of us since Christmas. While it's a massive improvement from last year, we're still miles from being a top 6 team.

Don't agree! Were not miles off West ham.

Unfortunately we may have a coach who is miles off  top six experience.

[KenjiOgiwara]

Their squad is miles better than ours.

[Mjvilla]

33 minutes ago, useless said:

This is the original link.

Having gone back and found this series of events, I've summised that villalad had never even listened to it. And has used something he's never heard as a stick to beat Smith with ever since.

When in reality, the point being made isn't that he's not a results man, it's more that he will concentrate on performance levels because the better the performance level, the more chance of a result. 

Which, in reflection, is a good way of doing it. Or else, you have knee jerk reactions calling everyone shit after each defeat. Look at the performance.. what could we do better, what can we take into the next game. 

[nick76]

8 minutes ago, foreveryoung said:

Don't agree! Were not miles off West ham.

Unfortunately we may have a coach who is miles off  top six experience.

Miles off? Because he has no big six experience...I assume you are trying to say quality.  We don’t know that because we haven’t got a squad anywhere near top six quality.

As for West Ham, their squad depth is far far deeper than ours.  Benrhama can’t even get a start when most in here wanted us to buy him and we brought Traore instead.  They’ve also had years to build that squad and for players to have PL experience.  Many of our players have in comparison much less PL experience.  Cash, Emi, Konsa, Luiz, Nakamba, Ollie, Traore, McGinn have probably 60 or less league games at this level.  We are a young, inexperienced at this level and a coach who himself has less than 70 games at this level but each season he’s progressing.

does he have big six experience? No.  
does he have big six quality? We don’t know until we can buy some more players and fill out a squad that has a chance of competing at that level.  We haven’t that chance yet to test Smith out at that level.

[Vive_La_Villa]

28 minutes ago, KenjiOgiwara said:

Their squad is miles better than ours.

Exactly! They had Cresswell, Rice, Antonio, Masuaku all out injured yet still had Benrahama, Lanzini, Fredericks, Yamolenko and Balbeuna on the bench. 

If anyone think we’re not miles off West Ham after being in the league for just under 2 seasons and having a whole squad to build then they should be thinking Smith has done a good job!

Edited April 23, 2021 by Vive_La_Villa

[tomav84]

1 hour ago, villalad21 said:

It was TRO linking me the interview about a year ago.

Do not remember the source but it's true. "I'm not really a result man" Smith's words not mine.

He went on to say the most important thing is putting in performances. And i get that, but if you tell your players results isn't the main thing i can't see that leading to a winning culture. Do you?

Yeah you're absolutely right.  It's a minor miracle that we picked up any points at all, let alone this many, with that attitude from the manager. 

It's almost as if focusing on a good performance leads to good results...or is that just a ridiculous notion?

[briny_ear]

2 hours ago, useless said:

It was I who first linked to the interview, Smith didn't say he was a results man as such, he said that he focuses on performances rather than results, which isn't the same thing, you can focus on performances with the idea being that that's the best way of getting results, it's kind of logical really, but some tried to twist it to make it as if Smith wasn't bothered about results.

 

That may explain why we seem to end up losing quite a few games we really might have won with the right attitude. You need to focus on winning games by hook or by crook in the premier league. Playing beautiful football is always nice as well but it’s the icing on the cake. If the players know they are going to get assessed on how they “performed” rather than whether they got the points in the bag, no wonder we have been slipping down the table.

[Rightdm00]

24 minutes ago, briny_ear said:

That may explain why we seem to end up losing quite a few games we really might have won with the right attitude. You need to focus on winning games by hook or by crook in the premier league. Playing beautiful football is always nice as well but it’s the icing on the cake. If the players know they are going to get assessed on how they “performed” rather than whether they got the points in the bag, no wonder we have been slipping down the table.

This is the youngest team in the Prem. I feel it's far more important to teach them the right way to play even if it cost a couple points over a season. Over the course of the season you can't argue that performances have improved immensely when compared to last year.  For example, we went from not being able to beat 10 man Palace to wiping the floor with them while have 10 men ourselves. 

 Results matter, and Smith has delivered there as well. 3rd year on the bounce we have improved under his management. Long may it continue. 

[QldVilla]

19 minutes ago, Rightdm00 said:

This is the youngest team in the Prem. I feel it's far more important to teach them the right way to play even if it cost a couple points over a season. Over the course of the season you can't argue that performances have improved immensely when compared to last year.  For example, we went from not being able to beat 10 man Palace to wiping the floor with them while have 10 men ourselves. 

 Results matter, and Smith has delivered there as well. 3rd year on the bounce we have improved under his management. Long may it continue. 

I think some are missing the point Smith was making. He is more focused on the process, rather than the outcome. If the team gets the tactics right, the players play their roles, then the outcome will take care of itself.

[briny_ear]

21 minutes ago, QldVilla said:

I think some are missing the point Smith was making. He is more focused on the process, rather than the outcome. If the team gets the tactics right, the players play their roles, then the outcome will take care of itself.

With all due respect, that is EXACTLY the point. If you don't focus on the outcome. you won't get the outcome you want.

My mind goes back to Smith mentioning favourably that Jack Grealish went into the dressing room after the defeat to Sheff U and told our squad they had played well. Don't really care how they played, they lost and the aim is to win. So it would have been better to focus their minds on why they didn't get a result, rather than praise them for playing "well".

[QldVilla]

Just now, briny_ear said:

With all due respect, that is EXACTLY the point. If you don't focus on the outcome. you won't get the outcome you want.

My mind goes back to Smith mentioning favourably that Jack Grealish went into the dressing room after the defeat to Sheff U and told our squad they had played well. Don't really care how they played, they lost and the aim is to win. So it would have been better to focus their minds on why they didn't get a result, rather than praise them for playing "well".

Not if you want to be a coach. What your saying is, don't worry about tactics, I'm not going to give you any instructions, where not going to train to beat the opposition this weekend.... Just go out and win?

The process is improving your own game in training, training to identify weaknesses in the opposition, applying tactics to beat the opposition. If you can't carry out the process, you've already lost.

[briny_ear]

48 minutes ago, Rightdm00 said:

This is the youngest team in the Prem. I feel it's far more important to teach them the right way to play even if it cost a couple points over a season. Over the course of the season you can't argue that performances have improved immensely when compared to last year.  For example, we went from not being able to beat 10 man Palace to wiping the floor with them while have 10 men ourselves. 

 Results matter, and Smith has delivered there as well. 3rd year on the bounce we have improved under his management. Long may it continue. 

I see this mentioned a lot in these pages. It's been a bit of a rollercoaster of improvement, hasn't it? Involving significant spells of going backwards, like most of last season , and since Christmas this season. And it would be as well to map our spells of better form onto a grid showing when Grealish has been playing well.

So I think the narrative of consistent improvement under Smith is hard to sustain.

[briny_ear]

4 minutes ago, QldVilla said:

Not if you want to be a coach. What your saying is, don't worry about tactics, I'm not going to give you any instructions, where not going to train to beat the opposition this weekend.... Just go out and win?

The process is improving your own game in training, training to identify weaknesses in the opposition, applying tactics to beat the opposition. If you can't carry out the process, you've already lost.

If Smith really is saying that, we are heading for trouble.

[ozvillafan]

2 minutes ago, briny_ear said:

I see this mentioned a lot in these pages. It's been a bit of a rollercoaster of improvement, hasn't it? Involving significant spells of going backwards, like most of last season , and since Christmas this season. And it would be as well to map our spells of better form onto a grid showing when Grealish has been playing well.

So I think the narrative of consistent improvement under Smith is hard to sustain.

That's an interesting way of looking at it.

I can't think of any success across any industry, business or venture that was a smooth and steady process. In fact, the ones that prove to be successful are often the ones that fail often but learn from it. So we should expect the rollercoaster - especially early into his tenure.

Consistent improvement, then, is not the lack of failing: It's the degree. The highs and lows should plateau out so the deviation between them is less. While we haven't been as great recently as our early season form, we are still much better than our worst last season - especially defensively which, as the saying goes, is where you need to start.

To me, overall, we have seen consistent improvement from where Dean took over - and the table reflects this.

[QldVilla]

14 minutes ago, briny_ear said:

If Smith really is saying that, we are heading for trouble.

Your taking the comment too literally. No long term success is ever built in sport by focusing on the outcome.

[Dave-R]

2 hours ago, briny_ear said:

I see this mentioned a lot in these pages. It's been a bit of a rollercoaster of improvement, hasn't it? Involving significant spells of going backwards, like most of last season , and since Christmas this season. And it would be as well to map our spells of better form onto a grid showing when Grealish has been playing well.

So I think the narrative of consistent improvement under Smith is hard to sustain.

The way I see it is if we're pulling in better players our improvement rate will get better. As we get rid of players who are being inconsistent far to much to find players who are regularly consistent then we will see longer periods of success and find ourselves bringing more points in through wins and losses.

That's what we need to aim for, turning more games we've lost points on to draws and wins, doesn't matter how we do it or who has to be cut from the team, if it works it needs to be done.

[villalad21]

6 hours ago, tomav84 said:

Yeah you're absolutely right.  It's a minor miracle that we picked up any points at all, let alone this many, with that attitude from the manager. 

It's almost as if focusing on a good performance leads to good results...or is that just a ridiculous notion?

Well I am a results man and I can never agree with downplaying the Importance of results. 

I don't believe Smith has created a winning culture in his time here and by the looks of it after the game he didn't look very sad or upset we lost the game. In fact he looked in awe with Pep, smiling after the game. Not my manager, I am sorry. 

Edited April 24, 2021 by villalad21

[DCJonah]

2 hours ago, villalad21 said:

Well I am a results man and I can never agree with downplaying the Importance of results. 

I don't believe Smith has created a winning culture in his time here and by the looks of it after the game he didn't look very sad or upset we lost the game. In fact he looked in awe with Pep, smiling after the game. Not my manager, I am sorry. 

Longest winning streak in the entire history of the club. 

 

[villalad21]

Just now, DCJonah said:

Longest winning streak in the entire history of the club. 

 

In the second tier so not really that relevant imo

Winning 4 games in a row at the start of the season was much more impressive.

[foreveryoung]

6 hours ago, QldVilla said:

Not if you want to be a coach. What your saying is, don't worry about tactics, I'm not going to give you any instructions, where not going to train to beat the opposition this weekend.... Just go out and win?

The process is improving your own game in training, training to identify weaknesses in the opposition, applying tactics to beat the opposition. If you can't carry out the process, you've already lost.

Well we ain't doing either at the moment, so who's fault is it?