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Dean Smith


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Just now, jim said:

Pretty much sums up where I am at as well.

If he does turn things around, then I'll be the first to admit I was wrong but unfortunately, looking at his record at his other clubs he looks to be a very limited manager and no amount of time will change that. 

The worry for me is that some are willing to let him build a new team?..  so what if that fails?

He get's sacked, the next manager comes in, rips "Dean Smiths squad up" as he will want his own team and round we go again.

**** that.

We need promoted this season.

I'd sooner we built a new team in the premier league rather than a championship one, imo.

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Someone want to explain how Dean Smith appears limited tactically? 

I'm certainly willing for the new regime, which on the football side means Smith and Pitarch to build a new team. Otherwise what's the point? If it fails then yes someone else will have a go. That's pretty normal too.

Promoted this season would be great financially for us but as quite a lot of us pointed out at the time starting the season with 1 senior CB and expecting promotion was a bit far fetched.

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2 minutes ago, romavillan said:

Promoted this season would be great financially for us but as quite a lot of us pointed out at the time starting the season with 1 senior CB and expecting promotion was a bit far fetched.

Granted RV, automatics probably was a bit ambutious, however 6th place to get into a play-off is not unrealistic, considering we have beat most of the teams above us already bar, it's more than achieveable imo.

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4 minutes ago, AvfcRigo82 said:

Granted RV, automatics probably was a bit ambutious, however 6th place to get into a play-off is not unrealistic, considering we have beat most of the teams above us already bar, it's more than achieveable imo.

Yep, I think it's doable, I'm starting to think the Tuanzebe injury is the most important one though. When we were really flying, he'd mop up, get his head up and do something constructive with the ball. He could play one and two touch to beat the press and get us going really well. 

Get him back sooner rather than later and of course a certain Jack Grealish and everything will look a lot rosier.

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4 hours ago, villalad21 said:

He seem very limited tactically which is disappointing because that's one of the things i wanted in our next manager when Bruce left.

We play the same exact way in every game, he never changes his formation and i can't remember him changing anything tactically that has changed a game so far. Except for him bringing on Hause and Whelan when w were losing 1-0 to Wigan ending in us losing 3-0. Also very weird subs a times which makes no sense. We are so predictable to play against which is dissappointing.

Hopefully he can change and turn it around, but unfortunately i think he is an average manager.

I have highlighted exactly the same problem that we suffered with him at Brentford, we had high hopes when he joined us, and he started off like a man possessed, high tempo, pressing football, easy on the eye, plenty of goals being scored, took us up to 6th position first time around, so naturally we thought he would press on the next season to greater things, but sadly no, we leaked goals, poor team selection, even poorer use of subs, we also became a little bit predictable, before he left to join you he was on a bad run with us with no win in 5. 

Our new man also got of to a bad start with no wins in 10, it wasn't helped by the sudden death of our technical director at the aged of 28, that left everyone at the club in shock, however Thomas Frank has tweaked and changed our system round, something  Dean Smith seemed unable to do, We are now unbeaten in 10 games, and scoring freely but not leaking like a sieve at the back. 

We aspire to obtain PL football being the size of club we are, Villa expect, and rightly so, to be a PL club, it seemed to me your directors employed him on the back of him and his family were life long Villa supporters, that is not a good enough reason, and like you I think he is just an average manager.

Looking forward to welcoming you all down to Griffin Park next Wednesday, should be an interesting game, it could be you last visit to Griffin Park, as we say goodbye to the old girl and hope to be in our new stadium sometime next season. 

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1 hour ago, AvfcRigo82 said:

The worry for me is that some are willing to let him build a new team?..  so what if that fails?

He get's sacked, the next manager comes in, rips "Dean Smiths squad up" as he will want his own team and round we go again.

**** that.

We need promoted this season.

I'd sooner we built a new team in the premier league rather than a championship one, imo.

That's football though isn't it? Surely this is all a bit 'chicken and egg,' no? What comes first, building a team, or getting promotion?

Smith inherited an imbalanced squad, and must surely have been limited to what he could actually achieve in the January Sales. There's the 'injury circus' that some acknowledge and some besmirch amidst rampant societal noobery. Either we miss those players because our squad wasn't as good as we thought it was when we were noncing Derby and Boro... or we don't. Personally, I am in the camp that we shouldn't be a one player team. We need to find a way to win without Jack... like we would need to win without Colonel Abraham. The loss of 'Axel,' was bad at the time because of how threadbare our defence was in the middle. Smith has endeavoured to solve that in January. Whether it works or not, we'll see. But this millennial fetish of 'I want results NOW,' is of limited sense. And people like that will be disappointed, more often than not.

So... how can Smith get promoted without constructing and effectively managing some sort of team of his own? Not having a pop at you, I like you (!!)... I just can't get beyond the fact that he's been here all of less months than the number of fingers on a standard human hand. The last twenty pages all seem to be some sort of self appointed in depth analysis on someone we know nothing about. For all of the 'I'll give him a chance' rhetoric, from certain posters, it's all bullshit. And the less said about the guy who seems to be looking forward to Smith failing so he can hold his own circle jerk and wag the finger on VillaTalk, the better.

Sheesh... 👍 

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1 hour ago, AvfcRigo82 said:

The worry for me is that some are willing to let him build a new team?..  so what if that fails?

He get's sacked, the next manager comes in, rips "Dean Smiths squad up" as he will want his own team and round we go again.

**** that.

We need promoted this season.

I'd sooner we built a new team in the premier league rather than a championship one, imo.

It never is guarenteed that any previous managers squad is ripped up when a new coach/manager comes in.

This squad is getting ripped up anyway when most of those with contracts won't see a new one because they have failed under two managers now.

The chances are down the line that some manager can always make do with a certain percentage of the squad. I would say the very best managers out there could pull off miracles with a previous managers squad and mite be able to do with making slight alterations.

Smith is young enough in his coaching career I think to learn more and keep adapting things here. Sure results may not turn out the way we'd like all the time but I hope that and I have to have faith, in that he can help move our squad forward from what was a very dark time in our history. I would say so much happened at villa in some months since promotion wasn't achieved that it in fact it was like a seismic charge blowing up and we were fortunate to recover.

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2 hours ago, AvfcRigo82 said:

The worry for me is that some are willing to let him build a new team?..  so what if that fails?

He get's sacked, the next manager comes in, rips "Dean Smiths squad up" as he will want his own team and round we go again.

**** that.

We need promoted this season.

I'd sooner we built a new team in the premier league rather than a championship one, imo.

100% spot on.

I honestly believe the board will assess in the summer based on how we finish the season. 

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6 hours ago, villalad21 said:

He seem very limited tactically which is dissappointing because that's one of the things i wanted in our next manager when Bruce left.

We play the same exact way in every game, he never changes his formation and i can't remember him changing anything tactically that has changed a game so far. Except for him bringing on Hause and Whelan when w were losing 1-0 to Wigan ending in us losing 3-0. Also very weird subs a ttimes which makes no sense. We are so predictable to play against which is dissappointing.

Hopefully he can change and turn it around, but unfortunately i think he is an average manager.

Much of the stuff aimed at Bruce....but we have a differently thinking manager now.

I think the limitations are in their players....hence why 2 different thinking managers have basically the same problems and are showing a similar style.

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10 minutes ago, jim said:

100% spot on.

I honestly believe the board will assess in the summer based on how we finish the season. 

You don't need big money to get out of this league.....you need the right blend.

The Prem' is the place to spend it.

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3 hours ago, gaffer85 said:

I don't see your point if your  going to compare the 2 managers I think you have to compare the 2 first seasons as manager  of the club and personally i think that Smith is slightly doing better than Bruce was at this stage of their aston villa tenure 

I can't understand how Bruce was given so much time yet people are starting to question Smith already 

He literally had one window and that's not  even the good one 

Let's get behind what he is doing and hopefully he brings back to where we belong

On this post I agree with the first bit, we should compare to Bruce's first season because we're in a similar mess player wise, but on the bold bit, let's not rewrite history and say Steve Bruce received no critisim in his first season.

The debate over style of play, tactics, results, etc started around the time his honeymoon period ended and we started losing again, and critisim of his January signings started in February. Most people then, as most people do now, acknowledged that he needs a bit more time to make the team his, but it was far from a universal opinion and claims like "people are writing off DS after 5 minutes but gave SB 2.5 years" is just nonsense 

Some people never wanted DS and have made their feelings clear from minute 1, in the same way some people never wanted SB and made their feelings clear from minute 1. Some people have now written DS off after a few months, as some wrote SB off after a few months. Most agree next season is the one to judge Smith on, as most people agreed the next season was the one to judge Bruce. 

From what I recall the argument over SB was far more heated than the one over DS as well so while it's right that DS needs some time to build a new team, he's not been criticised any more than our previous manager was, as much as literally any manager would be at this stage in their tenure 

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Smith's apparent flexibility in formation/system is a concern to me.

I really like what he talks about and it all sounds positive. But there must be another option somewhere along the line. Even a subtle one.

The only change of formation in his entire time here is Swansea away when we won 1-0. It was more of a 4411/4231 instead of the usual 433. You could tell watching it as well.

So he's tried it once in whatever it is, 20 games? I think he has to work on a backup shape he and the players are comfortable going with from minute 1. We can't be relying on top half PL players like Jack Grealish because unless we go up this season we won't have any next year.

Even if we do go up, which is the obvious ideal scenario, we have to have something else to go onto the field with. Look how Chelsea have been thumped on recent weeks once their system has a flaw exposed.

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8 minutes ago, Tomaszk said:

Smith's apparent flexibility in formation/system is a concern to me.

I really like what he talks about and it all sounds positive. But there must be another option somewhere along the line. Even a subtle one.

The only change of formation in his entire time here is Swansea away when we won 1-0. It was more of a 4411/4231 instead of the usual 433. You could tell watching it as well.

So he's tried it once in whatever it is, 20 games? I think he has to work on a backup shape he and the players are comfortable going with from minute 1. We can't be relying on top half PL players like Jack Grealish because unless we go up this season we won't have any next year.

Even if we do go up, which is the obvious ideal scenario, we have to have something else to go onto the field with. Look how Chelsea have been thumped on recent weeks once their system has a flaw exposed.

Can't agree.

There has been many a post match interview where he has explained a substitution and/or tactical change.

Usually after people labelled a sub as bizarre etc.

Them working or not is another conversation.

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4 hours ago, AvfcRigo82 said:

He get's sacked, the next manager comes in, rips "Dean Smiths squad up" as he will want his own team and round we go again.

If we keep hiring average managers it's the never ending cycle.

We should learn from the likes of Leeds and Wolves. Look what happens when you get in an actual good manager.

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27 minutes ago, Tomaszk said:

Smith's apparent flexibility in formation/system is a concern to me.

I really like what he talks about and it all sounds positive. But there must be another option somewhere along the line. Even a subtle one.

The only change of formation in his entire time here is Swansea away when we won 1-0. It was more of a 4411/4231 instead of the usual 433. You could tell watching it as well.

So he's tried it once in whatever it is, 20 games? I think he has to work on a backup shape he and the players are comfortable going with from minute 1. We can't be relying on top half PL players like Jack Grealish because unless we go up this season we won't have any next year.

Even if we do go up, which is the obvious ideal scenario, we have to have something else to go onto the field with. Look how Chelsea have been thumped on recent weeks once their system has a flaw exposed.

But surely formations morph as the game goes on....Its not static, its dynamic.

As territory is gained or receded, formations can change accordingly....for me too much is spoken about this( not discarding it, but its just one thing amongst many)....I get more concerned with players winning their individual battles with their opposite number.

I Hope Albert & Conor wins theirs if they are playing.

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4 hours ago, AvfcRigo82 said:

The worry for me is that some are willing to let him build a new team?..  so what if that fails?

He get's sacked, the next manager comes in, rips "Dean Smiths squad up" as he will want his own team and round we go again.

 

This is the cycle with any manager. It’s why we have needed an ethos at the club for a long time. We have jumped from one playing style under one manager to a completely different style under the next manager. Hopefully the new owners will Ben looking at changing that so that we pick a style and stick with similar managers

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47 minutes ago, JAMAICAN-VILLAN said:

Can't agree.

There has been many a post match interview where he has explained a substitution and/or tactical change.

Usually after people labelled a sub as bizarre etc.

Them working or not is another conversation.

Purely shape/formation I'm talking about. I can only remember Swansea it being spoken about. Maybe I've missed the others? Would love to see us try a 343/3421.

His subs which don't work, I usually agree with his reasoning. Honestly, I agree with 99% of everything he says. We were an average keeper away from winning six in a row Nov/Dec, God knows the positivity we'd have carried on from there.

Edited by Tomaszk
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Only 4 points outside the playoffs, beat the Blades tonight that's 1 point before the Weekends games with a midweek game coming up and another playoff contender next weekend coming to Villa park, not a bad situation really.

Imo Dean Smith was a good appointment  ( I'm a fan), plays good football, can work on a budget if necessary, is able to adapt should key players leave (did at Brentford) and is a Villa fan.

He has only had 1 window to work with, hard to fix a teams issues in 1 window.

Perhaps he is a victim of his own early success, beating Derby and Boro, getting a draw at WBA, winning the derby. Maybe some expected to fly up the table, hasnt happened, but was always unlikely without signing top class full backs and defenders wasnt it?

We are a bit nervous and edgy now, some questioning Bielsa and his selections and things. 

Start of the season though most Leeds fans would have snapped your hand off for a playoff place, heightened expectations because of early form can be a managers undoing imo.

Dean Smith is a good manager, string 2 or 3 wins together and things will look much better.

Start tonight, Wednesday and Next weekend pleaseeee

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