Dean Smith

[LakotaDakota]

12 minutes ago, KenjiOgiwara said:

Getting in a new manager and sacking him without a full pre-season and a summer transfer window is just plain bonkers. Criticize our performances all you want, but calling for his head is just ridiculous. 

So you want to give him a pre-season & make him responsible for completely rebuilding a massively decimated squad even if we only win another 1/2 games until the end of the season? When the season finishes he will have been in charge for 34 league games (+ one 3-0 defeat in the cup) If we have only managed 8/9 wins in 34 games and 5 of those were actually in the first 8 what makes you think he deserves any more of a chance?

[Keener window-cleaner]

16 minutes ago, LakotaDakota said:

August 6th to May5th is 273 days.

273 days to cram in 46 games, I just don't know how these poor people getting paid 2 million quid per year to play football can possibly cope with the demands of actually playing a game of football every 6 days or so

Agree with you, but I was talking about players reaching 35, most footballers retire at that age because their bodies can't cope with it, and in the last seasons of their careers the performance levels drops. We have many players 30-35 and my reply to the original post was that it is probably nothing more to it than a lot of players are getting old and dont perform (in contrast to the suggestion that they don't perform because of some other reason).

[Zatman]

3 minutes ago, LakotaDakota said:

So you want to give him a pre-season & make him responsible for completely rebuilding a massively decimated squad even if we only win another 1/2 games until the end of the season? When the season finishes he will have been in charge for 34 league games (+ one 3-0 defeat in the cup) If we have only managed 8/9 wins in 34 games and 5 of those were actually in the first 8 what makes you think he deserves any more of a chance?

Farke won 15 games only in his 1st season

David Wagner won 10 only

[villalad21]

21 minutes ago, KenjiOgiwara said:

Getting in a new manager and sacking him without a full pre-season and a summer transfer window is just plain bonkers. Criticize our performances all you want, but calling for his head is just ridiculous. 

Are you actually serious?

I'm just a bit curious, what if we don't win a single game between now and the end of the season, you would still stick by him?

The idea that a manager is immune to the sack in his first season regardless of what happens is something i will never agree with. To me he has to earn his right to keep the job in the summer, there are still plenty of games left for him to win me back, but as of now he is failing on all fronts. 

[LakotaDakota]

Don't disagree that age doesn't play some part but Cardiff had a total of 8 players under the age of 27 in their squad last year, 11 of them were 30+

You need a mixture of everything in the league. Sure Brentford have a lot of kids but that is also why they will never do anything and go on mass winning & losing runs as younger players are generally not very consistent.

The average age of squads in this league varies very little and is on average 25.8, we might be at the higher end of it at 27.4 (numbers taken from july/august)  but 16/7 teams average is 25+ and you can greatly reduce the average from 27-25 simply with the addition/removal of one player

[LakotaDakota]

19 minutes ago, Zatman said:

Farke won 15 games only in his 1st season

David Wagner won 10 only

15 is a hell of a lot more than our current 7

Norwich won 20 games in 16/17 and finished on 70 points. Farke won 15 and finished on 60. Sure it isn't as good and they didn't progress (did anyone really expect them to do anything other than somewhere around top 10?) but realistically they didn't actually do that much worse.

Hard to judge Wagner too much i guess.

Sure his first season he won 10 in 30, But that was with Huddersfield who were 18th, crap and had only won 3 in 16 before he was appointed so i would say his 1 in 3 win rate was actually pretty good

Edited February 17, 2019 by LakotaDakota

[weedman]

33 minutes ago, LakotaDakota said:

August 6th to May5th is 273 days.

273 days to cram in 46 games, I just don't know how these poor people getting paid 2 million quid per year to play football can possibly cope with the demands of actually playing a game of football every 6 days or so

I really hate this mindset. Money doesn't make you fitter. Money doesn't stop you being fatigued. Money doesn't make you a better player. 

At the top level the difference between 100% and 95% is massive. At our level it's probably more 100% to 90%. It's not like Sunday league where you can roll out of bed pissed 10 mins before the match and still play basically the same because the difference between 100% and 50% is negligible. No player chooses to be below peak condition, but playing lots of high intensity football matches certainly causes it, regardless of whether they're on £50 a week or £500,000

[LakotaDakota]

5 minutes ago, weedman said:

I really hate this mindset. Money doesn't make you fitter. Money doesn't stop you being fatigued. Money doesn't make you a better player. 

At the top level the difference between 100% and 95% is massive. At our level it's probably more 100% to 90%. It's not like Sunday league where you can roll out of bed pissed 10 mins before the match and still play basically the same because the difference between 100% and 50% is negligible. No player chooses to be below peak condition, but playing lots of high intensity football matches certainly causes it, regardless of whether they're on £50 a week or £500,000

It was more aimed at people saying out ancient players can't play 2 games every week. The simple fact is that other than 8 lots of midweek rounds they don't anyway

They are professional footballers, expecting them to be able to actually play 46 games of football in 273 days whatever money they are being paid doesn't seem too unreasonable

Edited February 17, 2019 by LakotaDakota

[AvfcRigo82]

1 hour ago, KenjiOgiwara said:

Getting in a new manager and sacking him without a full pre-season and a summer transfer window is just plain bonkers. Criticize our performances all you want, but calling for his head is just ridiculous. 

Or you could argue he was brought in to steady the ship, if he got us into the play-offs then it would have been an added bonus.

I think at the end of this season we should now aim at getting a more prolific manager here with the blank canvas of building a new squad and let the new guy start to build something big imo.

There will still be a few bits of deadwood to shift but the majority of it will have gone by the end of this season.

Also the growing rumour of a fall out with JT is another thing that now interests me.

As it stands, it's not looking good for Dean Smith.

Edited February 17, 2019 by AvfcRigo82

[AndyM3000]

3 hours ago, hippo said:

Slightly better ? This year we have narrowly beaten ipswich !!!!!!.....

Well under Bruce we couldn't beat them at all and they had 10 men for 60 minutes. Clear signs of progress!

[AvfcRigo82]

48 minutes ago, Zatman said:

Farke won 15 games only in his 1st season

David Wagner won 10 only

They had the experience of the mighty Borussia Dortmund setup in their CV.

Dean Smith had the Walsall way of doing things and the mighty Brentford style to bring to the party.

I like the guy but he and his assistant are out of their depth at this football club.

[sne]

The fitness level on our players are likely to be a lot worse than those for players in top teams.

They are expected to play more games, at a higher tempo against much better opponents.

With CL and cup runs many of them play 50+ games /season, and internationals to that.

They'll never be as talented, but there really is no reason why our players should not be as fit as these players.

Think in general a lot of players live a pretty cozy life and don't put that extra effort in with individual training.

Compared to how much athletes in many other sports train, footballers have it very easy.

we need to find players who want to do more than just the bare minimum acquired in training.

Sick to death of having a squad full of players who are fine with where they are just picking up a nice paycheck and kicking some ball a couple timer a week.

 

 

[andym]

39 minutes ago, LakotaDakota said:

15 is a hell of a lot more than our current 7

Norwich won 20 games in 16/17 and finished on 70 points. Farke won 15 and finished on 60. Sure it isn't as good and they didn't progress (did anyone really expect them to do anything other than somewhere around top 10?) but realistically they didn't actually do that much worse.

Hard to judge Wagner too much i guess.

Sure his first season he won 10 in 30, But that was with Huddersfield who were 18th, crap and had only won 3 in 16 before he was appointed so i would say his 1 in 3 win rate was actually pretty good

So Smith only needs to win 4 more games to match the 'pretty good 1 in 3' ratio achieved by Wagner and Farke, given when he took over we were crap and had only won 3 in 12.

Unfortunately even that looks unlikely at the moment.

[Darth Villa]

6 minutes ago, AvfcRigo82 said:

Also the growing rumour of a fall out with JT is another thing that now interests me.

As it stands, it's not looking good for Dean Smith.

@AvfcRigo82, forgive me for asking directly but can you elaborate on the JT fall out rumours? It strikes me that rumours will inevitably surface now, given the poor performances and thanks to our obvious frustration as fans but if something like a genuine falling out has occurred then it could have a bigger impact and help explain the drop off these past 10 games or so.

I just keep hoping it will get better next season but a nagging voice in my head (and not the wife for a change) keeps telling me I'm exhibiting Dr Xia levels of blind optimism.

[AvfcRigo82]

18 minutes ago, Darth Villa said:

@AvfcRigo82, forgive me for asking directly but can you elaborate on the JT fall out rumours? It strikes me that rumours will inevitably surface now, given the poor performances and thanks to our obvious frustration as fans but if something like a genuine falling out has occurred then it could have a bigger impact and help explain the drop off these past 10 games or so.

I just keep hoping it will get better next season but a nagging voice in my head (and not the wife for a change) keeps telling me I'm exhibiting Dr Xia levels of blind optimism.

Not a problem mate.

It was mentioned in one of the threads yesterday but again, only a rumour.

Like you say, times like these in our poor run of form could start these kind of stories/rumours etc. to coincide with the poor run of form we have witnessed/endured since December.

Again, How true these rumours are I am not too sure.

Wish I knew more as the poor form just doesn't add up (even with the loss of Jack and Axel) I do not think they will make this go away once they return.

Edited February 17, 2019 by AvfcRigo82

[Darth Villa]

Thanks @AvfcRigo82, I guess we're both in the same boat with regards to trying to make sense of the alarming drop off in performances.

My belief is the club have decided this year isn't happening and therefore they're not bothered as we seem to have a plan for surviving FFP.   This in turn is filtering through to the player's, who aren't the most committed and motivated individuals on their best days either.

I just hope we have plan's for next season that are well advanced as I don't know how long Smith will get if we don't start seeing progress once he's got his "own" player's in over the summer.

[KentVillan]

2 hours ago, LakotaDakota said:

August 6th to May5th is 273 days.

273 days to cram in 46 games, I just don't know how these poor people getting paid 2 million quid per year to play football can possibly cope with the demands of actually playing a game of football every 6 days or so

Your salary doesn't make you fitter. As you get older, you accumulate more injuries and weaknesses, and your body takes longer to repair the normal damage from 90 mins of football. This isn't like you playing three games of 5-a-side a week... these guys are going flat out, and unless your name is Ronaldo or Messi, it catches up with everyone at some point in the season. Tammy is looking tired, for example, and you can hardly criticise his attitude or professionalism.

[villalad21]

1 hour ago, andym said:

Unfortunately even that looks unlikely at the moment.

Very unlikely.

I'd be happy if we got another win before the season ends. We're awful. I've forgotten how it feels like to win. That pathetic Ipswich game seem ages ago

Edited February 18, 2019 by villalad21

[Stuartc445]

5 hours ago, foreveryoung said:

Once Smith gets his players in blah blah.

So the plan at the end of this season is to replace the squad with players who can play to his system.  Without Grealish, Abraham, McGinn, Mings, maybe Chester.

Good luck. We'll need to get used to promotion not happening next season either.

it's crazy isn't it, some people go on and on about how in the summer he'll get his players in like he did at Brentford but they strangely forget to mention that all Brentford have ever done is finish mid table. 

[1974Centenary]

Well if they are tired maybe they should think about changing careers to shall we say bricklayer.Tired my A*** .Their lifestyle might explain tiredness not energy levels on the pitch.