Dean Smith

[ciggiesnbeer]

22 minutes ago, mikeyp102 said:

 Bruce often said he made mistakes. It’s not really new. 

imho I think he lacked the "why" bit. I say this as someone who was pro Bruce for a very long time and still regard him with some fondness.

[MickeyC_UTV]

1 hour ago, JAMAICAN-VILLAN said:

Either Dean Smith reads Villa Talk, or he is just a very honest and open manager.

Says exactly what we thought/think, and acknowledges his mistakes!

I like it.

Just wait for the criticism, ‘too honest’ ‘ upsets (insert player’s name here), he is not a manager etc. etc. We have all read and been involvaed in the Bruce thread, but his honesty has been a breath of freah air IMHO

[Demitri_C]

10 hours ago, Vive_La_Villa said:

He said the players didn’t play the balls down the channels where he was making runs. Maybe the same thing used to happen for Bruce ? 

Bruce didn't take repsonsbility very often. His own foolishness and stubbornness of sticking to things that did not work led to his down fall. Remember him playing 3-5-2 and it never worked yet he stuck with it while we dropped points?

He was more interested in "shutting a few people up" then getting on with the job

[Vive_La_Villa]

7 hours ago, briny_ear said:

When Bruce said things like that he was pilloried for throwing players under the bus. Now Deano is saying it I note he is being praised for refreshing honesty. 

I guess that is progress. We can now have a discussion about how a game has gone and how the squad is playing without obsessively blaming  the manager for every single thing that happens on the pitch.

My post was more about maybe Bruce had a way to use Hogan but the players weren’t executing it well. We’ll never know because he never told us! 

To be honest I cant ever remember Bruce talking about why individuals didn’t play well. It might have got lost amongst the usual comments of club was in a bad place in the summer and how he has no money to spend because of FFP. 

Edit: many including me blamed Smith for making a wrong decision bring Hogan on. The manager himself also admits it was a mistake but explained why he did it.  That’s quite refreshing in my opinion. 

Edited October 26, 2018 by Vive_La_Villa

[Vive_La_Villa]

15 hours ago, hippo said:

We have Grealish and Tammy - Grealish ripped up this division last season - Tammy has in the past - if you beleive what you read spurs wanted to pay big money for Abraham.

Chester may not quite be premiership quality - but he is not far off it - and is amongst the better cb's in this division

Mcginn is clearly cutting it 

Hutton/Taylor - I believe are reasonable at this level 

Kjodia - blows hot and cold - but I believe is a decent striker at this level 

Bjarnson, Horihane, Lansbury  - ok fair enough none of them fantastic - but should be able to cut it alongside Grealish and Mcginn

Adomah, El Gahzi, bollasie, - none have yet sparkled this season  - but all have previous at this or higher levels

I really think the issue is moulding a team out of that lot - DS as been brought in as head coach, so most of his time will be spent fine tuning that lot into a unit - I am not saying we should/will rocket up the table - but if you compare the resources of some clubs in this division its favourable ...plus DS has been told he can add to the squad in the Jan window. IMO he has the tools to do the job.

A new GK, get Grealish firing and things should start to look alot better.

 

 

 

It’s a team that should be making a playoff challenge. Many seem to think it’s a team that should be walking the league. Well they used to anyway. 

[Stevo985]

8 hours ago, briny_ear said:

When Bruce said things like that he was pilloried for throwing players under the bus. Now Deano is saying it I note he is being praised for refreshing honesty. 

I guess that is progress. We can now have a discussion about how a game has gone and how the squad is playing without obsessively blaming  the manager for every single thing that happens on the pitch.

It's true.

Like I said earlier in the thread, when we like a manager all his interviews and press conferences are great. When we don't like him they're all shit. When in fact they're probably all the same.

VillaTalk and football fans in general read far far too much into everything said by managers.

[Vive_La_Villa]

48 minutes ago, Stevo985 said:

It's true.

Like I said earlier in the thread, when we like a manager all his interviews and press conferences are great. When we don't like him they're all shit. When in fact they're probably all the same.

VillaTalk and football fans in general read far far too much into everything said by managers.

True but I never really cared to listen to Bruce even when we were winning. There’s some managers I enjoy listening to such as pep or Klopp. Others are just boring. 

Smith is ok so far. A little dry though. 

Edit: I used to love listening to Warnock. Crazy guy. 

Edited October 26, 2018 by Vive_La_Villa

[sheepyvillian]

15 hours ago, Vive_La_Villa said:

There’s no blind spot. He’s just not been good enough. A lot of blame was directed at Bruce because of how we play. So give it a few months and if we can start playing a different way then Hogan should be banging in the goals right? 

Which is exactly what I said. Let's see if he can recapture the form he showed at Brentford. It's like some on here, and I don't include you, would be happy to see him fail just so they could say, " I told you so ".

[A'Villan]

3 hours ago, Stevo985 said:

It's true.

Like I said earlier in the thread, when we like a manager all his interviews and press conferences are great. When we don't like him they're all shit. When in fact they're probably all the same.

VillaTalk and football fans in general read far far too much into everything said by managers.

Tell me, what reason do I have for currently liking Dean Smith and all that he says?

I have a tendency toward being optimistic and Smith has had little opportunity to hamper that. One potential bias.

Another is that I have a lot of confidence in Wes Edens to make the right appointments.

I don't understand why either should have much significance in me making a judgement on how Smith presents.

FWIW when the going was good under Bruce he was quite humble and maintained his 'there or thereabouts' mantra.

It was when he came under scrutiny that he palmed off the blame and I was saying that from the get go, at a time that he had my full support, that I disliked some off his choice of words because for me it reflected a poor mentality.

[CosmicVillan]

4 hours ago, Vive_La_Villa said:

It’s a team that should be making a playoff challenge. Many seem to think it’s a team that should be walking the league. Well they used to anyway. 

"Talent wins games, but teamwork and intelligence win championships." - Michael Jordan 

[sne]

Have not listened to any of Smiths interviews yet but with Bruce (and many, many other managers) you can tell it is a highly rehearsed act where they just go through the motions and if pressed often fall back to the same over used phrases.

Be it going again, battening hatches, putting on boots or "shining"

As much as interviews really doesn't matter much to me I'd still like to see Smith go into different detail after different games, mention some specifics instead of broad sweeping nothing statements.

Not gonna lie, I was pretty fed up with our manager looking sad staring down his feet and soft-spoken explaining it was all down to individual errors out of his control.

[Stevo985]

1 minute ago, A'Villan said:

Tell me, what reason do I have for currently liking Dean Smith and all that he says?

I have a tendency toward being optimistic and Smith has had little opportunity to hamper that. One potential bias.

Another is that I have a lot of confidence in Wes Edens to make the right appointments.

I don't understand why either should have much significance in me making a judgement on how Smith presents.

FWIW when the going was good under Bruce he was quite humble and maintained his 'there or thereabouts' mantra.

It was when he came under scrutiny that he palmed off the blame and I was saying that from the get go, at a time that he had my full support, that I disliked some off his choice of words because for me it reflected a poor mentality.

He's just been appointed. We're all optimistic about what he can do for the club and how we'll perform under him.

Therefore we see what he says in a more favourable light than his predecessor who had fallen out of favour.

There's nothing wrong with that. It's natural. I do the same thing.

 

I'm just saying that I think people put too much stock in what managers say in front of the cameras.

[hippo]

I hope to god I am wrong - but all I am seeing is a guy who got  Walsall and Brentford mid table finishes. 

[A'Villan]

8 minutes ago, Stevo985 said:

He's just been appointed. We're all optimistic about what he can do for the club and how we'll perform under him.

Therefore we see what he says in a more favourable light than his predecessor who had fallen out of favour.

There's nothing wrong with that. It's natural. I do the same thing.

  

I'm just saying that I think people put too much stock in what managers say in front of the cameras.

Yeah, very true on your last point.

Personally, I was calling out Bruce for his interviews back when I thought we might even enjoy some PL football under him.

You did say generally speaking in your post, so probably didn't need to bring it up.

We can be glad some of the antics and back and forth of the Bruce is done with, this is the Smith thread. My bad.

[sheepyvillian]

17 minutes ago, hippo said:

I hope to god I am wrong - but all I am seeing is a guy who got  Walsall and Brentford mid table finishes. 

You're not wrong, he did get Walsall and Brentford mid - table finishes. 

[TheStagMan]

33 minutes ago, sheepyvillian said:

You're not wrong, he did get Walsall and Brentford mid - table finishes. 

Which for both those teams is very impressive. 

[Lord Willard]

Been here just over a week and managed two games already and people already writing him off. Never change VT

[hippo]

7 minutes ago, Lord Willard said:

Been here just over a week and managed two games already and people already writing him off. Never change VT

Where have you read that ? 

[Dave-R]

2 hours ago, Lord Willard said:

Been here just over a week and managed two games already and people already writing him off. Never change VT

Not seen anyone write Smith off yet. Odd concerns maybe.

No one can do a write off this soon, it would be crazy.

[TRO]

16 hours ago, briny_ear said:

When Bruce said things like that he was pilloried for throwing players under the bus. Now Deano is saying it I note he is being praised for refreshing honesty. 

I guess that is progress. We can now have a discussion about how a game has gone and how the squad is playing without obsessively blaming  the manager for every single thing that happens on the pitch.

you tinker...

but you're right.