Inexperience or incompetence?

[The gut 0]

Obviously he is short of experience, but, it is ridiculous to consider him incompetent.

Until the 63rd minute he was looking like a master tactician.

Until the 95th minute he was leading a newly promoted side to a draw against a high quality established premier league club, scoring 4 goals.

How could anyone even suggest Alex is in the slightest bit incompetent.

[westcoastcanary 173]

Hey Nutty, do you buy 5 copies of the same newspaper every day just to check the accuracy of the news? [;)]

I agree with you about Martin at CB, but even supposing Tettey had been available I think AN''s selection was still flawed (see my points about exposing Pinto and playing both Wes and Redmond -- especially with Howson as one of the DMs). Regarding Pinto, I''m still bothered by a comment AN made earlier in the season about how, if you give the ball away in advanced positions and expose yourself to swift counters, you need to be able to rely on defenders capable of defending one-on-one. I think that''s unrealistic. It''s not that other teams have defenders so good that they never make mistakes, or who are so much better at dealing with one-on-one situations; it''s that, more often than not, if they do make a mistake there is a covering player helping them out and making sure attackers face two defenders not one. 

[nutty nigel 7,536]

It brings us back to the Mulumbu conundrum Westy. Assuming he would have been our best option to replace Tetty it would be iinteresting to know why Alex Neil seems reluctant to start him at the moment.

[Tumbleweed 106]

I like Mulumbu a lot and enjoy his forward surges, he seems a little more attack minded than Tettey. But he did seem the obvious solution to the DM problem last Sat, maybe AN just thought that Liverpool weren''t that strong in the No10 and AM roles so could get away with Dorrans and Howson. But also playing Wes and Redmond, plus a new striker alongside MBokani was a real surprise.

Almost every single one of our players though has been really inconsistent, and just when I think one is on a roll they seem to have a shocker. Probably the most consistent has been Tettey, but I seem to recall he has lost a couple of runners at times leading to goals.

The tinkering can''t help with this, maybe Alex Neil should pick what he perceives our strongest line up to be and stick with it, let the opposition worry about themselves a bit more and give our first team more time to gel together.

Hopefully this mini break will work in our favour in terms of working on the defence more, and I am really keen to see Klose who will surely start against Spurs. I have no idea now though who he will be partnered with.

Oh and by the way if I gave the impression that I think AN is incompetent I apologise, that was not the intention. But I do strongly feel he has made mistakes, and my header question was more theoretical than anything else as from the outside there appears a fine line between the two when things aren''t going well.

[Mr Jenkins 0]

nutty nigel wrote the following post at 27/01/2016 10:34 AM:

It brings us back to the Mulumbu conundrum Westy. Assuming he would have been our best option to replace Tetty it would be iinteresting to know why Alex Neil seems reluctant to start him at the moment.

The answer to that one will be found in his performances against Spurs and Man City I suspect.