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hogesar

Was it so much easier for Eddie Howe this season?

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One of the primary criticisms of Alex Neil, and one i''d agree with to an extent, is the loss of identity Norwich suffered during the season stemming from that Newcastle game. Eddie Howe, however, is consistently praised for sticking to a style and keeping them up with it.
But surely that was much easier for Eddie Howe to do than Alex Neil?
Eddie Howe had already had a couple seasons with his team, not half a season like Alex Neil. Instilling a style which players believed in and were good at takes time and Howe had that time. Alex Neil had an immediate requirement to take us from 10th in the Championship to Promotion to the premier league in half a season. Which of course, he accomplished emphatically.
On top of that, Bournemouth are / were / who cares either way, a smaller club. With a much smaller fanbase and therefore, more than likely, much less pressure. Bournemouth looked in danger for some time but there was nothing about any fans showing dissent, nothing really on social media etc criticising Howe. If anything, the media continued to praise, both locally and nationally.
When we lose a match, our own local media scrutinise every aspect of it and AN doesn''t have the name of Howe so gets no backing in the national media. Coupled with increased fan pressure - the need to find an instant winning formula becomes more and more desperate.
I''m not excusing everything Alex Neil did or didn''t do, but when I see the media crawling all over Eddie Howe it does irk me a bit. And that''s not to say Howe is a bad manager because he''s obviously not. But not only has he had more backing financially, he''s also had all of the above in his favour.
I don''t think it''s fair to compare the two.

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The difference between Norwich and Bournemouth was a matter of footballing philosophy. After the 5-2 imploding defeat to Newcastle we notably changed our approach to games - and at the time it helped, but over the course of the season it probably didn''t.

Bournemouth had an approach they trusted and stuck to it. Sometimes they lost heavily, but they battled and gave it a good go, scored goals and won games. We, however, chucked the approach that got us back into the Prem out the window from that moment on and adopted a defensive approach which yielded less chances, and thanks to our rather unprolific strike force, goals as well. Had we stuck to our principles would we have stayed up? Hmm, I''m not sure, but we''d certainly have given a lot more teams a run for their money. Not scoring for 4 games in the last few games which really a final nail in the coffin, a slightly more attacking approach might have ended with different results. Nobody will know now, of course. ho hum.

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Bournemouth have a super rich owner who doesnt mind paying 50% more than the real value of players in order to recruit. I doubt they will be a Premiership regular for many years and will probably be relegated in 16/17 season.

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Eddie Howe did also have to deal with two of his biggest signings (Mings and Gradle) and his best striker (Wilson) missing most of the season.

In an odd way I wonder if it might have been the fact they didn''t have many players with Premier League experience that helped them- they were fearless. Rather than having players who had already tried and been found wanting at the top level (Bassong, Jerome etc) they came up with a team of players who were getting their first crack at this. Also as you mentioned the team had been together for longer with less upheaval that ours.

However to state it was ''easier'' for him is just a bit odd to be honest. Howe has done a great job getting this team together, playing slick football and delivering performances that are more than the sum of their parts, something Neil failed to do too often for us. He deserves all the praise he gets.

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hogesar wrote: "Eddie Howe had already had a couple seasons with his team, not half a season like Alex Neil. Instilling a style which players believed in and were good at takes time and Howe had that time."
Not just a couple of seasons. He was first appointed Bournemouth manager in the 2008--2009 season when the club were in dire straits and has managed them ever since with the exception of a brief and unsuccessful one-season spell with Burnley. He was reappointed Bournemouth manager in October 2012. 
Your general point though is absolutely valid; it takes stability, consistency and a settled identity over several years to build a team capable of long-term survival in the EPL. Yo-yoing may still be part of that (as in the case of West Brom for example), but yo-yoing without first establishing the fundamentals, as we have been doing, is a different matter.
Also, the building process is about much more than the team, the playing style,  the squad building. It is also about putting in place the necessary,  EPL standard, supporting infrastructure. You can''t do that if every other year you have to slash the budget available for off-field development in order to finance another push for an immediate return to the top division.
IMO the only benefit from our rapid ascent under Lambert has been removing the burden of debt hanging over the club. From every other point of view we would have benefited more from a period of stability and team building in the Championship. Put another way, it would have been better if we had actually adhered to the timescale envisaged in McNally''s original seven-year plan rather than, as happened, leap-frogging the Championship building phase.
To me this has implications for how we now move forward. I disagree with those who think we should throw everything at an immediate return to the EPL. Doing that will just prolong the current futile cycle. Being in the Championship is not in itself a deterrent to serious investors.,especially if the club has obvious EPL potential and exhibits the traits of a Swansea, or a Bournemouth.

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Perhaps Eddie Howe had an idea of his best side after 6 games unlike our manager who had no idea of his best side after 36 games.

Also his coaching staff did not come from the Lowestoft and Hamilton

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Howe had been working with the same players for the better part of 3 years. Our manager had 6 months. Granted, Neil should''ve figured it out, but Howe had a lot more time and probably knows the squad inside out.

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One thing I argued is that it actually shows Eddie Howe up as a manager, he didn''t have a plan b at all, he only knows one way to play and will suffer the consequences of this next season when they have lost the surprise factor and try to transition into being a premiership team.

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Nobody was harping on about bournemouths "mega rich owner" preseason when they were signing gradel, mings and distin.

In fact they were laughing.

Now the "mega rich owner" is something to hide behind. Did they spend much more than us? Nope.

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Said it months ago that Howe''s clear vision for his team and Allardyce''s ability to organise his side was going to land us in trouble.

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I''d argue it was a bit harder for him as well. He spent £8m on Mings who got injured and £6m on Gradel who got injured as well as their main man Wilson being out all season.

I thought from then on they''d be doomed but he did really well to get enough performances out of what was left.

The likes of Daniels, Francis, Ritchie and the signing of Afobe was what saved them. The former 3 stepped up a gear this season.

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It was a lot harder for Howe as mentioned by others.

(Im gonna put a disclaimer in here and state categorically that i think the man is an arrogant twat.)

Missing his best striker, with a first XI below our quality (on paper) and his two "marquee" signings. can you imagine the uproar if we ended up playing King up front as a lone striker?!

Fact of the matter is, his side was well set-up, everyone knew their job, they had a good team spirit and heads weren''t allowed to drop.

From what i could see from our side, we had the typical "passionate" scot with no plan b, criticising players in public and a complete lack of nous. I am far from a Binner, i realise the limitations of our club but we really do need to take a long hard look at ourselves. The bottom half of the Prem was full of utter dross and yet we managed to out perform all except Villa.

If there is one thing that has been proven this season its that a side needs an inspirational, yet tactically aware manager (Ranieri, Koeman , Poch) and to have a philosophy. We have seen that the lone striker doesn''t work anymore. Not necessarily a return to 4-4-2 as it existed in the English leagues for so many years but a realisation that your forward does need support.

As badly as i feel we underperformed, with just one decent striker we would have stayed up. If Defoe played for us this season for example who thinks we still would have gone down?

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[quote user="6088m canary"]with just one decent striker we would have stayed up. If Defoe played for us this season for example who thinks we still would have gone down?[/quote]Me [:|] Even if we''d Kane & Vardy up front we''d still have gone down through the fragility of our defence.

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