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It's been almost a year...

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People seem to want to forget that a in a lot of games under Farke we weren't very good and had to rely on moments of individual brilliance from Buendia or Pukki to get a result. It seems like people remember us always playing brilliant, incisive passing football under him in every game but that wasn't the case. In many games in our last promotion season we looked unconvincing and struggled to break teams down, in his first promotion season we were often woeful defensively and had to win and draw games from behind because we were far too open. The PL was a different story, we had the odd good game where we cut teams open in 18/19 but the vast majority of the time all of our passing moves broke down by the half way line and we looked really poor and dull to watch because we were so one dimensional and too easy to knock off the ball. 

Smith always seems to get judged against how we played under Farke v Leeds away and Huddersfield at home and not the average Farke era performance and it isn't fair on him. He doesn't have Buendia and is trying to build a style that will work better if we get promoted again which means developing players who have some physicality (at the expense of some technical quality because of our budget) and trying to attack teams quicker. People always wonder why we finished higher than Brentford in that promotion season but they then went on and survived in the PL when we didn't, it's because they built a team and style that could make the step up when required, it doesn't win you as many games against inferior opposition like Farkeball, but it translated a lot better when playing better teams and that is similar to what Smith is trying to do here. Yes it isn't as good as what Farke treated us to at his best, but we're trying to go up and stay up now, not be the best and most exciting Championship team because building with a style that only works if you have equal or better quality players than the opposition doesn't work in the league above. 

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30 minutes ago, Capt. Pants said:

Farke was rightfully sacked. Should probably should have been sooner.

Interesting though that in other posts, Smith supporters are now retrospectively criticising Farke for the very same things that the 'Farke outers' were spouting a year ago. Not exactly whole hearted support, which Smith clearly doesn't have (pre Luton)!

 

I understand why Farke was sacked, however what I can’t understand is what followed, why appoint a manger and give them no funds in January, when we were still in with a chance of staying up? If you were happy to accept relegation in the first place by not backing your new manager to bring in one or two players why not just stick with Farke who, although, seemed out of his depth at times in the Prem, would of almost certainly delivered another stellar season back in the Championship. Lampard was clearly the first choice of the club so Smith was already second best in the eyes of those in charge. It seems we took one step forward and 3 back under smith so far. 

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2 minutes ago, Christoph Stiepermann said:

People seem to want to forget that a in a lot of games under Farke we weren't very good and had to rely on moments of individual brilliance from Buendia or Pukki to get a result. It seems like people remember us always playing brilliant, incisive passing football under him in every game but that wasn't the case. In many games in our last promotion season we looked unconvincing and struggled to break teams down, in his first promotion season we were often woeful defensively and had to win and draw games from behind because we were far too open. The PL was a different story, we had the odd good game where we cut teams open in 18/19 but the vast majority of the time all of our passing moves broke down by the half way line and we looked really poor and dull to watch because we were so one dimensional and too easy to knock off the ball. 

Smith always seems to get judged against how we played under Farke v Leeds away and Huddersfield at home and not the average Farke era performance and it isn't fair on him. He doesn't have Buendia and is trying to build a style that will work better if we get promoted again which means developing players who have some physicality (at the expense of some technical quality because of our budget) and trying to attack teams quicker. People always wonder why we finished higher than Brentford in that promotion season but they then went on and survived in the PL when we didn't, it's because they built a team and style that could make the step up when required, it doesn't win you as many games against inferior opposition like Farkeball, but it translated a lot better when playing better teams and that is similar to what Smith is trying to do here. Yes it isn't as good as what Farke treated us to at his best, but we're trying to go up and stay up now, not be the best and most exciting Championship team because building with a style that only works if you have equal or better quality players than the opposition doesn't work in the league above. 

Regardless of manager I feel In the Premiership we always seemed to lack that composure for the most important games. I don’t mean the ones against the top 6 I mean the ones against the rest of the league that is the results that keeps you in the league. 
 

however under Farke I felt we always showed up when it mattered in big games in the Championship. So far under Smith I don’t really feel we’ve had a stand out team performance like we saw say at Leeds away under Farke. If that comes opinions could change but sadly I don’t feel Smith’s style of play is conducive to controlling football games. 

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2 minutes ago, By Hook or Ian crook said:

Regardless of manager I feel In the Premiership we always seemed to lack that composure for the most important games. I don’t mean the ones against the top 6 I mean the ones against the rest of the league that is the results that keeps you in the league. 
 

however under Farke I felt we always showed up when it mattered in big games in the Championship. So far under Smith I don’t really feel we’ve had a stand out team performance like we saw say at Leeds away under Farke. If that comes opinions could change but sadly I don’t feel Smith’s style of play is conducive to controlling football games. 

It's definitely not as conducive to controlling games you're right and that's why we won't win as many games or get as many points under Smith this year as we got under Farke the last two times. But that's kind of the whole point because we're building a style that can get results without having to control games if we get promoted again. We could stick Farke in charge and give him 100m to spend in the PL but we're still unlikely to be able to control games, score goals and keep teams out in the PL because the quality and athleticism in that league is so high. 

It's not perfect now i'll freely admit that, which is why I say we're building and not fully utilizing yet. We need to cut out the defensive mistakes and be more coherent and incisive in our counter attacking but I can see what we're trying to do even if it's not working yet. You have to remember though most of our players were signed for Farke and Smith has admitted in his latest press conference what is blatanetly obvious “Sometimes you can have a lot of players who just want to play football, but there are times when you look at the game within that, which isn’t solely about trying to play football, but to turn the opposition and create opportunities."

You want someone like Farke in charge and to try to control games if you've stayed up for 3 seasons and have build a good team in that time, a manager like him with that style isn't right for us for where we find ourselves right now. 

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5 minutes ago, Christoph Stiepermann said:

It's definitely not as conducive to controlling games you're right and that's why we won't win as many games or get as many points under Smith this year as we got under Farke the last two times. But that's kind of the whole point because we're building a style that can get results without having to control games if we get promoted again. We could stick Farke in charge and give him 100m to spend in the PL but we're still unlikely to be able to control games, score goals and keep teams out in the PL because the quality and athleticism in that league is so high. 

It's not perfect now i'll freely admit that, which is why I say we're building and not fully utilizing yet. We need to cut out the defensive mistakes and be more coherent and incisive in our counter attacking but I can see what we're trying to do even if it's not working yet. You have to remember though most of our players were signed for Farke and Smith has admitted in his latest press conference what is blatanetly obvious “Sometimes you can have a lot of players who just want to play football, but there are times when you look at the game within that, which isn’t solely about trying to play football, but to turn the opposition and create opportunities."

You want someone like Farke in charge and to try to control games if you've stayed up for 3 seasons and have build a good team in that time, a manager like him with that style isn't right for us for where we find ourselves right now. 

In this division,

With some of these players

And with this squad.

It's absolutely what we need.

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39 minutes ago, Christoph Stiepermann said:

People seem to want to forget that a in a lot of games under Farke we weren't very good and had to rely on moments of individual brilliance from Buendia or Pukki to get a result. It seems like people remember us always playing brilliant, incisive passing football under him in every game but that wasn't the case. In many games in our last promotion season we looked unconvincing and struggled to break teams down, in his first promotion season we were often woeful defensively and had to win and draw games from behind because we were far too open. The PL was a different story, we had the odd good game where we cut teams open in 18/19 but the vast majority of the time all of our passing moves broke down by the half way line and we looked really poor and dull to watch because we were so one dimensional and too easy to knock off the ball. 

Smith always seems to get judged against how we played under Farke v Leeds away and Huddersfield at home and not the average Farke era performance and it isn't fair on him. He doesn't have Buendia and is trying to build a style that will work better if we get promoted again which means developing players who have some physicality (at the expense of some technical quality because of our budget) and trying to attack teams quicker. People always wonder why we finished higher than Brentford in that promotion season but they then went on and survived in the PL when we didn't, it's because they built a team and style that could make the step up when required, it doesn't win you as many games against inferior opposition like Farkeball, but it translated a lot better when playing better teams and that is similar to what Smith is trying to do here. Yes it isn't as good as what Farke treated us to at his best, but we're trying to go up and stay up now, not be the best and most exciting Championship team because building with a style that only works if you have equal or better quality players than the opposition doesn't work in the league above. 

 

I'm sorry, but if you honestly think that the performances we have seen so far this season represent some kind of platform for surviving in the PL, you are away with the fairies. I accept that we may need to build a different style in order to survive, but Smith is not doing it. A different formation each game which means that even the players seem to have no idea what their role is this week does not represent progress towards this new style. He has had twelve months and everything seems as haphazard and random as it was on the day he arrived.

Edited by canarybubbles
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3 hours ago, cambridgeshire canary said:

"DF brought, class, style and a belief that, given the right tools, we could make something of it"

 

And is statistically one of the worst top flight managers in history. Funny you left that part out.

Probably because many of us watch football for enjoyment and excitement not because we want to study statistics.

Most of us also realise that statistics can be manipulated (and frequently are) to 'prove' whatever opinion you wish, however barmy.

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2 hours ago, Mello Yello said:

Is he a scarecrow then?.....

I can neither confirm nor deny my intention behind that statement…😉

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3 minutes ago, CirclePoint said:

I can neither confirm nor deny my intention behind that statement…😉

Is your job writing the messages in fortune cookies?

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2 hours ago, canarybubbles said:

Yesterday by chance highlights of the Newcastle game when Pukki got a hat-trick came up as first suggestion on my YouTube page, so I watched it. OMG, compared to the dross we get now, it looked so fluid and exciting. Pukki was on fire and Cantwell was nothing like the shadow of a player he has become. There was joy in the performance.

Now I know the vast majority of games that season weren't like that, and that for some reason we were unbelievably bad in the last ten games, but I couldn't help but feel how far we have regressed. For more than a year now, we have been disjointed, ugly, joyless, shapeless, and it's no longer because we have to face some of the best sides on the planet; we look just as crap against Cardiff and Hull and Reading as we did last season against Premier League opponents.

This post isn't an argument for Farke; our decline started under his management. But Smith has done nothing in twelve months to arrest that decline. We need a fresh start and a young, exciting head coach.

Leitner was incredible that day. One thing Farke struggled with, was managing big personalities.

Not having Leitner weakened us. 

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Just now, Creedence Clearwater Couto said:

Leitner was incredible that day. One thing Farke struggled with, was managing big personalities.

Not having Leitner weakened us. 

I agree about Leitner that day, but I'm not sure Farke is to blame for that fall-out. Leitner seems to self-destruct everywhere he goes. Such a waste of a fantastic talent.

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5 hours ago, CDMullins said:

I didn't mind losing under him because I knew 99% we'd go down swinging, trying to play football and with some passion.

Only in the premier league, we looked like Steve Rogers before he had super soldier serum.

Farke also struggled without Buendia in his side. He also struggled to get his teams to come from behind.

I loved Farke, but he was far from perfect and I really wish people would stop painting him that way just to use as a stick to beat Smith with.

I thought we disliked Andy Hughes for clapping the fans. Farke does it and suddenly he's a nice guy we all warm to and never (lie) wanted to leave?

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24 minutes ago, chicken said:


I thought we disliked Andy Hughes for clapping the fans. 

 

I thought we disliked Andy Hughes because he was an utterly ****e footballer? 

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3 minutes ago, Shining White said:

I thought we disliked Andy Hughes because he was an utterly ****e footballer? 

Well, you'd never have known that on here at the time... 

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6 hours ago, wcorkcanary said:

Hard to disagree, as we watch everything that was built up under Farke ,wash away over the last year. However, and this won't be popular, I think I can see where Smith is trying to take us, I just happen to think he's wrong. The 433 , once up n running with this level of player should do ok in the Champs , particularly with a competent DCM in place. 

But, it won't do in the Prem, no Farking way. Unless we bring in 6 seriously decent players. So here's my point.... If we concentrate on 352 ...gets sarge and Pukki on( with idah/ hugill as options. The midfield by definition of the system should be well patrolled at all times giving Nunez, Sara, Dowell/ Cantwell , whoever ...as they all look decent operators in tight spaces , some cover behind . 

Use this season to really bed in the system, should we get promoted, stick with it, just upgrade in personel as much as possible. Given how hard working  Sarge and Pukki are, we don't lose much , if anything defensively by playing this way.

Not a bad shout at all. Smith to me seems like the classic lets do what everyone else is doing type of manager. With the players we habe, 352 is pribably the best chance to get the best out of our players. Both max and dimi are better going forwards than defending. Hayden,nunez,sara can all tty and get in the central pair.  Todd / Dowell to get in at ten and give them a securenpair behind for when they lose the ball. Also gets pukki and sarge/idah up top. 

Major downside would be the 3 cbs. Perhaps we can convert McCleann into the Culverhouse style sweeper role?! 🙂

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With Smith in charge the club feels like it's in a downward spiral. We're becoming another Stoke, Middlesbrough,  Swansea,West Brom......heading back to mediocrity. Oh well it was nice while it lasted 

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1 year on we have gone backwards probably in a worse position than when Farke took over. As bad as Farke was towards the end this is next level sh1t.

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