Lees Melou

[canarydan23 4,060]

On 15/11/2023 at 13:20, hogesar said:

It does make you wonder if, what for us typically looked like a "rushed" decision to sack Farke was actually a problem that started in pre-season where Webber had sourced these players to change the way we approached the Prem season but Farke couldn't or wouldn't or simply disagreed and was festering since then.

You won't like this, but this give weight to the angry Webber argument sacking Farke the way he did as revenge for him binning off the Webber-way and reverting to 4-2-3-1 (and, you know, winning).

Entirely plausible. And a shame, as if Webber had stayed out of it and let Farke go his own way, we'd have almost certainly made a better stab at that season.

I'm not claiming we'd have survived, but I can be as certain as possible our points total wouldn't have started with a 2.

[hogesar 9,711]

3 minutes ago, canarydan23 said:

You won't like this, but this give weight to the angry Webber argument sacking Farke the way he did as revenge for him binning off the Webber-way and reverting to 4-2-3-1 (and, you know, winning).

Entirely plausible. And a shame, as if Webber had stayed out of it and let Farke go his own way, we'd have almost certainly made a better stab at that season.

I'm not claiming we'd have survived, but I can be as certain as possible our points total wouldn't have started with a 2.

Possibly, but we had like 3 or 4 games prior to that playing a back 5 as well, so it didn't feel like we were adopting, what was rumoured to be, Webbers desire for 4-3-3 for more than a 3 or 4 games at the start of the season.

Of course, it could have been a culmination. 

[chicken 2,640]

9 hours ago, king canary said:

Yeah I largely agree- my point is simply that the players we signed last season weren't bums and have shown themselves potentially capable elsewhere. Not saying it should have been enough to keep us up but I do think the absolute nothing that Farke was getting from them isn't the most anyone could have hoped for as some like to claim.

I agree.

Maybe a tad harsh owing to them all having been here a fair amount of time by then, but Smith did seem to get more out of some of the new players. Rashica and Normann were both injured for fairly large chunks of the season, Sargent played more games.

I honestly think the only real thing we can take from that season was that when more than two or three things don't go in your favour, especially as a self funding club, it really doesn't bode well.

Despite some arguments we clearly went in as we were told we would, for the summer transfer window. We'd be more patient in trying to land the targets we wanted rather than what we had been told before, which was we'd moved on quickly and missed out on players which were better than we ended up with.

The mistake though, was that we perhaps dallied too long. We signed a number of players essentially after pre-season. Sargent, Tzolis, Kabak, Gilmore and Normann all arrived pretty much at the very end of the window with days before the start of the season. That didn't start us off well. I assume that is also why Sargent was used sparingly in Farkes 11 games along with some of the others. I think he missed the opportunity after the Bournemouth cup game to capitalise on some of those performances which would have had those players bouncing a bit. 

We also should have stuck with the 4-2-3-1 that the majority of the team knew well and were confident with and looked at transitioning that slowly into the 4-3-3 we apparently wanted to play,

Hindsight is a wonderful thing, but I think it is almost certain that those players were capable of more, how much more we will never really know. Pukki would have scored more with better supply. Sargent could have been used better, especially if Pukki was struggling.

[chicken 2,640]

6 hours ago, canarydan23 said:

You won't like this, but this give weight to the angry Webber argument sacking Farke the way he did as revenge for him binning off the Webber-way and reverting to 4-2-3-1 (and, you know, winning).

Entirely plausible. And a shame, as if Webber had stayed out of it and let Farke go his own way, we'd have almost certainly made a better stab at that season.

I'm not claiming we'd have survived, but I can be as certain as possible our points total wouldn't have started with a 2.

This has all pretty much been debunked. Farke was going to be sacked no matter the result of the Brentford game so that doesn't really stack. Webber wouldn't have been the only one to make that decision either and it also ignores the one win in Farke's last 20+ premier league games.

In reality though, something did have to change, Farke was great in the championship but his brand of football in the premier league, whilst good on the eye at times, was pretty ineffective.

I'm not convinced Farke would have gotten that many more points. We didn't excel in project restart either. In fact, Danny Murphy probably summed that season up for us suggesting we were one of the nicest ball playing teams visually, to be bottom. We never really had the bite we needed. Lets not forget, Farke initially wanted to move Tettey on, and yet without him we have struggled since.

Farke was amazing for us, but we either couldn't land the personnel to make it work or his magic with us was on the wane. It happens.

[canarydan23 4,060]

3 minutes ago, chicken said:

In reality though, something did have to change, Farke was great in the championship but his brand of football in the premier league, whilst good on the eye at times, was pretty ineffective.

Something did change, we sacked Farke and still got a miserly points total, despite actually spending some cash. Kinda shows Farke emphatically wasn't the problem.

[Ulfotto 640]

Some decent analysis of that season here. It was just awful literally nothing went right on or off the pitch. Covid destroyed pre season, the fixture list from hell, Cantwell form disappeared, we had a run of awful luck with var, then crippling injuries, then Covid hit the squad and we playing matches which should never have taken place then rinse and repeat.

[splendidrush 700]

On 15/11/2023 at 08:55, Capt. Pants said:

Lees-Melou was basically dog ****. Lightweight and not up to the fight for English football. To be fair he's not the only one we've signed like that.

Well done, you used the word fight to describe a Frenchman...... history tells us that's never a good mix.....

[Canario 207]

In 185 battles that France has fought over the past 800 years, their armies have won 132 times, lost 43 times and drawn only 10, giving the French military the best record of any country.

History?

[TheGunnShow 5,977]

8 hours ago, Canario said:

In 185 battles that France has fought over the past 800 years, their armies have won 132 times, lost 43 times and drawn only 10, giving the French military the best record of any country.

History?

What's the recent form record and who were they fighting against? 😉