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Jose Mourinho

How do you feel about Mourinho appointment

  • Excited - silverware here we come baby

    Votes: 666 46.7%
  • Meh - will give him a chance and hope he is successful

    Votes: 468 32.8%
  • Horrified - praying for the day he'll fuck off

    Votes: 292 20.5%

  • Total voters
    1,426

Wheeler Dealer

Well-Known Member
Jul 29, 2011
6,863
12,282
The thing is, even if he fucks this up with a chonic lack of any attacking coaching and gets sacked, we’ve generally signed good players and the squad is being refreshed. A progressive coach should be able to come in and get us playing well pretty easily.

I'm thinking along the same lines, particularly if we are to believe it is Levy and Hitchens who buy the players and for the last 12 or so months we've been far more active than past seasons, so Levy may pull the trigger pretty sharpest if Mourinho continues to serve up such shite. My only caveat is whether Levy can absorb another costly pay off.
 

Wheeler Dealer

Well-Known Member
Jul 29, 2011
6,863
12,282
He totally enabled that system because he could literally do everything himself in midfield. Like when we played years back with Dier as DM dropping in between the CB's when we had the ball so we had a back three, that left Dembele literally on his own in the middle of the park. And he still bossed it.

Hopefully because Hojberg really seems to have a brain on his shoulders he can adapt his game to be more of a screening midfielder rather than a go get 'em ball winning one, that way freeing up both the full backs.
Hojberg may have a brain on his shoulders but also has concrete weights in his boots
 

Thewobbler

Well-Known Member
Oct 29, 2016
3,814
5,701
A question to all.

Do you think he will turn this round?

I cant shake the feeling that were waiting for the inevitable.

I'll wait until we've done our transfer business and having a few games with the new signings. if we cant start playing better with bale and Reguilon in the team then I will start to question if jose is the right man.
 

theslowcentury

Well-Known Member
Aug 22, 2013
54
270
We look totally devoid of confidence at the moment for sure. Don’t think it’s the coach but rather an accumulation of all the near misses over the Poch-era. Belief and confidence is hard to come by and it feels like the players are feeling the same weight of it all as we the fans are. Mourinho is the right coach on paper as he has been there and won it. Same for some of the players we are bringing in. Will it rub off on the players?

The joys of the 15-16 and 16-17 seasons and then the 2019 champions league run is that the squad didn’t carry a burden of expectation for the majority of the time so played without fear. The Amazon doc showed how everyone at the club wants to win so badly that I think fear has set in. The mind killer!
 

Hakkz

Svensk hetsporre
Jul 6, 2012
8,196
17,270
I stick to what I said in the match thread as well. The game today should be won on quality alone. We should have been able to send Sacramento and the players should be able to defend and create enough chances to win. At least 3 sitters were missed today. The quality needs to go up between the players.
 

JayB

Well-Known Member
Aug 24, 2011
6,652
26,046
I'm more optimistic than many seem to be. We had a ridiculous preseason with so many missing due to the pandemic situation and a couple (hopefully more) signings who are coming in after the season has started. If we can weather the storm of the early period in the season without falling too far off the pace, I think we'll be more than fine. We've got some real quality and a manager who has won everything so I'm hopeful that once the players get fully up to speed with their fitness and sharpness we'll be a very good team.
 

Danny1

Well-Known Member
Dec 6, 2006
5,622
17,169
God this thread is boring. The guy has been with us for half a season that was totally disrupted with injuries to senior players, key players leaving and becoming old fast and then the whole Coronavirus situation.

He is starting his first full season with us and is literally just getting in the players that he wants.

Can we not just give him some time to atleast try and prove himself. I see words like “awaiting the inevitable” and “time for him to go” etc etc and it’s quite frankly embarrassing.

He isn’t going anywhere for the foreseeable future so people may aswell just stop with the constant moaning and get behind him. Also I’m going to put this thread on ignore as when we win it’s dead and when we lose just one game everyone has a boring meltdown.
 

TPdYID

Well-Known Member
Jul 18, 2003
1,265
3,436
God this thread is boring. The guy has been with us for half a season that was totally disrupted with injuries to senior players, key players leaving and becoming old fast and then the whole Coronavirus situation.

Also I’m going to put this thread on ignore as when we win it’s dead and when we lose just one game everyone has a boring meltdown.
Problem solved then.
 

WiganSpur

Well-Known Member
Aug 31, 2012
15,974
32,682
I'm more optimistic than many seem to be. We had a ridiculous preseason with so many missing due to the pandemic situation and a couple (hopefully more) signings who are coming in after the season has started. If we can weather the storm of the early period in the season without falling too far off the pace, I think we'll be more than fine. We've got some real quality and a manager who has won everything so I'm hopeful that once the players get fully up to speed with their fitness and sharpness we'll be a very good team.
Surely we've got to be half decent with the new signings and if Ndombele becomes a regular in the team. There's too much quality for us not to be.
 

hellava_tough

Well-Known Member
Apr 21, 2005
9,429
12,382
Bale will breeze in through the front door at 2pm tomorrow, and he'll provide the lift in mentality that the players need!!!
 

ILS

Well-Known Member
Jun 21, 2008
3,803
6,913
I think once these two deals are done he will be asking Daniel for another centre half along with the back up striker. Then I think he will believe even more then before that he has the options available to push top four again and try and win a trophy.
 

Ben1

Well-Known Member
Jun 22, 2015
2,130
8,411
I think once these two deals are done he will be asking Daniel for another centre half along with the back up striker. Then I think he will believe even more then before that he has the options available to push top four again and try and win a trophy.
I imagine if Levy backs him to that extent (7 players and a fair bit of cash) then 'pushing' and 'trying' simply won't be enough.
 

Locotoro

Prince of Zamunda
Sep 2, 2004
9,326
13,915
Jose’s got some weapons now. An all-star front three, decent backups for them. Some pace and penetration out wide.

if he can find a CB and a back-up No 9 he will have close to the squad he wants.

Now he’s got to find a way to get this team playing post-Eriksen. To me, the team itself was struggling with two things last season. One was the CL final loss, which sucked the zest out of a lot of players, and secondly the reliance on Eriksen to conduct the side. We still haven’t really put in a real performance of note without him, and it’s a mental barrier that other players need to take responsibility for.

Maybe we go for a faux-Liverpool style and try and use our new fullback as wide creators, let the front three loose and use midfield as base to operate from.

The problem with Eriksen stems from when Dembele left. Dembele was the player that made us tick, he gave Eriksen and Alli that space they needed to operate between the lines. As soon as he declined and left the team fell apart
 

Locotoro

Prince of Zamunda
Sep 2, 2004
9,326
13,915
I stick to what I said in the match thread as well. The game today should be won on quality alone. We should have been able to send Sacramento and the players should be able to defend and create enough chances to win. At least 3 sitters were missed today. The quality needs to go up between the players.
With respect you're doing the same thing as the players and grossly underestimating a very disciplined well drilled Bulgarian side. We might not be talking about a European giant but this was no team of amateurs from a third world country. Bulgaria has a history of having technically skilled players and if you put that into a well disciplined team that's in full swing of their league campaign and full of confidence that's a good test.
 

Grey Fox

Well-Known Member
Jul 10, 2008
5,126
31,089
I thought this might be interesting for some of you to see and think about when you talk about Jose’s style of play and tactics, what you like, don’t like and what you expect to see and think we will see as he moulds the squad to his liking:

1)this is a match from 04/05 vs Newcastle:
Now this is 15 years ago and football has changed and we will come onto that in video 2 but there are still some clear principles of play in video 1 which resemble how he’s trying to get us to play today with most the attacks coming from transitions.

People who say Jose has no clue how to set-up an attack etc are kind of correct in a way but looking at it the wrong way. Jose as he’s said in the AON docco is all about “if you don’t concede goals then you can win matches” that is his mantra so his whole ethos is built around firstly stopping teams scoring. He does this by zonal and positional defending and then attacking in transitions and counter attacks. The best example of this so far was when we played Leicester last season and won 3-0. Jose’s approach is almost the reverse approach to Pep.

What we lack compared to this Chelsea team is:
World class defenders : Cech, Terry, Carbaliho, Makalele
Main thing : a CM who can create the transitions (Ndombele will be perfect) AND a goal scoring AM like lampard (dele and lo celso could be this) but lampard was

Wingers and attackers who are clinical on transitions (Son is pretty good but Lucas is so far off what Duff and Robben were which is why Bale will be a huge help for Jose)

We also miss another striker option as although drogba was brilliant, Gudjihnson was extremely important to Jose that season.



2) Chelsea vs Arsenal 2-0 14/15 season 4-2-3-1 formation

here what we have been missing is simailr to the above but here the formation and style of play is more modern and similar to how he’s trying to get us to play now:

Defenders they had were world class, ours aren’t bad especially with Doherty and Regulion additions but think we are still a top top class CB away from being as water right as Jose would like so can see why he still wants to bring one in.

CM creativity , they had fabregas who was so ideal for Jose in that role, again TN could be the man to play this role fingers crossed but we need him to step up ASAP :)

Quality in the attacking unit: Hazard Oscar schurlee/ Willian & costa. Until now dele hasn’t been on form and sorry but is no where near as dangerous as Oscar was that season, son needs to step up to be hazard levels and Lucas just isn’t producing goals or assists in the PL (no goals in 21 games!) so again schurlee & Willian mikes ahead of his quality but that is where bale comes in.



So in summary:
• Jose’s football has pretty much always been pragmatic and focused first and foremost on not conceding as as so much importance is placed on that its natural that the attacking side of things will suffer a bit. It’s why Jose teams rarely thrash teams 4,5-0 but when they are a well oiled machine, if they go 1-0 up it’s basically game over which is quite demoralising for the opponents.
The first Chelsea team he won the league with only lost one match and only conceded 15 goals which is remarkable, but even with the quality of lampard, duff, robbed drogba, they only scored 72 but that was enough to get 29 wins and 95 points! I know football has changed a bit but his 2nd title win only 5 season ago has shown that this style can still be very effective.
So, be prepared to be a bit ‘bored’ but if he gets us playing well then try and enjoy the way we ‘control’ games in a different way by controlling the space and areas of play and waiting like a tiger to counter punch, it may be a little boring for sure but it can be incredibly effective and as we’ve won zilch for years why not mabye get behind him for a bit and let’s see how it goes as he looks to mould the squad to his liking

•When Jose took over our squad was a mess and was miles away quality wise from the types of teams and squads he’s had where he’s won titles and trophies in the PL. BUT we’ve done a hell of a job at addressing the weaknesses :
RB : Doherty
LB : Regukion
DM : PEH
AM : Bale
And we will add at least a striker, so the squad has gone from say a 4-5/10 to now being about a 7-8/10 to where Jose needs it to be.

remember that klopp and pep both took a good 2-3 seasons to get the players in to suit the way they wanted to play. At Utd Jose spent a lot bit his squad had some huge weaknesses still and he wasn’t properly backed with his ideas whereas levy is clearly fully backing him and that could make a big difference.

Tottenham vs Leicester 3-0 last season :
I know Leicester we’re depleted with injuries but for me this game is the closest I’ve seen us play to how an well oiled Jose mouriniho machine team can operate and to be honest I found this game fairly exciting and fine to watxg



So all in all yes it can be a bit boring at times but it’s very exciting how Jose is RW-moulding the squad and if we can get say a ST and CB in the rest of this window he will have about 90% of what he needs, the team and squad will be chalk and cheese compared to last season.

So get used to games being close as thats the way Jose approaches matches in a pragmatic way so we shouldn’t ever be too open but we also will rarely blow teams away, BUT if we can become a hard working organised solid unit and can then use the pace and quality of the full backs, the creativity of GLC/TN and the pace power and quality of : Son, Bale, Dele, Bergy, Kane and a new striker then it could and should be very effective and get us lots of wins and points. It might not be everyone’s cup of tea (and I’m talking to myself a bit as well here) let’s try to have a little patience as once the new signings start to settle in we should see quite a different and effective Spurs and you just never know, the year does end in 1 after all..

COYS!


Fuck me are you BC in disguise?
 

Monkey boy

Well-Known Member
Jun 18, 2011
6,380
17,039
Not so sure about breezing in through the front door when he'll need to go straight home and self isolate for 14 days

Of course footballers are exempt from the normal rules because you know they’re so much more important than the average bloke. However James Rodriguez should have proved the point that you don’t need to self isolate when he played against us last weekend having only arrived in England 6 days earlier.
 

teok

Well-Known Member
Aug 11, 2011
10,836
33,607
A question to all.

Do you think he will turn this round?

I cant shake the feeling that were waiting for the inevitable.


What ever message he is telling them is taking a hell of a long time to sink in. Let's just hope we can cram enough good players into the team for it not to matter.
 
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