Manager Watch: Ange Postecoglou

Tucker · Feb 19, 2024

Trix said:
The system we play means you can't afford to make mistakes. Even the best players fuck up, and every single player makes mistakes. With how we set up it's very difficult to control what happens after the mistake which is the problem.

This is the crux of things for me, and I think the problems we are facing at the moment are down to a couple of separate things. Our midfield is tired, and so they’re making mistakes. Meanwhile, other coaches have worked out a way to force these errors more often. They are packing the middle of the park and making things narrow, getting stuck in early on and getting lots of turn overs.

Earlier in the season, Bissouma, Maddison and Sarr had tonnes of energy, and everything they were trying was coming off so they looked supremely press resistant. Now they’re all tired/ or coming back from injury and as a result those mistakes have crept in.

Like you say, we aren’t far off things imo. It’ll only take a couple of minor tweaks and/or players getting fitness back.

Japhet · Feb 19, 2024

Styopa said:
Yeah. I think you can say for example Wolves “worked us out” or you could say we were missing Porro and Udogie who are absolutely integral to the way we play and Maddison still looks half fit.

Look how much City struggled without Rodri.

All very true, but I would say that the players are now lacking the intensity we had earlier in the season. I think there are fairly good reasons for that with players missing and some returning from injury being a bit rusty. Hopefully extra time on the training pitch will address some of those issues but we need to get that drive and desire back as a matter of urgency.

Monkey boy · Feb 19, 2024

Trix said:
We've given up chances at the back in most games regardless who of plays. Poor finishing, last ditch tackles and Vic being brilliant have kept us in so many games, even games we've dominated. It's not sustainable to keep doing this with the same outcome.

I think if we are all being honest in those first 10 games there were more than a few that could quite easily have gone the other way and ended in defeat. I personally don’t think we’ve played especially well in more than a handful of games this season.

funkycoldmedina · Feb 19, 2024

Trix said:
As I keep saying there is a huge amount of room between being all out attack and all out defence. It isn't an either/or situation and neither will win you the league. It's about finding a balance somewhere in between. I don't think we are far off it and it's about tactical tweaks imo rather than a total shift in mentality.

Liverpool won the league playing like this. Their press smothered opposition and generally they overwhelmed teams. Klopp was also comfortable coughing up a few big chances per game, I think Allison had some best 1v1 stat. When their midfield started running out of steam and opposition started getting time on the ball to pick passes over the top they got spanked a few times.
So the style does work if the press is disciplined and intense. He has the pace at the back to deal with the times it's broken but I'm guessing he's still working on personnel in forward line to execute it.

Trees · Feb 19, 2024

Trix said:
I've had doubts this system would work in the Prem from the outset. Even when we were on that winning streak at the beginning it was clear that this way of playing was always going to cough up chances to the opposition, and in the Prem the opposition aren't going to keep missing opportunities like they were in the first dozen or so games. Posters telling me I must hate Ange or that I had an agenda with his appointment etc, lol ok.

There's a lot of scapegoating going on, but I don't think it's about personnel. This system quite simply leaves too much space to be exploited so a mistake anywhere on the pitch could lead to the ball being in the back of our own net with one pass.

I do however think it will get better with time, but not to the point you could win anything significant playing this way. He is going to have to adapt it in some way and make sacrifices to his all out attacking ethos if he wants to be successful. He's a very smart man so I'm hoping he makes the tweaks necessary, and with training and a couple more in we will get there.

I would also add that Gary O'Neill is one to watch as a future manager. Tactically spot on at the weekend. Unfortunately !

funkycoldmedina · Feb 19, 2024

Trees said:
I would also add that Gary O'Neill is one to watch as a future manager. Tactically spot on at the weekend. Unfortunately !

Hes done two outstanding jobs now with clubs that were considered certs for relegation. He deserves an opportunity to show what he can do at a well run club

fishhhandaricecake · Feb 19, 2024

Styopa said:
Yeah. I think you can say for example Wolves “worked us out” or you could say we were missing Porro and Udogie who are absolutely integral to the way we play and Maddison still looks half fit.

Look how much City struggled without Rodri.

Spot on mate bit of both really.

Styopa · Feb 19, 2024

funkycoldmedina said:
Liverpool won the league playing like this. Their press smothered opposition and generally they overwhelmed teams. Klopp was also comfortable coughing up a few big chances per game, I think Allison had some best 1v1 stat. When their midfield started running out of steam and opposition started getting time on the ball to pick passes over the top they got spanked a few times.
So the style does work if the press is disciplined and intense. He has the pace at the back to deal with the times it's broken but I'm guessing he's still working on personnel in forward line to execute it.

I think it was really the two world class signings of Allison and VVD which propelled Liverpool to the title.

Liverpool conceded 50 goals during Klopp’s first season and 42 the following season - nearly twice as many as we did that season!

RuskyM · Feb 19, 2024

funkycoldmedina said:
Hes done two outstanding jobs now with clubs that were considered certs for relegation. He deserves an opportunity to show what he can do at a well run club

Think Wolves are sort of fortunate that he's in the sweet spot of not being in line for the Top Jobs (he's not going to be Liverpool or United manager anytime soon) and a lot of clubs with more resources are arguably too chaotic (West Ham, Newcastle) or not quite stylistically right (Brighton). Think they'll be fine for the near future.

spurs-r-us · Feb 19, 2024

PaulM said:
What managers are project managers in this day and age? Pep? Klopp? Arteta?

Just the three at the top of the PL then? Shall we aim downwards?

spurs-r-us · Feb 19, 2024

whenstevewentup said:
I think the difference with klopp and arteta was that they literally had to rip up the squad and completely refresh it , how many first 11 players are we going to change ?
Which players can we upgrade ?
Richarlison
Kulu , Johnson .
add a midfielder
Another full back
its not a rebuild anymore , it’s tweaking . I don’t see wholesale changes next season
Yesterday we had 3 players on the bench who could easily start games for us and we wouldn’t moan . You can’t compare our situation to Liverpool or arsenal .

What do you mean?

Vicario, van de Ven, Udogie, Johnson and Maddison all arrived this season. Porro six months earlier. Sarr, Bissouma and Richarlison beginning of last year but none were playing. Kulusevski and Bentancur were six months earlier. Never mind the fact that the manager they joined under played the antithesis of what we're doing now.

It would be crazy to say that, because they all had a good first two months, they are settled from day one and the rebuild is over.

That's before you even get to the point of looking at the bench, most of whom are new. Skipp, Hojbjerg, Davies, Romero, Royal & Son are the only players who have been here for more than two seasons. Most of the rest are 1-18 months in.

spurs-r-us · Feb 19, 2024

Trix said:
We've given up chances at the back in most games regardless who of plays. Poor finishing, last ditch tackles and Vic being brilliant have kept us in so many games, even games we've dominated. It's not sustainable to keep doing this with the same outcome.

Its almost as if having very quick defenders and a class keeper are part of the plan, and we're shit when we have to play slow ones? As for poor finishing - if our forwards could finish we'd be winning games 3-2 rather than losing 2-1. Its not a one-side thing, nor to be honest is it overly noticeable against us.

Styopa · Feb 19, 2024

spurs-r-us said:
It would be crazy to say that, because they all had a good first two months, they are settled from day one and the rebuild is over.

Well I think a lot of people do think this. Because Vic, Udogie, VDV, Porro, Sarr, Bissouma etc all started so well this season, the idea developed that we went from having a terrible squad last season (who Conte was right to berate), to being just one or two players short of a title challenge this season.

spurs-r-us · Feb 19, 2024

Tucker said:
Earlier in the season, Bissouma, Maddison and Sarr had tonnes of energy, and everything they were trying was coming off so they looked supremely press resistant. Now they’re all tired/ or coming back from injury and as a result those mistakes have crept in.

Which is a big part of the reason why we need depth suited to the system though. At City, Guardiola realised early that Phillips just didn't fit in. When he had an injury, he'd play any combination of Lewis at 18 y/o, or Silva dropping deeper, or Nunes after he arrived. When we have an injury, or an AFCON absence, or a suspension, we rely on Hojbjerg and Skipp. Two good players who simply don't suit the system. That doesn't just throw our game off for a week, it means that, now our better mids are back (rushed back, because we needed them), the rest of the team aren't quite in sync either.

That means we need CMs who can press and play progressively, in the first XI and in the wings. Why do you think we're so keen on Gallagher and were linked to Joao Gomes heavily in January?

-Afri-Coy- · Feb 19, 2024

RuskyM said:
But whenever we lost with Mourinho and Conte, losses were put down to individual mistakes too, despite the style being much more compact and entrenched. Isn't this just the reality of playing against top class opposition?

It’s the reality of being a human being, and the fact that a team consists of 11 of them, there will always be room for mistakes and errors. Messi and Ronaldo are capable of horrendous mistakes too. It’s just human nature.

What I think you’re alluding to in the last sentence plays a big part though. Football at this level is an environment where even the slightest hiccup can have big consequences on a game. The margins are extremely slim, so as fans we need to be as patient as we can be when it comes to individual errors.

Problems arise when it becomes a pattern and then we need to question the suitability of the players within a given system but that’s a whole different conversation.

Trix · Feb 19, 2024

spurs-r-us said:
Its almost as if having very quick defenders and a class keeper are part of the plan, and we're shit when we have to play slow ones? As for poor finishing - if our forwards could finish we'd be winning games 3-2 rather than losing 2-1. Its not a one-side thing, nor to be honest is it overly noticeable against us.

Then we are watching different games.

Tucker · Feb 19, 2024

spurs-r-us said:
Which is a big part of the reason why we need depth suited to the system though. At City, Guardiola realised early that Phillips just didn't fit in. When he had an injury, he'd play any combination of Lewis at 18 y/o, or Silva dropping deeper, or Nunes after he arrived. When we have an injury, or an AFCON absence, or a suspension, we rely on Hojbjerg and Skipp. Two good players who simply don't suit the system. That doesn't just throw our game off for a week, it means that, now our better mids are back (rushed back, because we needed them), the rest of the team aren't quite in sync either.

That means we need CMs who can press and play progressively, in the first XI and in the wings. Why do you think we're so keen on Gallagher and were linked to Joao Gomes heavily in January?

Yeah, I’m sure that will come to some extent. We are after all at the beginning of the journey.

fishhhandaricecake · Feb 19, 2024

Styopa said:
I think it was really the two world class signings of Allison and VVD which propelled Liverpool to the title.

Liverpool conceded 50 goals during Klopp’s first season and 42 the following season - nearly twice as many as we did that season!

Spot on, until they got Allison and VVD Liverpool were struggling for consistency and conceding a lot of goals.

Klopp arrived 8th Oct 2015...
Liverpool had 4-5 important transfer windows to get the team to where it needed to be, Ange has had 2.
Sumer 2016: Mane and Winjaldijum.
Summer 2017: Salah, Robertson, Ox-Chamberlain
Jan 2018: VVD
Summer 2018: Fabiniho, Allison

15/16 season they finshed 8th.
16/17 season they finished 4th
17/18 season they finshed 4th
18/19 season they finished 2nd
19/20 season they finished 1st

Pep arrived 1st Feb 2016

Pep basically got a whole new team in his 1st 2-3 windows!

Summer 2016:
Nolito
Gundoguan
Zinchenko
Sane
Moreneo
Stones
Bravo

Jan 2017:
G.Jesus

Summer 2017:
Ederson
B.Silva
K.Walker
D.Luiz
Danilo
Mendy

To add to a team which already had the likes of : Kompany, De Bruyne, Aguero etc

So we can ignore Pep as good as he is he was handed an entirely new world class team.

For Klopp it was a phased building approach and without all of these ingredients as well as Trent coming through their youth system Klopp wouldn't have been able to have the consistency and success that he did.

Arsenal under Arteta is similar to Klopp, it took Arteta a good 3-4 seasons to get the ingredients he needed to get that team more consistent to be challenging for a title, allbeit he did win the FA Cup early on.

I think we need those 2 Liverpool VVD/Allison level of signings but in the forward departments.

E.g. Neto/N.Williams and Toney/Gimenez/Vlahovic.
Then pad that out with 2 better back-up FB options than Davies & Emerson (can be young cheaper signings but ones more suited to how the inverted almost midfielder full back needs to play under Ange)
Young back-up 4th CB and/or promote Dorrington or Phillips if they're deemed ready next season.
Plus a young back-up GK instead of Forster and a better CM than Skipp or PEH who again better suits our current system.

So 5-6 signings this summer and make them count, the first 2 might cost a bit but beyond that we can be creative.

Give Ange those and we should be able to be right up there next season I think.

fishhhandaricecake · Feb 19, 2024

only1waddle said:
And Arteta's first full season fans couldn't see what he was doing, moaned about how shit the football was, they hated it.

Think in his 2nd season they were bottom of the league after 4 games weren't they...

Most top level managers given time and the right players/resources to fit their system will in the end get you a good output.

Ange has got us well on our way there but this season was never going to be the one where it all clicked all the time that was never going to be possible never mind with the injuries, suspensions, lack of match fitness, AFCON & Asia games we've had to content with.

Give Ange 5-6 more this summer and next season we should be more consistent, but don't be surprised if next season we aren't challenging for the title just yet, this is a really really tough league, the toughest in the world, we will go on an upward trajectory but as Ange has said there is no specific timeline, it may go faster or take longer than we think, lets just stick with it and see

Styopa · Feb 19, 2024

Tucker said:
Yeah, I’m sure that will come to some extent. We are after all at the beginning of the journey.

We also have a young first choice defence, playing together for the first time, and the majority of whom are playing their first full season in this league: Romero (25); Porro (24); van de Ven (22); Udogie (21).

All of them still have room to naturally improve and develop as they hit their peak years and gain more experience.

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