- May 20, 2005
- 9,709
- 3,238
You are all talking like other clubs don't do it.
Are you all that fucking Naive to think that this doesn't happen at clubs day in, day out?
Jol wasn't going to turn things around. It was OBVIOUS he'd lost the dressing room for whatever reason and he only had Keane and maybe Dawson TRYING to play for him. Do you really think that's because we flirted with another club's manager? Lets face it, if Jol HAD the dressing room, after we 'got caught out' they'd be playing to keep him in a job and they just weren't.
The only place we were going this season was down and no matter how much we adored Jol, it was obvious he wasn't going to turn it around.
I don't understand how we as a team have manged the highest amount of tckes this season, scored the second highest number of goals and made the 4th highest amount of passes if they aren't trying! What the hell does that say about the efforts of players on other teams. I've read fans try and use all sorts a technical analysis for why we are conceding so many and that we defend so deep etc, yet the average Prem keeper has to deal with 10.6 shots per game, but Robbo only 8.2. This is the 5th lowest in the Prem. How on earth are we limiting teams to comparitively so few chances, if we defend so badly and don't try? Also have we not had both possession and territorial advantages in all but 3 of our games? Again very odd for a team that isn't trying.
Personally I'd look at the situation and see we are creating and scoring more than other teams, we are dominating games, giving away few chances, but conceding goals. That would suggest to me we are dealing very poorly with the comparitively few chances we do give away and therefore the answer and cause of our problems can be found by looking at each of our goals. If you do that you'll see goals that could have been defended better, but no more than other teams with a similar standard of defender. But what you'll also see is a constant run of poor individual errors and mistakes. Things that won't be put right on the training ground. Not tactical mistakes (they are there but no more so than for other teams), but stupid errors. Not a case of team not trying, but a case of players switching off at key moments and making poor decisions. And this is no more highlighted than in games when Dawson and Kaboul play together. I'm pretty sure they are the Prems youngest CB pairing and therefore it is understandable that they are also the most mistake prone pairing conceding an average of 3 goals per game, the worst in the Prem (I think.) There is no point banging on about Jol anymore, but people shouldn't distort history. I'm sure evey fault you see is true and was there, but you need to be comparitive with other Premiership sides. I seriously doubt you were looking our for players of other teams with their heads down, or gasping for breath or counting how many times teams rip through their defence.