4 minutes ago, Bob stark said:

I don't think the way we play right now is because sarri drilled them to play tippy tappy ball but sarri has impact through his signing. For a while, jorgi was our only sitting dm and there is only one way to play with jorgi.

 

 

Sarri inherited a back 3 squad of Conte that was a complete counter-attacking team. He's the only one that managed to play a 4-3-3 with success with that squad and did it by playing a possession-based style. I can only imagine how much more he would have done had he stayed as he is a top quality manager, he made the foundation of Napoli's style that is now going to win the domestic league and Lazio is right behind them as the second best team.

Jorginho proved himself for every manager he has played for regardless of the system. Potter on the other hand, proved to be the biggest downgrade in football history.

Edited April 10, 20233 yr by Gol15

1 hour ago, Gol15 said:

Sarri inherited a back 3 squad of Conte that was a complete counter-attacking team. He's the only one that managed to play a 4-3-3 with success with that squad and did it by playing a possession-based style. I can only imagine how much more he would have done had he stayed as he is a top quality manager, he made the foundation of Napoli's style that is now going to win the domestic league and Lazio is right behind them as the second best team.

Jorginho proved himself for every manager he has played for regardless of the system. Potter on the other hand, proved to be the biggest downgrade in football history.

Sarri is a very good manager. He would have been perfect for this team. 

Like you say he revolutionised Napoli and has Lazio being at their most scintillating and also performing their best in decades. 

Had a season with us where for more than half of his tenure he was subjected to boos from his own fanbase in the stadium and yet finished in top 4 with a continental  cup to boot. Yes he resigned but his detractors always omit the fact that he was unlikely to want to continue in that toxic environment, with a lack of respect by both fans and press alike. 

Lampard's job was made easy with coming right after him in my opinion that first season. 

2 hours ago, ducavis said:

Liverpool won with Firmino leading the line, this Arsenal team also has Jesus with 8 league goals. What these two teams had/have are high scoring wingers & midfielders. Martinelli is on 14, Saka on 12, and Odegaard on 10 goals. Salah scored 19, & Mane 18 league goals in their title winning season.

it’s easy to say we need a 20+ forward, the reality is there is a dearth of No 9 in football presently. You take out the oldies like Lewandowski, & Benzema, and Haaland, and you would struggle to come up with 5 top No 9s. 

It doesn't have to be a 20+ forward. Though that would be great. It needs to be a focal point. Someone who can hold the ball up and play in others around him. Jesus is a fantastic player in this regard for someone his size. Sane was very similar. Someone who knows where and when to run, anticipates the ball in and around the box, is cool and calm when the chance arrives. Someone who is a "natural" instinctive finisher.

We don't have that player anywhere in our squad. Every other EPL team do.

17 hours ago, ducavis said:

Haven’t we tried the 20+ goal striker route by signing a €100 Lukaku and that didn’t work out? What we need next season is to have our all our attacking players chipping in with 10-15 goals. 
 
 

 

The back 3 for me in its current state that involves using a LWB & RWB as creative outlets has to go, it needs to be binned and never revisited it. It worked very well last season but it was more a case of it being a freak season, every single player outperformed their expected output. This season we are seeing Arsenal & City using a revised version of the back 3 to devastating effects. Think City have scored 21 goals in the last 4 games, and Arsenal 13 in the last 4 before today. They are also doing it without using any fullback at all, but pushing 4- 5 attacking & creative forces into their first 11. Pep has even said Walker doesn’t have a place in his first team. Problem is we have brainlessly spent £60m+ on Cucurella, and still have Gusto to come. Would be hilarious if in the long term only 1 of our fullbacks is a permanent fixture in the first 11.

I don't think there is one way to do it.

If you want everyone to score 10+ goal then I agree with you, it is very difficult to stick with 343 as asking your wb to score goals and defend their box the whole season is unrealistic. 

 

14 minutes ago, abister1 said:

Sarri is a very good manager. He would have been perfect for this team. 

Like you say he revolutionised Napoli and has Lazio being at their most scintillating and also performing their best in decades. 

Had a season with us where for more than half of his tenure he was subjected to boos from his own fanbase in the stadium and yet finished in top 4 with a continental  cup to boot. Yes he resigned but his detractors always omit the fact that he was unlikely to want to continue in that toxic environment, with a lack of respect by both fans and press alike. 

Lampard's job was made easy with coming right after him in my opinion that first season. 

Exactly, the last time Lazio was the second best team was over 20 years ago. As soon as Lampard started to experiment on his own, things went south for him.

Sarri is a really good manager but the irony is that a significant part of our own fanbase didn't want him here, the right man for the job wasn't backed by the fanbase it really is interesting how some of those same people blindly wanted Potter to stay, you can't make this stuff up.

He was the one that deserved the time to build something special, just unlucky that when he finished top 3, the above 2 clubs were the 2nd and 3rd best finishes in PL history (98 and 97 points won). 

I'd be fine with a back 3 if the next manager cleverly utilizes our attacking wide players. 

Think with James, Gusto, Chilwell, Badiashile, Fofana, Colwill, Enzo, and Kante. We are simply tailored to play this system.

Should have kept Potter till seasons end, while informing him we are looking in to replacements. 

5 hours ago, abister1 said:

Sarri is a very good manager. He would have been perfect for this team. 

Like you say he revolutionised Napoli and has Lazio being at their most scintillating and also performing their best in decades. 

Had a season with us where for more than half of his tenure he was subjected to boos from his own fanbase in the stadium and yet finished in top 4 with a continental  cup to boot. Yes he resigned but his detractors always omit the fact that he was unlikely to want to continue in that toxic environment, with a lack of respect by both fans and press alike. 

Lampard's job was made easy with coming right after him in my opinion that first season. 

Lampard's job made easy? With a transfer ban and Hazard leaving? Unsurprisingly I don't see it that way.

Just as I was a Potter person, I recall you were an unswerving Sarri savant. Regardless of results or how dire the football was at times. 4-0 hammering by Bournemouth, you backed him. 6-0 massacre by Citeh. Home draws against the likes of Southampton, Burnley, Wolves, (Wolves also beat us in the away fixture), home loss to Leicester, you backed him.

I guess if we have to accept he was "unlucky" with how good Citeh and Liverpool were that season, then we also have to acknowledge how he got "lucky" in the way both Arsenal and Tottenham imploded in the season run in. Tottenham were particularly spectacular in being "Spursy" that year. 

Interesting fact for those who say Sarri wasn't backed by the club. Sarri was definitely backed in the transfer market and spent £189 million on players. At that time he was the first manager, under Roman, to be given more than £100 million to spend and fail to produce more than one trophy.

You're right about Serie A though. He's good there.

 

Yeah Potter was unlucky that Arsenal, Newcastle, Man United, Spurs, Aston Villa, Brighton, Brentford or Fulham didn't implode this season. Could of had a real shot of securing 3rd. 

20 minutes ago, just said:

Lampard's job made easy? With a transfer ban and Hazard leaving? Unsurprisingly I don't see it that way.

Just as I was a Potter person, I recall you were an unswerving Sarri savant. Regardless of results or how dire the football was at times. 4-0 hammering by Bournemouth, you backed him. 6-0 massacre by Citeh. Home draws against the likes of Southampton, Burnley, Wolves, (Wolves also beat us in the away fixture), home loss to Leicester, you backed him.

I guess if we have to accept he was "unlucky" with how good Citeh and Liverpool were that season, then we also have to acknowledge how he got "lucky" in the way both Arsenal and Tottenham imploded in the season run in. Tottenham were particularly spectacular in being "Spursy" that year. 

Interesting fact for those who say Sarri wasn't backed by the club. Sarri was definitely backed in the transfer market and spent £189 million on players. At that time he was the first manager, under Roman, to be given more than £100 million to spend and fail to produce more than one trophy.

You're right about Serie A though. He's good there.

 

Well I have seen people call black white in my lifetime so no surprises here. 

Potter in half a season lost more games than Sarri lost all season. We won't even go into win ratios. 

Football dire you say, but at least I have lots of sweet memories from that season. Most memorable under Potter for me is the day he was let go as he wasn't up to the job. 

19 minutes ago, Sconnie Blue said:

Yeah Potter was unlucky that Arsenal, Newcastle, Man United, Spurs, Aston Villa, Brighton, Brentford or Fulham didn't implode this season. Could of had a real shot of securing 3rd. 

Yeah but, he'd be good in Serie A though.

2 minutes ago, abister1 said:

Well I have seen people call black white in my lifetime so no surprises here. 

Potter in half a season lost more games than Sarri lost all season. We won't even go into win ratios. 

Football dire you say, but at least I have lots of sweet memories from that season. Most memorable under Potter for me is the day he was let go as he wasn't up to the job. 

Whatever. I'm not arguing for a moment that Potter has proven to be a better manager than Sarri. He most certainly hasn't. I'm against the revisionist spin that Sarri's time was a great success and the assumption that he would have gone on to bigger and better things here. Regardless of any other factors, the transfer ban and the loss of Hazard suggests he wouldn't.

Could be wrong though. And Higuain might have banged in 30 goals the next season.

 

13 minutes ago, just said:

Whatever. I'm not arguing for a moment that Potter has proven to be a better manager than Sarri. He most certainly hasn't. I'm against the revisionist spin that Sarri's time was a great success and the assumption that he would have gone on to bigger and better things here. Regardless of any other factors, the transfer ban and the loss of Hazard suggests he wouldn't.

Could be wrong though. And Higuain might have banged in 30 goals the next season.

 

Sarri wasn't a failure here by any means, he changed the way we played, brought us CL football again while at the same time playing cup finals and winning one of them. What sort of revisionist spin is that according to you? Nobody had any higher expectations that year as it was clear that we are too far behind Man City, Sarri himself openly talked about it.

He would have just continued his work and there is no doubt in my mind that he would have done better than Lampard since it would have been his second season, just like he did now with Lazio that is playing better now than last year, more time means a better team to a good manager and that's regardless of the players since he would have established a stronger system. Losing Hazard is a blow but it wouldn't be the first time he lost his best scorer, he lost Higuain to Juventus after he scored 36 in 35 league matches and it didn't stop him from doing his work as the following season he won even more points in the league overall. 

45 minutes ago, just said:

Yeah but, he'd be good in Serie A though.

And the Premier League.

Ended up 9th with Brighton while the club made a transfer profit and had the 19th highest wages. Unprecedented.

 

10 minutes ago, Gol15 said:

Sarri wasn't a failure here by any means, he changed the way we played, brought us CL football again while at the same time playing cup finals and winning one of them. What sort of revisionist spin is that according to you? Nobody had any higher expectations that year as it was clear that we are too far behind Man City, Sarri himself openly talked about it.

He would have just continued his work and there is no doubt in my mind that he would have done better than Lampard since it would have been his second season, just like he did now with Lazio that is playing better now than last year, more time means a better team to a good manager and that's regardless of the players since he would have established a stronger system. Losing Hazard is a blow but it wouldn't be the first time he lost his best scorer, he lost Higuain to Juventus after he scored 36 in 35 league matches and it didn't stop him from doing his work as the following season he won even more points in the league overall. 

Gol. Why did Juventus sack Sarri in his SECOND season? He's a brilliant manager allegedly. He won them a ninth title in a row. Why did they get rid of him so quickly?

Why do you think Higuain looked fantastic in Serie A but generally a slow as sh*t donkey in the EPL. What do you think the reasons were?

The fact was he wasn't a failure, but nor was he this massive success you claim him to be here. I think it was Big Blue who recently said in another thread that all things considered, the reputation he came with, the players available to him, the money spent etc. He eventually achieved par for the course. I completely agree.

 

I mean Juventus barely finished 4th the season after Sarri left, not to mention they were outplayed by Atalanta in the Coppa Italia for the majority of the match. 

Now they are no where in sight of a European place. 

37 minutes ago, just said:

Gol. Why did Juventus sack Sarri in his SECOND season? He's a brilliant manager allegedly. He won them a ninth title in a row. Why did they get rid of him so quickly?

Why do you think Higuain looked fantastic in Serie A but generally a slow as sh*t donkey in the EPL. What do you think the reasons were?

The fact was he wasn't a failure, but nor was he this massive success you claim him to be here. I think it was Big Blue who recently said in another thread that all things considered, the reputation he came with, the players available to him, the money spent etc. He eventually achieved par for the course. I completely agree.

 

He was sacked after becoming the oldest manager to win the league title in Italy, after getting eliminated in the first knockout round of the CL by an away goal, it was overall 2:2. Technically it was during his first season still. They have been chasing the CL forever now and so he got sacked but the interesting thing is that the team that eliminated Sarri managed to also eliminate the second best PL team at the time, Man City with a clean victory of 3:1.

Higuain was way passed his prime when he got to the PL.

I do think that Sarri did his job properly but nothing extra, the point being that he genuinely wanted to make everything work when it didn't so while it wasn't a perfect season like Conte's first season, as a person Sarri was much more willing to make a fresh and new team out of our squad.

Edited April 10, 20233 yr by Gol15

50 minutes ago, Gol15 said:

 

I do think that Sarri did his job properly but nothing extra, the point being that he genuinely wanted to make everything work when it didn't so while it wasn't a perfect season like Conte's first season, as a person Sarri was much more willing to make a fresh and new team out of our squad.

 

Speaking of Conte while Sarri's football wasn't exactly heartstopping it was a hell of a lot better than the garbage the former produced the season before.

Edited April 10, 20233 yr by Argo

Telegraph Sport 8th August 2020

Juventus have sacked coach Maurizio Sarri after one season in charge, following the team's elimination from the Champions League in the round of 16 on Friday.

"Juventus Football Club announces that Maurizio Sarri has been relieved of his post as coach of the first team," the club said on its website.

Sarri was dismissed despite leading Juventus to the Serie A title two weeks ago, their ninth in a row.

The Italian appears to have paid the price for Juventus again failing to win the Champions League. However, the chain-smoking 61-year-old has also struggled to impose his distinctive style in his first season in charge.

Napoli under Sarri used to weave intricate patterns through opposing defences, but Juve's play has often been characterised by sterile possession while their defence has lost its air of impregnability.

Club president Andrea Agnelli suggested on Friday night that he was considering changes. One match cannot decide how a season is evaluated," he said. "It has to be analysed in its totality, in general and keeping all elements in consideration.”

 

The sacking was not a surprise to many. In winning Serie A under Sarri Juve  managed to win only two of their last eight matches, including losing three of their last four, but just managed to hang on finishing with one point more than Inter.

3 hours ago, just said:

Telegraph Sport 8th August 2020

Juventus have sacked coach Maurizio Sarri after one season in charge, following the team's elimination from the Champions League in the round of 16 on Friday.

"Juventus Football Club announces that Maurizio Sarri has been relieved of his post as coach of the first team," the club said on its website.

Sarri was dismissed despite leading Juventus to the Serie A title two weeks ago, their ninth in a row.

The Italian appears to have paid the price for Juventus again failing to win the Champions League. However, the chain-smoking 61-year-old has also struggled to impose his distinctive style in his first season in charge.

Napoli under Sarri used to weave intricate patterns through opposing defences, but Juve's play has often been characterised by sterile possession while their defence has lost its air of impregnability.

Club president Andrea Agnelli suggested on Friday night that he was considering changes. One match cannot decide how a season is evaluated," he said. "It has to be analysed in its totality, in general and keeping all elements in consideration.”

 

The sacking was not a surprise to many. In winning Serie A under Sarri Juve  managed to win only two of their last eight matches, including losing three of their last four, but just managed to hang on finishing with one point more than Inter.

I predicted this when sarri moved to juve. It was quite obvious this will happen. if you say it is because juve was a counter team and sarri wanted to play possesion football then you don't understand Sarriball. 

1 hour ago, Bob stark said:

I predicted this when sarri moved to juve. It was quite obvious this will happen. if you say it is because juve was a counter team and sarri wanted to play possesion football then you don't understand Sarriball. 

I might not understand Sarriball.

I do however understand the sh*t that we have played for the past x number of seasons. Slow, stagnant play; knocking it around between centre backs; out to wing backs; back to dm, back to cb, switch to other wing back; get up to the edge of the 18 yard box, get a nosebleed and knock it back to dm, sh*ts his pants and punts it back to gk....rinse....repeat....

Call the above whatever you like. Sarriball, tuchelball, potterball, dull as dishwater ball....

Its all the same dirge, that is being rebadged. 

Edited April 11, 20233 yr by nonotnowjim

On 09/04/2023 at 21:25, nonotnowjim said:

I agree that he didn't build anything.  But as I said 5454 times, it was always going to take time given the circs he took over. That bit (Time) is the part that most of the demanding 'new money' brigade on here don't understand or grant.

If you expect someone to build a team when a)  not having a pre-season; b) having had a single winter transfer window; c) given the mountainous task of integrating X number of new young players that had before never set foot in the EPL; and d) had the season disrupted by a World cup which left him 6 first team players - then your expectations are irrational and unrealistic.

Play darts do you?

Just noticed the double treble 18 in your post

5 hours ago, nonotnowjim said:

I do however understand the sh*t that we have played for the past x number of seasons. Slow, stagnant play; knocking it around between centre backs; out to wing backs; back to dm, back to cb, switch to other wing back; get up to the edge of the 18 yard box, get a nosebleed and knock it back to dm, sh*ts his pants and punts it back to gk....rinse....repeat....

Couldn't have put it better myself m8.

Recent exception was the Dortmund game, they failed to press us like the EPL teams do and that gave us time to work out that in order to score... we needed to pass the ball forward at a greater velocity - and then put it in the f'ing net.

Edited April 11, 20233 yr by Bebe1980

Come back Graham - all is forgiven. 

Your sacking looks even more pointless now. 

17 minutes ago, Gonoir Beniashile said:

Come back Graham - all is forgiven. 

Your sacking looks even more pointless now. 

At least we've seen some goals .... Poch's teams have scored 31 in 19 games ... Potter's teams only managed 33 in 31 games.

I know things are tough right now, but I for one am not going to get all misty eyed about Potter regardless of how bad things get. If I'm going for a stroll down memory lane, then Mourinho, Ancelotti, Conte or Tuchel will do for me 🙂