2 hours ago, cfcforeverfan said:

I would be really surprised if Pochettino can win us any trophies at all under his management 

 

and no, Audi cup or some random cup in pre season doesn’t count as trophy

I think you'll find that's his former London club who would consider that a trophy and would be followed by the DVD release.

5 hours ago, SydneyChelsea said:

Nah, this is confirmation bias and speculation speaking. It reads like you've formed a conclusion and applied it in retrospect.

In the last ten years, we've had Silva, Rudiger, Reece James, Ashley Cole, Azpilicueta, Terry, Ivanovic...some of the best 1v1 defenders the league has ever seen, let alone Chelsea. If anything, the complete opposite is true, where we've over-relied on individual ability rather than having effective defensive systems, especially at set-pieces. We've also had to accomodate players like David Luiz, Jorginho, Obi Mikel who were great at some aspects of defending but deficient in others. 

As for City's success, it is hardly revolutionary. Just as Italian managers revived the 3-4-3/3-5-2, so too has Guardiola returned to using four defensive players at the back. The 2000s saw the rise of the attacking fullback and extinction of the first-and-foremost defender such that by the end of the decade, "defensive" fullbacks were considered a liability. 

This season's City team read like something out of a 1980s football magazine with four actual defenders across the back and an attacking tactic that is essentially getting it to the big lad upfront as quick as possible. All that is old becomes new again.

Its just nonsense as usual from him, we currently have the 4th least goals conceded in the prem this season, bettered only by City, Utd and Newcastle. Were actually ahead of the amazing super dooper title challengers Arsenal.

3 hours ago, charierre said:

Football continues to evolve. Tactics/ systems that disappeared yesterday reinvent themselves tomorrow. There is no correct way to play the game, it’s all about using players at your disposal in the best possible means whilst trying to stay one step ahead of the rest.

Maybe there is one but football is so unpredictable that I don't think it is that important to play "the best way". 

I think there is no question that the squad has more in them than they produced this season. Equally it is fair to say that it wracked by injury and that some players, I would say Kovacic, just aren't trying right now.

Its blindly obvious that any competent new manager will have to put a broom through the old guard. A new manager will have much more license and opportunity to do this than Potter did because the performances were so terrible that a change program is clearly required.

Despite the forward and backline issues the starting point is the midfield, in my book. We relied on kante, kova and jorghi for the last few years. All of them have to go. Kante is just too injured.

Enzo is the start of the new midfield but who is going to play with him has to be worked out. Westhame have Rice and Paqueta. They are fantastic compared to our midfield. Brighton have Macallister and Caicedo. They are fantastic compared to our midfield. We are not in that race this season and managers have lacked the boldness to move forward.  Me personally I think we need one tough enforcer with some skill to play at 6 and someone to play the Lampard role or similar

In defence we need to assume that Chillwell and James wont play much and Silva has to go. He is too old for a big team. We need a clear decision on whether Fofana is playing game in and game out. If not he has to be replaced as well. That would be a tough decision but you cant build a team around players that are regularly out due to injury. No matter how good. Because Chillwell and James aren't going to play much and their replacements won't be as good we need a formation that places less emphasis on wing backs.

After that is the attack. Personally I think barring a striker there are plenty of good attackers in the squad.

We will have to play some of the younger players more and with clearer plans of how they will be used. Look at how Brighton got Mitoma going.

As well as Pochettino we already knew that better medical and fitness management is required. 

For every front line solider there are 7 people working to put them there. Those 7 people also need to be at the top level in the industry.

I guess Pochettino won't be properly announced until after the final ball is kicked this (sh*te) season. And to be fair, it would be harsh on Lamps to have a big thing about the arrival of Pochettino whilst he is still toiling away (allbeit very badly).

As soon as he gets his bum in that managers seat, I want im to be utterly ruthless. Get rid of all the mercenaries who don' give a toss who they play for us long as they are picking up their £150-£200k per week. He needs to put a TEAM together that are proud to play for the shirt and who the supporters can get behind. There have been some great sides in the PL era and have to begrudgingly acknowledge our rivals - United, Arsenal and now City. But so have we, and we need to get back to having that spine of the team you can select every week and can depend on. Jose's "untouchables", when you knew if they were fit, they would play. Cech, Ashley, JT, Lamps, Essien, Maka, Drogba (add Ballack to that when he came). We're a million miles away from that this season with no-one worthy of being a guaranteed starter (bar 38 year old Silva). 

Not expecting him to transform it overnight but I do expect a massive improvement on this season and as long as he is strong and doesn't allow player power to cause issues, I am confident he will succeed. Roll on the New Season and New Era........................................

21 hours ago, Nibs said:

I guess Pochettino won't be properly announced until after the final ball is kicked this (sh*te) season. And to be fair, it would be harsh on Lamps to have a big thing about the arrival of Pochettino whilst he is still toiling away (allbeit very badly).

As soon as he gets his bum in that managers seat, I want im to be utterly ruthless. Get rid of all the mercenaries who don' give a toss who they play for us long as they are picking up their £150-£200k per week. He needs to put a TEAM together that are proud to play for the shirt and who the supporters can get behind. There have been some great sides in the PL era and have to begrudgingly acknowledge our rivals - United, Arsenal and now City. But so have we, and we need to get back to having that spine of the team you can select every week and can depend on. Jose's "untouchables", when you knew if they were fit, they would play. Cech, Ashley, JT, Lamps, Essien, Maka, Drogba (add Ballack to that when he came). We're a million miles away from that this season with no-one worthy of being a guaranteed starter (bar 38 year old Silva). 

Not expecting him to transform it overnight but I do expect a massive improvement on this season and as long as he is strong and doesn't allow player power to cause issues, I am confident he will succeed. Roll on the New Season and New Era........................................

I get the feeling a lot of the players “coasting” will be in for an absolute shock!! 

He’s got one hell of a job on. I honestly fear for us next year IF we don’t get off to a good start next season. The young players look shellshocked, building confidence will be incredibly hard. Forget looking for potential, we need a couple of battle hardened professionals to give us the bit of steel and backbone we are totally lacking.

Why this not confirmed yet.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited May 25, 20233 yr by Ibby_786

If I were him this job is a no brainier.. only possible to go up from here.. really if it weren’t the first half of the season we would be relegated.. never thought that I would say that.

1 hour ago, charierre said:

He’s got one hell of a job on. I honestly fear for us next year IF we don’t get off to a good start next season. The young players look shellshocked, building confidence will be incredibly hard. Forget looking for potential, we need a couple of battle hardened professionals to give us the bit of steel and backbone we are totally lacking.

Graham Roberts, Joey Jones, Peter Nicolas, Vinnie Jones spring to mind charierre. 

You know I am really looking forward to finding what the truth of the matter is under Pochettino.

Seems half the forum think we have a really good squad of players that will become a special team with Pochettino and a few key signings.

Other half think we have mostly bought duds and will be a minor miracle for us to be decent again.

Wonder what next season brings.

Reports (in austalian media) are Postecoglou now a top target for Spurs. 

After watching today I am more convinced we have a good team in the making. Fofana has made a number of stupid mistakes for instance. With better discipline he wouldn't make them.

The midfield today looked good for long stretches. Just no goals

On 23/05/2023 at 17:41, dkw said:

Its just nonsense as usual from him, we currently have the 4th least goals conceded in the prem this season, bettered only by City, Utd and Newcastle. Were actually ahead of the amazing super dooper title challengers Arsenal.

I was interested by this stat so, completely jinxing today's result of course, I had a deeper look at this.

As posted elsewhere I don't set much store by "defensive stats" because they are usually devoid of important context, namely, taking into account the game state - is the defending player/team leading or chasing the game? It's obviously easier for teams to defend when they lead, and so teams that lead a lot should have a better defensive record. So I wanted to see if our horrible attack was causing an effect on our defense.

 

% from left to right: Leading | Level | Trailing - soccerstats.com

Manchester City	37				52.4%	40.8%	6.8%
Manchester Utd	37				39.2%	44.4%	16.4%
Newcastle Utd	37				30.6%	55.3%	14.1%

Chelsea	37				19.2%	53.3%	27.4%
Crystal Palace	37				16.9%	55.5%	27.6%

 

Of the three clubs with a superior defensive record, you can see they spend far more time in the lead and far less time chasing a result/lead, meaning their defenders have it a lot easier. While the other clubs spend around 50% of their game chasing a lead(ie scores level or trailing), we spend over 80% of game time chasing a lead.

How often have we seen this narrative play out where we miss hatful of chances and concede a soft counter-attack or set-piece goal? Our inability to score puts such huge pressure on our defenders and embarassingly, we're closer to Crystal Palace than the Champions League teams. No team is going to Chelsea fearing an attacking onslaught and looking merely to get a result, they know we can't score and they can win

I suppose the positive thing is that there is quality there for Pochettino to work with. We're the 4th best defense despite all the above, which suggests our players are individually quite good at defending. They just can't do it forever and the attackers are not taking the pressure off enough, meaning momentum is almost always against us.

6 hours ago, Ibby_786 said:

Why this not confirmed yet.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I imagine they don't want to announce in the middle of the mess that is this season. They are probably waiting for the season to end so he has a completely clean slate.

If he's not signed by this time next week, good chance he found something better 🤫 He will have full tray of tasks to deal with, but after this season, most of us have dropped our expectations. Any kind of revival and finishing in the top half of the table be an improvement. I don't expect anywhere close to Conte's first season.

1 hour ago, icecoolguy22 said:

If he's not signed by this time next week, good chance he found something better 🤫 He will have full tray of tasks to deal with, but after this season, most of us have dropped our expectations. Any kind of revival and finishing in the top half of the table be an improvement. I don't expect anywhere close to Conte's first season.

Just to repeat I posted on this thread weeks ago, or it seems so, that it would be sensible not to make the announcement until end of season.

 

3 hours ago, SydneyChelsea said:

I was interested by this stat so, completely jinxing today's result of course, I had a deeper look at this.

As posted elsewhere I don't set much store by "defensive stats" because they are usually devoid of important context, namely, taking into account the game state - is the defending player/team leading or chasing the game? It's obviously easier for teams to defend when they lead, and so teams that lead a lot should have a better defensive record. So I wanted to see if our horrible attack was causing an effect on our defense.

 

% from left to right: Leading | Level | Trailing - soccerstats.com

Manchester City	37				52.4%	40.8%	6.8%
Manchester Utd	37				39.2%	44.4%	16.4%
Newcastle Utd	37				30.6%	55.3%	14.1%

Chelsea	37				19.2%	53.3%	27.4%
Crystal Palace	37				16.9%	55.5%	27.6%

 

Of the three clubs with a superior defensive record, you can see they spend far more time in the lead and far less time chasing a result/lead, meaning their defenders have it a lot easier. While the other clubs spend around 50% of their game chasing a lead(ie scores level or trailing), we spend over 80% of game time chasing a lead.

How often have we seen this narrative play out where we miss hatful of chances and concede a soft counter-attack or set-piece goal? Our inability to score puts such huge pressure on our defenders and embarassingly, we're closer to Crystal Palace than the Champions League teams. No team is going to Chelsea fearing an attacking onslaught and looking merely to get a result, they know we can't score and they can win

I suppose the positive thing is that there is quality there for Pochettino to work with. We're the 4th best defense despite all the above, which suggests our players are individually quite good at defending. They just can't do it forever and the attackers are not taking the pressure off enough, meaning momentum is almost always against us.

Thats some mighty fine statting, mighty fine....

I agree it shows how much pressure our defence is under due to the massive lack of goals, coupled with teams knowing they can defend against us much higher up the pitch, compressing the field of play which gets their attack and midfield "sitting" on our defence. 

As you say, it shows we have good individual defenders, and possibly a good overall defensive structure. This also tallies with our own eyes that a lot of our goals are down to individual errors, sometimes moronic ones. Again, this fits with the narative that we out fitness levels are atrocious, most mistakes are made when a player tires.

I assume he's signed behind the scenes and they are waiting until the end of the season. If it's not announced in the 1-2 days after Newcastle, then I still start to worry.

Not that I'm not worried already!

18 minutes ago, Zeta said:

I assume he's signed behind the scenes and they are waiting until the end of the season. If it's not announced in the 1-2 days after Newcastle, then I still start to worry.

Not that I'm not worried already!

I'm the total opposite, when it's gets to the point it's quite evidently done by all reliable reports then in my head it is. I don't think a deal has ever fallen apart at this point for us (all parties in full agreement).

I prefer to save my stress for deals that have/had genuine jeopardy like Enzo.

It’s no surprise they haven’t announced it yet, they only put Frank in the job to shut the fans up and take the pressure off them, they should of just left Potter in the job until the end of the season, they bottled it really, just to take the pressure off them. When Pochettino comes in the pressure will be back on them again. I have no confidence in them at all at this point in time.

16 minutes ago, coco said:

It’s no surprise they haven’t announced it yet, they only put Frank in the job to shut the fans up and take the pressure off them, they should of just left Potter in the job until the end of the season, they bottled it really, just to take the pressure off them. When Pochettino comes in the pressure will be back on them again. I have no confidence in them at all at this point in time.

It's like watching a car crash unfold. Horrifying. It's just been one bad decision after the other. The next maybe even worse than the last. Never felt we were particularly managed great by the previous regime, though they had some good points and high standards on where we finish which set the tone for everyone one around the club but these guys make them seem like gurus. 

Spurs fan made a huge list of why he wants Levy out and this is what he said in reference to Pochettino:

Quote

Self imposed transfer ban on Pochettino after he finished 2nd and 3rd, no idea why he had no interest in investing into the team to see us actually push for a title.
Sacking Pochettino, when it was years of either not bringing in players, or bringing in the budget alternative, that was to blame.

 

5 minutes ago, Sconnie Blue said:

Spurs fan made a huge list of why he wants Levy out and this is what he said in reference to Pochettino:

 

Nail on head. Whingers grizzling that Pochettino has never won anything. He kept Spurs punching way above their weight season after season, got them to a CL final. Levy's thanks was to thwart him.

3 hours ago, dermott said:

Nail on head. Whingers grizzling that Pochettino has never won anything. He kept Spurs punching way above their weight season after season, got them to a CL final. Levy's thanks was to thwart him.

I don't think they were punching above their weight. He had Kane at his peak, one of the best strikers we have seen in the Premier League. Son, one of the best link up players and a player that can hit a shot better than most. Eriksen, one of the best passers of the ball and a player that controls the midfield, a step below Fabregas but still one of best at it. Dembele, one of the best all round midfielders. Two of the best CB's in the league in Vertonghen and Alderweireld. Walker, one of the fasters wing backs in the world who has now grown to become the best in the world in his position. 

Levy has held them back, but I don't believe for a second that they were punching above their weight. If they had beaten us to the signings of Hazard and Willian, then they would have had the best squad in the league.

Edited May 26, 20233 yr by Scott Harris

3 minutes ago, Scott Harris said:

I don't think they were punching above their weight. He had Kane at his peak, one of the best strikers we have seen in the Premier League. Son, one of the best link up players and a player that can hit a shot better than most. Eriksen, one of the best passers of the ball and a player that controls the midfield, a step below Fabregas but still one of best at it. Dembele, one of the best all round midfielders. Two of the best CB's in the league in Vertonghen and Alderweireld. Walker, one of the fasters wing backs in the world who has now grown to become the best in the world in his position. 

Levy has held them back, but I don't believe for a second that they were punching above their weight. If they had beaten us to the signings of Hazard and Willian, then they would have had the best squad in the league.

But Pochettino developed all of them to the levels they were. Levy never injected quality to match the standards that Pochettino needed to freshen up the squad, which reflected on the poor performances the season he was sacked. 
 

This sh*t right here needs to change.