Who would people prefer as the next manager?

2 hours ago, SydneyChelsea said:

It's things like this that make me worry less about Maresca and more about the board/SDs.

Either the likes of:
Jose Mourinho
Antonio Conte
Julen Lopetegui
Graham Potter
Nuno Espiritu Santo
Ange Postecogolou
Thomas Frank

are terrible coaches, or having clowns in management mean that coaches are forced into the same mistakes and never given the tools to thrive.

As the power of squad building shifted towards SD, manager has become less important.

2 hours ago, Bob stark said:

As the power of squad building shifted towards SD, manager has become less important.

While true, this isn't new. It's been the case for over 20 years and at Chelsea, at least since Vialli

17 minutes ago, SydneyChelsea said:

While true, this isn't new. It's been the case for over 20 years and at Chelsea, at least since Vialli

It is different though, a while ago sd job is to support manager this days it is different. They have a lot more power. So they are the one who is in charge of building/assembling the squad and manager/HC job is just to manage/train these players.

A while ago, Maresca was asked, can he recall Disasi if needed? He said he need to ask the club first. 😂😂

6 hours ago, Mod said:

How?

He can grow hair

7 hours ago, Mod said:

How?

Because hes not a complete moron trying to prove to the world his sh*t smells like roses.

20 minutes ago, dkw said:

Because hes not a complete moron trying to prove to the world his sh*t smells like roses.

Please don’t give morons a bad name by associating them with our f**kwit manager!

At the game last night there was frustration but by and large the support for Maresca was positive

The story I was told at the game by a chap you often see at away games and who, has to be fair picked up snippets in the past which turn out to be correct, was that the medical team have alerted the SDs to the fact that several players physically and mentally are already in the “Red Zone” and they , the medical team have had the major say as to which players could and should not be given additional minutes. In other words they made some players like Reece Palmer, like Fofana and yes Fernandez non selectable thankfully Cucerella wasn’t available for other reasons. The SDs held the whip hand which should probably always be the case but it seems that at most other clubs the numbers only inform team selection not dictate availability

The situation has been complicated even further because of the schedule in January when there are 9 games over 31 days and that on top of there are still 3 games in December.On this point it seems that some at the club are staggered that other clubs like say Arsenal who likewise will have a very similar number of games in January haven’t rotated as aggressively and by pushing the can down the road as it were are inevitably going to face significant issues as their players get deeper into those pesky at risk areas

It was claimed that they conversion between the SDs and Meresca got worse , or shall I say got worse when it was made clear that there aren’t planned major additions in the next window although they are looking at a forward.

Is he ITK ? Who knows but to be fair it did make sense

Edited December 17, 2025Dec 17 by terraloon

13 hours ago, Deino said:

f**k this sh*t, have I woken up in some kafka-esque dystopian nightmare?

At least he's better looking and may even pull off the silver puffer jacket look.

Yes, I' m shallow, sue me!

In all seriousness if Maresca…

Stopped needlessly over complicating things,

Played players in their natural positions,

Picked players on form,

Worried less about the opposition (Leeds as an example)

Not make so many changes when rotating,

Sped up the passing to something like 2 touch football, rather than this boring and unproductive stand still with the ball, wait for a half hearted press then pass it back or sideways

Allowed our goalkeepers to release the ball quickly when the opportunity is there then he might have a chance of winning us over.

But that’s a lot of faults in one single football manager and he clearly isn’t the type to change or even adapt.

My way or the highway doesn’t work in a lot of industries but doing that as a football manager when most of your principals either don’t work or has detrimental consequences is idiotic and isn’t sustainable.

1 hour ago, terraloon said:

In other words they made some players like Reece Palmer, like Fofana and yes Fernandez non selectable thankfully Cucerella wasn’t available for other reasons.

Is this just for last nights game? I don't think anyone would have expected any of these players to play anyway.

Did he elaborate that E.Fernandez might be in the red zone©️ because Maresca has played him for almost 2000 minutes while A.Santos is yet to reach 900 minutes for the season.

How to manage minutes, the Maresca way:

27 minutes ago, 2211 said:

In all seriousness if Maresca…

Stopped needlessly over complicating things,

Played players in their natural positions,

Picked players on form,

Worried less about the opposition (Leeds as an example)

Not make so many changes when rotating,

Sped up the passing to something like 2 touch football, rather than this boring and unproductive stand still with the ball, wait for a half hearted press then pass it back or sideways

Allowed our goalkeepers to release the ball quickly when the opportunity is there then he might have a chance of winning us over.

But that’s a lot of faults in one single football manager and he clearly isn’t the type to change or even adapt.

My way or the highway doesn’t work in a lot of industries but doing that as a football manager when most of your principals either don’t work or has detrimental consequences is idiotic and isn’t sustainable.

If end results (W/L/D) stayed the same but we were at least enjoyable to watch it’d be tolerable.

2 hours ago, terraloon said:

At the game last night there was frustration but by and large the support for Maresca was positive

The story I was told at the game by a chap you often see at away games and who, has to be fair picked up snippets in the past which turn out to be correct, was that the medical team have alerted the SDs to the fact that several players physically and mentally are already in the “Red Zone” and they , the medical team have had the major say as to which players could and should not be given additional minutes. In other words they made some players like Reece Palmer, like Fofana and yes Fernandez non selectable thankfully Cucerella wasn’t available for other reasons. The SDs held the whip hand which should probably always be the case but it seems that at most other clubs the numbers only inform team selection not dictate availability

The situation has been complicated even further because of the schedule in January when there are 9 games over 31 days and that on top of there are still 3 games in December.On this point it seems that some at the club are staggered that other clubs like say Arsenal who likewise will have a very similar number of games in January haven’t rotated as aggressively and by pushing the can down the road as it were are inevitably going to face significant issues as their players get deeper into those pesky at risk areas

It was claimed that they conversion between the SDs and Meresca got worse , or shall I say got worse when it was made clear that there aren’t planned major additions in the next window although they are looking at a forward.

Is he ITK ? Who knows but to be fair it did make sense

Interesting read, thank you.

At least we managed to get the win despite the changed formation, although we couldn't do it with the starting lineup. Big game this Saturday against an underperforming Newcastle who have played the same amount of games as us. Hoping for more Palmer magic

44 minutes ago, GarnachoCheese said:

Is this just for last nights game? I don't think anyone would have expected any of these players to play anyway.

Did he elaborate that E.Fernandez might be in the red zone©️ because Maresca has played him for almost 2000 minutes while A.Santos is yet to reach 900 minutes for the season.

How to manage minutes, the Maresca way:

Not much more detail that I went into in my OP

As I pointed out the Red Zone doesn’t just look at physical condition it also takes a view of a players mental well being.

Yesterday was of course the ideal opportunity to rotate and yes to make 11 changes to a starting 11 is radical but yesterday was a banana skin and Cardiff presented a real challenge so on reflection he just about got it right .

What compounds our issue in terms of burn out was the CWC but I suspect our issues will be replicated in club after club over the next few weeks particularly in clubs that have had to go near enough full strength almost certainly those clubs medical teams will have had the same discussions but many haven’t had the opportunity to rotate . Look at Palace, look at Villa and yes possibly even Arsenal.

Whilst Colwill is almost certainly out for the season others who we had hoped to rely on seem to be too fragile ( Lavia) or unlucky ( Delap)

This is a personal take but I suspect at least one, possibly two of our out on loan players will be in our squad come the end of January

14 minutes ago, Shweaves said:

Interesting read, thank you.

At least we managed to get the win despite the changed formation, although we couldn't do it with the starting lineup. Big game this Saturday against an underperforming Newcastle who have played the same amount of games as us. Hoping for more Palmer magic

Worth looking at Newcastles injuries they are steadily climbing in numerical terms indeed they currently have more out than us

20 minutes ago, Shweaves said:

Interesting read, thank you.

At least we managed to get the win despite the changed formation, although we couldn't do it with the starting lineup. Big game this Saturday against an underperforming Newcastle who have played the same amount of games as us. Hoping for more Palmer magic

Indeed.

We don't tend to do well in the North East and it's an early kick-off so will our players be alert and awake?!!

Bar-Codes are always hard to play at St Jame's, and their home support does help big-time, but with their injuries, hopefully we can shut them up and come home with 3 points. Palmer hat-trick is what I'm praying for......................

Newcastle's injuries are all in defence, particularly in the middle, so we'll no doubt pass it around amongst our centre backs for most of the game, rather than attack hard to try and exploit that.

1 hour ago, Sexyfootball said:

Newcastle's injuries are all in defence, particularly in the middle, so we'll no doubt pass it around amongst our centre backs for most of the game, rather than attack hard to try and exploit that.

If Maresca went full parody of himself he’d play two the CBs upfront so most of our possession would be in front of the opposition goal for a change. They could be any worse than any of our other strikers we’ve had since Costa (minus Giroud of course).

1 hour ago, Munkunku said:

If Maresca went full parody of himself he’d play two the CBs upfront so most of our possession would be in front of the opposition goal for a change. They could be any worse than any of our other strikers we’ve had since Costa (minus Giroud of course).

Simon Jordan on talksport this morning said “i have no doubt the comments were aimed at Egbali”, don’t always agree or believe him but he does hear things that we dont, so i tend to believe him, the post match conference after the Cardiff game, people who were there said Maresca still looked pissed off, so i think it will be very interesting if we get beat at Newcastle

2 hours ago, axman2526 said:

And in 12 months time, we will be exactly where we are now.

1 hour ago, Sconnie Blue said:

And in 12 months time, we will be exactly where we are now.

Now watch us sign another 8 players in January LOL.

I’m just fully anticipating Emegha to be sh*t and Queneda struggling in the Prem.

Emegha will be no better than Guiu.