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- 5 Dec 2017
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Playing well for parts of games and rubbish in others has been happening all season including under Manning, it just shows that the team isnt quite good enough yet to sustain performances. Not help by lots of money wasted by Robinson on players still not doing anything.Agree with all of this. I am very much one of the people who think Des should be given a proper summer to get his squad together and we shouldn’t be considering sacking him at all right now - but I am absolutely of the opinion that we’ve played poorly for pretty much all of his tenure (even in the victories).
Shrewsbury was his best effort. Against Northampton and Portsmouth more recently I thought we were largely solid and let ourselves down with some errors at key moments. Other than that there have been a few good 30 minute periods - not even halves - but that’s it. We finished strongly (after a poor first hour) at Wycombe. We were good for 30 minutes against Derby. Controlled a pretty low quality second half at Carlisle. Gave it a good crack against Bolton but finished noticeably second best. Even the Wigan game we got the bounce of the ball on a few of our goals and were probably quite flattered by the scoreline. Considering how we’ve hung onto the Top 6 it’s actually quite unbelievable how poor we’ve been since November.
I’m not expecting to make the playoffs after the last 2 results - but they are still a possibility. Whether that happens or not I do want to see us finish the season delivering much better performances. That Orient performance was abject. On the assumption that we’re getting nothing from Bolton and Pompey away, the home game against Cheltenham is a MASSIVE fixture (as it was last season ironically).
I’m not convinced there’s been a huge difference in performance level across Northampton, Wigan, Portsmouth, Wycombe, Reading, Carlisle, Charlton… Some have gone our way and some haven’t. Burton was an outlier as much as Rovers was the other way.I don't think Carlisle was particularly good, it was patchy but we took our chances.
Charlton was pretty even I thought but Smyth scored a worldie to win it!!
Burton at home has been the only convincing performance for me since Des has taken over.
Playing well for parts of games and rubbish in others has been happening all season including under Manning, it just shows that the team isnt quite good enough yet to sustain performances. Not help by lots of money wasted by Robinson on players still not doing anything.
Actually, yes I do remember thinking we got away with at least a couple of results under Manning, so yes I would probably describe them as flukes (injury time pen to secure a draw v Wycombe, the win against Bris Rovers (which was the Long, Bodin and Rodrigues show, looking at the match report . . . would they do that now? Also lots of mentions of needing smart saves from Beadle to keep us in games early on in the season) . By the same token, I think teams also get flukey wins (Port Vale in September) and draws (Blackpool in October) against us. How many times have we thought how did we win/lose that? There will always be results against the run of play. It's never as black and white as good team always wins (thankfully).We had a manager who had us 2nd averaging 2.13 PPG (usually enough for automatic promotion). He left, the new manager comes in, 4 months later we're 7th playing woeful football and averaging 1.16 PPG (which last season would've had us 18th). Some 'nuance' to that is that other than Harris, every player has regressed under said new manager.
As I said in a pervious post, it's excuse after excuse. It's gone from give him a few games to settle, to wait till the injured players are back, to give him a transfer window, and now it's the staffs fault (even though other than an assistant most roles have been filled).
Unless the suggestion is that us winning games under Manning was a fluke, then it feels like defending the indefensible. Even if you say we were 'overperforming' under Manning, we're now significantly underperforming under Des.
Having a team 'overperforming' is the sign of a good manager, right? So what do we call managers who have a team underperforming?
HahahahahaI know it's a bit 'if my auntie was my uncle' but anyone suggesting holding on to second place was fanciful should just let this sink in;
Hold on to two leads last week in home games against Northampton and Orient and hold on to two leads against relegation threatened Reading and we would now be second. Morale of this, get on the front foot when you have a lead and blow inferior opposition away. The buck stops with Buckingham and his unfathomable tactics - simple as that.
I know it's a bit 'if my auntie was my uncle' but anyone suggesting holding on to second place was fanciful should just let this sink in;
Hold on to two leads last week in home games against Northampton and Orient and hold on to two leads against relegation threatened Reading and we would now be second. Morale of this, get on the front foot when you have a lead and blow inferior opposition away. The buck stops with Buckingham and his unfathomable tactics - simple as that.
I know you keep saying it is as simple as that Dick, but it is clear that you are in the minority with that view, judging by the poll alone.I know it's a bit 'if my auntie was my uncle' but anyone suggesting holding on to second place was fanciful should just let this sink in;
Hold on to two leads last week in home games against Northampton and Orient and hold on to two leads against relegation threatened Reading and we would now be second. Morale of this, get on the front foot when you have a lead and blow inferior opposition away. The buck stops with Buckingham and his unfathomable tactics - simple as that.
I know you keep saying it is as simple as that Dick, but it is clear that you are in the minority with that view, judging by the poll alone.
By the same token, nobody is denying that Buckingham is A FACTOR in our performance. Players not performing and doing stupid things/making individual mistakes is also costing us big time.....and thats before we get onto the wage-stealers who are supposedly not performing because they're sulking about the manager . . . .
Everyone, from top to bottom of the club needs to take a long hard look in the mirror, because many of them share the collective blame for our downturn.
Had a quick look and these are the figures I got.Out of interest, can one of the stato's confirm:
- Our xG under Manning vs our actual goals scored
- Our xGA under Manning vs actual goals conceded
- Our xG under Des vs our actual goals scored
- Our xGA under Des vs actual goals conceded
Thank you!
I really think you are, yes.Perhaps it sounds like I'm over simplifying it but am I really ? We are talking about keeping a football out of the bloody net late on or putting a bit more pressure on some very ordinary opposition earlier on. Four absolutely winnable games when we had the momentum, it was all set up nicely. Long in, Burey out, Leigh up front, Brannagan operating from virtually the car park, Dale and Goodwin perform really well but don't get starts despite Harris desperately in need of a rest as Buckingham has often alluded to.
It's chaos. Complete chaos.
I really think you are, yes.
Each of those individual examples you cite (defending properly, not attacking/applying pressure early on, Brannagans positioning - actually I think he was trying to protect a very shaky defence) - unless we know for certain that this is something that Buckingham has explicitly told them to do, then it IS down to players AND manager as a whole to work out why that happened.
And that last sentence of yours perfectly sums up your one-eyed vindictive view of a man struggling with circumstances beyond his control. When did he first rattle your cage?You know how it works though, the manager will always carry the can and rightly so. The players are never going to step forward, they will always hide behind the manager - that's the nature of the beast. If he has explicitly given them instructions and they aren't executing those instructions then there's clearly a breakdown. Whichever way you turn, the buck will stop with Des.
I know you don’t grasp lower league football considering you are a massive armchair Man United fan but even by your standards Baldy you are making yourself sound more stupid by each post.You know how it works though, the manager will always carry the can and rightly so. The players are never going to step forward, they will always hide behind the manager - that's the nature of the beast. If he has explicitly given them instructions and they aren't executing those instructions then there's clearly a breakdown. Whichever way you turn, the buck will stop with Des.
Ssshhhh! He’s watching the Man Utd match on tele. …I know you don’t grasp lower league football considering you are a massive armchair Man United fan but even by your standards Baldy you are making yourself sound more stupid by each post.
I see you chose to ignore the post about the facts of XG which shows we were over performing, this was also highlighted on the football league highlight show at the time.
It is fanciful if you thought we would keep up the form of 8 wins out of 10 all season.
Yeah...cos Steve Evans record of getting teams into the Championship is second to none.Steve Evans would have got us promoted, and the football would probably be easier on the eye than this.
Had a quick look and these are the figures I got.
Manning
xG 20.83 (1.39 p/g) scored 29 = overperformance of around 40%
xGA 18.27 (1.22 p/g) conceded 14 = overperformance of around 25%
Buckingham
xG 25.62 (1.35 p/g) scored 26 = almost bang on, slight overperfomance
xGA 25.26 (1.33 p/g) conceded 29 = close again, just over 10% underperformance
Plenty of people have said that we were overperforming in terms of goals scored under Manning and it wasn't sustainable which is backed up here, as others have said relying on Leigh to score a goal a game was likely to end in tears. For what it's worth if everything went according to this Manning's xG would have us 8th and Buckingham's 10th. Doesn't factor in difficulty of opponent, players available etc of course.