Damocles said:
hilts said:
So you are saying we are ditherers and Mp keeps his job because he doesn't rock the boat and no one else in the world can manage us apart from pep and klopp
seems like the perfect recipe for success
One man's ditherance is another man's patience.
Remember when we didn't demand the manager's head if we didn't win a game and the idea of a manager only getting 18 months was absolutely ridiculous?
Those were the days. Barely 5 years ago.
The trouble is the stakes are somewhat different than they were pre Sheikh Mansour. We could extol the virtue of patience then (relatively) safe in the knowledge that, barring an absolute Alan Ball of a manager, we wouldn't go up or down and we'd be back for another bite of the cherry the following season.
And this goes well beyond not winning 'a game'. It's been a gradual build up. It's Britain doing nothing as Hitler annexed the Sudetenland and then went ahead with the Anschluss, before the straw of the invasion of Poland broke the camel's back; it's Capitol records in the US rejecting the Beatles first 4 UK singles releases, before 'I wanna hold your hand' burst the dam. Burnley, Sunderland, Sheffield Wednesday, Arsenal, Middlesbrough, Hull and Barcelona all led up to Liverpool, and the fact that so many erstwhile Pellegrini supporters (for want of a better term) are suddenly prepared to advocate his removal is testament to that. Either we've all taken leave of our senses or there's a very serious issue to be had.
Up until recently there've been chronic injury problems, post World Cup hangovers, the AFCON, unjustified press criticism and bum European draws to distract us from clear analysis. Our wagons were in a circle and we were peering out between the wheel spokes for our enemies. Everyone now though is fit and well, we've added a £25m centre forward to the mix, but our form has fallen off a cliff and we are suddenly all looking inwards. Inwards to childlike tactical philosophies, to disastrous team selections, to systems that don't suit particular players and particular players that don't suit particular systems, to a midfield that is all over the place defensively, to defenders who played in World Cup finals making errors that would embarrass an U11's team, to performances against top teams (bar Chelsea) that have bordered on the excruciating, to players that don't look fit and to others that don't look sufficiently interested,and so on and so on.
Not everything is Pellegrini's fault obviously. FFP has had the intended effect, far greater than the 'pinch' Khaldoon intimated IMO, and several of our buys have been poor, not just in terms of the actual footballing ability of the individuals concerned, but also in terms of their suitability for the chosen philosophy. The problem the club has now though is that whilst incomes are healthy, the global fanbase is still in its infancy, the current squad is ageing and needs overhauling, and several of our rivals are improving as rapidly as we seem to be floundering. Spurs, Arsenal and Liverpool are all in sufficiently good form to suggest that one more fuck up against either a Leicester or a Burnley, and we will be in real danger of not finishing in the top 4, and if that particular doomsday scenario comes true, then our long term plans will take one huge fucking dent. With Ya Ya nearly 32 and Spanish Dave just turned 30, our next couple of forays into the transfer market need to be for top top quality players. Whether we would still be able to get them without Chimps League football to offer and without the perceived prestige of the rags, the Arse or the dippers, is another matter.
With that as a potential backdrop then, it's no wonder many people are now casting an anxious eye over a manager, who's just picked a 4 man midfield, including Ya Ya Toure, whose defensive contribution is nil, to face up to an extremely mobile, high pressing quintet, and without any natural width or pace to stretch the opposition's 3 man defence, and whose response was to bring on James Milner and instead of deploying him in front of our beleaguered centre halves, plonked him out on the left flank. Everything about Sunday was an utter fucking shambles, and right now I just can't see a way forward with a manager making so many frankly dreadful calls.
