Postecoglou & Lange (& Paratici) Watch

One thing I did note for the Palace game is that Nuno's response to adversity - namely being five players short after the international break due to injury or isolation - was to go for the one point, and it got even more obvious when Dier hobbled off early in that match. The obvious issue with that approach is that countless managers over the course of history have been undone by playing for a draw - and not just the pragmatic ones, either, considering Redknapp nearly threw away a SKC final by playing for a draw in the second leg against Burnley

One thing that does come to mind is comments from Connor Coady about how Nuno ran the show at Wolves where he cultivated fear and deep respect from his players to keep them in line, and so far at least there's been no sign of that and I have to wonder why that is, whether it's because he's decided (or been told?) not to bring down the iron fist immediately, which is what undid Villas-Boas at Chelsea and in his second season with us, or if there's something else to it

 

For me, the general “boost” that always comes with a new manager is already over, and was over very quickly. The body language from many of our players suggests that they aren’t buying in, or feel it’s just more of the same that we witnessed under Mourinho.
Playing football in the way we are, is incredibly boring for us fans, let alone the ones who are on the pitch, regardless of how much they get paid.

it’s a difficult one where we go from here.

I don’t see anything changing under nuno. It was abundantly clear that he was well down the pecking order, so he was on the back foot before he even started working with the players. If they’ve even got as much as a sniff of uncertainty about him, he was always going to struggle, and I feel that’s what we’re seeing unfold.

I personally don’t think we can ignore the January transfer window like we have in the past, and will need to address positions that didn’t get the attention they needed in the summer.
We’re currently trying to attract players but can’t offer them CL, EL or the best wages. But to be attempting to get players through the door with these embarrassing performances is going to make it even tougher that it already is. We’re a laughing stock, no mistake about it.

We can’t turn back time, but I genuinely don’t think this can be fixed under nuno. Something doesn’t seem right.
Personally I think the players need someone like Potter in charge, who may not have won anything yet, but is widely regarded as one of the best coaches from this country at the moment.
At least we know he has the ability to deliver decent football and results through clever planning and making the most of what he’s got, which should still be possible even with Levy’s restraints. He’s also far more suited to what the fans want to see week in week our in terms of style, too.

Time will tell, and I suspect Levy is very reluctant to make any changes at this stage, simply because he’d be admitting what a poor decision it was to hire Nuno in the first place.

 

The biggest surprise for me is the people who keep on saying things like:

‘Next time, Levy has to get it right’
‘We have to learn from this’




Madness

 

It’s a huge blot on Paratici’s early reign but this is football and **** happens a fair bit. He’ll need to swallow pride and hold his hands up admitting he got it wrong.

I too feel a little disappointed I’m already pretty much “Nuno out” so early on but just as there were many Spurs fans who wanted Jose sacked after his appointment, I’m pretty much like this with Nuno. It just felt so inevitable he’d not be the right guy for this football club. Literally a few days before we appointed him he was in talks with Palace… If that isn’t damning of the quality of teams interested in him then I don’t know what is.

As for his replacement, pay the £25m for Potter, pay whatever Ajax want for ten Hag, offer Conte the mega contract and a strong say on transfers he wanted, if they all reject us then take a punt on Terzic seeing as he was temporarily in charge of a club I want us to emulate. There’s people out there who’ll fit our profile and who’d want to work with players like Kane and Son, whilst those two are here it’s still a massive draw for any potential managerial candidate. The fact Nuno has managed to make both look extremely poor in his games in charge so far is also damning.

 

FWIW I’m not really one of the Levy/ENIC-out crowd, but you’re right that Nuno may not have been the right appointment. We won’t know that until his time with us is over. I think expectations need to be tempered a bit especially after the City win which obviously was great but perhaps distorted things a bit at the start of the season. Look at Nuno’s past PL history, along with where we’ve finished the last few years, and look at Poch’s first season as a comparison. We’re perhaps expecting too much when the squad has needed major surgery for years and we’re combining that with a new DoF and a manager expected to step up to heights he hasn’t reached before.

Obviously I’m not saying we shouldn’t be ambitious and we all want the best for the club but we may as a fanbase have collectively got a bit carried away with the 3 opening wins and being top, when in reality only the City performance was that impressive, and games against City are always have to be viewed a bit in isolation.

 

That will cost Levy money, money which Levy is not prepared to spend. Every decision Blofeld makes is done so with the balance sheet in mind.

 

We spend money though, the narrative we don’t is massively outdated.

We’ve just spent money poorly. Extremely poorly in fact.

 

Skyte Sports are parroting the MouAnon weirdos in saying we'd be in a better spot right now if we stuck with the ubermensch

Must have been a different manager who had us losing games, playing **** and divided the dressing room in about six different ways then...

 

Apparently Nuno`s teams have failed to score in the first half of 70% of his PL games in charge. That is shockingly bad.

 

The obvious question about why we've suddenly gone from having a defined shape to wanting to play a more open game which only serves to leave us open is why we've reached this point

One version is that there's pressure on Nuno to do so, and given how that coincides with Ndombele's reintroduction to the team that certainly leads credence to that theory as that rather neatly covers two of the main gripes of the Twitter/Reddit crowd simultaneously, and it;s hardly the first time we've had a Portuguese manager do exactly this

The second is that somebody's leaning on Nuno to play Ndombele to generate sufficient interest in him for January, which means rejigging the system to accommodate him in the belief that there will be a Kessie/Nandez/Aouar/McKennie/whoever taking his place in the team by the next transfer deadline, and that certainly does remind me of how we were using Eriksen a couple of seasons ago

The third is that Nuno's panicking because the plan was to get some points on the board while building up fitness and getting players adjusted to the tactics, but the Palace result shook him and he's trying to make up for that by switching the tactics when the players have barely had time to adjust to his original tactics, which is quite similar to how Poch was bouncing between formations in his last few games

Lastly, something to do with reverse vampires

 

Our shape yesterday was too defined, if anything. You could see it was a 4-3-3 from space.
The wingers were too central, the midfield was miles from the defence and Kane was playing too deep.

If he wants to play Ndombele, then he needs to play him as an attacking midfielder.
That requires changing to a formation that actually uses one.

 

Think HBIC may have a point about the media using some of our phrases and terms on this forum because I’ve lost count of the amount of times I’ve said Nuno’s a b-tech Jose without the history.

 

How did he divide the dressing room?

If anything he was getting the best out of our best two players. Dele and Ndombele were binned for a good reason and both keep on proving time and time again why they were binned.

 

Ndombele played 46 games for us last season.
Mason binned him towards the end of the season, but Mourinho was picking him constantly.
https://www.transfermarkt.co.uk/tanguy-ndombele/leistungsdaten/spieler/450936/plus/0?saison=2020

 

Turmoil

 

Going back to Paratici, there is one gigantic question mark about our manager search

The shortlist that Levy & Hitchen drew up tended to favour managers who play 3ATB, for example ten Hag, Conte and Fonseca, but Paratici insisted on a coach who plays a back four

At which point he recommends Nuno, who played 532 at Wolves

 

5 more years!

 

Ten Hag plays a back four.
Obviously I don't watch Ajax every week, but I don't think I've ever seen him play three there.
Variations on 4-2-3-1 and 4-3-3, from what I've seen.

 

I have only said that AVB and JM should be sacked.
I think sacking Nuno after just 10 games is a mistake but can see why others think it should happen.

Not sure anyone is surprised by this tbf.

Think I wrote (on the Premier league board) that things could well turn ugly by time we play arsenal...I was hoping Nuno would at least make us entertaining to watch but this is like watching a JM spurs team.

No idea what the answer is tbh...would just like to want to watch a Spurs game.

Levy must be removed from any involvement in picking future managers but beyond that I am at a loss.

 

And this is the thing: Paratici recommended Nuno to Levy and Hitchen

I genuinely don't know why people keep repeating the mantra about removing Levy from picking future managers when he didn't pick the current one