Match Day Thread versus Portsmouth

If you're desperate for a 'keeper....

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Better hide the pasties though.......

 

So for anyone who hasn't seen it, here is the link for the new iFollow service, which has coverage of the Portsmouth game. I won't use the word highlights having seen the free 10 minute episode.

https://www.pafc.co.uk/ifollow/

There are two levels of service: free and £4.49 per month, which gives live audio commentary and 90 mins of video coverage delayed by 24 or 48 hours.

Three things I noticed:

1. How things turn on small events Songo'o misses a simple headed goal chance at one end and immediately afterwards, Pompey score with a fluke at the other end.
2. You can see why Carey was taken off
3. You wonder why Sarcevic wasn't.

 

Been reading some of Derek Adams comments on the match....other than it being a rubbish game.

He said, "We were the better team in the first half, second half we pushed on and we went for it".

Is that what truly happened....the BBC stats said we had 6 shots at goal with only 1 on target, and we had two corners and 48% of play.

Does that tie up with Adams account of proceedings....I don't know what to believe if it is.....would he see 2 shots on target as a massacre then ?

 

It's not what I read on any website. I'm getting seriously concerned that Adams has an eyesight issue. He can't see further than the end of his nose obviously. Perhaps he should change jobs and become a Referee or Lino.

 

I'm not one who calls for Manager's head. To be honest they aren't the ones who go out onto the pitch and play. No matter what a Manager might spout from Monday to Friday it's the players who go and play on a Saturday and it is them who usually bollox it up. All I ever ask for is honesty. I want the Owner to be honest about intentions etc. I want the players to go out and give an honest performance win or lose. I want a manager to say it how it is without a load of bullshit included. If they played pants and the opposition didn't then say that. To try to tell people who were there that they were watching a completely different game to the one they were is just plain insulting.

I don't care who plays for us or who owns us or who manages us. All I want is some effort for my money when they do. I'll leave speculation as to the who and when to others. Adams has one of the safest jobs in football due to our owners short arms and long pockets.

 

I agree Adams is safer than most managers are. I disagree with your opinion as to why that is.

Everything that's been said indicates Brent believes a football club should be run as a proper business, not as some sort of hobbyist's plaything. He's talked many times about Adams' professionalism and his understanding of football as a business. So far, Adams got us to the play-offs in his first year with somebody else's squad and got us promoted the following year with his, narrowly failing to go up as champions.

At that time, fans were all a-flutter over Adams leaving for a bigger club and he was given a long contract to stop that happening. Now in their fickle way, it's "Adams out". Who would we get in with a better record?

Brent hasn't changed his openly stated attitude, Adams hasn't changed his playing style but we aren't getting the results in the midst of a horrible run of failed pre-season plans, a series of long term injuries and ill-discipline by a number of players.

If you want to point the finger at anything, we had a poor summer on the transfer market. Yes, players were let go I'd have kept (Spencer, Slew). Yes, I might have tried to keep Kennedy on loan even if that cost a bit more but I see he didn't start for Portsmouth on Saturday. Surely we'd have been pushing at an open door at Cardiff. More to the point though, I can't believe it was intended that we'd end up with only one central striker. It looks likely that at least deals in that part of the team that were planned didn't go through and maybe there were others. To compound matters, in a panic, we've then brought in Ciftci who's been a waste of money. Is that all Adams' fault or did he list the players he wanted and someone else didn't deliver them? I don't know for sure but I know what I think....

 

Losing Ryan Taylor within the first 90 minutes of the season was a big blow....but he surely wasn't seen as a regular goal machine, a target man laying off the ball and scoring the odd goal or two maybe.
We failed to find a goal scorer because they rarely come free, injury prone or on their last knockings maybe and your able to squeeze a little more life out of them.
You have to pay money up front and as we all know PAFC prefer to stay in the black at all times....so Poundland won't be the place to shop for what we need.

Ciftci was a gamble....he had reasonable success earlier in his career to tempt Celtic to buy him...but things haven't gone well for him since moving to Celtic.....Adams took the chance but Ciftci isn't a target man and would work better as a two up front....and we know that that isn't Adams style.

So we really haven't had our strongest team on the pitch since the beginning of August.....and then we come to goalkeepers....No6 is Will Mannion 19 years old from Hull City with one first team appearance to his name....not sure that he is another Demi Matthews though.....I expect we'll find out tonight or Saturday.

 

Wow that's a bit blinkered notdistant. If Brent wants to run the club like he would a business then fair enough. But, if one of his executives was failing in that business what would he do? My guess is sack him because failure in a business can bring the whole business down can't it. If you think the summer transfers was to blame then who do you blame for that then? Surely it's the Manager's province to sign players. If the signings work out then it's the Manager who takes the plaudits.

I've already said that I don't much care who I have as the Manager Wooperts as long as it's not one of the dreaded three of course and you know who they are. If pushed then maybe somebody like the one up the road from us Tisdale. Think he has done well on limited money previously. He wouldn't come here though

 

Not in most clubs it's not.....

 

Ok lets let Adams off the hook with the signing duty. So if not him then who? The owner who won't stump up cash that the wanted players expect must be to blame. If not the Manager then Brent. You cannot blame the bloke making the phone calls asking players to come so it has to be one or the other. Or perhaps it's the wanted players for not accepting less than they believe they are worth and being offered that elsewhere. I agree with Plym in that Argyle have to shop predominately in Poundland due to the financial constraints imposed on the workers by the Company owner. In Poundland you generally don't get anything worth more than a pound unless you are very very lucky.

 

I suspect it's Starnes that makes the phone calls.

The financial constraints are there to stop us going belly-up again. I did however say at the start of the season that this was the time to put a little extra in to make the step up to the new league. Did that happen? We don't really know. Were players approached who turned us down for reasons other than money (e.g location)? We don't know. Were we let down at the last minute by players reasonably expected to sign (e.g. Simon Church)? We don't know.

 

What we do know is that players are more interested in a club on the up that's not shopping at Poundland or its subsidiary the 99p shop.

There's got to be a time to splash some cash....to protect your investment....which is Div 1 status instead of Div 2 return.

Sinking to Div 2 after taking too many seasons to get out of it, will spell trouble at the turnstiles next season....there is only so much even a green tint can take....what a waste of money building a refurbished Grandstand for a reducing spectator base....it's maybe time for some serious money to enter the directors box...there must be some out there somewhere....obviously not tempted by what they see...especially if it means Div 2 next season and getting beat by the likes of lower league Yeovil.

 

I would accept the location thing if we were talking premiership players on mega cash per week. We aren't and I more readily believe that if somebody offered more than another on a contract then the player would take it no matter where the team played. Maybe not in 100% of cases but at least the vast majority. Adams picks them and Brent pays them. The man in between merely calls them and makes the offer he is allowed to make.

 

We have a very different understanding of what a Chief Executive does.....

 

I doubt we do notdistant. Perhaps the difference lies more in that we are Plymouth Argyle in league one and not Man United or Arsenal where the restraints on cash are not quite so marked and lesser persons can and do perhaps make decisions on contracts.

 

We also have a very different understanding of strategic as distinct from operational management and the role of the budget.

Only one of us remembers that Brent also said that he would not be involved in transfer dealings unless there were character or reputational issues. Of course, if you choose to believe everything that's said is a lie.........

 

So he will accept relegation to protect his deep pockets and his short arms would he....there's got to be a time when being relegated is not the best financial answer....maybe he should stop playing the big boss and return to his first love rugby and advertise the clubs for sale to advance PAFC's prospects.

He'll never get a better chance than the 400 year anniversary of the Mayflower sailing....I bet there will be a flood Americans coming over in 2020....they love other peoples history because they've hardly got any of their own to look back on.

 

I do not believe he has nothing to do with signings. For a start he dictates the amount of money that can be spent on players either through just wages or fees and wages. He may not say you can't have this one or that one exactly but his influence is there. He says to Adams that he can for instance £500k for wages etc. Adams can sign one player on £10k per week or he can sign 5 players on £2k per week. It is blatantly obvious that one player won't do it so he gives no choice that Adams can't sign anyone on mega wages. The CEO probably has no say at all unless Adams is trying to overspend.