Dumb and Dumber? Undeserved Tag.

[Red DNA]

1 hour ago, the1stknowle said:

Yeah - was a really good interview. He came across really well and as very thoughtful. 

To the original point, I hate the D&D tag and hope people using it maybe think about it a bit more (and then stop).

Exactly this, if you wouldn’t be prepared to say it to their faces in public don’t hide behind a keyboard and say it where they have (or wouldn’t lower themselves to) no opportunity to defend themselves other than try to learn and improve before the next game. 

[2015]

Fair play to the guy for being so honest in the last week. I questioned the coaching under Holden, good players don't just turn bad overnight. Says a lot about the pair of them that they continued to work even though they most likely thought they'd be given the boot.
As long as we get results under Pearson until the rest of the season that's all that matters. 

[Spike]

My take on last night was that Pearson made some suggestions, and they certainly made a difference for a few reasons:

Kalas at LCB - This, as mentioned by many, gave Towler support and took the main focus of Kalas being a leader of the back three off of him. I've said it so many times before, but I do not see Kalas as a leader, a mentor yes, but not a leader. Moving Kalas out of the middle and giving him something else to focus on got the absolute best out of him.
Vyner back in defence - As much as I like Moore he still has a lot to learn, Vyner is far more composed and consistent which takes the pressure off of the other CB's allowing them to play more freely.
The midfield 3 - I still don't understand why Bakinson, Nagy and Palmer isn't our main 3 in midfield more often! Bakinson is a great balance of defence and attack, he's a real box to box midfielder in the middle. Nagy does that defensive protection that we need and can play passes under pressure meaning he brings the defensive balance, and then you have Palmer who will help as much as he can but is better at putting pressure on the opposition defence which leads me to:
Palmer, Diedhiou and Wells - This for me is the real key of last night! Diedhiou is a big man, but we know he can do most things hence he is our first choice striker, however on his own he is easier to mark out of the game and his ability to hold the ball is not his strongest part of his game. Having Wells finally used in his strongest role really allowed Diedhiou that bit of freedom that he needs to get in goal scoring positions and attack in a more aggressive manner. He is still able to provide us with his big man attributes but in having Wells next to him, it pulled defenders out of position and allowed Wells to push at defenders in uncomfortable positions. With Palmer behind them not only did it offer dangerous passing options that pulled Middlesbrough's back line around it gave us 3 dangerous options who were all going towards the opposition meaning Wells could attack the back line, Diedihiou could lose his marker and Palmer had threatening options to either run or make a choice of passes.

These changes could have been made under Dean or Simpson and Downing, but we'rent and in my personal opinion this is why we need a tactician rather than coaches picking the line-up. I also believe that Warnock set up to push his line high up and pin us back based on how bad we were at holding possession and our inability to sit back and defend. Whoever set us up to put the ball up the pitch and then get the whole team to move up utterly destroyed that game plan, and it gave us the building blocks to not only avoid having the defence under constant pressure but to retain more possession and put us further up the pitch when beginning our attacks meaning more shots.

All off these changes could have been seen by an experienced manager or even a coach who focuses on tactics primarily, but I think this is where Dean and co lacked. Many of our fans said we were better under LJ than Dean and co, but I think again that comes down to LJ having a massive passion for tactics, even if that ultimately was his undoing as he constantly looked to implement new tactics and didn't haver the players to execute them. LJ's issue was he wanted to try too much, an experienced manager tends to have 2-3 tactical sets that they tweak and hone based on the players they have which is what I hope we'll see with Pearson.

[The Swan and Cemetery]

Palmer, Nagy and Bakinson playing together, whilst imperfect, meant we saw some one touch passing/movement, decent first touches and more forward looking generally. Much harder to press as a result. Plus the British Bulldog charge approach to Bentley’s distribution mentioned elsewhere. 

[Banjo Red]

Got to admit eating humble pie today was Deano the problem all a long?

[Tin Soldier]

From what I was hearing, it all got a bit “cushty” down AG when Deano was there.

Nice bloke and all that but Deano couldn’t kick ass. Our Nige can!!

[Phileas Fogg]

1 minute ago, GasDestroyer said:

From what I was hearing, it all got a bit “cushty” down AG when Deano was there.

Can you elaborate on what you heard?

I was concerned that Paterson in particular was 'delighted' Holden got the role. 

[steveybadger]

1 hour ago, Davefevs said:

I like Simpson, he’s bloody honest, but ultimately on Saturday, having talked about shackles and all that, they set us up awfully.  Simpson’s post-match interview was awful, like he couldn’t wait to get out of here. So they did deserve stick on Saturday imho.

So, good news in many respects that last night’s pre-match presser was enthusiastic.  Maybe him and Downing had been dragged down.

It rubbed off on the players too last night.

Maybe work had become a “chore”.

Fingers crossed its onwards and upwards from this point onwards.

 

Probably fair enough re Saturday but that was as caretaker for 1 game. My point was really more about criticism of their coaching as that’s their main role. 

[RedRock]

2 minutes ago, Banjo Red said:

Got to admit eating humble pie today was Deano the problem all a long?

Actually, I don’t think Deano made too bad a fist of things in the circumstances... but then lost the squad and that only goes one way. 
 

He did identify where the problems were... but was then handed tools to fix them that were old, broken and not fit for purpose. Which heads back to one person.

Covid and injuries were horrendous issues and, again, on the injury front I think you need to look beyond Holden for that, as was the run down of contracts again, not Holden.

The problem he had, being a rookie manager, was that key players in the squad when things started to go pear-shaped lost confidence in him. 
 

Clearly, there were mistakes, selections, tactics, seeming inability to create any playing partnerships or any great coherence or cohesiveness to our play, dodgy subs and playing, not resting, some recovering players - some were big mistakes. However, he did get dealt a bad hand. 
 

I wish him well and hope he gets another managerial job soon. Certainly, I’ll clap him on any return to The Gate, which I wouldn’t do for his predecessor. 

[Banjo Red]

1 hour ago, RedRock said:

Actually, I don’t think Deano made too bad a fist of things in the circumstances... but then lost the squad and that only goes one way. 
 

He did identify where the problems were... but was then handed tools to fix them that were old, broken and not fit for purpose. Which heads back to one person.

Covid and injuries were horrendous issues and, again, on the injury front I think you need to look beyond Holden for that, as was the run down of contracts again, not Holden.

The problem he had, being a rookie manager, was that key players in the squad when things started to go pear-shaped lost confidence in him. 
 

Clearly, there were mistakes, selections, tactics, seeming inability to create any playing partnerships or any great coherence or cohesiveness to our play, dodgy subs and playing, not resting, some recovering players - some were big mistakes. However, he did get dealt a bad hand. 
 

I wish him well and hope he gets another managerial job soon. Certainly, I’ll clap him on any return to The Gate, which I wouldn’t do for his predecessor. 

Fair comments and there is the suggestion that the players weren't buying what he was selling.

[old_eastender]

The Dumb and Dumber tag is harsh, and yes Simpson has spoken well recently.

It was interesting what he said about round pegs in round holes, wonder why he didn't take that approach for the Barnsley game where we had Lansbury DM, Vyner CM and Semenyo central striker; all 3 not round pegs in round holes. Who knows, had Lansbury not been injured Simpson might have picked him again!

Bottom line is Simpson & Dowding have to take a big slice of responsibility for the tripe that has been served up this season, they cannot just be absolved on the basis Holden was making all the decisions. In much the same way as JM and DH should have both been seen as part of the problem with LJs regime, and DH never offered the job.

Moving forward, perhaps if Simpson/Downing can coach under Nige's direction, they might have a future here, but I would not be at all surprised if part of the negotiations for retaining NP will be discussions over NP bringing in his own people.