Eleven years ago today

[22A]

I went back 2,600+ pages and found this sort of post. Obviously the good times were over.

Posted February 6, 2010
Weve lost the plot how long do you johnson fans want to wait before you say its dead, weve been rubbish for ages and i'll always support the players but he has to go were lost and we'll never get it back without a change! Tell me now everything will be ok because your chatting shite time to go bring in some new blood now!

[italian dave]

13 hours ago, GrahamC said:By every metric GJ was our most successful manager since Alan Dicks.

By this time he had run his course but he transformed us from a bit of a mess post the short Tinnion era to a side that finished 4th, 10th & 10th in his three full Championship seasons.

I believe we have only bettered his WORST finish once, (in 18/19) since then & prior to that you have to go all the way back to 1990/91..

Also worth pointing out we were still operating in the old Ashton Gate, which for all the nostalgia was looking years past it’s best & didn’t raise anything like the revenue that the pre Covid era rebuild did.

By a mile SL’s best managerial appointment, though obviously optimism is high with NP..

Very much so: brought great success when we really were poor relations of the Championship. But like you say - and maybe a bit like his son - seemed like he’d run his course.

There certainly was something going badly wrong those last few weeks/months. I was at the last game at Plymouth which really was one of the most bizarre games I’ve seen.

We played 6’7” (or something like that) Stefan Mairehofer up front and our single, sole tactic was to simply welly the ball as high and as long as possible in vaguely his direction. Time after time, keeper, defender, full back, midfield, it didn’t matter who, they just booted it. It was probably the most embarrassing tactical display I’ve ever seen - I exclude Jan and Feb just gone on the basis that we didn’t appear to have any tactics then.

How we pulled it back to 2-2 I’ll never know. 

[Robbored]

8 hours ago, italian dave said:

Very much so: brought great success when we really were poor relations of the Championship. But like you say - and maybe a bit like his son - seemed like he’d run his course.

There certainly was something going badly wrong those last few weeks/months. I was at the last game at Plymouth which really was one of the most bizarre games I’ve seen.

We played 6’7” (or something like that) Stefan Mairehofer up front and our single, sole tactic was to simply welly the ball as high and as long as possible in vaguely his direction. Time after time, keeper, defender, full back, midfield, it didn’t matter who, they just booted it. It was probably the most embarrassing tactical display I’ve ever seen - I exclude Jan and Feb just gone on the basis that we didn’t appear to have any tactics then.

How we pulled it back to 2-2 I’ll never know. 

Were there ever any tactics or tactical changes under GJ? I can’t say I noticed any unless you consider moving your centre back into a CF a tactic - a lower league one at that..........’clubs in the bag’..........

The players were furious and really fired up second half after the brawl in the changing room.They knew it would be the last time they played under him.

[GrahamC]

1 hour ago, Robbored said:

Were there ever any tactics or tactical changes under GJ? I can’t say I noticed any unless you consider moving your centre back into a CF a tactic - a lower league one at that..........’clubs in the bag’..........

The players were furious and really fired up second half after the brawl in the changing room.They knew it would be the last time they played under him.

No, we never made a single tactical change in the 4 years that we went from bottom of L1 under Tinnion to the top of the Championship & made a playoff final under GJ.

FFS, I know you have an agenda here but just how stupid does that statement look?

You not “noticing any” is hardly surprising though, is it?

[Lanterne Rouge]

4 minutes ago, GrahamC said:

No, we never made a single tactical change in the 4 years that we went from bottom of L1 under Tinnion to the top of the Championship & made a playoff final under GJ.

FFS, I know you have an agenda here but just how stupid does that statement look?

You not “noticing any” is hardly surprising though, is it?

There are none so blind as them that will not see

[Robbored]

5 minutes ago, GrahamC said:

No, we never made a single tactical change in the 4 years that we went from bottom of L1 under Tinnion to the top of the Championship & made a playoff final under GJ.

FFS, I know you have an agenda here but just how stupid does that statement look?

You not “noticing any” is hardly surprising though, is it?

Ok....give me some examples of tactical changes other than putting his CB up top?  The guy was/is a one dimensional, one trick pony and he’s currently at the right level for his managerial skill set

[Guest]

I remember that evening in Plymouth, it just felt the right time to part ways.

It was one hell of a ride and i don’t think I’ve felt same level of euphoria since the days of Rotherham promotion day and then some fabulous away days the following season culminating in the Palace games.

Times have moved on, the club has been completely changed off the field now.

I wonder if GJ still prints out copies of posts on here for his filing cabinet 

[CodeRed]

18 hours ago, REDOXO said:

Yes I agree. I don’t know with certainty any details but the fact that nothing was denied and the sequence of events that followed was so marked says a lot. 
 

It seems like a knee jerk based upon other semi related factors. Either way I’m still and always will be convinced that the eventual upshot was LJ!

You make a good point,  there was always the impression that SL felt he owed (the) Johnson(s) one.

Had GJ -say- left the season before for an upward move I don't think the LJ era would have happened.

[TomThumb84]

2 hours ago, Robbored said:

Were there ever any tactics or tactical changes under GJ? I can’t say I noticed any unless you consider moving your centre back into a CF a tactic - a lower league one at that..........’clubs in the bag’..........

The players were furious and really fired up second half after the brawl in the changing room.They knew it would be the last time they played under him.

Should not have been an issue though as your belief that “formations do not matter” means that anything goes.

[Robbored]

21 minutes ago, TomThumb84 said:

Should not have been an issue though as your belief that “formations do not matter” means that anything goes.

Formations don’t matter.......it’s about the ability of the players to adapt with the play.

All teams have attackers, midfielders and defenders which is essentially all you need to know.

All this ‘it’s a 4-3-3 or a 4-4-2 or even a 3-5-2’ is completely irrelevant. The formation or shape constantly changes throughout any game in and out of possession and if you doubt me then next time you watch a live match on tv, note the ‘formation’ and then pause it two mins later - the ‘formation’ will  be very different.

 

[Rossi the Robin]

When we reached the play offs the goalposts moved - originally it was all about containment and establishing ourselves as a championship club 

It was all about getting promotion after that and I don’t think we were ready for it at the time - god knows what would happened if we got promoted 

[Lanterne Rouge]

2 minutes ago, Rossi the Robin said:

When we reached the play offs the goalposts moved - originally it was all about containment and establishing ourselves as a championship club 

It was all about getting promotion after that and I don’t think we were ready for it at the time - god knows what would happened if we got promoted 

We`d have done a Derby for sure.

[GrahamC]

1 hour ago, Robbored said:

Ok....give me some examples of tactical changes other than putting his CB up top?  The guy was/is a one dimensional, one trick pony and he’s currently at the right level for his managerial skill set

No, because I don’t think you understand anywhere near enough about football if I did.

Are you seriously suggesting we got to the top of the Championship without him ever making a single tactical change?

As for the first bit, playing Noble behind a lone striker (Enoch) after a spell when we were a 4-4-2 team with Brooker & Jevons up top is the first one that springs to mind but of course even within games there were loads & this fool knows that.

[Rossi the Robin]

I would have loved GJ to play Maynard with Trundle just behind him - he seemed to go off Trundle at this point and I found it very frustrating 

[Davefevs]

1 hour ago, Robbored said:

Formations don’t matter.......it’s about the ability of the players to adapt with the play.

All teams have attackers, midfielders and defenders which is essentially all you need to know.

All this ‘it’s a 4-3-3 or a 4-4-2 or even a 3-5-2’ is completely irrelevant. The formation or shape constantly changes throughout any game in and out of possession and if you doubt me then next time you watch a live match on tv, note the ‘formation’ and then pause it two mins later - the ‘formation’ will  be very different.

 

Formations do matter, but not as much as people believe they do.

I’m definitely not an advocate of “if we’d had played 352 tonight instead of 433, we’d have won”, nor am I “we are 433 with and 451 without” either....but I am massively interested in how we transition shapes in and out of possession and how that might look in certain phases of play.

The very good Swans Analytics on Twitter produced these.  These start to give a feel of the fluidity of positions where players make passes, so not all encompassing, but a useful view to expand the mind about how a 352 might shape up and perhaps where you might stop Swansea.

 

I’m gonna be really intrigued how our 4231 might shape up against Rotherham’s 532 today, but less about the actual formations, but how we deal with their WBs / FBs and side CBs.  In effect they will have a 5 v our 3, so how do we make that a more-conventional 5 v our 4, or exploit that if we are 5 v 3 we must must be 7 v 5 in our favour in other positions.

What we failed to do at their place was use the advantage of 7 v 5, because Rotherham transitioned really well to get their WBs to make that 7 v 5 a 7 v 7.

That is what I’m looking for today.  It’s things like that I look for whilst watching the game, rather than the player on the ball per se.

Sorry, digressed.

[RedHienz]

On 19/03/2021 at 10:54, Robbored said:

The club not wanting to portray themselves negatively - hence the ‘mutual consent’ smokescreen. Most of us know why he was sacked - something along the lines of gross misconduct but it was over a decade ago so doesn’t really matter now.

Yet here you are mentioning it again.

 

 

[Robbored]

1 hour ago, GrahamC said:

No, because I don’t think you understand anywhere near enough about football if I did.

Are you seriously suggesting we got to the top of the Championship without him ever making a single tactical change?

As for the first bit, playing Noble behind a lone striker (Enoch) after a spell when we were a 4-4-2 team with Brooker & Jevons up top is the first one that springs to mind but of course even within games there were loads & this fool knows that.

You’re missing my point GrahamC 

I’ll repeat - GJ was limited in his tactical nouse. As far as I recall he had one default tactic, namely move a CB upto the front and hope that balls into the box created something - not exactly original ...............

LJ on the other had went OTT with his tactical nouse by over complicating things.

GJ like all managers had defenders, midfielders and attackers to utilise but he never had the ability to ‘think outside the box’ and come up with something innovative - why do you suppose he’s never managed higher up?

As I said before the guy is a one dimensional one trick pony.

[Robbored]

52 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

Formations do matter, but not as much as people believe they do.

I’m definitely not an advocate of “if we’d had played 352 tonight instead of 433, we’d have won”, nor am I “we are 433 with and 451 without” either....but I am massively interested in how we transition shapes in and out of possession and how that might look in certain phases of play.

The very good Swans Analytics on Twitter produced these.  These start to give a feel of the fluidity of positions where players make passes, so not all encompassing, but a useful view to expand the mind about how a 352 might shape up and perhaps where you might stop Swansea.

 

I’m gonna be really intrigued how our 4231 might shape up against Rotherham’s 532 today, but less about the actual formations, but how we deal with their WBs / FBs and side CBs.  In effect they will have a 5 v our 3, so how do we make that a more-conventional 5 v our 4, or exploit that if we are 5 v 3 we must must be 7 v 5 in our favour in other positions.

What we failed to do at their place was use the advantage of 7 v 5, because Rotherham transitioned really well to get their WBs to make that 7 v 5 a 7 v 7.

That is what I’m looking for today.  It’s things like that I look for whilst watching the game, rather than the player on the ball per se.

Sorry, digressed.

Dave........can you not see that whatever formation a team lines up with that it constantly changes as the game progresses? and why I consider formations largely irrelevant.

Teams still have attackers, midfielders and defenders but they’re not static in their position, they change shape all the time. When Hunt bombs toward the formation changes and when he drops back it changes again.

I posted earlier that in order to see what I’m getting at, take note of a team’s formation and then pause the screen a few mins later and it will have changed. 

I did exactly that the other day when Man Utd were live on tv. 4 at the back became 5 at the back and the 3 in midfield became two when they were under pressure and changed again when they were on the front foot.

 

[Guest]

Let

It

Go 

[Davefevs]

9 minutes ago, Robbored said:

Dave........can you not see that whatever formation a team lines up with that it constantly changes as the game progresses? and why I consider formations largely irrelevant.

Teams still have attackers, midfielders and defenders but they’re not static in their position, they change shape all the time. When Hunt bombs toward the formation changes and when he drops back it changes again.

I posted earlier that in order to see what I’m getting at, take note of a team’s formation and then pause the screen a few mins later and it will have changed. 

I did exactly that the other day when Man Utd were live on tv. 4 at the back became 5 at the back and the 3 in midfield became two when they were under pressure and changed again when they were on the front foot.

 

Did you read my post?  I was actually largely agreeing with you, perhaps I was too subtle for you?.

[italian dave]

Blimey, on the Sunderland thread people  are getting worked up about not moving on about a manager who left a year ago. And now we’re still arguing about a manager who,left a decade before that!

Harry Thickett thread anyone?

[Robbored]

19 minutes ago, Davefevs said:

Did you read my post?  I was actually largely agreeing with you, perhaps I was too subtle for you?.

Your charts are too small for me to read Dave so I tend to pass them by but read your narrative.

[MarcusX]

On 19/03/2021 at 10:54, Robbored said:

The club not wanting to portray themselves negatively - hence the ‘mutual consent’ smokescreen. Most of us know why he was sacked - something along the lines of gross misconduct but it was over a decade ago so doesn’t really matter now.

Sounds like rumour and speculation

[Guest]

5 hours ago, italian dave said:

Blimey, on the Sunderland thread people  are getting worked up about not moving on about a manager who left a year ago. And now we’re still arguing about a manager who,left a decade before that!

Harry Thickett thread anyone?

I heard Harry hauled the head of the supports club into his office and produced a collection of tapestries 

[SecretSam]

On 19/03/2021 at 13:42, Kid in the Riot said:

GJ left us in such a mess that after he left one of the best English managers in English football at the time decided to join us.

And left shortly after

[Kid in the Riot]

11 minutes ago, SecretSam said:

And left shortly after

Because Steve Lansdown started signing players Coppell didn't want. Hardly GJ's fault 

[2015]

On 19/03/2021 at 10:45, SecretSam said:

I think many in here view the GJ era through rose-tinted goggles.

Most fans were calling for him to go. After initial success, and a play-off campaign built on belief, we started to rot from within.

Rotten squad, lousy football, bizarre signings and zero youth development.

Took years to recover.

100%. Left us a bloated average squad in which we could not shift fully off our books until around 2013. Also think we view how we played with rose tinted spectacles too. We were a functional side, not exactly exciting to watch. +1 GD in the play off season says a lot

Such an overrated era. Much preferred us under Cotterill and early LJ era.

[2015]

Patrick Agyemang, Stern John, Bas Savage, Mark McCammon, Peter Styvar, Izzy Iriekpen, Jamal Campbell-Ryce, Chris Iwelumo all among the 'clubs in the bag' type loan signings.

Then with average players on long term deals - Nyatanga, Sproule, McAllister, Fontaine, L Johnson, Haynes, Clarkson (800k of madness) all among the list of names.

Talented players like Noble, Trundle, Hartley, McIndoe and Keogh should have been the ones post 2008 that GJ should have put faith into.

I'm well aware he also made some very astute signings pre 2008 which led to us reaching the play off final. As Noble hinted at in OSIB podcast, the signing of Adebola completely changed our playing style. He'd know more than us..