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Nagy to Pisa - Departure CONFIRMED (Merged)


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3 hours ago, robin_unreliant said:

For £5m wasn't it? ?

I like a good argument with some sarcasm thrown in. So what have I got wrong so far, in your opinion? Everything I posted on here has proved true. The fee? We’ll never find out what he went for but if you listen to some on here, they imagine that we let him go for nothing.

Didnt Pearson say we have to sell before we buy? He didn’t say we have to give away before we buy did he!

So what is it you find so funny, do tell?

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1 hour ago, RobintheRed Red said:

No true thats why in my opinion are forwards seem starved of supply you could have Harry kane upfront no crosses imcoming  because fullbacks are not attacking enough .

 

Ah but, if we had Harry Kane he would be our full back.

 

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1 hour ago, 1960maaan said:

Would never have got a game under Pearson. Didn't track back very well, did try to work on it but couldn't/wouldn't tackle. In a team that is working hard to press and win the ball high, he would have been a luxury . COD works back reasonably well and try to help out his FB. If he can stay fit, ODowda is a good player and I could see him and Pring working well together. Same with JD, but he needs to work on his attacking side.

Not sure about that, he actively recruited a player like Mahrez who's hardly going to press aggressively. I think he would recognise that certain players aren't instinctively going to press but their natural ability makes the trade-off worth it. 

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10 minutes ago, PHILINFRANCE said:

I am sure that I read recently, since LJ's departure anyway, that Engwall was not actually watched, but was signed based on a recommendation only.

Is @billywedlock able to confirm this?

Where did this rumour come from? I’d be astonished if this was actually true 

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1 minute ago, Phileas Fogg said:

Not sure about that, he actively recruited a player like Mahrez who's hardly going to press aggressively. I think he would recognise that certain players aren't instinctively going to press but their natural ability makes the trade-off worth it. 

Horses for courses. He came in and wanted to make us robust, hard to beat and has instilled a high press. We aren't good enough to carry passengers. When Pearson brought in Mahrez, he had had a few years to build his squad. Here he inherited a shambles and had a lot of work just to get us in a position to compete.
  

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2 hours ago, Red Exile said:

The way I see it FFP has almost nothing to do with our current situation. Seems to me that a previous regime - Cotts/Burt, with credit to whoever was running the academy - identified, or developed, players of real talent, built a strong team ethic, got us promoted, identified players who would enhance that group, got pushed back, it all fell apart and they left. When Ashton and LJ stepped in they did well for a bit with many of the the same raw materials, but eventually sold the family silver, and with the exception of Webster replaced it with players that turned out to have little value.

COVID has had a massive impact I acknowledge but if we're teetering on the brink of relegation its because the regime that followed Cotts & Keith Burt wasn't up to the job.

It's an appealing narrative but I don't think it is quite right. 

The reality is that we DID replace those players. Our best football under Johnson came the season after the FA Cup when we won (I think) ten games in a row in all competitions. By the time we did that, only three of our promotion winning team were playing for us (Fielding, Pack and Smith) and I think Smith was injured. Meanwhile youngsters like Bryan and Reid had moved on too. If you take the last game of that winning run (QPR at home in February 2019), 8 of the eleven starters and all three subs who came on were signed when Johnson was manager. 

The truth is it felt apart long after Cotts and Burt left. The depressing thing is - whoever was to blame - Mark Ashton and Lee Johnson essentially sabotaged their own work. Ultimately I don't think the issue is that Johnson and Ashton didn't have the skills for the job but that complacency set in and assumptions were made that they'd just repeat their early successes. But where people rest on their laurels is where things start to go wrong...

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2 hours ago, Mr Popodopolous said:

Toney would have cost £10m in Jan 2020, although I might be wrong on this. £10m for Toney in Jan 2020 when pushing for the playoffs and perhaps more? Vydra would have been my choice of the 2 from Burnley FWIW.

Probably mine as well.

Unfortunately, not only would he have been more expensive, but he wasn't even available!

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13 minutes ago, 1960maaan said:

Horses for courses. He came in and wanted to make us robust, hard to beat and has instilled a high press. We aren't good enough to carry passengers. When Pearson brought in Mahrez, he had had a few years to build his squad. Here he inherited a shambles and had a lot of work just to get us in a position to compete.
  

True, good point.

I doubt he'd proactively seek to recruit a Mahrez type until we had the basics down. I think if Eliasson was here though he could've worked with him in a similar way. I remember Johnson was saying they bought in Eliasson as statistically he was the closest to Anthony Knockeart which was the type he wanted in the team.

I think quite often Johnson himself could identify good players like Eliasson, but couldn't form a cohesive team from them. 

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5 minutes ago, Phileas Fogg said:

I think quite often Johnson himself could identify good players like Eliasson, but couldn't form a cohesive team from them. 

Yep, agree. I don't think he knew how he wanted to set up, he had too many things going on in his head almost.

We needed a coach to set a shape, then recruit for that. LJ never had a plan so just brought in players . It's why we ended up so over staffed with similar standard players. Quantity but limited quality.

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4 minutes ago, 1960maaan said:

Yep, agree. I don't think he knew how he wanted to set up, he had too many things going on in his head almost.

We needed a coach to set a shape, then recruit for that. LJ never had a plan so just brought in players . It's why we ended up so over staffed with similar standard players. Quantity but limited quality.

Yeah - I feel with Johnson that he was so focussed on how to find small gains to get an extra 2% out the players that he never worked out how to ensure he got that first 98%...

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18 minutes ago, JonDolman said:

Fair enough I think O'Dowda is a better tackler but calling either a bottler would be ridiculous imo.

I thought under Holden O'Dowda's role was winning balls deeper in the middle of the park and driving us up the pitch. He did so very well. Lots of fans don't like him but even many of them were saying how well he was playing over that period in the 352. He was then moved to the wing when Holden changed system.

He was also back defending set pieces, which he had not done in previous seasons, getting up well and winning headers in our box.

So I think it's all a bit of a myth that O'Dowda is a coward or a bottler. He's not as good at tackling as Williams, James or Palmer. But they are all excellent tacklers. But then he's better than a fair number of others imo.

I always get the impression watching O’dowda is he’s someone who’d benefit from seeing a sports psychologist, I don’t know whether it’s a confidence thing but we constantly hear stories about how he tops all sorts of stats in training only to look completely lost in a match 

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37 minutes ago, LondonBristolian said:

It's an appealing narrative but I don't think it is quite right. 

The reality is that we DID replace those players. Our best football under Johnson came the season after the FA Cup when we won (I think) ten games in a row in all competitions. By the time we did that, only three of our promotion winning team were playing for us (Fielding, Pack and Smith) and I think Smith was injured. Meanwhile youngsters like Bryan and Reid had moved on too. If you take the last game of that winning run (QPR at home in February 2019), 8 of the eleven starters and all three subs who came on were signed when Johnson was manager. 

The truth is it felt apart long after Cotts and Burt left. The depressing thing is - whoever was to blame - Mark Ashton and Lee Johnson essentially sabotaged their own work. Ultimately I don't think the issue is that Johnson and Ashton didn't have the skills for the job but that complacency set in and assumptions were made that they'd just repeat their early successes. But where people rest on their laurels is where things start to go wrong...

All fair points...but in fairness to me it slightly depends when you think City played their best football!!

Peak City under LJ for me was 2017/18 up to the night we lost to Wolves, when Frankie was still in the building, Flint was in his prime, Smith and Pack were the midfield with Joe on the left and Bobby up front, and we were 2nd in the table at kick-off having just been beaten in the League Cup Simi-Final. It's not been a lot better than that in the past 40 years.

That said a more ruthless owner would have sacked Johnson after the abysmal run following that loss to Wolves...4 wins in 21 matches, finished 11th with LJ seemingly clueless how to return to the previous winning form.

As for the following season, sure, we had that great run but we also lost 7 in 11 in the league earlier in the season and then threw away chances of the play-offs by winning just 4 of the final 12 matches. Once the rot set in LJ appeared to have no idea how to stop it. Maybe, to take up your final point, that was something to do with resting on laurels. I always thought it was over-confidence followed by panic. I don't believe LJ did have the skills for the job of leading a side to promotion over a season. Maybe he will acquire them.

Whatever, we have been left in a mess, the nature of which sits more with the responsibilities of a CEO than a manager.

 

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1 hour ago, 1960maaan said:

Yep, agree. I don't think he knew how he wanted to set up, he had too many things going on in his head almost.

We needed a coach to set a shape, then recruit for that. LJ never had a plan so just brought in players . It's why we ended up so over staffed with similar standard players. Quantity but limited quality.

Clubs in the bag was his quote the other was one for the future. Clubs in the bag says we didn’t  have a system or an identity. Always different so some players could only. Play in certain formations if we didn’t play that they didn’t play . Not a phrase I’ve ever heard a top manager use as they buy players to fit a system Pep,Klopp,Dyche, nobody has clubs in the bag

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1 hour ago, LondonBristolian said:

It's an appealing narrative but I don't think it is quite right. 

The reality is that we DID replace those players. Our best football under Johnson came the season after the FA Cup when we won (I think) ten games in a row in all competitions. By the time we did that, only three of our promotion winning team were playing for us (Fielding, Pack and Smith) and I think Smith was injured. Meanwhile youngsters like Bryan and Reid had moved on too. If you take the last game of that winning run (QPR at home in February 2019), 8 of the eleven starters and all three subs who came on were signed when Johnson was manager. 

The truth is it felt apart long after Cotts and Burt left. The depressing thing is - whoever was to blame - Mark Ashton and Lee Johnson essentially sabotaged their own work. Ultimately I don't think the issue is that Johnson and Ashton didn't have the skills for the job but that complacency set in and assumptions were made that they'd just repeat their early successes. But where people rest on their laurels is where things start to go wrong...

Tis a fair response.  Looking back it was a period when he picked a fairly steady team and system, making maybe one change occasionally.

1 hour ago, JonDolman said:

Fair enough I think O'Dowda is a better tackler but calling either a bottler would be ridiculous imo.

I thought under Holden O'Dowda's role was winning balls deeper in the middle of the park and driving us up the pitch. He did so very well. Lots of fans don't like him but even many of them were saying how well he was playing over that period in the 352. He was then moved to the wing when Holden changed system.

He was also back defending set pieces, which he had not done in previous seasons, getting up well and winning headers in our box.

So I think it's all a bit of a myth that O'Dowda is a coward or a bottler. He's not as good at tackling as Williams, James or Palmer. But they are all excellent tacklers. But then he's better than a fair number of others imo.

It’s not myth, it’s a difference of opinion.

We will get to evaluate him over the coming weeks and see what he can offer.  Pring has laid down a marker.

Not sure I’d call Palmer an excellent tackler ?….committed tackler, maybe.

 

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1 hour ago, LondonBristolian said:

Yeah - I feel with Johnson that he was so focussed on how to find small gains to get an extra 2% out the players that he never worked out how to ensure he got that first 98%...

The most frustrating aspect of LJ’s time was his maxim “ if it ain’t broke, I’ll fix it anyway”.

He seemed to have an almost pathological desire to make changes  - almost for changes sake - and to prove how clever he was a coach. That. and continually picking his teams to counter the oppositions strengths, rather than focussing on picking a team to play to ours.

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