I broadly agree but I am not quite as harsh on RvN (not yet at least). I do think that overall, the standard of performances has improved - the problem is that the results have gotten worse. Our performance against Man City was probably our best of the season. We put in an admirable showing at Anfield and Villa Park. We looked fairly decent in the first half last night. But we got 0 points from 12.
I also think you have to account for the fact that he hasn't had his best squad available since he became manager. We have lost 4 of our better players for an extended period of time, including our only genuine quality player in Hermansen who is probably the sole reason why we are on 14 points and not rivalling Southampton for bottom place. Cooper had Ricardo and Fatawu available - players who I think could have flourished under RVN - but chose not to play them. I do think there is a risk that we create a myth where we turn "Cooper never had us in the bottom 3!" into "Cooper would have kept us up!". The first is correct but let's face it, we played like a bottom 3 team and it was only a matter of time. There is no evidence at all that Cooper would have kept us up.
Last night and Wolves are big black marks against him, though. He showed a distinct naivety and lack of tactical nous in both games, which is concerning. It makes me wonder whether he is the best person for us long-term. In the short-term (i.e. the remainder of the season), I don't really see the point of replacing him. We are going down, I think we all know that - sacking another manager won't change that now, especially as all the viable options (Moyes, Potter) have gone off the market. And it's not his fault that Cooper and Rudkin front-loaded the squads with expensive wasters like Ayew and BDCR and splashed out £20m on a second-rate beige midfielder like Oliver Skipp whilst ignoring the very obvious problems in defence and up front.
We are probably going to finish on 20-25 points, which will make it the worst PL season in the club's history. I don't know whether he is the right person to entrust with a potential promotion bid but sacking him now would be pointless and expensive. I would assume there is some sort of relegation clause in his contract which makes it cheaper to sack him after relegation, but with Rudkin and Top you never can be sure....
Overall though, this is on course to be the worst season in our history, especially with Forest looking like a good bet for Champions League which, frankly, makes me feel genuinely quite ill. Cooper and RVN have some blame attached, but ultimately the responsibility lies with Top and Rudkin. They have preceded over 2 relegations in 3 seasons from a position where we were challenging for European places - an astonishing failure that seems to go unnoticed by many in the media. They hold the ultimate blame for this and until they are gone, we will continue to fall into an ever steady decline.
I share the same apathy you have, 99. I am in a bad place when it comes to my club - the worst part being that I am genuinely losing interest in the club and hope that things will improve. We are in a spiral of decline that is only going to get worse and we have ruined our chances of becoming an established PL side capable of top 6-10 season after season. We are now, at best, a yo-yo club - something Vichai worked so hard to move us away from. It's heart-breaking that it's his son that has wrecked his legacy, but it's true. The time for him to sell-up has long gone - if he cared about the club, he would sell the club and let someone else try to repair the damage he has done.
Yeah spot on Foxello. I agree - I’m overly harsh on Ruud, heat of the moment after the match. My big concern with him is we’ve gone from a team who were very negative under Cooper - but pretty effective on the break, to a team that tries to play more progressive football but with absolutely no cutting edge.
We seem less likely to score under Ruud and part of the problem is the build up play. I don’t want direct long ball tactics - far from it, but there isn’t enough movement or fluidity - far too many passes, passes going backwards - we just look so short of creativity sometimes
In Buononotte he’s taken a player that was on fire, disrupted his rhythm by dropping him and is now trying to squeeze him in on the right. Add to that he hasn’t tightened up the defence at all - probably not helped by the fact he barely has any staff.
The decision to hire him just hasn’t worked - and as I say, I feel for him because we look better on the ball and he’s had key injuries Cooper didn’t have.
That said - I’d be very surprised if he makes it to the end of the season. Cue another Dean Smith type appointment I reckon
Whilst I was hoping Potter or Moyes would be appointed ( neither wanted the job) I think Ruud got the fans on side with those early points we picked up.
But with several of our better players out injured plus games against Liverpool, Man City, Newcastle and even Wolves under “new manager bounce “ he’s going through a tough period.
We have our hands tied regarding bringing decent new players in, Top may have money but can’t spend due to the profit and loss rules.
I believe as a team we are looking a lot better, we might easily have beaten Palace with a Vardy of 4-5 years ago.
We’re quite likely going down, let’s hope for somehow bringing in a Huth and a Fuchs, I think it was 2014 when we looked doomed at Christmas and ended up 14th.
'I do think there is a risk that we create a myth where we turn "Cooper never had us in the bottom 3!" into "Cooper would have kept us up!". The first is correct but let's face it, we played like a bottom 3 team and it was only a matter of time. There is no evidence at all that Cooper would have kept us up'.............
That last point is simply not true.
Before I present the 'evidence' I ought to say that I don't disagree with much of what you say, and agree that we were probably in deep relegation trouble under Cooper. Having said which, these are the key stats (which mostly speak for themselves):
Cooper - 12 games, 15 goals for, 23 against, points 10, goals for per game 1.25, goals against per game 1.92, points per game 0.83.
RVN era - 9 games, 8 goals for, 23 against, points 4, goals for per game 0.89, goals against per game 2.56, points per game 0.44.
There is an argument to say that the teams we have faced under Ruud have been higher in the table but this isn't as marked as one might imagine: average position in table of opponent: Cooper - 10.8, RVN 9.2.
On another critically important metric, how we are doing against our immediate competition for those cherished relegations spots (say up to Palace in 15th), Cooper was P3 W1 D2 L0 whereas RVN is P2 W0 D0 L2.
I don't know how Cooper did it, did he have some cunning plan I can't fathom, or was he just plain lucky? We seem to be a bit more pleasing on the eye generally under RVN, but ultimately it's goals and points that count; also against Palace we seemed to regress to the usual Rudkin vision of a team (I have to blame him for this as you could insert Puel, Brendan or Enzo instead of RVN and make the same point) where possession is everything, the players are petrified of losing the ball so we end up passing back when we win it in midfield instead of trying to exploit potential gaps in a disorganised defence; doing this all the time is insane for us as the team then faces a perfectly arranged opposition (we're not Manchester City John, we haven't got the players to break down a defence using intricate passing and movement).
I've been circumspect about our chances this season since we were (mostly) romping the Championship, but to end on a slightly more positive note, despite RVN overseeing a desperate 6 game losing streak, somehow we are but one win away from safety. Which I suspect says more about how poor the teams down the bottom of the league are than anything much good about us.
One slight glimmer of hope is the FA Cup game success, which suggests that next year we may be competitive, even with an EFL points deduction, to at least make the playoffs. One benefit of having a relatively poor squad is that other clubs are hardly likely to come sniffing around for many of our players (save Mads obviously and we'd lose Facundo for sure), so we may yet prosper next year.
One final point, in the Championship you get 4 more games to watch for your season ticket expenditure. On reflection I'm not sure if that is a bonus or just additional torture .
comment by Appletonsthename (U10074)
posted 48 minutes ago
...............We’re quite likely going down, let’s hope for somehow bringing in a Huth and a Fuchs, I think it was 2014 when we looked doomed at Christmas and ended up 14th.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Yes but in 2014/15 we were competitive in the matches despite our poor run, mostly only losing by the odd goal - unlike now. Bringing Huth in certainly made a huge difference to the defence.
Here's a typical line up from the Great Escape period:
Schmeichel
Wasilewski Huth Morgan Shlupp
Mahrez Cambiasso James Albrighton
Ulloa Vardy
What would we give for a line up like that now?
Nuneaton; you make some interesting points and have the data which appears to back it up. But I would counter this by saying that Cooper had a stronger squad available to him than RVN has had - Cooper had Hermansen, Ricardo and Fatawu, three of our best players last season, all fit and ready. Ruud has not. Also, Cooper didn't utilise the latter two, practically at all in the league. Cooper also had a full pre-season, transfer window (in which we bought the PL experience that he asked for) AND the momentum from a successful promotion campaign - all of which have been unavailable to RVN.
Whilst the data may indicate that we were doing just about enough to stay enough, the performances were not. I mentioned a while back that of the 24 halves of football under Cooper in the PL, we probably played 'well' in 4 of them - that's not sustainable at PL level. Some of the performances under Cooper were truly dire - worse than even Taylor or Rodgers at their worst. The Everton game still gives me nightmares.
So yes, if you want to go on data and data alone, we might have just about stayed up under him if, somehow, we managed to keep getting undeserved points from games we were mostly poor in. But eventually, the results would have caught up with the performances.
Coincidentally, of the 8 games we have under RVN, how many points do you think Cooper would have managed? I think we would have lost to West Ham and Brighton. We might have got a point from Wolves. I can't see the Newcastle, Man City, Liverpool or Villa results being different - maybe we would have sh*thoused a point? And then against Palace, maybe we would have sneaked a horrible 1-0 or 2-1. So overall, probably the same tally, if not slightly lower.
Also, I would say that perhaps a more logical question is not "would we be doing better under Cooper now?" but rather "would we be doing better if RVN was hired in the summer instead of Cooper?". For me, the answer is undeniably 'yes'. For starters, the transition from Maresca to RVN would have been smoother and the players would have been more on board with it (they clearly disliked Cooper, as evident from Vardy's reaction to being subbed and the 'we miss you Enzo' party situation). I also don't think that RVN would have sanctioned the moves for Skipp, Ayew, BDCR and Edouard - I think he would have prioritised players from abroad, probably from Netherlands, and would not have had a dogmatic insistence on PL experience.
Fair points Appleton. The difference in 2014 is we had the quality - Pearson was struggling to find the system and use the players at his disposal to make it work. Seems bizarre we were cut adrift at the bottom with a team consisting of Cambiasso, Mahrez and a prime Jamie Vardy.
He unlocked the puzzle in the end but it was Ranieri who figured out how to best make use of that squad (and Kante helped enormously)
Problem is we just don’t have those players this time. And I’m afraid Ruud while producing better displays isn’t really showing that he can school a defence. The players aren’t good enough in general - but they can still play better than they are and be more organised. The defending isn’t even championship standard
I think Foxello is bang on there Nuneaton. It’s not comparable because RVN has lost arguably his 2 best players - Mads and Fatawu and also lost Ndidi.
If Cooper had this team I don’t see how the results would have been any better - perhaps some of the games might have been tighter, I’m not sure
Fatawu was the reason we turned it around against Southampton - without him we weren’t winning that game in my view. It turned when he came off the bench. His loss is absolutely huge and Cooper wasn’t even using him properly
Imagine if Cooper didn’t have Mads for any of his matches. Totally different outcome
Where I do agree with you is that the fans are incredibly forgiving of RVN in a way that they weren’t with Cooper. This is wrong. RVN has major question marks over his use of Buononotte, why the goals have dried up, our lack of cutting edge and our defensive mistakes
comment by Foxello - "a miserable Rodgers obsessed weirdo" (U6985)
posted 4 hours, 1 minute ago
Nuneaton; you make some interesting points and have the data which appears to back it up. But I would counter this by saying that Cooper had a stronger squad available to him than RVN has had - Cooper had Hermansen, Ricardo and Fatawu, three of our best players last season, all fit and ready. Ruud has not. Also, Cooper didn't utilise the latter two, practically at all in the league. Cooper also had a full pre-season, transfer window (in which we bought the PL experience that he asked for) AND the momentum from a successful promotion campaign - all of which have been unavailable to RVN.
Whilst the data may indicate that we were doing just about enough to stay enough, the performances were not. I mentioned a while back that of the 24 halves of football under Cooper in the PL, we probably played 'well' in 4 of them - that's not sustainable at PL level. Some of the performances under Cooper were truly dire - worse than even Taylor or Rodgers at their worst. The Everton game still gives me nightmares.
So yes, if you want to go on data and data alone, we might have just about stayed up under him if, somehow, we managed to keep getting undeserved points from games we were mostly poor in. But eventually, the results would have caught up with the performances.
Coincidentally, of the 8 games we have under RVN, how many points do you think Cooper would have managed? I think we would have lost to West Ham and Brighton. We might have got a point from Wolves. I can't see the Newcastle, Man City, Liverpool or Villa results being different - maybe we would have sh*thoused a point? And then against Palace, maybe we would have sneaked a horrible 1-0 or 2-1. So overall, probably the same tally, if not slightly lower.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Of course we'll never know what Cooper would have achieved. For what it's worth I doubt we would have got anything more than we have now, although that's not taking into account the 'lucky' Cooper factor, so who knows? You do realise in your assessment you've given him a better potential return than RVN has achieved (5 points) . Also we'd be above Wolves in 18th only a point behind Ipswich and closer to Palace. If only.
'Lucky' Steve Cooper may not have lost Mads or N'didi either - the Newcastle and Brighton games would have been different under him.
Incidentally I'm not using any data to make my point other than the stuff that genuinely counts, ie goals scored and points gained. I couldn't use any of the other info that gets produced as that would just confirm what you are saying about us generally playing poorly and not deserving to have as many points as we did when Cooper was sacked.
Again, I reiterate that I'm not saying that Cooper would have kept us up, but I would certainly not have been putting any wager on him failing.
In regard to RVN not having a preseason, transfer window or momentum from last year, that is more a question for the management to answer as to why they made the change when they did - these are factors which no doubt were taken into careful consideration when making such a desperate move.
comment by Foxello - "a miserable Rodgers obsessed weirdo" (U6985)
posted 4 hours, 29 minutes ago
Also, I would say that perhaps a more logical question is not "would we be doing better under Cooper now?" but rather "would we be doing better if RVN was hired in the summer instead of Cooper?". For me, the answer is undeniably 'yes'. For starters, the transition from Maresca to RVN would have been smoother and the players would have been more on board with it (they clearly disliked Cooper, as evident from Vardy's reaction to being subbed and the 'we miss you Enzo' party situation). I also don't think that RVN would have sanctioned the moves for Skipp, Ayew, BDCR and Edouard - I think he would have prioritised players from abroad, probably from Netherlands, and would not have had a dogmatic insistence on PL experience.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
It's an interesting thought, although RVN probably wasn't available at the time. Bringing in players from the Netherlands may have been as bad - or worse - than the ones we have got, as difficult as that might be to envision.
comment by 98 Problems (and promotion ain’t one) (U12353)
posted 3 hours, 58 minutes ago
I think Foxello is bang on there Nuneaton. It’s not comparable because RVN has lost arguably his 2 best players - Mads and Fatawu and also lost Ndidi.
If Cooper had this team I don’t see how the results would have been any better - perhaps some of the games might have been tighter, I’m not sure
Fatawu was the reason we turned it around against Southampton - without him we weren’t winning that game in my view. It turned when he came off the bench. His loss is absolutely huge and Cooper wasn’t even using him properly
Imagine if Cooper didn’t have Mads for any of his matches. Totally different outcome
Where I do agree with you is that the fans are incredibly forgiving of RVN in a way that they weren’t with Cooper. This is wrong. RVN has major question marks over his use of Buononotte, why the goals have dried up, our lack of cutting edge and our defensive mistakes
----------------------------------------------------------------------
As I've surmised above, 'Lucky' Steve Cooper may not have lost either Mads or N'Didi as the matches they got injured in would have played out differently. Imagine instead how many more points we might have if Mads had been available?
I'd like to agree that Fatawu is a huge loss, but in the weird fantasy world of Cooper still being our manager, how much would he be playing?
I think the fans have cut RVN a lot of slack because he was a great player, speaks well, and seems to have the team playing in what generally looks like a reasonable way. Also having a midfield that allows Palace to saunter through the middle and past our CB statue to open the scoring, or being unable to give JJ a desperately needed break is as much down to Rudders as RVN.
Page 1 of 1
First
Previous
1
Next
Latest
Sign in if you want to comment
And that my friends…is that
Page 1 of 1
posted on 16/1/25
I broadly agree but I am not quite as harsh on RvN (not yet at least). I do think that overall, the standard of performances has improved - the problem is that the results have gotten worse. Our performance against Man City was probably our best of the season. We put in an admirable showing at Anfield and Villa Park. We looked fairly decent in the first half last night. But we got 0 points from 12.
I also think you have to account for the fact that he hasn't had his best squad available since he became manager. We have lost 4 of our better players for an extended period of time, including our only genuine quality player in Hermansen who is probably the sole reason why we are on 14 points and not rivalling Southampton for bottom place. Cooper had Ricardo and Fatawu available - players who I think could have flourished under RVN - but chose not to play them. I do think there is a risk that we create a myth where we turn "Cooper never had us in the bottom 3!" into "Cooper would have kept us up!". The first is correct but let's face it, we played like a bottom 3 team and it was only a matter of time. There is no evidence at all that Cooper would have kept us up.
Last night and Wolves are big black marks against him, though. He showed a distinct naivety and lack of tactical nous in both games, which is concerning. It makes me wonder whether he is the best person for us long-term. In the short-term (i.e. the remainder of the season), I don't really see the point of replacing him. We are going down, I think we all know that - sacking another manager won't change that now, especially as all the viable options (Moyes, Potter) have gone off the market. And it's not his fault that Cooper and Rudkin front-loaded the squads with expensive wasters like Ayew and BDCR and splashed out £20m on a second-rate beige midfielder like Oliver Skipp whilst ignoring the very obvious problems in defence and up front.
We are probably going to finish on 20-25 points, which will make it the worst PL season in the club's history. I don't know whether he is the right person to entrust with a potential promotion bid but sacking him now would be pointless and expensive. I would assume there is some sort of relegation clause in his contract which makes it cheaper to sack him after relegation, but with Rudkin and Top you never can be sure....
Overall though, this is on course to be the worst season in our history, especially with Forest looking like a good bet for Champions League which, frankly, makes me feel genuinely quite ill. Cooper and RVN have some blame attached, but ultimately the responsibility lies with Top and Rudkin. They have preceded over 2 relegations in 3 seasons from a position where we were challenging for European places - an astonishing failure that seems to go unnoticed by many in the media. They hold the ultimate blame for this and until they are gone, we will continue to fall into an ever steady decline.
I share the same apathy you have, 99. I am in a bad place when it comes to my club - the worst part being that I am genuinely losing interest in the club and hope that things will improve. We are in a spiral of decline that is only going to get worse and we have ruined our chances of becoming an established PL side capable of top 6-10 season after season. We are now, at best, a yo-yo club - something Vichai worked so hard to move us away from. It's heart-breaking that it's his son that has wrecked his legacy, but it's true. The time for him to sell-up has long gone - if he cared about the club, he would sell the club and let someone else try to repair the damage he has done.
posted on 16/1/25
Yeah spot on Foxello. I agree - I’m overly harsh on Ruud, heat of the moment after the match. My big concern with him is we’ve gone from a team who were very negative under Cooper - but pretty effective on the break, to a team that tries to play more progressive football but with absolutely no cutting edge.
We seem less likely to score under Ruud and part of the problem is the build up play. I don’t want direct long ball tactics - far from it, but there isn’t enough movement or fluidity - far too many passes, passes going backwards - we just look so short of creativity sometimes
In Buononotte he’s taken a player that was on fire, disrupted his rhythm by dropping him and is now trying to squeeze him in on the right. Add to that he hasn’t tightened up the defence at all - probably not helped by the fact he barely has any staff.
The decision to hire him just hasn’t worked - and as I say, I feel for him because we look better on the ball and he’s had key injuries Cooper didn’t have.
That said - I’d be very surprised if he makes it to the end of the season. Cue another Dean Smith type appointment I reckon
posted on 17/1/25
Whilst I was hoping Potter or Moyes would be appointed ( neither wanted the job) I think Ruud got the fans on side with those early points we picked up.
But with several of our better players out injured plus games against Liverpool, Man City, Newcastle and even Wolves under “new manager bounce “ he’s going through a tough period.
We have our hands tied regarding bringing decent new players in, Top may have money but can’t spend due to the profit and loss rules.
I believe as a team we are looking a lot better, we might easily have beaten Palace with a Vardy of 4-5 years ago.
We’re quite likely going down, let’s hope for somehow bringing in a Huth and a Fuchs, I think it was 2014 when we looked doomed at Christmas and ended up 14th.
posted on 17/1/25
'I do think there is a risk that we create a myth where we turn "Cooper never had us in the bottom 3!" into "Cooper would have kept us up!". The first is correct but let's face it, we played like a bottom 3 team and it was only a matter of time. There is no evidence at all that Cooper would have kept us up'.............
That last point is simply not true.
Before I present the 'evidence' I ought to say that I don't disagree with much of what you say, and agree that we were probably in deep relegation trouble under Cooper. Having said which, these are the key stats (which mostly speak for themselves):
Cooper - 12 games, 15 goals for, 23 against, points 10, goals for per game 1.25, goals against per game 1.92, points per game 0.83.
RVN era - 9 games, 8 goals for, 23 against, points 4, goals for per game 0.89, goals against per game 2.56, points per game 0.44.
There is an argument to say that the teams we have faced under Ruud have been higher in the table but this isn't as marked as one might imagine: average position in table of opponent: Cooper - 10.8, RVN 9.2.
On another critically important metric, how we are doing against our immediate competition for those cherished relegations spots (say up to Palace in 15th), Cooper was P3 W1 D2 L0 whereas RVN is P2 W0 D0 L2.
I don't know how Cooper did it, did he have some cunning plan I can't fathom, or was he just plain lucky? We seem to be a bit more pleasing on the eye generally under RVN, but ultimately it's goals and points that count; also against Palace we seemed to regress to the usual Rudkin vision of a team (I have to blame him for this as you could insert Puel, Brendan or Enzo instead of RVN and make the same point) where possession is everything, the players are petrified of losing the ball so we end up passing back when we win it in midfield instead of trying to exploit potential gaps in a disorganised defence; doing this all the time is insane for us as the team then faces a perfectly arranged opposition (we're not Manchester City John, we haven't got the players to break down a defence using intricate passing and movement).
I've been circumspect about our chances this season since we were (mostly) romping the Championship, but to end on a slightly more positive note, despite RVN overseeing a desperate 6 game losing streak, somehow we are but one win away from safety. Which I suspect says more about how poor the teams down the bottom of the league are than anything much good about us.
One slight glimmer of hope is the FA Cup game success, which suggests that next year we may be competitive, even with an EFL points deduction, to at least make the playoffs. One benefit of having a relatively poor squad is that other clubs are hardly likely to come sniffing around for many of our players (save Mads obviously and we'd lose Facundo for sure), so we may yet prosper next year.
One final point, in the Championship you get 4 more games to watch for your season ticket expenditure. On reflection I'm not sure if that is a bonus or just additional torture .
posted on 17/1/25
comment by Appletonsthename (U10074)
posted 48 minutes ago
...............We’re quite likely going down, let’s hope for somehow bringing in a Huth and a Fuchs, I think it was 2014 when we looked doomed at Christmas and ended up 14th.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Yes but in 2014/15 we were competitive in the matches despite our poor run, mostly only losing by the odd goal - unlike now. Bringing Huth in certainly made a huge difference to the defence.
Here's a typical line up from the Great Escape period:
Schmeichel
Wasilewski Huth Morgan Shlupp
Mahrez Cambiasso James Albrighton
Ulloa Vardy
What would we give for a line up like that now?
posted on 17/1/25
Nuneaton; you make some interesting points and have the data which appears to back it up. But I would counter this by saying that Cooper had a stronger squad available to him than RVN has had - Cooper had Hermansen, Ricardo and Fatawu, three of our best players last season, all fit and ready. Ruud has not. Also, Cooper didn't utilise the latter two, practically at all in the league. Cooper also had a full pre-season, transfer window (in which we bought the PL experience that he asked for) AND the momentum from a successful promotion campaign - all of which have been unavailable to RVN.
Whilst the data may indicate that we were doing just about enough to stay enough, the performances were not. I mentioned a while back that of the 24 halves of football under Cooper in the PL, we probably played 'well' in 4 of them - that's not sustainable at PL level. Some of the performances under Cooper were truly dire - worse than even Taylor or Rodgers at their worst. The Everton game still gives me nightmares.
So yes, if you want to go on data and data alone, we might have just about stayed up under him if, somehow, we managed to keep getting undeserved points from games we were mostly poor in. But eventually, the results would have caught up with the performances.
Coincidentally, of the 8 games we have under RVN, how many points do you think Cooper would have managed? I think we would have lost to West Ham and Brighton. We might have got a point from Wolves. I can't see the Newcastle, Man City, Liverpool or Villa results being different - maybe we would have sh*thoused a point? And then against Palace, maybe we would have sneaked a horrible 1-0 or 2-1. So overall, probably the same tally, if not slightly lower.
posted on 17/1/25
Also, I would say that perhaps a more logical question is not "would we be doing better under Cooper now?" but rather "would we be doing better if RVN was hired in the summer instead of Cooper?". For me, the answer is undeniably 'yes'. For starters, the transition from Maresca to RVN would have been smoother and the players would have been more on board with it (they clearly disliked Cooper, as evident from Vardy's reaction to being subbed and the 'we miss you Enzo' party situation). I also don't think that RVN would have sanctioned the moves for Skipp, Ayew, BDCR and Edouard - I think he would have prioritised players from abroad, probably from Netherlands, and would not have had a dogmatic insistence on PL experience.
posted on 17/1/25
Fair points Appleton. The difference in 2014 is we had the quality - Pearson was struggling to find the system and use the players at his disposal to make it work. Seems bizarre we were cut adrift at the bottom with a team consisting of Cambiasso, Mahrez and a prime Jamie Vardy.
He unlocked the puzzle in the end but it was Ranieri who figured out how to best make use of that squad (and Kante helped enormously)
Problem is we just don’t have those players this time. And I’m afraid Ruud while producing better displays isn’t really showing that he can school a defence. The players aren’t good enough in general - but they can still play better than they are and be more organised. The defending isn’t even championship standard
posted on 17/1/25
I think Foxello is bang on there Nuneaton. It’s not comparable because RVN has lost arguably his 2 best players - Mads and Fatawu and also lost Ndidi.
If Cooper had this team I don’t see how the results would have been any better - perhaps some of the games might have been tighter, I’m not sure
Fatawu was the reason we turned it around against Southampton - without him we weren’t winning that game in my view. It turned when he came off the bench. His loss is absolutely huge and Cooper wasn’t even using him properly
Imagine if Cooper didn’t have Mads for any of his matches. Totally different outcome
Where I do agree with you is that the fans are incredibly forgiving of RVN in a way that they weren’t with Cooper. This is wrong. RVN has major question marks over his use of Buononotte, why the goals have dried up, our lack of cutting edge and our defensive mistakes
posted on 17/1/25
comment by Foxello - "a miserable Rodgers obsessed weirdo" (U6985)
posted 4 hours, 1 minute ago
Nuneaton; you make some interesting points and have the data which appears to back it up. But I would counter this by saying that Cooper had a stronger squad available to him than RVN has had - Cooper had Hermansen, Ricardo and Fatawu, three of our best players last season, all fit and ready. Ruud has not. Also, Cooper didn't utilise the latter two, practically at all in the league. Cooper also had a full pre-season, transfer window (in which we bought the PL experience that he asked for) AND the momentum from a successful promotion campaign - all of which have been unavailable to RVN.
Whilst the data may indicate that we were doing just about enough to stay enough, the performances were not. I mentioned a while back that of the 24 halves of football under Cooper in the PL, we probably played 'well' in 4 of them - that's not sustainable at PL level. Some of the performances under Cooper were truly dire - worse than even Taylor or Rodgers at their worst. The Everton game still gives me nightmares.
So yes, if you want to go on data and data alone, we might have just about stayed up under him if, somehow, we managed to keep getting undeserved points from games we were mostly poor in. But eventually, the results would have caught up with the performances.
Coincidentally, of the 8 games we have under RVN, how many points do you think Cooper would have managed? I think we would have lost to West Ham and Brighton. We might have got a point from Wolves. I can't see the Newcastle, Man City, Liverpool or Villa results being different - maybe we would have sh*thoused a point? And then against Palace, maybe we would have sneaked a horrible 1-0 or 2-1. So overall, probably the same tally, if not slightly lower.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Of course we'll never know what Cooper would have achieved. For what it's worth I doubt we would have got anything more than we have now, although that's not taking into account the 'lucky' Cooper factor, so who knows? You do realise in your assessment you've given him a better potential return than RVN has achieved (5 points) . Also we'd be above Wolves in 18th only a point behind Ipswich and closer to Palace. If only.
'Lucky' Steve Cooper may not have lost Mads or N'didi either - the Newcastle and Brighton games would have been different under him.
Incidentally I'm not using any data to make my point other than the stuff that genuinely counts, ie goals scored and points gained. I couldn't use any of the other info that gets produced as that would just confirm what you are saying about us generally playing poorly and not deserving to have as many points as we did when Cooper was sacked.
Again, I reiterate that I'm not saying that Cooper would have kept us up, but I would certainly not have been putting any wager on him failing.
In regard to RVN not having a preseason, transfer window or momentum from last year, that is more a question for the management to answer as to why they made the change when they did - these are factors which no doubt were taken into careful consideration when making such a desperate move.
posted on 17/1/25
comment by Foxello - "a miserable Rodgers obsessed weirdo" (U6985)
posted 4 hours, 29 minutes ago
Also, I would say that perhaps a more logical question is not "would we be doing better under Cooper now?" but rather "would we be doing better if RVN was hired in the summer instead of Cooper?". For me, the answer is undeniably 'yes'. For starters, the transition from Maresca to RVN would have been smoother and the players would have been more on board with it (they clearly disliked Cooper, as evident from Vardy's reaction to being subbed and the 'we miss you Enzo' party situation). I also don't think that RVN would have sanctioned the moves for Skipp, Ayew, BDCR and Edouard - I think he would have prioritised players from abroad, probably from Netherlands, and would not have had a dogmatic insistence on PL experience.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
It's an interesting thought, although RVN probably wasn't available at the time. Bringing in players from the Netherlands may have been as bad - or worse - than the ones we have got, as difficult as that might be to envision.
posted on 17/1/25
comment by 98 Problems (and promotion ain’t one) (U12353)
posted 3 hours, 58 minutes ago
I think Foxello is bang on there Nuneaton. It’s not comparable because RVN has lost arguably his 2 best players - Mads and Fatawu and also lost Ndidi.
If Cooper had this team I don’t see how the results would have been any better - perhaps some of the games might have been tighter, I’m not sure
Fatawu was the reason we turned it around against Southampton - without him we weren’t winning that game in my view. It turned when he came off the bench. His loss is absolutely huge and Cooper wasn’t even using him properly
Imagine if Cooper didn’t have Mads for any of his matches. Totally different outcome
Where I do agree with you is that the fans are incredibly forgiving of RVN in a way that they weren’t with Cooper. This is wrong. RVN has major question marks over his use of Buononotte, why the goals have dried up, our lack of cutting edge and our defensive mistakes
----------------------------------------------------------------------
As I've surmised above, 'Lucky' Steve Cooper may not have lost either Mads or N'Didi as the matches they got injured in would have played out differently. Imagine instead how many more points we might have if Mads had been available?
I'd like to agree that Fatawu is a huge loss, but in the weird fantasy world of Cooper still being our manager, how much would he be playing?
I think the fans have cut RVN a lot of slack because he was a great player, speaks well, and seems to have the team playing in what generally looks like a reasonable way. Also having a midfield that allows Palace to saunter through the middle and past our CB statue to open the scoring, or being unable to give JJ a desperately needed break is as much down to Rudders as RVN.
Page 1 of 1