The Official Dean Smith Thread | Page 402 | Vital Football

The Official Dean Smith Thread

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Silhillvilla said:
Since the start of January, bar 45 mins at Turf Moor , we've looked the same as last season to me , probably worse in terms of goals for column
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Yeah, but that was our BEST last season. I don't understand how you don't see that. You must do, otherwise you wouldn't start with "Since the start of January" because that shows you know what was happening before was pretty special.
 
Since the turn of the year, nobody can deny our form has dropped.

But we're still lower midtable in the form scales and clear of the dropzone which remains an improvement on last season.

It's first half of the season frustration more than anything.

(unless we lose every remaining game!)
 
It's funny because if Mr Fate had gaily skipped through the season sprinkling the same amount of wins and losses I bet hardly anyone would be complaining (Silhil and Fulford obvs), but the fact all our best games were at the start and then all our bad games at the back is making people lose their minds.
 
OK, let's look at our record from the start of last January.

I said earlier that I thought January was good in terms of performances if not so much results, and why.

In February we beat Leeds and Arsenal, drew with Brighton, and lost to Leicester and West Ham. Not bad at all. Not gate-crashing Europe form, but I'd say comfortably top half.

In March we lost to Spurs and Sheffield, and drew with Newcastle and Wolves. A mini-slump undoubtedly, but not a catastrophy.

In April we've beaten Fulham, and lost narrowly to Liverpool. Decent.

So this "bar 45 mins against Burnley we're back to last season" is sheer and utter garbage. One poor month, March, and that's it.
 
Platypus said:
It's funny because if Mr Fate had gaily skipped through the season .
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I had to put my glasses on there Platypus, I thought 'when the hell have I ever given the impression I skip gaily or otherwise...'

I agree with the rest of it, it would have been better if the wins/losses .. good performances/poor performances were mixed.

But the point is, they aren't and we have dipped badly from a great start
 
We're definitely worse off without Jack, but apart from winning the first 4 games, if you look at results, it's been pretty consistent all season, we weren't brilliant in the first half of the season and we haven't been terrible in the second half. I don't really see a huge dip myself and surely we all knew we weren't going to keep up those Arsenal away type performances all season. In fact our worst run of the season was near the start losing 4 out of 5.

W W W W L L W L L W D W W D L L W L W L W D L W L D D L W L
 
The Fear said:
Storming start, and we were playing such great football. As said, that is enough for me to see the future as we add more depth (in quality). If we were similar to last season, I'd not be content but we aren't. This has surpassed my expectations.
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Yep, the football hasn't been as good recently, no doubt about that, obviously not helped by Jack's absence and Barkley losing interest in being a professional footballer (when he was the one who could have taken the burden off Jack). And even the likes of Martinez making a few clangers which is unlike him.

I think a lot of factors have lead to our loss of momentum, and not all down to Smith.
 
davewal1 said:
well after a £250 million spend you would hope to be a bit more that a one player team who was there already
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To repeat myself once more:
- Half an entire squad replaced at avg. £8m/player
- Best goalkeeper in the league
- Third best defence in the league
- England international striker
- Brazil international midfielder
- Traore who is inconsistent yet still has 5 goals and 4 assists in his first season

But you go ahead and keep repeating yourself.
 
It's fine margins in the PL, and the manager can only use what he has at his disposal. Take the Man C game. Take Foden out of it and I suspect we would have had something out of the game. They had Foden, we didn't have Jack.

To me DS produced the right plan given the relative resources of the two clubs. We had to defend for our lives, but anything else would have handed it to them on a plate. Our players were criticised for passes going astray. Poor coaching? On this occasion I'd say that MC's closing down was so effective that the slightest misjudgement was seized upon, and most outlets were cut off; it wasn't passes being cut out which did for us, it was the odd chink appearing in what was generally a very solid defence.

I had doubts about DS, but at the moment I think he's doing fine. We have a long road ahead of us and there will be ups and downs, but I think the overall trend is upwards. To me the MC match showed we can play without Jack, even if we lost (narrowly).
 
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