The Official Dean Smith Thread | Page 351 | Vital Football

The Official Dean Smith Thread

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BringbakMON said:
do you think we should compete, look well organised and match the workrate (at least) of other teams in every game ?
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I am just going to say this is bollocks too because Graham Potter does all of that and gets no results.

We want it all, we organization and good football but none of us give a flying fuck if we're not getting results. Call a spade a spade, Bruce got all the above until he didnt and then we sacked him.

I'll settle for this jackal and hyde team until I see a real high-quality manager appointed.
 
don't watch anything of Brighton tbh but it's far too often we're second best to pretty average teams.
(Potter and Dean have picked up roughly the same amount of points over their 40 odd games at prem level so he's getting some results at least)
 
robbali said:
9 in 3 home games. And it could have been more.
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If nothing else it should stop the "we're defending better as a team" comments every single interview....
I am still absolutely fuming about his post-match comment, saying we played well to get the three goals today, and that we can take that form into Arsenal. No Dean, we didn't do well to get the three goals. Two of them were during the six minutes of injury time when Southampton had essentially decided to stop playing. If we take that "form" into the Arsenal game we will get completely and utterly tonked....
 
I’m in the camp of desperately wanting Smith to be the most successful manager we’ve ever had, but I can see and regularly post constructive criticism about what I’m seeing him deliver. I suspect we are the less vocal but vast majority of supporters.

Those things he needs to work if he merely wants to take us to being a mid table team, as we took these sorts of things for granted even during our poorer years in the top flight.

We aren’t an experiment like Brentford, where you can stick to what you know because the pressure of 10k fans at a small club doesn’t matter. The difference here, is that we are at the lowest of our expectations - finishing 17th in the league - so it has to improve.

Smith has to learn how to change the game and evolve with the game over time. I’m probably getting ahead of myself on my last point, but if he’s still here in 4-5 seasons, what’s the betting we’re still playing exactly the same 4-3-3? It may be the right thing to do, it might not. I hope he has a long and successful career for us to find out.
 
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Villan57 said:
so you want to sack a manager after he's won 4 out of 6 games, you really need to take more water with it
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So you're not taking the loss at home to Stoke City into consideration then?......

It's not the losses, it's the manner of the losses that irk me. We have a much better team now to what we had last season, but we still manage to be crap on a too regular basis. No plan B most the time. Not up for the game from the first whistle. Yesterdays' first half (from the bit I saw) we were prancing around like it was some sort of fucking practise match!

THAT is not acceptable.
 
danvilla2 said:
I’m in the camp of desperately wanting Smith to be the most successful manager we’ve ever had, but I can see and regularly post constructive criticism about what I’m seeing him deliver. I suspect we are the less vocal but vast majority of supporters.

Those things he needs to work if he merely wants to take us to being a mid table team, as we took these sorts of things for granted even during our poorer years in the top flight.

We aren’t an experiment like Brentford, where you can stick to what you know because the pressure of 10k fans at a small club doesn’t matter. The difference here, is that we are at the lowest of our expectations - finishing 17th in the league - so it has to improve.

Smith has to learn how to much to change the game and evolve with the game over time. I’m probably getting ahead of myself on my last point, but if he’s still here in 4-5 seasons, what’s the betting we’re still playing exactly the same 4-3-3? It may be the right thing to do, it might not. I hope he has a long and successful career for us to find out.
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Yes, I agree with that, and also nothing would make me happier than to see Dean smith become a very successful manager at Villa Park because that, of course, means a successful Aston Villa and that's all we fans want.

It's over to you Dean & Co to deliver. That's why you are paid very handsomely.
 
Thomas Holte said:
Yes, I agree with that, and also nothing would make me happier than to see Dean smith become a very successful manager at Villa Park because that, of course, means a successful Aston Villa and that's all we fans want.

It's over to you Dean & Co to deliver. That's why you are paid very handsomely.
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Exactly.
 
Wurzel said:
I thought we had a very good transfer window, didn't you?

As for Poch. I would be amazed if he would consider Aston Villa at the moment.
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I guess I'd answer that question by asking how many proven PL players we bought?

DS may very well not be in total control of that, or at least he wasn't, and I absolutely take that into consideration but as much as I can know, I "know" that DS isn't up to it at this level so I think it's only a matter of time now - if we hadn't spent so much money (c£200m) then I'd likely take a different view but we have so I'm not.

Poch is a thinker, wants a challenge, and is proven at this level - I think we're made for him and, specifically, because we've also proven that our BoD will splash the cash in a way that Levi never would.
 
Unless the data has changed significantly the average tenure of a PL manager is about 1.3 seasons.

A third into this season would take us to the Burnley match or gulp the Baggies at their shithole on Dec 19th.

If Villa return to the form of last season a la the last two games, and this continues till then you have to fear for Dean.

For people who continue to ignore the evidence and see Dean as some kind of messianic leader - for a below/ average manager at this level, I think the win ratio of an average is about 30%, Dean is on about 29.5%.

If the team continues to play without purpose or coherency then its not hard to see that he will be testing the patience of the owners at some point this season.

Food for thought.
 
Villa are a mid-sized club. I mean that with no disrespect.
Purslow has admitted we can't offer the salaries that "proven prem players" routinely expect. That will come if we stay in the division for 2 or more years. People need to realise what a huge rebuilding job this is.

We couldn't beat Newcastle for Callum Wilson.
 
Oh god lets not get into this because it is a farcical debate to have, Dean Smith does not run the club from top to bottom like Ferguson.

We operate a Director of Football model, you can pick Dean Smith vs. DoF type signings. The whole idea of our approach is designed to be able to transition easily to another manager. We have a transfer panel, Dean comes up with ideas and so will our scouting and DoF. Dean will ask them to go look at some of his ideas but ultimately it is an agreement between every about who is the right fit. Dean of course has to sign off but they're never going to get to that stage if the DoF, scouting team, and Purslow disagree.

Let's not go down this route and start blaming for this, the team selections, performances, and results are enough to criticize him for.

I still think that was our best transfer window in at least 5 years if not 10. We attempted to actually address problem areas with a clear and obvious plan. Maybe that plan will not work out as the season progresses but I for one see it as attempting to fix multiple deficiencies we all agreed needed upgrading. And many thoroughly agreed we still needed further bodies in the door.

At some point, we have to look at this as a holistic issue and stop blaming one person.
 
CDX_EIRE said:
At some point, we have to look at this as a holistic issue and stop blaming one person.
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You mean the way Suso took the can for last season? :fish:

I agree about the window, almost everyone did. If you were a fan of Deano this meant Villa were now assured of a top 8-10 finish - piece of piss.

If you weren't a fan of Dean at least this meant that Dean had been backed and we could see an end to 'its all the players fault, the recruitment is shit and Deano is working miracles with a shit squad blah blah...' and the beginnings of some accountability.

Or maybe not...
 
Wurzel said:
I can't carry on defending Smith to people who just want him gone, so I'm not going to. Personally I think he has done a very good job as Aston Villa manager, but there are those who will never rate him, and that's fine. I hate this modern football fan mentality of sack the manager every time the team has a bad performance. Fortunately I believe the owners know what they expect from their investment, and where they expect the club to be. They seem to be realistic, unlike many fans, and will give Dean the time and resources to continue to progress the team, something he has managed to do consistently since he came. So I will put my trust in the owners, they are the ones who will know when it is time to replace Smith, personally I hope it is in many years time because that will mean he has been very successful.
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My mentality of sacking Dean Smith isn't after a couple of defeats. I don't rate him but never say never. It's the continuation of making basic tactical errors time and time again that makes me not rate him. I thought he had learnt but he obviously hasn't. We need a result pretty quickly in these next few games otherwise we will be yet again looking over our shoulders just like last season.
 
crimsondonkey said:
You mean the way Suso took the can for last season? :fish:

I agree about the window, almost everyone did. If you were a fan of Deano this meant Villa were now assured of a top 8-10 finish - piece of piss.

If you weren't a fan of Dean at least this meant that Dean had been backed and we could see an end to 'its all the players fault, the recruitment is shit and Deano is working miracles with a shit squad blah blah...' and the beginnings of some accountability.

Or maybe not...
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I agree, don't get me wrong I think Dean gets the bullet if he doesn't show significant improvement and rightly so.

I believe Purslow and the owners are very much pragmatists with a long time horizon, we're not like that. 12th is a success, we can sit here and debate the size of our club, its ambition and all the rest but times have changed. The gulf in financial clout, player quality and attractiveness is skewed. Avoiding a relegation battle and finishing in a nice safe comfortable league position are the expectations this year IMO.

The last two games are a huge wake-up call and hopefully, Dean takes heed as well as the players not giving it the full bollocks. This will be another hard-fought season, we're not just going to show up and beat teams. Dean isn't a pragmatist in his approach and that cost us in both of our last two games.

I am convinced we spend most of our tie on the training practicing what we'll do with the ball and not what we'll do without it. I don't think Dean has sat there and thought of how the opposition can beat us. I am not so sure we've spent the time trawling through the last two games and making it absolute agony for the players.

It seems like the worst thing the lads could have done was score 3 goals because now Dean believes if we just had more time we'd have won. That denial is what will eventually be his undoing, I don't see results and performances like these going away.
 
Fulford said:
My mentality of sacking Dean Smith isn't after a couple of defeats. I don't rate him but never say never. It's the continuation of making basic tactical errors time and time again that makes me not rate him. I thought he had learnt but he obviously hasn't. We need a result pretty quickly in these next few games otherwise we will be yet again looking over our shoulders just like last season.
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You do know we are 6th in the league?
 
In fairness, against Leeds their heads completely went that was nothing to do with tactics.

Southampton didn't line up tactically to score with every shot on target and 3 cheap freekicks. We were woeful first half, but they didn't dominate.
 
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