A serious look at Mauricio Pochettino

[el3mel]

Yeah that's totally the same as losing 3 of your top scorers at once as well as your best midfielder this season.

It's the equivalent of Salah, Mane, Firmino and Wijnaldum all being out at the same time. Teams can cope with defensive injuries if they have firepower, I'd swap having Kane, Alli and Son out anyday for Vert, Alderweireld and Trippier.

If you have lost your entire defense before you would have said the opposite really.

I had seen United defeating Arsenal under LVG with an almost entire team out and having to play Carrick in defense, something that also happened under SAF several times too who put Carrick and Fletcher in CBs at one point.

Injury crisis happen in any big club and we had our fair share of it. The role of the manager is to get on with it. You're acting like it's an easy ride with squad and injuries in other big clubs.

 

[Posh Red]

If you have lost your entire defense before you would have said the opposite really.

I had seen United defeating Arsenal under LVG with an almost entire team out and having to play Carrick in defense, something that also happened under SAF several times too who out Carrick and Fletcher in CBs at one point.

Injury crisis happen in any big club and we had our fair share of it. The role of the manager is to get on with it. You're acting like it's an easy ride with squad and injuries in other big clubs.

We beat arsenal and half of our team were pulled from the academy that day. That was one of the best things about Van Gaal; he wasn’t afraid to give kids a chance when we had injuries to first team players.

 

[SquishyMcSquish]

If you have lost your entire defense before you would have said the opposite really.

I had seen United defeating Arsenal under LVG with an almost entire team out and having to play Carrick in defense, something that also happened under SAF several times too who out Carrick and Fletcher in CBs at one point.

Injury crisis happen in any big club and we had our fair share of it. The role of the manager is to get on with it. You're acting like it's an easy ride with squad and injuries in other big clubs.

Nooooope, I really wouldn't. We've had injury issues to the backline before. It really doesn't impact a club anywhere near as much as having its best attackers missing. There's a reason clubs pay the top, top money for attackers like Kane or attacking midfielders like Pogba, they're the rarest kind of player to replace. Defensive injuries are a problem but players can be replaced in those areas if you have a solid system, it's far harder to replace the magic of fantastic attacking players. SAF was a genius and made some weird things work on a couple of occasions, but he nearly always had a world class attacker or two who could make the difference.

Everybody else has had a very easy ride compared to us with injuries this season. You can go ahead and act like it's 'normal' for an entire attacking force to be wiped out and the clubs best player overall to be unavailable, but it isn't and nobody is buying that line. We're obviously not going to be able to just 'get on with it' as usual when our star players are unavailable, and no other club would be able to either. We're not Manchester United, we don't have the revenue to have 70m strikers just sat on the bench.

Like I've already stated, I would love to see Liverpool play without their entire front 3, or Chelsea and Arsenal too for that matter if you removed 3 or 4 of their most important players. The two Manchester clubs can cope better because you're both stupidly loaded boasting obscenely expensive squads, but even then you're bound to find it hard. The idea we can just crack on as normal is ludicrous.

 

[el3mel]

Nooooope, I really wouldn't. We've had injury issues to the backline before. It really doesn't impact a club anywhere near as much as having its best attackers missing. There's a reason clubs pay the top, top money for attackers like Kane or attacking midfielders like Pogba, they're the rarest kind of player to replace. Defensive injuries are a problem but players can be replaced in those areas if you have a solid system, it's far harder to replace the magic of fantastic attacking players. SAF was a genius and made some weird things work on a couple of occasions, but he nearly always had a world class attacker or two who could make the difference.

Everybody else has had a very easy ride compared to us with injuries this season. You can go ahead and act like it's 'normal' for an entire attacking force to be wiped out and the clubs best player overall to be unavailable, but it isn't and nobody is buying that line. We're obviously not going to be able to just 'get on with it' as usual when our star players are unavailable, and no other club would be able to either. We're not Manchester United, we don't have the revenue to have 70m strikers just sat on the bench.

Like I've already stated, I would love to see Liverpool play without their entire front 3, or Chelsea and Arsenal too for that matter if you removed 3 or 4 of their most important players. The two Manchester clubs can cope better because you're both stupidly loaded boasting obscenely expensive squads, but even then you're bound to find it hard. The idea we can just crack on as normal is ludicrous.

Even at this time we defeated Arsenal under LVG we had no strikers available and had to get Rashford up from the academy to be the striker this game and the previous one. Rooney, Martial and Will Keane were all injured. We had an entire team out not just the defense.

Managers have to get on with this, as simple as that. These things happen.

 

[SquishyMcSquish]

Even at this time we defeated Arsenal under LVG we had no strikers available and had to get Rashford up from the academy to be the striker this game and the previous one. Rooney, Martial and Will Keane were all injured. We had an entire team out not just the defense.

Managers have to get on with this, as simple as that. These things happen.

So you've cited a single game where a team dealt with injury issues, and this means that teams will simply 'get on with it' when their best players are all taken away from the side?

Managers do have to get on with it and Pochettino will do. We won our league game with the injuries but have lost a couple of cup games, one of which was away at Stamford Bridge. I'm not suggesting we're suddenly going to collapse and not look like a football team, but inevitably we will struggle more to get results and likely have a couple of poor games, that's inevitable over a decent stretch of matches with those players missing. We're not a club who have the finances to boast incredible depth so inevitably a crisis like this is going to hit hard.

I don't know what else to say really. If you think having Kane, Alli, Son and Sissoko unavailable wouldn't impact other managers then cool, so be it. Serious question though, I've said it a couple of times but how do you think Klopp would deal with his front 3 all being out injured for a month? Do you think they'd be able to navigate that with ease, considering they looked utterly clueless vs Wolves?

Any manager, no matter how world class, needs top players to get results.

 

[el3mel]

So you've cited a single game where a team dealt with injury issues, and this means that teams will simply 'get on with it' when their best players are all taken away from the side?

Managers do have to get on with it and Pochettino will do. We won our league game with the injuries but have lost a couple of cup games, one of which was away at Stamford Bridge. I'm not suggesting we're suddenly going to collapse and not look like a football team, but inevitably we will struggle more to get results and likely have a couple of poor games, that's inevitable over a decent stretch of matches with those players missing. We're not a club who have the finances to boast incredible depth so inevitably a crisis like this is going to hit hard.

I don't know what else to say really. If you think having Kane, Alli, Son and Sissoko unavailable wouldn't impact other managers then cool, so be it. Serious question though, I've said it a couple of times but how do you think Klopp would deal with his front 3 all being out injured for a month? Do you think they'd be able to navigate that with ease, considering they looked utterly clueless vs Wolves?

Any manager, no matter how world class, needs top players to get results.

No, not just one game because that was an entire period of having our defense out and 1 striker available. It happened under LVG in both seasons and even happened for Mourinho in his last season by the last 2 months of it. Also Fergie had to deal with several injury crisis. It's normal. It's not always rosy and having all your players available for you at the big club like you're thinking. As a manager you have to deal with the unexpected.

 

[Bola]

But he's at Spurs where top 4 is enough. If you gave him a few extra hundred million to spend and told him you wanted him to go win every trophy, I suspect he'd be happy to upgrade his ambitions.

He's enough resources to win a cup now. I don't want a defeatist attitude at the club

 

[SquishyMcSquish]

No, not just one game because that was an entire period of having our defense out and 1 striker available. It happened under LVG in both seasons and even happened for Mourinho in his last season by the last 2 months of it. Also Fergie had to deal with several injury crisis. It's normal. It's not always rosy and having all your players available for you at the big club like you're thinking. As a manager you have to deal with the unexpected.

We've dealt with bad injuries before ... you keep making out like this is some normal situation when it blatantly isn't. We've had Kane, Eriksen, Son, Alli out for stretches and coped but to have 3 of our stars out all at the same time is not normal and not something top managers are having to deal with all the time, it's a crisis. Of course our attacking play is going to suffer, the feck do people expect?

You're acting like I think all is rosy at a big club and you don't get injuries. Literally all I've said is that any club in the league would suffer bad results if you removed 3 of their best attackers and their best central midfielder from the team. The least impacted would probably be City, but even they suffered somewhat just from losing KDB and Fernandinho, and they have the best depth going. Do the same to Arsenal, Chelsea or Liverpool and their managers would struggle to get results, 100%.

 

[Random Task]

I feel like if Redcafe could decide United's transfer strategy the main objective would be to piss Glaston off .

It certainly couldn't be any worse the Ed's "let's spend shocking amounts of money on literally anyone who is available because lolololol topbantz" approach.

Plus Eriksen is probably my favourite non-United player. I'd love to have him at the club.

Also @GlastonSpur (what's your alert counter up to right now?)

 

[el3mel]

We've dealt with bad injuries before ... you keep making out like this is some normal situation when it blatantly isn't. We've had Kane, Eriksen, Son, Alli out for stretches and coped but to have 3 of our stars out all at the same time is not normal and not something top managers are having to deal with all the time, it's a crisis. Of course our attacking play is going to suffer, the feck do people expect?

You're acting like I think all is rosy at a big club and you don't get injuries. Literally all I've said is that any club in the league would suffer bad results if you removed 3 of their best attackers and their best central midfielder from the team. The least impacted would probably be City, but even they suffered somewhat just from losing KDB and Fernandinho, and they have the best depth going. Do the same to Arsenal, Chelsea or Liverpool and their managers would struggle to get results, 100%.

I'm saying these crises happen at any big club that's all. It's not something you don't expect while you're managing a club.

 

[JoseandMkhiarespecial]

Eriksen probably has bigger ambitions than 4th place for the rest of his career. I hope he moves on from Spurs.

Think of all the times Sir Alex played makeshift teams with people like Rafael at Right Midfield and won matches, and yet Spurs fans and Poch fans try claim that they've got a depleted squad and it doesn't matter if they lose all their games when there is an injury

Imagine being a Spurs fan and being told that the FA cup doesn't matter, and that losing to the real top clubs in the league and beating the dross like Watford is the height of your clubs ambition. I would honestly cancel my season ticket.


Tell me all about how Spurs squad was depleted when Leicester romped the league and Spurs were nowhere to be seen

 

[Cheesy]

Why can't a manager be evaluated in both? Do well in the league while winning a couple of smaller trophies. That would be a sign of a great manager.

The excuses that Poch gets are very similar to Moyes one 6-7 years ago. Hey, it doesn't matter that he didn't win a trophy, McLaren won a trophy, is he a better manager? Hey he did better than anyone without money to spend (but in both cases, where they spent big it was more miss than hit). Why does it really matter that a manager does well in low key transfers when at United he will buy at a different level of market, etc etc. It is like time has gone back but United fans haven't learnt their lesson.

I'm not sure that's the case. Moyes was able to build a fairly solid and reliable but unspectacular Everton side who were arguably just punching above their weight - nevertheless he was essentially a good mid-table manager, but not one who'd ever shown anything to indicate he was worthy of a top job. Pochettino's had Spurs in the top three consistently and has them playing an entertaining brand of football. Whether or not he'd succeed or not is questionable but he'd be a better appointment than Moyes ever was. Comfortably.

 

[EwanI Ted]

He's enough resources to win a cup now. I don't want a defeatist attitude at the club

He doesn’t really. They rested about the same number of first teamers as we did vs Arsenal, but with what he had available that meant a bigger drop in quality than we faced. That’s why prioritising competitions is a bigger deal for Spurs than for us. He’s naive for saying as such in public but it’s not defeatest. I don’t think you could accuse Pochettino of that when they’ve punched so far above their weight for so long.

 

[Cheesy]

Even at this time we defeated Arsenal under LVG we had no strikers available and had to get Rashford up from the academy to be the striker this game and the previous one. Rooney, Martial and Will Keane were all injured. We had an entire team out not just the defense.

Managers have to get on with this, as simple as that. These things happen.

That doesn't strike me as a particularly great example. It came during a season where we were woeful and missed out on the CL spots - we'd went into the season without enough strikers, and LVG lucked out when he was forced into playing an academy player who turned out to be very good. It wasn't some example of brilliant squad management or anything. Obviously clubs cope with injuries when they can but plenty also end up getting fecked over too. It's easy to be selective and look at examples where it worked, but even when Fergie was here we had spells where a big player was missing and we looked noticeably weaker as a result.

 

[JoseandMkhiarespecial]

If Klopp wasn't top of the league no one would care that Salah was injured in the CL final. They would still slate him for losing it whether people were injured or not.

And now I'll destroy the next argument, the small budget.
Spurs are lucky that Kane and Alli are Spurs fans and will sit on a small wage. Eriksen won't though in my opinion.

Poch plays one squad every match because he's a Plan A manager and that's it.

Anybody else like Pep, Sarri, or Ole, rotates their attack and stuff because that's what a big club does when it's actually playing for 4 trophies unlike Spurs.

Having one XI for every game works for them against the dross of the league like Watford. It won't work at Man Utd though. A club who actually aim to win trophies on all fronts.

 

[JoseandMkhiarespecial]

Guys like Nkoudou come on and look as if they're league one level because they've never had any minutes. What a great squad manager.

He's literally living off Alli and Kane. Sell them and watch him do a Brendan Rodgers

 

[Moriarty]

Having one XI for every game works for them against the dross of the league like Watford. It won't work at Man Utd though. A club who actually aim to win trophies on all fronts.

That might be a great motivation for him.

 

[Canagel]

The issue lies with Pochettino choices. This guy expect lesser quality players to just fill the spot and role of the players they're replacing. You adjust your tactics accordingly and set team up to get result. The other day they didn't have to score but within half hour they concede 2 goals. Do you not queation the tactics? Anyone couldve expected Chelaea to come out firing tottenham neeeed to hold out and then push later. But no they folded like pack of cards and lose the lead they worked to establish the whole leg.
Second half they played better and showed they could get result so it's nothing to do with squad depth. Then theyll tell you it was "lottery of penalties" and "we had no chance".
You can't train for 11 players . You train for the whole squad and prepare back up plan in case of injuries.

 

[antohan]

Defensive injuries are a problem but players can be replaced in those areas if you have a solid system, it's far harder to replace the magic of fantastic attacking players. SAF was a genius and made some weird things work on a couple of occasions, but he nearly always had a world class attacker or two who could make the difference.

Everybody else has had a very easy ride compared to us with injuries this season.

I don't know what else to say really. If you think having Kane, Alli, Son and Sissoko unavailable wouldn't impact other managers then cool, so be it.

Eh?

Even the other three you make it sound like they are the second coming of Ronaldo, Ronaldinho and Rivaldo.

Re: easy ride so far, you only just got the injuries. If anything it is incredible you've been able to play these guys week in week out for so long with little resort to backups. Was bound to happen eventually.

Not that I dispute it's unfortunate, just came in here to read what people had to say about Pochettino and all I see is moaning about your inury crisis being the worst ever. I just get the feeling the longer Kane is injured the closer he will get to rivaling Marco van Basten in the pantheon of greats. Mind, that would mean we are well on course for CL qualification so I look forward to it.

 

[SquishyMcSquish]

Eh?

Even the other three you make it sound like they are the second coming of Ronaldo, Ronaldinho and Rivaldo.

Re: easy ride so far, you only just got the injuries. If anything it is incredible you've been able to play these guys week in week out for so long with little resort to backups. Was bound to happen eventually.

Not that I dispute it's unfortunate, just came in here to read what people had to say about Pochettino and all I see is moaning about your inury crisis being the worst ever. I just get the feeling the longer Kane is injured the closer he will get to rivaling Marco van Basten in the pantheon of greats. Mind, that would mean we are well on course for CL qualification so I look forward to it.

Kane is, in many people's opinion, the best striker on the planet. You don't have to agree of course, but he's certainly our best player and of course we're going to miss him. Not just his goals but his hold up play is world class and he holds together our attack. Sissoko may not provide magic to the attack, but he's been by far our most effective presence in midfield this season and will be sorely missed.

Alli/Son might not be on the same level as those names, but they're clearly two of our best attacking players and some of the best in the league in their position. Also, it's not that one of them is injured, or even just two, it's the fact they're all out at the same time. That wasn't 'bound to happen eventually', that's just extremely bad luck.

 

[el3mel]

That doesn't strike me as a particularly great example. It came during a season where we were woeful and missed out on the CL spots - we'd went into the season without enough strikers, and LVG lucked out when he was forced into playing an academy player who turned out to be very good. It wasn't some example of brilliant squad management or anything. Obviously clubs cope with injuries when they can but plenty also end up getting fecked over too. It's easy to be selective and look at examples where it worked, but even when Fergie was here we had spells where a big player was missing and we looked noticeably weaker as a result.

How talked about squad management ? I'm talking about going on with the injuries you have and try to get the best results without complaining. Fergie, LVG and Mourinho all dealt with injury crises and makeshift lineups with players out of position here. It simply happened and will happen. If you as a manager can't cope with it and is going to lose then you're not cut out for a big club. It's not always rosy there.

What about a match like this ?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/football/europe/8399065.stm

 

[Canagel]

We've dealt with bad injuries before ... you keep making out like this is some normal situation when it blatantly isn't. We've had Kane, Eriksen, Son, Alli out for stretches and coped but to have 3 of our stars out all at the same time is not normal and not something top managers are having to deal with all the time, it's a crisis. Of course our attacking play is going to suffer, the feck do people expect?

You're acting like I think all is rosy at a big club and you don't get injuries. Literally all I've said is that any club in the league would suffer bad results if you removed 3 of their best attackers and their best central midfielder from the team. The least impacted would probably be City, but even they suffered somewhat just from losing KDB and Fernandinho, and they have the best depth going. Do the same to Arsenal, Chelsea or Liverpool and their managers would struggle to get results, 100%.

They have an injury crisis. Sokratis, Koscielny, Holding, Bellerin, Welbeck, Mkhitaryan. Three of them season ending.

 

[SquishyMcSquish]

They have an injury crisis. Sokratis, Koscielny, Holding, Bellerin, Welbeck, Mkhitaryan. Three of them season ending.

And they're struggling badly defensively as a result. There's limits to what a manager can do without quality, Emery can't do much when he's barely left with any competent defenders.

We're going to struggle big time going forward without our 3 star attackers, and that isn't on Pochettino. We'll see if we can scrape together results or not.

 

[Revan]

How talked about squad management ? I'm talking about going on with the injuries you have and try to get the best results without complaining. Fergie, LVG and Mourinho all dealt with injury crises and makeshift lineups with players out of position here. It simply happened and will happen. If you as a manager can't cope with it and is going to lose then you're not cut out for a big club. It's not always rosy there.

What about a match like this ?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/football/europe/8399065.stm

Spurs would have exploded if they had an away game in UCL with their only available defender being Danny Rose. Pochettino would have been hailed as the Goat manager for losing only 4-0.

 

[amolbhatia50k]

Spurs would have exploded if they had an away game in UCL with their only available defender being Danny Rose. Pochettino would have been hailed as the Goat manager for losing only 4-0.

I think that's where the debate goes awry. I'm not even one of his biggest admirers but most sensible people consider him a serious contender for the United job and an excellent coach, rather than a managerial great or the Messiah. If we went for him we obviously wouldn't be hiring a Pep for example. There is a middle ground between a fraud and a great, though.

I do agree that his inability to win any silverware has to be a disappointment and can't be brushed under the carpet. It's harder at Spurs compared to United and our FA cup and Europa League wins because their squad isn't great, but they could have at least one trophy in this time.

 

[Revan]

I think that's where the debate goes awry. I'm not even one of his biggest admirers but most sensible people consider him a serious contender for the United job and an excellent coach, rather than a managerial great or the Messiah. If we went for him we obviously wouldn't be hiring a Pep for example. There is a middle ground between a fraud and a great, though.

He is not a fraud, a better version of David Moyes is what he is.

However, he has a tendency of getting excuses here. Lose against United? Poor luck. Lose against Chelsea? Players injured. Lose against Cardiff? Players injured. Lose against Juve? Poor luck. The list goes on. He is a decent manager with serious limitations. The fact that him despite winning as many trophies as me was leading this poll with around 60%, where there are serial winners (at their peak) as options speaks for itself how overrated he is. Forget football legends like Zidane and Allegri, even someone like Jardim is miles better. Better football, developed more players than Poch, reached higher stage in UCL, won the league against the mighty PSG while being all the time in a negative budget and having to sell his best players all the time.

 

[SquishyMcSquish]

Again, Ferguson was the greatest manager in PL history, arguably the greatest of all time overall. Is that the bar we're setting for being a good manager now? Do you guys expect Ole to be able to replicate SAF if he's appointed?

Ferguson did some extraordinary things, we all know this, hence why he's GOAT material. Other great managers have totally failed to live up to his record and ability to win league after league, that doesn't mean they weren't very good managers, it just means they weren't Ferguson. If that's the bar then you're going to be waiting a long, long time to appoint somebody.

Pretty much any manager working today would struggle badly to get results if they had their entire attacking force missing, or their entire defence injured. Pep struggled in the league until he spunked 100 million to replace some ageing fullbacks and ridiculously expensive central defenders. Klopp needed to splurge 150m or so to replace a keeper and a defender, put Karius and Lovren back in for VVD and Alisson and of course they wouldn't be able to get the same results. Top managers still require top players for it to work properly, they aren't magicians.

 

[SquishyMcSquish]

He is not a fraud, a better version of David Moyes is what he is.

However, he has a tendency of getting excuses here. Lose against United? Poor luck. Lose against Chelsea? Players injured. Lose against Cardiff? Players injured. Lose against Juve? Poor luck. The list goes on. He is a decent manager with serious limitations. The fact that him despite winning as many trophies as me was leading this poll with around 60%, where there are serial winners (at their peak) as options speaks for itself how overrated he is. Forget football legends like Zidane and Allegri, even someone like Jardim is miles better. Better football, developed more players than Poch, reached higher stage in UCL, won the league against the mighty PSG while being all the time in a negative budget and having to sell his best players all the time.

Aye, top football clubs agree with you, hence why he's had to crawl back to Monaco and couldn't get offers from anywhere but Qatar and China.

Also the whole 'serial winners' thing didn't go well for you with either LVG or Mourinho, and a guy who was a total failure in his first top managerial role has led you to 8 wins in a row.

 

[flappyjay]

Future United manager material...

Talked himself out of a job if nothing else.

Different clubs different priorities

 

[flappyjay]

That doesn't strike me as a particularly great example. It came during a season where we were woeful and missed out on the CL spots - we'd went into the season without enough strikers, and LVG lucked out when he was forced into playing an academy player who turned out to be very good. It wasn't some example of brilliant squad management or anything. Obviously clubs cope with injuries when they can but plenty also end up getting fecked over too. It's easy to be selective and look at examples where it worked, but even when Fergie was here we had spells where a big player was missing and we looked noticeably weaker as a result.

Most managers in the premier league wouldn't have thrown Rashford in. I have noticed that a lot of them would convert a wide attacking in player into a striker. Under Jose we probably would have played Memphis as a false nine in that situation. Give LVG credit for having the balls to throw in an academy lad in that situation

 

[SquishyMcSquish]

Also he's nothing fecking like David Moyes, where does this comparison come from? The fact they're both got a club punching above its weight?

David Moyes was a pragmatic manager who was able to get Everton high up the table, the highest he managed was fourth and he never even got to the CL groups. Pochettino has a philosophy and an idea about how he wants his team to play, and has had his team finish runners up in the league and third twice, whilst mixing it up with sides like Barcelona, Juventus and Real Madrid in Europe.

Moyes had one season where they got 4th, and even then they got knocked out in the fecking preliminary round. They also had a number of seasons where they were marooned in the middle/lower half of the table. There's no comparison with Pochettino there at all.

 

[Judas]

This place does leap from extreme to extreme. You're either the best thing since sliced bread or....you're getting compared to David moyes. So reactionary.

 

[amolbhatia50k]

He is not a fraud, a better version of David Moyes is what he is.

However, he has a tendency of getting excuses here. Lose against United? Poor luck. Lose against Chelsea? Players injured. Lose against Cardiff? Players injured. Lose against Juve? Poor luck. The list goes on. He is a decent manager with serious limitations. The fact that him despite winning as many trophies as me was leading this poll with around 60%, where there are serial winners (at their peak) as options speaks for itself how overrated he is. Forget football legends like Zidane and Allegri, even someone like Jardim is miles better. Better football, developed more players than Poch, reached higher stage in UCL, won the league against the mighty PSG while being all the time in a negative budget and having to sell his best players all the time.

I don't think he's the mediocre (or little more) manager you seem to think he is. Moreover given he has many miles to travel in his managerial career, such definitive pronouncements boxing him into some predetermined categories are far too presumptive. At Spurs he's done very well and I prefer to see what he does at a bigger job before the final verdict is out.

Also the comparison to Moyes falls flat. The difference lies in the fact that Moyes was always meant for a midtable club (and a little better in the right circumstances) whereas Pochettino does not appear to be. It's in the finer details if one bothers - the tactics, the approach to games, the progressiveness etc.

 

[Revan]

This place does leap from extreme to extreme. You're either the best thing since sliced bread or....you're getting compared to David moyes. So reactionary.

I've been comparing him to Moyes even when Poch was the best thing since slices bread. The only consistent Caf member.

 

[Cheesy]

How talked about squad management ? I'm talking about going on with the injuries you have and try to get the best results without complaining. Fergie, LVG and Mourinho all dealt with injury crises and makeshift lineups with players out of position here. It simply happened and will happen. If you as a manager can't cope with it and is going to lose then you're not cut out for a big club. It's not always rosy there.

What about a match like this ?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/football/europe/8399065.stm

Yes, and they all had spells during which they struggled after losing key players. The result you've linked below is from the 09-10 season - the same year where we relied on Rooney to a remarkable extent at times and often found ourselves struggling without him. All managers have to cope with injury losses but almost all of them find their teams weaker at one stage or another due to it. If that's happening right now with Pochettino then it doesn't invalidate his ability as a manager. Fergie might just be the greatest the game has seen and yet undoubtedly had spells where major injuries fecked him over to a certain extent, no matter how hard he tried to adapt.

 

[Cheesy]

Also he's nothing fecking like David Moyes, where does this comparison come from? The fact they're both got a club punching above its weight?

David Moyes was a pragmatic manager who was able to get Everton high up the table, the highest he managed was fourth and he never even got to the CL groups. Pochettino has a philosophy and an idea about how he wants his team to play, and has had his team finish runners up in the league and third twice, whilst mixing it up with sides like Barcelona, Juventus and Real Madrid in Europe.

Moyes had one season where they got 4th, and even then they got knocked out in the fecking preliminary round. They also had a number of seasons where they were marooned in the middle/lower half of the table. There's no comparison with Pochettino there at all.

And the year they finished 4th, they finished with a negative goal difference and a remarkably low points total that'd have had them nowhere near the top four most seasons.

 

[Giant Midget]

Yes, and they all had spells during which they struggled after losing key players. The result you've linked below is from the 09-10 season - the same year where we relied on Rooney to a remarkable extent at times and often found ourselves struggling without him. All managers have to cope with injury losses but almost all of them find their teams weaker at one stage or another due to it. If that's happening right now with Pochettino then it doesn't invalidate his ability as a manager. Fergie might just be the greatest the game has seen and yet undoubtedly had spells where major injuries fecked him over to a certain extent, no matter how hard he tried to adapt.

Yup. We should have won the CL in 06/07, those injuries to the defense really fecked us. Heinze at CB, and I still don’t get what Evra was doing for Kaka’s second goal...

 

[Random Task]

This place does leap from extreme to extreme. You're either the best thing since sliced bread or....you're getting compared to David moyes. So reactionary.

All football fans are fickle mate. It's just what we are.

But you're right, comparing Poch to Moyes is extremely harsh given the latter has actually won a trophy (Community Shield 2013).

 

[Cheesy]

Yup. We should have won the CL in 06/07, those injuries to the defense really fecked us. Heinze at CB, and I still don’t get what Evra was doing for Kaka’s second goal...

Not to mention that our collapse back in 03-04 happened to largely coincide with us losing Rio for the rest of the season. Or the possibility that, while we didn't exactly fall apart, we'd have maybe managed to get over the line and win the title in 94-95 had Cantona not been suspended.

Obviously Fergie was magnificent in that he was able to adapt and often had to work without having key players at his disposal. He coped well with plenty of major injuries over the years. But likewise there are cases where we lost key players for a bit and clearly suffered as a result. Which is fine. It happens. I reckon you'd struggle to find a single manager who wasn't adversely impacted at one point or another by a major injury or suspension. Pochettino's no different in that regard and it's a bizarre criticism to hold against him, unless there's a pattern that's been established in which he's consistently never able to deal with any remotely key player being out.

 

[antohan]

Kane is, in many people's opinion, the best striker on the planet. You don't have to agree of course, but he's certainly our best player and of course we're going to miss him. Not just his goals but his hold up play is world class and he holds together our attack. Sissoko may not provide magic to the attack, but he's been by far our most effective presence in midfield this season and will be sorely missed.

Alli/Son might not be on the same level as those names, but they're clearly two of our best attacking players and some of the best in the league in their position. Also, it's not that one of them is injured, or even just two, it's the fact they're all out at the same time. That wasn't 'bound to happen eventually', that's just extremely bad luck.

I'd argue it was extremely good luck you could play them every week for so long without rotating for injuries and dips in form. The downside of that rub of the green is you are bound to be more vulnerable when you have to do something makeshift.

The narrative here seems to be he is a bad manager because he can't deal with losing his best players. The "bad management" side of that is maybe not having rotated enough to have other options pushing for inclusion. It's true he hasn't been given the deepest squad to work with and has no say in that. Essentially, you are facing a tough period which is there by design from the moment you have a top first XI but lack depth. Maybe he could have done more testing youth players to have them raring to go? (genuine question, dunno, are they terrible?).

I think 1. the criticism is a bit far-fetched, 2. the Caf antagonists seem to have found someone else to argue and drone endlessly (and often baselessly) over in the absence of Mourinho vs. Virus and it will be a long and irritating 2019-2020 if he did become our manager, 3. it will actually be interesting to see how it pans out, you are getting the excuses in early when it's actually a good opportunity to see whether he can deal with it well or not at all.