Enfield Town 0-5 Eastbourne Borough

[The Crowing Cockerel]

13 minutes ago, symptomless said:

 

Why don't we just get a manager that's payed in the Premier League?

...

Nothing is decided until May. 

 

1. I understand Wayne Rooney is available.

2. To be fair, sometimes things are decided in advance of May. 🤔

3. Personally, I like to see/read healthy and considered disagreement on here. It shows that each of the contributors really cares about the club.

[Towningaround]

5 minutes ago, symptomless said:

I'm sorry, but that's laughable! Come on man, I didn't ask you what you WOULDN'T do; I asked you what you WOULD do! You've offered up backseat management and a list of criticisms week after week now. Apart from saying you'd play two up front you've offered nothing else. And, thank god Gavin read your posts because otherwise heaven knows where we'd be! 🙃

 

No I said, I’ve said many times what I would do. Then I preceded to say what I wouldn’t do which was limited to the game v EB Boro. What’s so difficult to understand about that?

7 minutes ago, symptomless said:

We've conceded 1 goal (ONE GOAL!) from open play in 6 games, and that came down the middle v. Chesham!

 

Yeah one goal….and as I said, despite this we’ve been getting away with murder in every game bar Welling. Conceding chances and conceding goals don’t go hand in hand you know that don’t you?

Farnborough, Aveley especially and Chesham first 20 mins and last 30 mins destroyed us and we flew by the seat of our pants. 
Where did the majority of chances come from for Aveley? Oh yeah from the flanks. Their no 10 especially gave Stallard a torrid time. I get that we’ve been short down that side but being exposed in wide areas has been a season long problem. The last few games we’ve gotten away with it and it was only a matter of time before it was exposed. Anyone with decent understanding of the analysis tools available to clubs in this league would’ve known EB Boro were going to tear us apart down that side. And they did. 

12 minutes ago, symptomless said:

You would have changed that successful formation for this one game? Without a training session? AND a wholesale change in playing personnel. Eh? Really? You'd have done that? Unexpected, but ok.

Gavin was quite clear in the Welling game that he’d changed a team that had won back to back games and gone 4 unbeaten because he specifically felt that game warranted a different front two. So why not adapt defensively to suit a top team? 

They’ve had all season to be prepared to play more than one formation. Don’t be kidding anyone that it can’t be done without working on.

Ive said all season I’d have been playing a different formation so no I wouldn’t have done it just for this game but yes I think it would’ve combatted a strength of the oppositions and helped disguise a weakness of ours. 

That’s actually what match prep and coaching is about isnt it?

Oh and btw the formation is hardly proven to be a successful one! We’re in February and we’ve just got out the bottom 4 for the first time following narrow wins against sides around us one of who is in complete freefall. 
 

18 minutes ago, symptomless said:

He created plenty v. Chesham and had a hand in each of the goals, something you criticised Sam Youngs for not doing recently, whilst scoring a hat full of goals. But you would have taken him off. Ok.

He chased and harried for the first goal and the defender made a real hash of dealing with a nothing ball. The third goal he did well to delay and play in the overload but that’s about it. Having a hand in goals but not scoring is apparently good enough for some but not others now? 

Sam Youngs is a different type of player playing in a different position. I didn’t criticise his contributions to the team, in fact I commended on them but I made the observation that without his goals (which is undeniably crucial for us) that he actually contributes nothing else. As a midfield player it’s like playing with 10 men out of possession and he never looks like creating for anyone else. That’s true. No one has been able to demonstrate anything different. I would clarify, once AGAIN though, that without his goals we’d already be relegated. That’s not in dispute.

 

23 minutes ago, symptomless said:

I thought he might play Jack Smith from the start instead of Youngs, because I couldn't think of anyone else to play there. BUT NEITHER CAN YOU! So why criticise without coming up with something better? 

If he was sticking with wing backs I’d have played Oyenuga at RWB and pushed Leonard over to the left (or vice versa) or I’d have played Leonard in the middle running beyond the forwards and played Smith deeper and rested Bates from a game that was never going to see a ball on the floor. 

As I’ve said all season I’d have played full backs anyway in which case we may have got away with Stallard playing left back and Parcell right back with Oyenuga and Leonard ahead of them.

I may even have played Hish at left wing in front of Stallard and Leonard off the front player with Oyenuga on the right. 

As I have said my focus would’ve been to get the ball down the sides of them or beyond them as opposed to landing it on the giants head and hoping Hutchinson won some flick ons for Hish….who spent most of the game wide, a bit uninterested anyway.

Good managers find solutions. Bad ones stick with rigid thinking and just moan about who didn’t do as they were told. 
 

31 minutes ago, symptomless said:

Right, good tactic. But WHO? Who are these fresh legged, experienced players you speak of? You've already dropped a third of the first team. In reality, who would YOU replaced then with?

We had Benjamin and Oyenuga on the bench both of who could’ve added stability to a defensively weak line up in either wide areas or defensive midfield areas. Whittaker could easily have taken Youngs place as he has done as a sub in a few games lately when Youngs has finished a game as a forward. We could easily have gone to 4231 and given Knight a start. 

But if your brains stuck in a rigid 352 then it rules out many of these options and your stuck in a formation that exposed all your own weaknesses to one of the best sides in the division. 

35 minutes ago, symptomless said:

If you can't answer that then how about showing some support for the position we're in and laying off with the incessant and in my opinion, unwarranted and unrealistic criticism. 

 

Oh do me a favour 🤣🤣🤣 There has been plenty of criticism all season from plenty of posters and I’ve actually remained constructive with it or supportive of it for longer than most. 

39 minutes ago, symptomless said:

Why don't we just get a manager that's payed in the Premier League? Why don't we get players who have experience and talent to match the best in our division? Or switch from 3-5-2 to 4-5-1 or 4-4-2 at will? We get promoted, we'll just get better tactics and better players, yeah? That's just how it works, right?

What the f*ck are you on about? I made a simple comment about how it was evident how one manager completely out-thought the other and its now apparently unfair? A manager in this league needs to be adaptable and he needs to get the best out of what’s available. We’ve done neither. As I said, don’t be kidded on about our budget….its pretty healthy….but we’ve had a manager that took until February to even recognise one single effective change.
Other than that he’s literally chopped and changed personnel too often but never tactics. The personnel we’ve had have suited different tactics all season - definitely from about October onwards - but he’s been too rigid. 

 

45 minutes ago, symptomless said:

Dozens of football clubs get promoted and relegated each year.  That's the measure of a club, its management and its status. Its worked for 100+ years and its a pretty accurate measure. So, in the meantime get behind your team and support them through thick and thin.

 

No idea what your point is other than you’re stating the f*cking obvious. 

[symptomless]

Look, you're entitled to your opinion. You know what they say about "opinions". Apart from being flexible with formation there isn't much more than, "He played player A, I would have played player B". Certainly nothing there says that it would have changed anything on Tuesday night. 

For example, he said himself that he thought Smith played well when he came on for Youngs on Saturday so gave him the start. Seems perfectly reasonable. But AFTER the game you say, "Well, I would have played Whittaker instead."; one of our smallest players up against a wall of 6' 4" defenders. Right, where's the logic in that?

And nothing you said that takes into account the 101 other factors and constraints that the manager has to juggle. Player fitness, illness, availability, motivation, form, overall balance of the team ...

It would be fantastic if we'd had the chance to simply switch formation but the reality is that EB had trained twice since they lost on the weekend. Our players had a "briefing" before the match. Considering the number of players that we've had go through the door this season its a wonder that we have a functioning system at all.   

12 hours ago, Towningaround said:

13 hours ago, symptomless said:

Dozens of football clubs get promoted and relegated each year.  That's the measure of a club, its management and its status. Its worked for 100+ years and its a pretty accurate measure. So, in the meantime get behind your team and support them through thick and thin.

 

No idea what your point is other than you’re stating the f*cking obvious. 

The "f*cking' obvious point, that you're missing, is that the Club, the manager and the players are judged at the end of the season. There's plenty of football to be played. Its a new experience for the club and the fans. I'm enjoying the journey. If we go down, then so be it, we go again next season with the experience behind us. If we stay up then great, I hope lessons are learned and we move on.

You've made your damning judgement already. Its only February.

Edited 19 hours ago by symptomless

[Towningaround]

7 hours ago, symptomless said:

Look, you're entitled to your opinion. You know what they say about "opinions". Apart from being flexible with formation there isn't much more than, "He played player A, I would have played player B". Certainly nothing there says that it would have changed anything on Tuesday night. 

 

So apart from suggesting player A or player B and offering up alternative formations - I have nothing else to offer?

Ive already said that there’s every chance that no matter what happened Tuesday the outcome would most likely be the same. But the fact is, you and other people seem to think that just because you eke out a result somewhere despite the opposition missing a hatful of chances and your gk being man of the match, that there was no need to try anything different.

The fact is each game is its own entity. Gavin said exactly this when he threw Hish in to the starting line up v Welling despite the team being 4 unbeaten and having won the last two games to zero. If he can change a team to suit a particular game offensively then he should be capable of changing it defensively. 

You asked what I’d do and I offered several alternatives in personnel and formation only for you to say “yeah but apart from that what else?”. It Ike you’re f*cking fluent in stupid. 

Eastbourne are big strong and direct. They use the flanks and they get the ball in the box. We knew that. Gavin knew that. Yet he still went with Will ‘0’ the wisp at LWB who’s been torn apart in each game he’s played flying by the seat of his pants and Leonard who’s an attacking player at RWB. He also knew he was going to spin them round and go as long as possible yet took out the 6’5” Chukwu and played Hutchinson and allowed Hish to hang around the wing somewhere scratching his @rse most of the game. 

You didn’t like the fact that I said that the Eastbourne manager completely out managed Gavin…..that’s a fact. I also said that it was understandable seeing as they’re full time and he’s played at the highest level. This is factual. It’s irrelevant to them say “yeah but that’s an unfair comparison”

Gavins budget is damn healthy. It may help if the training time they had actually saw the coach get there twice a week?

7 hours ago, symptomless said:

For example, he said himself that he thought Smith played well when he came on for Youngs on Saturday so gave him the start. Seems perfectly reasonable. But AFTER the game you say, "Well, I would have played Whittaker instead."; one of our smallest players up against a wall of 6' 4" defenders. Right, where's the logic in that?

I didn’t say “I would’ve played Whittaker”. You asked me to offer up some alternative ideas so I did. ONE of them was that you could play Whittaker as the attacking midfield player seeing as that’s who Gavin had been bringing on in games when he’d moved Youngs forward. It makes more sense than smith who is a deeper player. I also said if I’d played that way I’d have played with different tactics against the giants rather than continue with the same old shite of booting it forward hoping someone won a header. 

 

7 hours ago, symptomless said:

And nothing you said that takes into account the 101 other factors and constraints that the manager has to juggle. Player fitness, illness, availability, motivation, form, overall balance of the team ...

What the hell has that got to do with it? Gavin’s proved to have struggled with getting much of that right all season.

 

7 hours ago, symptomless said:

It would be fantastic if we'd had the chance to simply switch formation but the reality is that EB had trained twice since they lost on the weekend. Our players had a "briefing" before the match. Considering the number of players that we've had go through the door this season its a wonder that we have a functioning system at all.   

19 hours ago, Towningaround said:

Maybe if when they did train they actually did some meaningful preparation we wouldn’t be in February and only able to play one way with one formation?

 

7 hours ago, symptomless said:

The "f*cking' obvious point, that you're missing, is that the Club, the manager and the players are judged at the end of the season. There's plenty of football to be played. Its a new experience for the club and the fans. I'm enjoying the journey. If we go down, then so be it, we go again next season with the experience behind us. If we stay up then great, I hope lessons are learned and we move on.

 

The manager and the players are judged after every game. Simple as that. After this game I judged him to have been out managed by someone with more resources, better players and more football knowledge. So I said as much. 
 

Edited 13 hours ago by Towningaround

[MTHead]

It’s amazing how much knowledge there is around this forum. It is surprising with all the expertise that is coming from some that they aren’t managing in the Premier League. I’ll be surprised if any of us one knows what the budget is this year. Quoting other league managers opinions is Trump like , The club out performed last year and it is clear that  we were not prepared for the transition upwards. I need to remind myself that the progress from the Essex League that the club has made so far has been outstanding, we will be trying to punch above our weight for the next few years, while we form a financial and governance business model. Success on the pitch needs to go alongside establishing a sustainable framework for future progress. Carping about tactics and player selection is part of the day to day banter but the Board, Management and Members would do well to ensure we are strong, cohesive and financially stable, without a sound business model we will fail to succeed. Get off their backs a support them in their quest.
 

 

[djwilf]

29 minutes ago, MTHead said:

It’s amazing how much knowledge there is around this forum. It is surprising with all the expertise that is coming from some that they aren’t managing in the Premier League. I’ll be surprised if any of us one knows what the budget is this year. Quoting other league managers opinions is Trump like , The club out performed last year and it is clear that  we were not prepared for the transition upwards. I need to remind myself that the progress from the Essex League that the club has made so far has been outstanding, we will be trying to punch above our weight for the next few years, while we form a financial and governance business model. Success on the pitch needs to go alongside establishing a sustainable framework for future progress. Carping about tactics and player selection is part of the day to day banter but the Board, Management and Members would do well to ensure we are strong, cohesive and financially stable, without a sound business model we will fail to succeed. Get off their backs a support them in their quest.
 

 

Very well said.