The Mail Bag
How Are Your Tethers?
Comments (27)
There's no denying he's made us far better than we were, on the whole he's bought well with limited resources and on paper (and on our day) our team is pretty good but the negativity with which he sends them out sometimes beggars belief.
I suspect the mantra in the dressing room is go out and do not lose as opposed to go out and win. Its now pretty evident that he's instilled this to the degree where the players are so hesitant to play to their natural strengths when attacking, that they plainly can't gel. Sometimes they seem frightened to attack or even more simply just fuckin shoot. It seems to me that they have inherited his Calvinistic restraint and have to exercise caution at all costs, "Oh no, it won't do to win games with lots of goals, one nil will be sufficient".
If you are a flair player this attitude must effect your confidence immensely. How can you create a bit of magic if always in the back of your mind you are terrified to take a risk and fearful to take some sort of creative responsibility because above all else you are expected to defend first.
This attitude simply has to change if we are to attain any form of success, even if the success is merely nicer football to watch. Ideally I suppose it should be Kenwright that goes and someone with a few bob and some integrity to come in his place but to be honest, having witnessed todays debacle, I'd happily welcome a Quatari King with a dubious human rights record.
Having said all this, I still think that Moyes has the ability to take us closer to the greatness we all crave but he needs greater resources and perhaps a change of staff to reverse the culture of negativity that is obviously prevailing at the club. Attack-minded coaches would be a good first step, attack-minded midfielders the second.
A small new broom perhaps to begin with but if that doesn't get rid of the cobwebs then we should get the biggest Hoover we can find and clean the whole place out because ? as far as tethers go, I'm getting pretty close to the end of mine.
Ste Blundell, Posted 11/12/2010 at 19:32:38
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When we were shite, "let's not get beat" was a fine tactic... but, now we have improved, this ethos doesn't gel anymore. The quality and standard of the squad has improved but so must the management and tactics.
There is no creativity, no different way of thinking. Wigan were there for the taking but, not only did we fail to pull the trigger, the gun wasn't fucking loaded in the first place.
The players seem unhappy, stiffled and lacking in confidence. They need to jump out of the defensive shell Moyes has cocooned them all in.
Moyes has finally assembled his chess set only to find he can't fucking play chess.
I have always felt that Moyes was tactically naive and always felt that he was easily out-foxed by most managers; however, nobody can deny that he has given back this club some dignity.
Moyes has constantly competed with one hand tied behind his back and it would be outrageous for us to seek his sacking for these reasons alone. All I want is for Mr Moyes to adapt to the fact that he is predictable and for him to utilise what is a fairly decent squad of players. Wake up, Davey, and prove all us doubters wrong.
One day, the strength of the squad had overtaken him and it was goodbye but a genuine 'thanks and well done.'
Our Manager now has players available aspire to the top four of five, but the tactical nous required is a step too far. He has to go. The walls are tumbling down...
Arteta plays too deep and is just making short, safe passes that do not hurt the opposition. DM has no-one to push for a start when players are patently off form. Most other clubs have decent benches... we have players who are just back from injury or untried youngsters.
Our best chance of picking up points seem to be away from home where our negative play can stifle opposition teams and perhaps we can nick a goal. DM I'm afraid has a very weak hand with which to survive and that's about all we can hope for with the squad we have.
Pienaar looks like he is going (although he plays his heart out every week); Anichebe looks like following him out the door. Heitinga was a very poor buy, as was Bily, so what are we really left with? No emerging youngsters in the forseeable future and no money to bring in some exciting new blood.
That's what we're left with after all 8 years of Moyes's hard work.
Why was Arteta playing so deep? Could it be that he was told to do that by Moyes?
People saw through him a couple years ago. The man is predictable as you say. You can name the line-up weeks and weeks in advance. He plays everyone out of position, despite seeing them play better in their correct position.
There can be absolutely no doubt in most people's minds it's time for him to go and now before we end up in a situation no new manager can pull us out of.
The club is extremely unstable at present and getting rid of Moyes won't make it any worse. Di Matteo for me... :p
How many more games will it take before we get buried in the bottom 3 with no way out?
Sorry Trevor, this is his team, the buck stops right at his door... Time to get shut of him before we do end up to our necks in shite and with no way back from the rim.
I have respect for Moyes in turning us from relegation fodder with old players to one which usually reaches the upper echelons of the league. I think that he has taken us as far as he can go though. We have gone from playing like Wolves to more like Arsenal just without the cutting edge!
This defence that Moyes has got us playing better doesn't stand up. It's the most ineffective crap I've ever watched. This isn't a midfield of Gemmill, Linderoth and Gascoigne. This is a midfield full of quality players that other teams would pay a lot of money for. So why can't Moyes get them playing?
He ran out of ideas long before this season. It's just taken a lot of people a lot of time to wake up and realise what a phoney Moyes is.
Failing that, he has to give Beckford a chance to learn, but the problem there are the stories that no-one actually likes the bloke. If we've no money for a striker, we should find some way to freshen our attack, maybe a Donovan-Coleman right side might help.
Paul Rimmer, you are right about us being like Arsenal without the cutting edge. At least that implies it's something which can be fixed.
Compared to other teams we make lots more passes but half of them do not gain an inch of progress. This makes for comparitively slow attacks and allows opponents to pack the box.
An important lesson in an FA badge course is: A defender's main priority is not to win the ball but to slow down the attack. He does this by forcing the opponent to pass the ball. Course instructors award points and praise when defenders do that. Opposing coaches would be delighted at the number of passes we are forced to make.
Conversly, the attacker's priority is not to be slowed down. He can do that by keeping passes to the minimum that is required in order to penetrate the defence.
Although Moyes has complained about the number of passes we make to deliver the ball into the danger zone, he should also take into account that a tightly marked lone striker does not provide much of a target for rapid delivery. Moyes hopes we will snatch the winning goal in a low-scoring game. It worked for him when we achieved 4th spot so he sees no reason for change.
Even in that short a time span, the game has moved on with more emphasis placed on attacking football. As we have seen to our cost the team that uses the ball effectively with fewer passes often wins the game.
The journey home was filled with various football phone-in?s and I was back in time for Match of the Day. The one common occurrence was the talk of how the newly promoted team, especially Blackpool are playing with a positive approach. Enjoying their football and giving it a real go. Shame the same can't be said about our boys.
What's Moyes afraid of?? Surely a positive approach can?t do any worse then we are??
If Moyes doesn't think they're good enough, then he should have sold Pienaar in the summer and got a better striker in. Instead he made the fatal statement of saying it was his best ever squad. Clearly Bollocks.
0-0 at home to Wigan is a disgrace. I notice even the threads on the OS are up in arms too.
Hit the exact problem, he does not want to loose and he has forgotten we need to win, he is way too negative, he has lost his way, he has well and truly been found out.
Moyes has served us well, he has had millions out of the club in wages; do the honourable thing, Dave, and resign... you've had enough money out of our club already!!!
Bingham took over a team in 1973 that had finished 17th, and Lee left a team in 1981 he steered to 19th. In that period we had one 3rd place, two 4ths, a Milk Cup Final and two FA Semis. One player won England caps, and some excellent players came through the youth scheme.
The difference is that at times in that stretch we played some exhilarating football.
For me, it's the Seventies all over again. But with a worse soundtrack.
The biggest annoyance for me was the decision to start Saha. Travelling to the game, me and my mates were all in agreement that it would be a joke to carry on starting him but, lo and behold, on arriving at the ground, it's announced that the man with no league goal in 9 month's is playing.
January is a HUGE month for us now, Kenwright and Moyes have to break their balls to get some striker's in or I will be storming that Goodison boardroom myself!
1) When has Moyes ever willingly purchased a good player in the January window that has changed our season? (I can only think of Donovan... and he was not "purchased".) Moyes hates the January window.
2) Does anyone really think we have the money to buy the magical striker you're dreaming about?
3) If the answer to (2) is sell to buy, have you noticed how difficult it is to sell your players when that is your motivation? We can only sell if someone wants to buy. And we only get what they are prepared to pay ? not necessarilly what we think they're worth... or we end up not selling.
Get real, people: nothing meaningful is likely to go down in January. I'm sorry.
I am sure there have been hundreds of expanations I have missed but can anyone explain this?
Bill Kenwright and his lack of vision.
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1 Posted 11/12/2010 at 22:29:51
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