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O'Neil In, Out and Shaking it all about

Even in my wildest optimisms I didn’t dream he’d have us top half come February.
 
Up to and including the Ipswich game we had played 5 PL games yielding just 4 points (beat Everton 1-0 and drew 1-1 with Luton), performances and results were getting worse as time went on so no wonder fans were questioning the wisdom of appointing a rookie manager with just a handful of games to his name. Yes some of the abuse and name calling was OTT but I think for most that was more aimed at the situation than the man himself though unfortunately he was the target of most of it.

After Ipswich came the unbelievable result against City and that was a real turning point. We should all be happy and enjoy this without those coming out of the woodowrk to call those who were initially sceptical about this appointment
 
I'm impressed with him and his overall planning, but i am truly impressed with how he has turned individual players from ordinary to superb.
Not just kunha and channy, but ait nouri, gomes, kilman and particulRly semedo, now if he can just teach semedo to cross the ball well...........
 
AndyWolves said:
The second point, similar in mentality to "Lage just needed more time" or "Lage needed more money". Absolutely nothing in reality to base it on.
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There are still Lage Truthers out there. You may as well carry a massive sign above your head saying "I never go to games".
 
pavlosmacwolf said:
I'm impressed with him and his overall planning, but i am truly impressed with how he has turned individual players from ordinary to superb.
Not just kunha and channy, but ait nouri, gomes, kilman and particulRly semedo, now if he can just teach semedo to cross the ball well...........
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Yeah, players have improved under him, whether that's the actual players improvements or players being played in a style that suits their strengths, probably both. I know I keep banging on about it but the fitness of the whole squad has a big bearing on our performances imo.

On Semedo, I actually think there has been an improvement (not massive) in his attacking play.
 
Lets be honest, the PL can be an unforgiving place and its all good after 23 games and a lot of us look like we called it wrong, but only takes one tricky run of results and we are all back on here retracting our humble words and declaring GO is shit like -

friends-i-knew-it.gif


We are a fickle bunch of nobbers really
 
sycophantia said:
Yeah, players have improved under him, whether that's the actual players improvements or players being played in a style that suits their strengths, probably both. I know I keep banging on about it but the fitness of the whole squad has a big bearing on our performances imo.

On Semedo, I actually think there has been an improvement (not massive) in his attacking play.
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Apart from his no-show against Brighton away last season (after which I'd have gladly never seen him play for us again) Nelson has been consistently quality for well over a calendar year now.

He'll have 1 year left on his contract at the end of this season and will be one of our highest paid players so unless we see a new deal for him over the next few months I'd imagine that he'll be sold in the summer. If he is I think a lot of Wolves fans will be surprised by who is interested in him, how much he goes for and how much we'll miss him when he does, especially if the club decides that his 'replacement' is Matt Doherty or Ki-Jana Hoever.
 
I know that in the final third he's not much kop, but I struggle to think of better footballers at his position in the Prem. There are a bunch of RBs floating around who kill our move for the Disasi OG stone dead by failing to control the pass from Dawson and losing the opportunity to set the attacker into space down the channel.

Very unlike me to big up Nelson, I grant you.
 
Another one eating crow on this. After Ipswich I was convinced we'd be using the November international break to find his replacement, but here we are, on track for our best season post-Nuno and with longstanding critical issues with the team - scoring goals, above all - finally put to bed.

I think the big thing I underestimated was that he's clearly a top-level man manager, and injecting confidence into this squad has done a huge amount on its own to right the ship after a couple of seasons of what sounds like a fairly toxic environment, both due to the Lage hangover and to the behaviour of some members of the squad. It's still relatively early days, though, and the jury's still out on other aspects of his game. There's night and day between the naivety with which he set up for matches in the first few months of the season (and responded to opposition tactical changes in-game) and where he is now, and I'm still not sure why that is. Took him a while to get a handle on the squad and what it could do? He's a super quick student of the game? That early season form was just a bad run and this was always his level (or vice versa, and this is the purple patch)? Whatever it is, happy to give him time now, because he's clearly not the PE teacher so many of us worried he was.
 
Lycan said:
Apart from his no-show against Brighton away last season (after which I'd have gladly never seen him play for us again) Nelson has been consistently quality for well over a calendar year now.

He'll have 1 year left on his contract at the end of this season and will be one of our highest paid players so unless we see a new deal for him over the next few months I'd imagine that he'll be sold in the summer. If he is I think a lot of Wolves fans will be surprised by who is interested in him, how much he goes for and how much we'll miss him when he does, especially if the club decides that his 'replacement' is Matt Doherty or Ki-Jana Hoever.
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Yep, I think not far into the future people will be saying, "remember how good Semedo really was"
 
Alan said:
I know that in the final third he's not much kop, but I struggle to think of better footballers at his position in the Prem. There are a bunch of RBs floating around who kill our move for the Disasi OG stone dead by failing to control the pass from Dawson and losing the opportunity to set the attacker into space down the channel.

Very unlike me to big up Nelson, I grant you.
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I wrote this about Nelson in the summer.

Lycan said:
I'm past defending Semedo. I thought he'd really turned a corner under Lopetegui but I won't ever forgive him for Brighton away. He's an idiotic defender, a fucking coward and when he eventually moves on I don't suppose I'll look back on his time at Wolves with much fondness.
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Just about as poor of a shout as my OP in this thread...
 
Fabulous stat...

That win over Man City had added significance because O'Neil tweaked the team's shape, adding another defender in Toti Gomes. He has started every game since and, as of Sunday, Wolves could claim to have picked up as many points as City since that day.
 
Lycan said:
I wrote this about Nelson in the summer.



Just about as poor of a shout as my OP in this thread...
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You wanted bad things to happen to him during that Brighton match as I recall 😂
 
All in good fun, @Lycan!

He was abominable that day, no question.
 
The Semedo situation is a bit of a conundrum.

Athletic FBs who are approaching 31 are entering the territory where value can start to decrease quite quickly (although Kyle Walker is nearly 34 and he doesn’t look like slowing down). But at the same time I’m not convinced we’d replace him effectively if we cashed in.

So even though he will be one of the biggest earners, I think we’d be better served trying to give him a 2 year extension on his current deal and accept that £15m loss on wages and value as an asset, rather than spend half of that on wages, make a net profit from the sale on the replacement, but end of tangibly worse off on the field.

Or maybe I’m chatting shit and FBs in this mould are ten an penny…
 
We already need a RB/RWB to cover his availability as neither Doherty nor Hoever are anywhere near fit for purpose, and I doubt Lembikisa will be in six months either. I'd rather not have to sign two.
 
Dipping into my vast well of knowledge, I honestly feel that next season, when we 'get found out', a bit like we did with Nuno when teams watched the tapes and learnt how to play against us, that we'll be in better hands to combat this effect, to stretch and play better instead of suffering the dreaded '2nd year bounce'.
It's kind of exciting watching these guys responding to GO'N knowing there'll be a different, not necessarily bigger, but different challenge coming next season....
I hope he's having his contract enhanced.
 
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