The Bruno Lage Appreciation Thread

[AndyWolves]

If any other club were rolling along at 0.6 PPG, with a new manager that hardly anyone had heard of six months ago and they'd scored one goal of their own in five games, and had just lost comfortably at home to a newly-promoted team without having a shot on target, you'd be absolutely piling in at 14/1.

You can get 28/1 on Nuno, that's tremendous value imho

 

[Tony Towner]

I'm not suggesting hubris Jeff wouldn't sack him and as manager there always has to be a degree of culpability, but missing chances and conceding soft goals because we don't have effective enough players at either end of the pitch isn't something new. If he now either tries new players or formations which also don't work then he may carry the can for that, but he's unlikely to be where the majority of blame lies

 

[jlo]

But, who is going to come in and do anything better/different with the squad this side of the Jan transfer window? I think Lage might learn from Brentford and set us up a bit better for the next few games, but hey, who knows. It's all a bit of a mess at the moment

 

[Deutsch Wolf]

Who would you rather have as manager?

As you say, it's not so much the manager that's the problem. But that's by the by, we don't have a time machine to fix fuck ups.

Depends what the club want. I was in favour of Paulo Fonseca in the very brief period between Nuno getting sacked and it being obvious that it would be Lage to replace him. Whether it would change anything, I don't know.

 

[Deutsch Wolf]

I'm not suggesting hubris Jeff wouldn't sack him and as manager there always has to be a degree of culpability, but missing chances and conceding soft goals because we don't have effective enough players at either end of the pitch isn't something new. If he now either tries new players or formations which also don't work then he may carry the can for that, but he's unlikely to be where the majority of blame lies

The manager always, always, always is the first guy to fall. He's the easiest to get rid of and the easiest to point the finger at. Plus Jeff is not going to sack himself.

The bald facts are that if we are on say, 6 points from 10 games, I don't think that's sustainable and he'll go.

 

[Deutsch Wolf]

But, who is going to come in and do anything better/different with the squad this side of the Jan transfer window? I think Lage might learn from Brentford and set us up a bit better for the next few games, but hey, who knows. It's all a bit of a mess at the moment

The thing is it's basically only Norwich who ever shrug their shoulders and say "what can you do, we'll just leave it as it is".

Albion sacked Bilic last season when it was obvious they weren't going to get anyone better (they got a horrible fat bastard who just rinsed them of cash) and it was clearly the board's fault for not sorting out a proper budget in the summer. That's just what happens.

 

[AndyWolves]

So we have a shit squad but still think we should be taking points off teams who finished in Europe?

I stand by that Lage has had 1 game where he hasn't met expectations.

The folk who do the recruitment have let us drift to a bottom half / quarter PL team.

 

[jlo]

Don't disagree with you, it's just all pointing to this season being a long slog which might end up on relegation which is pretty depressing after what's been promised.

Lage has this run until game week 14 when any game could result in points on paper (Hi @AndyWolves) so he better figure out what to do to make this squad work, because the alternative feels like it'll result in a downwards snowball effect.

 

[Deutsch Wolf]

Andy - I'd really rather not have the same argument every day, but:

a) Do you expect us to get something out of Sunday's game?

b) If so, how do you account for them holding Man City to a 0-0 draw away from home three days ago?

c) If not, then who on earth are we supposed to be beating?

 

[Tony Towner]

It'd likely be after the Palace game I'd have thought as that precedes an international break. With the 6 games prior to that all being against traditional middle to lower table sides then I agree 6 from 11 would put him in danger, it's not unreasonable to expect us to get more than that from
Southampton a
Newcastle h
Villa a
Leeds a
Everton h
Palace a

 

[Deutsch Wolf]

Of course recruitment is the massive issue. We all know that. We all know the window was shocking given how glaringly obvious it was what we needed, and we did next to nothing.

But it's irrelevant in the context of this discussion. Like it wasn't the branch manager of Northern Rock in Queen Street who caused the bank to fall over. But he lost his job and the people who did cause it walked away with a nice payoff. And the world keeps turning.

If we're in any kind of a relegation fight, the owners (I hesitate to say board, because we don't really have one any more) will take the simplest course of action and sack the manager, who is only there because they parachuted him in out of relative obscurity. They won't say "no-one else could do any better" or "these teams are better than us so you can't expect us to win". Cloud cuckoo land that.

 

[jd1981]

Southampton (A)
Newcastle (H)
Villa (A)
Leeds (A)

How many points do we think he needs? 4? 5?

Even 5 only gives us 8 from 10 games, which is shit and has us at best hovering above the bottom three. I don't think we'll get 5...

That 14/1 on him being first/next to go looks tasty.

NB: Us being a bit shit isn't all his fault. It's some of his fault.

3-4 I think which would leave us in the bottom 3 heading into November. Not many managers survive that neither would Bruno. Once Fosun see that the PL status is under threat expect them to act very quickly. He won’t be able to do a Colin Lee either ie get to a point when it’s almost untenable then win a few then repeat the cycle.

 

[Deutsch Wolf]

Lee never really did that! Turner did, loads of times.

Lee was another one who got sawn off by the owners/MD. Guess who kept their job.

 

[jlo]

Southampton (A)
Newcastle (H)
Villa (A)
Leeds (A)

How many points do we think he needs? 4? 5?

Even 5 only gives us 8 from 10 games, which is shit and has us at best hovering above the bottom three. I don't think we'll get 5...

That 14/1 on him being first/next to go looks tasty.

NB: Us being a bit shit isn't all his fault. It's some of his fault.

Going back to this. Ironically with the same players last season you'd have predicted 6 points from those 4, maybe even 7-9. Manager aside, you'd have to say they are all winnable games on the right day

 

[jd1981]

Lee never really did that! Turner did, loads of times.

Lee was another one who got sawn off by the owners/MD. Guess who kept their job.

Always the case tho as you said they appoint someone who they don’t back fully and then deem them not good enough after 5 months. But the one who is equally incompetent in the appoint carries on.

 

[Deutsch Wolf]

We actually did get 8 from those last season. Should have been more, Newcastle properly fluked their point and Saiss missed from less than a yard at Villa.

We won't get 8 this year.

 

[jd1981]

Going back to this. Ironically with the same players last season you'd have predicted 6 points from those 4, maybe even 7-9. Manager aside, you'd have to say they are all winnable games on the right day

Thing is Nuno in these situations made sure we ground something out it wouldn’t be pretty but we’d get something Chelsea away, Fulham home last season etc.

 

[AndyWolves]

Andy - I'd really rather not have the same argument every day, but:

a) Do you expect us to get something out of Sunday's game?

b) If so, how do you account for them holding Man City to a 0-0 draw away from home three days ago?

c) If not, then who on earth are we supposed to be beating?

A) Honestly, no idea, this is a game where all 3 results seem equally likely

B) I didn't expect that to happen, I didn't say it wouldn't or couldn't happen. There will also be results like this again this season, where the unexpected happens.

C) Teams who are notionally worse than us, but I'd obviously be delighted to get points from games we wouldn't expect to.

Edit Would you expect Saints to take points off man city next time they play?

 

[Deutsch Wolf]

I don't know, I certainly doubt they automatically think they'll lose though or just say "it's ok" if and when they do.

Who are these notionally worse teams?

 

[Throbber3]

So far I am with the supercomputer. Weekly Post 348 (football-observatory.com)