duncanjwitham

11 minutes ago, SSD said:

I think with LR at least you could see the improvements and progress within a short space of time, in terms of entertainment and creating good chances.

I’m sure I’ve posted this before, but the thing for me is that it’s obvious how you turn that Rosenior side into a really good side. There’s a bunch of stuff you need to do like 5% or 10% better than we were doing (move the ball quicker, be more clinical in the final third, cut out a few backwards passes when we’ve already broken the lines etc), but that’s basically it.  You don’t need to radically change anything.  Obviously actually doing it in practice might be another matter, but it’s clear *what* needs doing.

But as to how you get this bunch of players into a side like Warne’s Rotherham, I just have no clue.  We seem a million miles away from it.  Barely any of the players, including the ones we’ve signed this season, seem capable of it.

4 minutes ago, alram said:

My biggest worry is our record against top half teams under warne is shambolic, I would love to know our record top half v bottom half under warne.

 

It’s impossible to get out this league without beating top half teams regularly

It’s more of a case of strugglIng against the teams above us in the league, and doing okay against the teams below us.  The problem is, the number of teams in the first group seems to be expanding at a slightly alarming rate.

10 minutes ago, RoyMac5 said:

He just got in Sibley's way half of the time!

But with instructions so vague... Are there any tactics at all?

We certainly don’t seem to be trying to actually change anything with all these subs, just get fresh legs on to do the same thing the last guy was doing., whatever that was supposed to be.

Just now, enachops said:

I struggled to understand our formation in the first half. Was it a 3 or a 4 at the back? If it was a 4 which it seemed it was on occasions, where the hell was Elder playing? I struggled to understand his role all afternoon. If it was a 3, Elder and Smith have to be the worst 2 wingbacks going forward I’ve seen. They made  Richard Jackson and Paul Boertien look like Carlos and Cafu for Brazil. Very odd tactics today.

Thought Sibley did well when he came on, linked well down the left. Embleton looked like he couldn’t run, very one paced. Collins did well but drifts to the left too much. Washington is terrible. Despite this, we came closest first half. A point probably fair. Thought the ref was decent, but linesman was awful.

It was a flat 442 for most of the game, with Elder left wing. We switched to a back 5 after we scored.

3 minutes ago, Chester40 said:

it wasnt the worst football I've ever seen that's for sure

So you were at the Oxford and Blackpool games as well then 😉

Most damning indictment of the whole thing was Dom Dietrich interviewing James Collins afterwards, he asked what directive Warne had given him before going on: “be busy, put yourself about and if a chance comes, take it” (probably a slight paraphrase there). If run around and try and score a goal is the extent of the tactical guidance they’re being given, what hope have we got.

13 minutes ago, The Last Post said:

The Warne out camp is getting bigger 😁

55 minutes ago, hintonsboots said:

My postman is still sh1t after 5 years.

Bet he still manages to get more deliveries right than our wide players do though.

38 minutes ago, Stive Pesley said:

OK - so how about the way he apparently didn't spot that Kirchner was a total phony, despite working very closely with him on the deal?

The thing is, neither did Preston, or the EFL, or Rooney/Stretford, or the rest of the people at Slync.io.  He managed to fool a hell of a lot of people.

2 hours ago, Gerry Daly said:

Of course not. 3-4-3 is exactly the same as 4-4-2 as far as the midfield 4 are concerned surely. One less defender and one more up front, so a more attacking formation

So what's the plan for defending the wider areas in our own third? 

You either spread the back 3 out wide to try and cover the whole pitch, which is what leaves the central guy exposed with massive gaps either side of him.  I.e. a big part of why Sonny Bradley has looked so bad so far.

Or you have the wider midfielders cover them, in which case they are functionally wingbacks whatever you might think.

Or you just stay tight centrally and don't defend them at all, in which case you are giving the other team free reign to pump as many crosses into our box as they like.

Pick one.

12 hours ago, Loughborough Ram said:

Of course he does for the time being.

He is relatively fresh into the job and is under real pressure from a very demanding fan base, so for him to be putting time into developing players for 3, 4 or even 5 years time would be selfless in the extreme.

I'm sure that he would love to have a team of academy graduates ready to call on, but for the time being his priority has to be getting a squad together to be successful now, especially as he doesn't have the resources available to to buy first team players let alone plough money into the 18s and 21s

If he still has no interest in the youth teams in a couple of years time, then criticise him but at the moment it just looks like another convenient stick to beat him with

1 hour ago, Tamworthram said:

In an ideal world you’re right but sadly managers have to focus on the here and now and what will keep them in their job. Warne won’t be remembered for the condition he left the academy in. A successful academy won’t protect him from the sack nor will a failing one cause him to lose his job. He’ll be remembered for how successful he is with the first team. He’ll also know how long he remains manager of Derby is almost entirely dependent on how successful the first team is. I know it’s a little cynical but I’m not sure how much your legacy counts. I’ve thought about this before when attending retirement events for senior people I’ve really respected. The feeling for a few weeks is “they did a great job whilst they were here” but sadly, they are soon almost forgotten as their replacement introduces their ways, imposes their personality and takes responsibility or praise for the failures and successes under their tenure.

I want to be clear that I'm not talking specifically about Warne here but about managers in general, but the whole idea of managers caring about their legacy is just absolute peak-level idiocy.  Should we really be hindering the long-term future of the club, by not giving our expensively trained academy players the chance, purely so a current employee can secure a legacy for themselves? It's ridiculous.

It should be written into managers contracts that developing youth players is a fundamental part of their job, and if they aren't doing it, they should be sacked.  If you want a genuinely successful academy, you cannot have a manager just not bothering with it for a couple of years, it has to be a fundamental part of the club, with a route from youth teams into the first team planned out for years to come.  Those 17 year olds that don't get some first team exposure and few minutes here and there won't turn into the 19 year olds that start half a dozen games in a season, and then they won't turn into those 21 year olds that start 35 games a season for you.  You can't just start and stop using an academy at random, and still expect to churn out good players.  It has to be a long-term project, and it has to be one that outlasts any manager that we appoint.

People wonder why we're stuck at Championship and now League One level, and why we struggle to get really good academy players through to the first team, and it's stupid stuff like this that's at least part of it.  We can't compete with the massive clubs on finances to buy players, so we should be producing our own.  That's how we get to the Prem and stay there, and we should be doing everything we can to make it happen.  

12 minutes ago, DavesaRam said:

I’m aiming for 8th ….. row from the back of the South Stand on Saturday. That’s my seat row, and I can’t wait - I hate these international breaks!

Weird… that’s where James Collins seems to be aiming for most of the time too…

9 hours ago, Jimbo Ram said:

I think Sibbo has done well in the 5 or so minutes he is often given. Got the injury time winner in one game and also hit the post in a 5 minute cameo in another. When he was finally played he looked very good at left wing back. Why not play him there again if Warney refuses to give up on his 3 at the back? 

He didn't look good at wingback, he barely played there and struggled when he did.  The decent spell he had in the team was almost entirely playing at left back in a 4, with a winger in front supporting him.  And even towards the end of that spell, teams were starting to target his lack of experience defensively.

34 minutes ago, YorkshireRam said:

I'm starting to confuse myself at this point, but in my mind more effective isn't necessarily better. It's more direct and gets you from your own goal to the opposition's quicker and is therefore more effective at advancing play- i'm not even sure that's the point I was initially making, it was a just throwaway adjective added to the list for good measure really 😂

I suspect most people are going to equate “more effective” with better, even if people may have different definitions of better.  I think you’re sort of trying to argue for some kind of attacking efficiency measure (passes-per-chance-created or passes-per-shot for example), but while that might be an interesting thing to use to compare teams and styles, I don’t think it’s necessarily anything that you would necessarily want to maximise or minimise.  As much as anything, the teams that have a high pass-per-shot value, are probably just going to be the teams that pass the ball a lot.  

2 minutes ago, YorkshireRam said:

I understand your point, but the stats under LR go a fair way to outright disproving this. We created a lot of chances but converted very little- so all that attacking support didn't actually benefit us... I don't think it's a coincidence that faster + more direct = more goals; at least in our specific case anyway. It's possible that having fewer attacking players present, but by merit of the system, fewer oppositional defensive players due to the speed of the break is actually more beneficial to scoring goals, and therefore more effective?

10 games for Rosenior is far too small a sample size to make any comparisons like that, especially given that he was missing McGoldrick for a bunch of them.  And I seem to remember we missed a lot of genuinely good chances under Rosenior, which is very little to do with the actual system/style of play and more down to individual players.  And likewise, have had plenty of games under Warne where we've never remotely looked like scoring.

And like I said, neither is necessarily better or worse, you can absolutely make either extreme (of directness that is) work, at this level at least.  What really matters is playing to your strengths, having a good game-plan and executing it etc.  Then it's just down to personal taste as to what you'd prefer to what.

16 minutes ago, YorkshireRam said:

If they both rely to the same extent on that variable, then you could remove it from the equation and just compare the other elements? I'd argue less passes to the final shooting position constitutes more effective build-up, due to there simply being less involved in reaching that point in play. That's mainly what I'm getting at, reaching the same position quicker is more effective- it's a very surface level point though. 

The problem with getting there quickly is you don't always have the same amount of support or control when you actually get there.  A possession-based team might take longer to get the ball into the final third, but when it does there will be plenty of bodies around to get involved in creating/taking chances, and the ball is far more likely to actually stay in the final third while that happens.  A more direct team might actually get the ball into the final third quicker, but lose it more quickly too because there are less passing options, less people to cross to etc.  Or the first ball-receiver in the final third (i.e. the guy you've gone long to) might never even get control of it at all, because he's dealing with a direct ball to fight for, or a longer pass to chase after and he get in a foot-race for, rather than a relatively short ball to feet.

I'm not saying either is necessarily better or worse, but it's not simply a case of quicker=better, there's some kind of quality issue at play too.

1 minute ago, oodledoodle said:

Is it 'eck. What missing answer would you rather give? "No except for the half an hour we've looked a good side since he arrived?"

There’s maybe some scope for distinguishing between the football Warne apparently wants to play and what we’re actually doing on the pitch at the moment.  But I suspect it wouldn’t actually change a whole lot.

18 minutes ago, IlsonDerby said:

That’s ridiculous. There were games under Clough that we absolutely played opponents off the park. There were lots of other games where it was boring unfortunately but his brief was ‘keep us in the division, get rid of everyone who earns anything more than peanuts’. 

Clough’s biggest problem was he was too quick to go away from playing good football if we had a sticky patch.  We’d start out playing great stuff, have a couple of defeats down the line, then go straight to trying to grind out wins for months.  The big difference for me though, was that I think Clough wanted us playing good football, even if he couldn’t always make it happen.  And if he couldn’t make it happen, he was willing to compromise to try and get something working (we definitely didn’t play great football the season we had Shackell and Barker, but we were solid and ground out plenty of results).  I’m not sure either of those apply to Warne.

16 minutes ago, Ghost of Clough said:

We actually attempt the 5th fewest long balls per game (64)

And then we just need to agree what *exactly* constitutes a long ball.  I suspect a fair few of the types of passes the long-ball-moaners are unhappy about don’t even get classed as long balls. Specifically (for me anyway) the aimless chips over the top to nobody that we seem to play far too many of.  It’s far more about forcing the ball forwards when it isn’t on than any specific length of pass.

19 minutes ago, Rich3478 said:

Certainly wouldn’t say is hoofball.

I think part of the problem with discussions like this is that while I think WarneBall is absolutely both hoofball and also very defensive football, it isn’t what people normally mean by those terms.  We aren’t just lumping long balls up to a big target man, and we aren’t doing anything like sitting deep in 2 banks of 4 of trying to be hard to break down etc.  But we are very set on getting the ball forward and wide as quickly as we can, at the expense of having any kind of control of our own.  And we do seem very set on going out to stop the other team playing (by out running them, pressing them etc) at the expense of having a strategy to win the game of our own.  So both sides are kind of right, but it’s also basically an irrelevant argument over semantics.  The people saying we don’t like the hoofball are basically saying that we don’t like the minimal effort to actually establish some element of control in games, not that we don’t like the number of long balls we play (not wanting to put words into other peoples mouths etc).

9 minutes ago, Tamworthram said:

That was the sentiment 12 months ago but we can't continue to have no/low expectations for the rest of our lives just because "we still have a club to support". Same with (as has been voiced by several people) DC. We will always be grateful to him for stepping up in our darkest hour but that doesn't make him immune from fair and reasonable criticism for the rest of his tenure.

At the very least we should expect to see progress and improvement from last season.

11 minutes ago, Archied said:

I was replying to two posters in particular ( you wernt one of them ) and if you read back both but particularly one are arguing it’s time for warne to go and openly posts that he’s posting the stats to prove his point , not really sure what’s wrong with pulling the stats angle apart in answer to them and they are plenty able to give it back and have done , have I missed the bit where this is no longer a forum where opinions clash and people give it out and take it back as long as it’s offensive or sweary?

You basically said earlier that when it's time for Warne to go you will just know it's the time, you'll feel it.  All the people quoting stats are saying is, "I feel it's time for Warne to go, and here are some stats that I think back up my opinion".  They aren't saying sack him entirely *because* of the stats, they're just trying to support what they think with some evidence.

Obviously it's fine to argue that you don't think the stats are important, or that they don't say what people think they say etc.  But it kind of comes across (IMO anyway) that you are arguing that people shouldn't post evidence for their claims,  we only want baseless accusations and evidence-free assertions in here please.  That's why I think people are getting a bit worked up about it.

None of these stats "matters" in the sense that them being high (or low) has any intrinsic value.  Nobody is going out specifically to maximise their xG stat today.  But that's not the point of them, it's to tell you about what's happening on the pitch without having to watch every single minute played by every player in every game ever, and ideally without any bias in there..  And people are absolutely right in that an individual stat doesn't necessarily determine the outcome of a game.  Just because you have a high xG it doesn't guarantee you win any given game. You can win without having many shots, or without having much possession, or without creating many good chances.  But if almost all of these metrics are lower that you'd like, it's almost certainly a sign that something is going wrong somewhere.  You aren't going to win many games of football if you don't create chances and you don't keep the ball and you don't complete many of your passes and so on.

1 hour ago, jameso said:

You’re right of course but a better example and reframing would be Smith's mistake for the penalty.

Personally I don’t think it was a penalty - the Bolton player bought it and no checking technology was available to reverse the decision- but none of it would have been possible without Smith’s rash challenge. It’s not that Smith should think “Hmm, if I make a challenge here, I give the ref a chance to make a poor decision”, it’s that he should think (even in a high speed high intensity moment) “not a good idea to lunge in right on the edge of the penalty area given the likely behaviour of anyone being challenged while moving at pace and the low probability of them scoring from this position if I don’t make a challenge” with the context firmly implanted in his mind that we don’t have VAR or good refs at this level so he’s unlikely to get away with a mistake like that!

And even beyond the individual decision making by players/referees, the way we set up results in us getting counter-attacked a lot (we get it forwards quickly, lose it, they break etc).  And those are the kinds of situations that result in lots of penalties (and red cards) - players chasing back, players having to make last-ditch tackles, players dealing with players running at them etc.  And the more chances you give players and referees to screw up, the more likely they are to actually screw one up. 

It probably does result in those type of situations for us too, where we get to break back on them, although we don't always seem to be getting those decisions at the moment. 

9 minutes ago, Kokosnuss said:

I like the way he's been allowed to bring in 8-10 new first team players more suited to his style of football is now used as an excuse for performances because he needs time for them to, um, settle in and learn how to play his style of football.

I think that would be a reasonable excuse if we looked like a team that hadn't quite gelled yet.  It's always going to take time for players and managers to get to know each other's games, no matter how good they are.  But I don't think we look like that at all, I think we look like a ragtag bunch of players with no idea what they're supposed to be doing.  Normally in that situation, you'd probably see a manager trying a bunch of stuff and hoping something started working, but I don't even think we're doing that, just doing the same old thing over and over again.