Exeter Arms Talk

[chewbacca]

Very interesting read, thank you for the updates on these events. Glad Simmo seems to be impressing everyone as I thought he was a cracking aquisition when all was announced, a world apart from recent previous number 2's. It is a shame Greenram wasn 't available to comment at the event as that would have been a great angle to fire at Rush and see how he dealt with it. I tend to agree with Mostyn that it is a change in remit from the owners, something has changed in the mind set of the ownership group and they want the promised long term success to come in a more short term, which in turn changes the whole consolidate, keep costs down, tight unit of hard working players philosophy. The work Clough and the club had done was a good building block but all the talk pre season was about aiming for the top six, maybe the remit had been cranked up during the summer but Clough still wanted to carry on in his old ways of slow build and given as long this season as he was they decided it was just very much same old same old and a complete change was needed to push on to the level now desired by the owners.

[Gary Teale]

Well as a they have been given about two years to get us promoted I don't think they will right it off just yet. I think it's more an indication that they want to bring a few new players in to add to our current squad as it doesn't have any depth as this weekend is showing, we don't have 3 midfielders available and that's one of our stronger areas of the squad.

[Mostyn6]

Yeah – I would be more worried if they came in and said they saw no need to change anything!

 

I suppose the root of it is that the Anti-Clough brigade such as yourselves must find it frustrating that what you've been saying for ages is now accepted as right and the Pro-Clough brigade must find it frustrating that they bought into the previous strategy and now somewhat duped.

 

Bottom line is that it now feels like we're about to write off ANOTHER season (you can hear it now "it's been a season of transition", "we were never going to make the play-offs with such an overhaul of the squad in mid-season" etc)

 

I don't see that. The fact that moves are being made to improve the side now and Simmo intimated they were itching to get through the rest of 2013 without losing too much ground (I don't recall his exact words, but they were jokingly about not losing before xmas etc). There must be something in the pipeline or the job isn't appealing for McClaren. Based on his contract, he's only got one FULL season to achieve? I cannot see that, they'll try and sneak in via play-offs straight away I reckon.

 

The paragraph above, yes it is frustrating. I always said your coaching staff has to cover all the attributes needed (man management, tactics, defending, attacking, technique, set pieces, fitness, formations etc). No ONE manager can cover all of those, so you build the team of coaches to cover it all.

 

I wonder how happy I'd have been had Nigel employed Simmo and Steele, I reckon I wouldn't have been 'Anti' his management.

[inter politics]

As we've all discussed many times before, we don't and many teams at this level do not require a 25 goal striker.

 

Martin, Ward, Sammon and Russell will probably score 40-50 goals

 

Bryson is on for a career high and will probably net at least 10 goals - hopefully the other midfielders can get another 10-15.

 

And the defence (mostly Jake) can get half a dozen.

 

We require a left back with the height of Forsyth (or at least somebody who can battle for headers), the tenacity of Roberts and somebody who can strike the balance between attack and defend (with defend being the main responsibility).

 

Another defensive midfielder (somebody like Perkins) to alternate with Eustace and another wide option would be nice (Burke would have been decent).

[Stive Pesley]

Agreed – the 25 goal striker has been proven to be unneccessary by last season's promoted teams.

 

Also the stats quoted in the link in the Forsyth thread show that you are more likely to win a game by keeping a clean sheet than by scoring two goals. In other words it's more important to fix your defence before you buy a "prolific" striker.

[May Contain Nuts]

I think every manager (and assistant) says they'd like a player who can score 25 goals, wouldn't be reading too much into that!

[mwram1973]

I wonder how happy I'd have been had Nigel employed Simmo and Steele, I reckon I wouldn't have been 'Anti' his management.

 

 

I really don't think though Simmo and steele would have worked for him though, even if they were offered the positions. Simmo has more experience than Nigel anyway.

 

I think the pull of working with McClaren swung it, I Mean, to get probably the best gk coach in the country to come to us is a bit of a coo don't you think.

 

I also believe that if and when Mac decides to move on, I think Simmo will take over.

 

Just my thoughts like.

[rynny]

Am I the only one who finds this all vaguely troubling?

Having sat through a couple of fan forums with Rush in the latter days of Nigel, I heard so much said about what a great squad we now had, the best squad Nigel has ever had, how we wanted a lean and hungry squad and would only consider loans for injuries, how Russell would be the goal scorer we are missing, we would definitely be aiming for top six etc etc

And now the new guys have come in and are now pretty much saying that we can't get promoted with this squad, we don't have the depth and competition we need, we still need a 25 goals a season striker and we're loaning players in all over the place.

What troubles me is that Rush can't have it both ways – he either has to agree with the new coaches and admit that the strategy he forced Nigel to take was WRONG (and yes I think we all accept that Nigel always appeared to be working on a shoestring with one hand tied behind his back?) and that the fans were RIGHT all along or he tells the new coaches to pipe down and get back on message regarding spending little and wisely.

He was right about it being Nigel's best squad maybe not quite good enough in defence to go up though.

[Stedcfc]

A lot of very interesting comments on here.

 

I think its fair to say that for the past year or so we've had a pretty good starting 11 but the back up has been pretty poor.

 

The back up is largely exactly that and would never take one of the starting 11s places unless they were injured. I was a fan of Clough but this philosophy was very frustrating, he seemed to have 11 players he wanted to play (regardless of the formation) and he would play them regardless of form or carrying injuries. This also seemed to mean he would rarely make subs until somebody was shattered.

 

Anyway onto the new and I agree the owners must of had a change of plan. McClaren must certainly be more expensive that Clough and I cant see that he would come without promised funds.

 

Rush has changed his tune as you've said but ultimately he is a PR machine and is there to spout 'good news' whether there is any or not. It would be very interesting to see how he answered had that been put to him.

 

The summer was odd for me money was apparently available yet little was spent. It doesnt really make sense that Clough didnt want to spend it but he did like a small sqaud so who knows.

[Ambitious]

For what it's worth, I've written a piece based on simpson's comments regarding McGrath and thrown some other pieces in there - started strong, so should become well viewed.

 

http://hereisthecity.com/en-gb/2013/11/06/sp-if-i-could-sign-any-player-from-the-past-it-would-be-paul-mcg/?

 

Had fun searching for other quotes on the irish man though - loved guy!

[Gary Teale]

Did anyone go to the two last night?

[NormantonRam]

Agreed – the 25 goal striker has been proven to be unneccessary by last season's promoted teams.

 

Also the stats quoted in the link in the Forsyth thread show that you are more likely to win a game by keeping a clean sheet than by scoring two goals. In other words it's more important to fix your defence before you buy a "prolific" striker.

 

Better to have both. Cardiff were a rare case, and they kept clean sheets. Lambert scored more than 25, Ebanks-Blake did as well IIRC. Lets not kid ourselves that a goalscorer isn't necessary, its more necessary when you can't keep clean sheets.

 

As there is neither a strong defence and a prolific Striker, McClaren will do well to finish in the top 6. I already think it is about next season for McClaren. This season is about as finishing as high as possible, I don't think the owners really expect a top 6 finish.

[Stive Pesley]

Better to have both. Cardiff were a rare case, and they kept clean sheets. Lambert scored more than 25, Ebanks-Blake did as well IIRC. Lets not kid ourselves that a goalscorer isn't necessary, its more necessary when you can't keep clean sheets.

 

As there is neither a strong defence and a prolific Striker, McClaren will do well to finish in the top 6. I already think it is about next season for McClaren. This season is about as finishing as high as possible, I don't think the owners really expect a top 6 finish.

 

 

But we could be an exception too if we had a strong enough defence - we're still joint top scorers in the league at the moment! 26 goals in 14 games...

[NormantonRam]

But we could be an exception too if we had a strong enough defence - we're still joint top scorers in the league at the moment! 26 goals in 14 games...

 

I'm sure that was the case, In previous seasons. Then the goals dried up. I think the Jan signings will tell whether we will remain as top scorers.

[Ramarena]

I'm sure that was the case, In previous seasons. Then the goals dried up. I think the Jan signings will tell whether we will remain as top scorers.

 

I wonder if he will focus on defence in Jan or try to improve a variety of areas?

[maydrakin]

Cloughie used to say he'd look at bringing in players to improve the team.

Maybe he just couldn't attract better players to come to us? Or couldn't find ones that were affordable? The scouting network has been widely criticised as not nearly good enough...