Relegation battle

[CornwallRam]

1 hour ago, Curtains said:

You forgot injuries or does that not count. 

And other sides don't suffer injuries? Previous Derby managers haven't suffered injuries? 

[Ellafella]

8 hours ago, sunnyhill60 said:

It is irrelevant what players Coco "wants", and what a ridiculous selection from  the current squad as to who are failures. We have seen how much better all of those can be.

Successful managers get more more out of the players they inherit than their predecessor. It took Mac a handful of games, both times. It is impossible to identify any area where Coco has improved things, save the  introduction of Knight as a genuine first team squad member.

9 points from ten games in Nov/Dec is absolutely relegation form, not to mention 2 from 5 games in December. Yet after the Forest and Preston there was some agreement progress was was being made, Lawrence in his most effective position, and Martin linking the play. This vanished when Coco changed both the formation and personnel and went cautious. Injuries are but a small part in the decline since Preston.

The manager is clueless and the football is truly dire. Get your head out of the sands, relegation beckons.

 

 

Absolutely agree. 

[Uptherams]

9 hours ago, AndyinLiverpool said:

I don’t think he wants any of these players at least not the senior players he inherited. And why would anyone want Lawrence or Davies or Forsyth or Holmes or martin? Failures. 

We don't have the luxury. To have a complete overhaul of the squad will take a considerable amount of time, money and require us to have the best recruitment not only in this league, but perhaps in Europe. There is also no telling how new signings would work out either. I don't expect any miracles, no one should. We should expect what is the norm. We could go and spend £10m a pop on 6 of the next best things and only 2/3 workout.  

He isn't getting the best out of any of this squad. Not one single player. That is damning. 

[AndyinLiverpool]

5 minutes ago, Uptherams said:

We don't have the luxury. To have a complete overhaul of the squad will take a considerable amount of time, money and require us to have the best recruitment not only in this league, but perhaps in Europe. There is also no telling how new signings would work out either. I don't expect any miracles, no one should. We should expect what is the norm. We could go and spend £10m a pop on 6 of the next best things and only 2/3 workout.  

He isn't getting the best out of any of this squad. Not one single player. That is damning. 

I always thought that Cocu was brought in to completely overhaul the squad. He's been tasked with bringing the kids through. Time is what he needs to be given to do that.

Flirt with relegation? Possibly.

Actually get relegated? Possibly.

Get rid of the dead wood? Definitely.

Hold your nerve, everybody.

[Tyler Durden]

2 minutes ago, AndyinLiverpool said:

I always thought that Cocu was brought in to completely overhaul the squad. He's been tasked with bringing the kids through. Time is what he needs to be given to do that.

Flirt with relegation? Possibly.

Actually get relegated? Possibly.

Get rid of the dead wood? Definitely.

Hold your nerve, everybody.

Genuine question - who would you define as dead wood and how would Cocu succeed in getting rid of said dead wood where other managers have failed?

[GenBr]

2 hours ago, NottsRam77 said:

He’s already tried to bring two in shape the of pattison and dowell 

both would be described as “technical” players ... just not very good ones 

where the blame lays for those two abject signings is where people disagree 

the manager ? or recruitment team ?

in my mind it’s the manger that says yes or no having been given the recommendations, information, footage, stats and whatever else they use these days 

buck stops there in my book but That’s just my opinion 

Cocu was here for about a month before we started bringing players in. I suspect we will disagree but i certainly dont think any of them were Cocus players. He didnt have the time to assess the squad or what was needed and frankly it felt to me that a lot of our signings this year were made in desperation due to time constraints. 

[Uptherams]

1 minute ago, AndyinLiverpool said:

I always thought that Cocu was brought in to completely overhaul the squad. He's been tasked with bringing the kids through. Time is what he needs to be given to do that.

Flirt with relegation? Possibly.

Actually get relegated? Possibly.

Get rid of the dead wood? Definitely.

Hold your nerve, everybody.

Do I think we will get relegated? No. But take stock of the situation. People are trying to remain positive that we won't get relegated. When did a target like that become acceptable? 

The kids are breaking into the match-day squad for various reasons. But I want to be absolutely clear. Them being such hot prospects has absolutely nothing to do with this manager. The club has worked tirelessly for 5 years to develop this academy. 

[Curtains]

1 hour ago, CornwallRam said:

And other sides don't suffer injuries? Previous Derby managers haven't suffered injuries? 

Yes but this season has been exceptional and we lost Keogh. 

Shinney just started to play as did Clarke and then got injured. Talk about bad luck. 

[AndyinLiverpool]

2 minutes ago, Tyler Durden said:

Genuine question - who would you define as dead wood and how would Cocu succeed in getting rid of said dead wood where other managers have failed?

It's not who I would define as dead wood that counts but there are quite a few for whom Derby County could be their last club (or at least their last club in the top half of the English leagues. He will probably have to let contracts run out but that's why time is required. Nobody's going to buy the likes of Davies or Forsyth or Martin or Thorne or Anya or any of the others that have been hanging around for yonks because they are past their best and trousering good money. They will probably continue to collect their salaries until the bitter end.

[AndyinLiverpool]

9 minutes ago, Uptherams said:

Do I think we will get relegated? No. But take stock of the situation. People are trying to remain positive that we won't get relegated. When did a target like that become acceptable? 

The kids are breaking into the match-day squad for various reasons. But I want to be absolutely clear. Them being such hot prospects has absolutely nothing to do with this manager. The club has worked tirelessly for 5 years to develop this academy. 

Indeed. But it's Cocu's brief to bring them into the team, isn't it? To change them from prospects into actual players. He needs the time to do that.

[Nuwtfly]

We are sleepwalking towards relegation.

And we're not too big to go down, either.

If the rest of the season plays out in a similar fashion to all our other seasons over the last few years, we'll likely go down.

This is getting too real now.

[Tyler Durden]

5 minutes ago, AndyinLiverpool said:

It's not who I would define as dead wood that counts but there are quite a few for whom Derby County could be their last club (or at least their last club in the top half of the English leagues. He will probably have to let contracts run out but that's why time is required. Nobody's going to buy the likes of Davies or Forsyth or Martin or Thorne or Anya or any of the others that have been hanging around for yonks because they are past their best and trousering good money. They will probably continue to collect their salaries until the bitter end.

You've just made my point for me - Cocu isn't going to be able to shift the deadwood that other managers couldn't simply for the reasons you've quite rightly stated in your post. 

My point was am a bit confused why you put that in your original post that Cocu would be achieving something that quite clearly is beyond his sphere of influence

[Owd miner]

At least there will be sum good away days in league 1 ... 

[ramboy63]

15 minutes ago, GenBr said:

Cocu was here for about a month before we started bringing players in. I suspect we will disagree but i certainly dont think any of them were Cocus players. He didnt have the time to assess the squad or what was needed and frankly it felt to me that a lot of our signings this year were made in desperation due to time constraints. 

He may of had only a month pre season but he as now had half a season and still does not no what formation to play let alone what side to play even given the fact we have had injuries like every other side gets in a season

10m on one player in the summer is now starting to luck a poor decision,i am not saying Beilik is a failure but i have not been bowled over at the same time.Any other manager would probably been shown the door by now so Mel must have a long term plan,lets hope that plan does not include relegation as i would rather get rid of Cocu now than loose our place in the championship

[Ellafella]

9 minutes ago, Curtains said:

Yes but this season has been exceptional and we lost Keogh. 

Shinney just started to play as did Clarke and then got injured. Talk about bad luck. 

Shinnie is a very good example. He only got in the team by default because there was nobody left to pick due to injury and suspension. Shinnie had been frozen out. Why? Because according to Phillip he {Shinnie} needed to learn to play football in the way that Cocu wanted. What did that mean? I still don’t know. 
Anyway Shinnie came in and played fantastic and showed what he can do. The point? Cocu is a very poor judge of the type of player that you need in the Championship. Had Shinnie changed the way he plays? Had Shinnie altered his style? No. Not one iota. So why did Cocu say that? What did he mean? And so why when Shinnie played did he do so well? 
Anybody solve this? 

[AndyinLiverpool]

1 minute ago, Tyler Durden said:

You've just made my point for me - Cocu isn't going to be able to shift the deadwood that other managers couldn't simply for the reasons you've quite rightly stated in your post. 

My point was am a bit confused why you put that in your original post that Cocu would be achieving something that quite clearly is beyond his sphere of influence

I am not sure I know what you're saying. Am I supposing that all the players Cocu doesn't want can be sold off in January? No. I'm pretty sure he knows the situation he is in and Morris knows it too. I see part of his remit is to overhaul the squad. If that takes two or three years in order to get rid of some of those players, so be it.

[Owd miner]

Just had email fer Middlesbrough away ... £30 ta watch two poor teams ... worra a joke 

[Tyler Durden]

1 minute ago, AndyinLiverpool said:

I am not sure I know what you're saying. Am I supposing that all the players Cocu doesn't want can be sold off in January? No. I'm pretty sure he knows the situation he is in and Morris knows it too. I see part of his remit is to overhaul the squad. If that takes two or three years in order to get rid of some of those players, so be it.

You said that Cocu had been tasked with overhauling the squad and a definite part of that was him getting rid of the deadwood. 

Am not sure why you mentioned that facet as clearly it is beyond Cocus scope that's all or any other manager be it Cocu or Joe Bloggs.

The only way I can see Cocu getting rid of said deadwood is by him out surviving them when their contracts run out which at the moment doesn't appear to be a guarantee by any stretch of the imagination

[AndyinLiverpool]

2 minutes ago, Tyler Durden said:

You said that Cocu had been tasked with overhauling the squad and a definite part of that was him getting rid of the deadwood. 

Am not sure why you mentioned that facet as clearly it is beyond Cocus scope that's all or any other manager be it Cocu or Joe Bloggs.

The only way I can see Cocu getting rid of said deadwood is by him out surviving them when their contracts run out which at the moment doesn't appear to be a guarantee by any stretch of the imagination

Fair enough. I was thinking more along the lines of trying to get rid: Notifying players that they are no longer required, encouraging them to look elsewhere; working with Mel Morris in working with budgets for paying players off etc. But probably having to wait for them to be out of contract.

[May Contain Nuts]

2 hours ago, CornwallRam said:

And other sides don't suffer injuries? Previous Derby managers haven't suffered injuries? 

Of course they do, although not usually to the magnitude that they have to put out a team as unbalanced and lacking in genuine quality as the one we've been left with.

It's the balance bit which is the most important.

McClaren suffered injuries to Martin, Thorne, Mascarell & Russell yet despite signing Ince & Bent in January we fell from almost certainties for automatic promotion, went on a poo-show of a run and fell out of the play-offs on the final day against Reading.

Lampard only had to lose Mount for a short spell of games and our form became pretty much identical to what it is now despite having a better squad to choose from.

The constant disregarding how big an effect the injuries we've had this season by a select few is staggering. You are allowed to use injuries as a reason without it merely being an excuse!