This has been coached out of the team in the name of better control.
This is what annoyed me, even last season, because this was something opponents would fear.
Now all teams know we’re going to pass it backwards and there’s 0% chance of a counter-attack.
For months those of us critical of Slot have been told that we cannot judge him this season because the impact of the loss of a Jota was incalculable. That the players just aren’t going to be there mentally and that has limited what Slot can get out of them this year. He must be given very broad leeway because of that in the results and performances we can expect he can get out these damaged players.
But when it comes to the players, the ones this argument acknowledges are impacted by their bereavement, they can go and get fucked.
Unfortunately, Gomez is no longer the level that we needed 3 seasons ago, be it availability or consistent ability…
Gomez hasn’t played enough this season to be thrown into such a match. He looked lost and out of sync all match. By half time he looked completely knackered.
It’s what you call being “hung out to dry” I think.
So what you are saying is that the reason they all gave up yesterday was because of Jota?
I floated that idea only a couple of months after he died, and was accused of using his tragic death as an excuse for the poor performances, so good luck with that. 
Not remotely and I know you dont believe that is what I am saying.
What my view on the impact Jota had on this season’s performance is not relevant to the point about how the grieving of the players is only held up by you as a reason to excuse slot but not the players themselves.
No it isn’t, and it never has been.
This is you trying to score a cheap point, and frankly you are a lot better than this kind of shithousery.
We are often very bad at seeing the inconsistencies in our own arguments. We are especially bad at that when they are driven by emotion.
What you have said about the players here is completely inconsistent with what you have been arguing all season about how we need to readjust our expectations for SLot this season. Calling for him to be let go has been called “knee jerk” because he’s working with players who just emotionally arent there. But they players themselves? They arent trying…get rid of 'em!
That is fucking unforgivable.
I’d be tearing strips off teammates in the dressing room after that
Didn’t even create any shape, just a nice straight line. Not a midfielder in view and Ekitikè looking on bewildered.
I think a few home truths… maybe a few punches… might do more good right now
Players are being hung out to dry by Slot’s tactics. There’s no two ways about that anymore it’s proven. Exactly what they’re being coached, fuck knows. But eventually, players will just give up instinctively when they can see that all the efforts are not amounting to anything. Nothing is coming to fruition. I’m pretty sure they have talked to Slot about it given that many are experienced campaigners and serial winners. But clearly the manager overlooks their legitimate concerns. When that happens and things aren’t working then their energy the cohesion, the camaraderie it all goes out the window. And then they stop fighting for each other. And that’s the end.
It’s a shitty little comment on your part. You aren’t trying to be constructive or add to the debate. You are just picking at me, totally misrepresenting an argument I made months ago, to try and make a show of me. There are plenty of lads here who have taken against me because I’ve refused to join the hatefest on Slot, but none of them have made my feel quite as angry as this exchange with you, someone I’ve always thought to be one of the best posters here.
I have never extended sympathies and understanding to Slot that I haven’t to the players. Quite the opposite. My concerns about the impact of Jota’s death have been mostly about the playing squad, and if it seems that I’ve used it as a defence of Slot, it isn’t a case of ‘Lay off Slot, he’s grieving’, it’s more a case of ‘Lay off Slot, he’s having to manage a bunch of lads who are grieving’.
I expressed this call for understanding months ago. and I was very clear that while I believed (and still do) that it’s a contributing factor to why some of the lads look off it this season, I never suggested it was the only reason, or even the biggest reason.
I have never said that all criticism of the team is unacceptable because of what happened to Jota, and if I felt that I would have done more than make two or three posts about it over the last eight months.
It’s simply untrue that I’ve been ‘arguing all season’ that criticism of him is unfair because of Jota. I remember arguing this early on in our struggles, when calls to sack Slot could very reasonably be described as knee jerk. As the season has gone on and it’s become increasingly clear that our struggle go quite a bit beyond the lads grieving, I have reluctantly come to the conclusion that the club do need to make the change - as I am sure you are aware - and have limited my defence of him to comments where people have crossed the line with personal comments.
If you are as intellectually honest as you expect me to be, you would admit that this line of attack was motivated far more by a desire to make a show of me personally, than contribute to the forum in any way. It’s incredible poor form on your part.
It is a shape, in a sense, just one not known to euclidian geometry, rather looking like how spat bubble gum ends up on the floor.
Lively debate this…
I give it up to 48hrs
5 attackers in a high press, everyone else 50 yards away.
It’s a flawed vision of football in the coaching set up as far as I can see. All season we have been struggling to see this vision come together of what the midfield is supposed to look like both on and off the ball.
At this point I only have three possible conclusions…
I tend to believe it is number 1.