Sage in or out

Sage in or out

  • In

    Votes: 91 46.7%

  • Out

    Votes: 66 33.8%

  • Sit on the fence

    Votes: 38 19.5%
  • Total voters
    195
est1905 said:
Which key positions would you say we have big holes? For me its only in the centre of defence. This was always going to be a problem but its not as if the club didn't try very hard in the last window to bring in two quality central defenders.
This is why Disasi was signed on loan and Honest. I seriously doubt we really wanted either of them but it ended up better than nothing.
People have criticized the sale of Munoz but I'd still do that deal now. Forest paid massively over the top for him and much as I loved Daniel he is definitely past his best
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Also the question with Munoz isn’t whether he was past his best. It’s whether he was better than the other available options. Based on the evidence so far the answer is a resounding ‘yes’. He was miles better. Given we invested his transfer fee in Khallali all we did was trade down in quality in a key position
 
PatrickA said:
Good players help of course, but the true art is building a consistent team that functions as a unit which outperforms the sum of it's parts.
Pulis would be an example, finishing eleventh with a team of largely average players and making us a difficult team that nobody relished playing.

Glasner to a certain extent too.
Yes, we had better players under him , but he was instrumental in changing the psychology of the club that anything was possible.
It was a strange feeling to turn up at a Palace game and think you had a reasonable chance regardless of the opposition.

At the moment Sage does not convey the bloody minded resilience of a Pulis or the supreme self confidence of a Glasner.
The best managers are able in applying psychology to make players believe they are better than they are so they outperform, or alternatively hint the players are not quite good enough so they become determined to prove the manager wrong and again outperform.
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All very well said and thought out, sadly, we now do not have the leadership needed at the back, we are easily passed, are far too slow, very flat footed, unable to defend high balls (especially at the back post), lack the skills or the passing ability to pass out from the back and spend too much time passing the ball backwards or sideways, then due to the lack of skill to be able to play in this way, allow the opposition to press high, forcing us in to making mistakes thus creating unnecessary pressure at the back. We have just not replaced the quality we sold on very well!
 
Sage's misfortune is not having the players available to Glasner for a significant period.
His tactics may well have worked with a firing front 3 of Sarr, Mateta and Eze and a defence including Guehi, Lacroix and Mitchell who all excellent 1 on I defenders.
His mistake is possibly to try and play those tactics with only some of those resources available.
 
Lanzo-Ad said:
Good post, Pulis did a great job with very average players, i think that is what we need to aim for, realism and organisation.
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The first things Pulis did was organise average players into a coherent defensive unit. The second was sign players (or get the club to sign players) who he knew to be good enough and of the right character.

The opposite of what we've done, basically.
 
sprites said:
Way, way too soon to pull the trigger. Sage has been dealt a stinker of a hand, with all the changes he's had to deal with, losing his top players, then losing his captain etc.

He may turn this around. He may not. But he sure as hell deserves more then seven games to try. We're 14th for crying out loud, not even close to the drop zone.

I agree the body language today wasn't great. But we just lost 5-0...it's hardly going to be positive, is it?

He gets 'til Christmas...then we reassess.
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tell me ´til Christmas in 4 weeks
 
I'm not sure what to take from the Besiktas game.

On one hand, it was not only a far better performance than we saw at Brighton, but also much better than we have seen most weeks. Probably our best performance this season? That can only be positive, and it would be churlish to deny Sage any credit for that.

At the same time, I am not wholly convinced that we saw a different, or even a more coherent tactical approach. The pressing in the first half was excellent, and a big part of why we were on top for long spells. It might also have a part to play in us letting the first goal in. I felt Disasi pressed into midfield to be aggressive in his marking of the forward, leaving a huge gap for Ndidi to run into. As I said at the time, that's not the first time we've seen that happen to our detriment. It perhaps indicates that the risks associated with pressing remain.

Moreover, I'm not sure the opposition really tested the back line, so it wasn't easy to say that we looked more organised. There were signs at times of a more joined up back five, but there were also loads of spells when our wingbacks seemed caught between pressing or marking their winger, and got caught in no-mans land between the two. Besiktas just didn't really punish us for it.

Overall, perhaps Sage remains convinced that pressing hard all over the pitch is the form of defence he wants. In other words, he doubled down on his approach, rather than changing it.

If that ends up working, great. If not, then I think he remains on thin ice.

Newcastle will tell us more. The stats for teams doing well on Sundays after Thursday night away games in Europe are not encouraging at all. I am not sure Palace can reproduce that kind of pressing and running on Sundays, having done it on Thursdays.
 
After the 5-0 Brighton debacle, I suspect many supporters were expecting the worst, accordingly a draw at Besiktas on the back of a much improved performance was most welcome and the 'Noise' concerning Sage has generally abated.
Should we succumb to an abject defeat against Newcastle the debate will once again focus on the future of our manager.
 
We can all clearly see how sage wants to play, we all want our team to play like klopps liverpool. Unfortunately we dont have players who're good enough.

Its hard enough playing with 2 midfielders in this league, let alone playing the forward press with our two wing backs pushing up. Its just suicidal and other teams will play straight through it. Liverpool done it with 11 world class players, playing 443 with 2 world class full backs and look how many times Trent was caught out of position.

I'd love for Sage to prove me wrong but I just don't see how, yes the defence his inherited is not ideal but if he continues to play this way then his only got himself to blame as he wont last long.
 
TheBigToePunt said:
I'm not sure what to take from the Besiktas game.

On one hand, it was not only a far better performance than we saw at Brighton, but also much better than we have seen most weeks. Probably our best performance this season? That can only be positive, and it would be churlish to deny Sage any credit for that.

...

Overall, perhaps Sage remains convinced that pressing hard all over the pitch is the form of defence he wants. In other words, he doubled down on his approach, rather than changing it.

If that ends up working, great. If not, then I think he remains on thin ice.

Newcastle will tell us more. The stats for teams doing well on Sundays after Thursday night away games in Europe are not encouraging at all. I am not sure Palace can reproduce that kind of pressing and running on Sundays, having done it on Thursdays.
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I think that is indeed the case. He said once again in his post match interview with the club's 'reporter' that the best way to defend is to have the ball, so I expect him to continue to urge the players to press high. However, and as you say, it's doubtful whether the same players (largely) can do that again on Sunday. If Sage is going to continue along that path then he will need to use all 5 subs on Sunday wisely so as to keep the momentum going. The question is which 5 can he bring on without lowering the quality?

I imagine that if fit and/or duly recovered we'll start with:

Henderson

Richards Disasi Canvot (or possibly Ahanor)

Khalaili Wharton Kamada Mitchell

Pino Mateta McNeil
​
so, basically the team that started on Thursday with possibly 2 changes.

I'm assuming Timber and Strand Larsen will still be injured.

The 5 subs to be used might be
  • Sarr​
  • Nketiah​
  • Mingueza​
  • Hughes​
  • Osorio (or Guessand)​
If Sage is looking to continue playing this front-foot pressing style then he needs to give the fringe players minutes so as to gel more easily when they come on or even start.

Sunday should be quite revealing as to how things lie
 
I’m going to say in now, because what other pelmet are we going to get?
Give him time, we’ll pick up enough points to stay out of trouble, thankfully we’re not going to be playing Man City and Brighton every week.
We’re going to ship goals and as long as we keep looking dangerous ourselves going forward I’ll be reasonably happy if we’re chipping away at that 40’poimt mark

But having said that if we get well beat against the toon and the yids then I’ll review it again😇😁
 
JHB said:
Centre back, midfield and right wing back.

Centre back is obvious. Centre midfield is incredibly thin if either Timber or Wharton are injured which Timber now is. Neither Mingueza or Khalali are good enough at the moment. No good having two sub standard options. Still leaves a gap on the pitch and a weakness opponents are continually exploiting.
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In midfield centrally we have (when fit) Wharton, Timber, Kamada, Doucoure, Hughes, Mingueza (can and has played cetral midfield), Sarr, Lerma, Pino, Mcneil, Gozo, Ozorio.
All of the above have either previously played in central midfield and can play the role or its their natural position.
On the point of right back. I disagree. Simple as that. Kalaili is young and will make mistakes (News flash, Palace cant afford the finished article, we have to coach him into the finishe article, like we did with Eze, Guehi and countless others). He is comfortable on the ball, has good pace and his crosses are getting better all the time. Yes he is better going forward than he is defending but so was Munoz. Mingueza is the opposite. He is a better defender than attacker but has more experience and every time I have seen him I think he has had a decent game. Mingueza was named in the Europa team of the year for his performances for Celta Vigo. He also came through Barcelona's system. The lad is no mug. To say he is not good enough to be a squad player for Palace is not only laughable, its disrespectful to the lad.
 
JHB said:
Also the question with Munoz isn’t whether he was past his best. It’s whether he was better than the other available options. Based on the evidence so far the answer is a resounding ‘yes’. He was miles better. Given we invested his transfer fee in Khallali all we did was trade down in quality in a key position
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Again, could not disagree more. I haven't seen him play for Forest but their fans are very underwhelmed by him.
 
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