Sage in or out

[dreamwaverider]

Seriously why is Sage still here? He is well and truly cooked.

It would be a big surprise at this point if we looked like a competent football team tomorrow against Liverpool. If we won it would be the biggest miracle since the parting of the Red Sea.

It is almost certain we will be in the relegation zone at the end of the weekend. What is worrying is we are getting worse and worse as other teams start to figure it out.

The games against Coventry and Hull already look season defining. We simply cannot go into them with Sage in charge. We are at the stage where we would be more effective if we got Chat GPT to generate our tactics

This question keeps being asked. The answer will almost certainly be money. Parish has had an absolute disastrous 9 months financially and without support from the board will almost certainly be struggling now with finances. To fire Sage is possibly an expense we cannot afford.

 

[dreamwaverider]

I'm trying to be cheerful but even 'er indoors' calls me Victor, A big defeat tomorrow & i'll probably give myself the bullet....and no, thats not a euphanism!

Are you Parish in disguise?

 

[samprior]

This question keeps being asked. The answer will almost certainly be money. Parish has had an absolute disastrous 9 months financially and without support from the board will almost certainly be struggling now with finances. To fire Sage is possibly an expense we cannot afford.

Surely relegation is an expense we can afford even less.

 

[dreamwaverider]

I think you have a point, it is like cruelty, watching a man unravel in front of the world media is not nice, he must be dreading tomorrows game, i fear for his mental health, he seems a nice guy totally out of his depth, almost hard to watch.

Dont worry, I would imagine his bank balance must give him considerable comfort and if and when he finally goes, if we can rustle up the money for his exit and to buy in another manager, well then he will get a lovely cushion to rest up for a good while. Not so bad.

 

[PatrickA]

Your theory holds up until one realises that for the majority of last season, playing the same system with the players you mention, we were utter dross. We scraped through in Europe against teams unfamiliar with us, but here in the Premiership it had been utterly rumbled.
It's a poor system, its faults exacerbated this season by a clueless manager and players of lesser ability.

The system did have it’s successes with the only 3 major trophies in our history and many on here acclaiming Glasner as our greatest ever manager in implementing it so well.

Nonetheless, there is no doubt that there was a drop of form last season after the sale of Guehi and injuries to Munoz meaning the likes of Sosa, Devenny and Johnson were used as RWB which clearly negated our threat down the right.

We are certainly well short of making the system work with the currently available players.

 

[elgin eeagle]

Glasner’s 343 system was essentially designed around Munoz from an attacking perspective. He was the key player in driving forward down the right and leading us in transition phases.
Opposing teams were frequently caught out , even the likes of Manchester City and Liverpool.

Of course latter day Munoz had injury problems and some teams got wise to our tactic and defended deeper against Munoz to minimise the threat, but when the 343 system was at it’s most effective Munoz was the key component.

Defensively the key players in the 343 system were Guehi and Lacroix with both having the recovery pace as well as the ability to defend 1 on 1 against opposing forwards running at them.
They also understood defensive positioning and were rarely caught out in this regard.

We have persisted with the system even though we have sold the players who made it work.

I would also contend that Sarr and Mateta were important players in making the system work.
Both had good goal scoring records and were very dangerous in the final third.
Mateta had the presence to play the lone front man well and Sarr developed an excellent understanding with Munoz leaving space on the right for Munoz to conduct his raids.

We have largely been without these two players this season as well.

My contention is the we have persisted with a system without the 5 players who made it successful.

None of the replacements who have come in look anywhere as near as adept or comfortable in the system.
It doesn’t suit the majority of our players.

It may be that when the club took the decision to replace Glasner with Sage they looked for a coach who played a similar system reasoning that the squad were used to playing the system and it had brought some success.

However, as I’ve sought to illustrate above the plan hasn’t worked without the 5 key players who made it work and the replacements are nowhere near the quality or experience of the players replaced.

Is this bad luck, bad planning or a combination of both?
Perhaps that’s for another day; at the moment it’s necessary to institute a change to get the season back on track.

Absolutely this. I feel for Sage as he has been thrown under the bus, and because the players are giving 100% for him to the final whistle i dont think he deserves the sack, but if he starts Richards and Cannot with Disasi ahead of Chilwell and Lerma then i think Liverpool will win easily and that will then do for him. The defence was weakened with the loss of Lacroix and Munoz in the summer, and then further weakened with the loss of Riad and Tomiyasu.

 

[WJK1960]

The system did have it’s successes with the only 3 major trophies in our history and many on here acclaiming Glasner as our greatest ever manager in implementing it so well.

Nonetheless, there is no doubt that there was a drop of form last season after the sale of Guehi and injuries to Munoz meaning the likes of Sosa, Devenny and Johnson were used as RWB which clearly negated our threat down the right.

We are certainly well short of making the system work with the currently available players.

I echo these sentiments. We were fourth at the beginning of December. Then Munoz suffered his injury, Sarr became unavailable and we had a terrible run of form.
Others on here have complained about tactics, but in my opinion it is the drop off in quality of player that is the main reason for our current level of performance. Sage is a dead man walking and we will probably lose by two or three this afternoon. But whoever replaces Sage, it is very unlikely to result in a significant improvement in performance. With our current squad we will still be in the bottom 3 at Christmas.

 

[Lanzo-Ad]

The system did have it’s successes with the only 3 major trophies in our history and many on here acclaiming Glasner as our greatest ever manager in implementing it so well.

Nonetheless, there is no doubt that there was a drop of form last season after the sale of Guehi and injuries to Munoz meaning the likes of Sosa, Devenny and Johnson were used as RWB which clearly negated our threat down the right.

We are certainly well short of making the system work with the currently available players.

The formation only works in games that the other team has the ball, Man City 78%, and you play on the break, like the cup final, Forest fans think they have turned the corner, but will lose in their next game against Bournemouth, Tactics, Tactics, Tactics, i haven't looked but i would bet all of our best results under Glasner came with under 30% possession, and the worse results came when we had more possession than the oppo.

 

[park the bus]

The system did have it’s successes with the only 3 major trophies in our history and many on here acclaiming Glasner as our greatest ever manager in implementing it so well.

Nonetheless, there is no doubt that there was a drop of form last season after the sale of Guehi and injuries to Munoz meaning the likes of Sosa, Devenny and Johnson were used as RWB which clearly negated our threat down the right.

We are certainly well short of making the system work with the currently available players.

The system was wholly reliant on Munoz and was very one dimensional, no plan B when Munoz got injured, or when he recovered no plan B for his loss of form. At a guess Khalaili is meant to be a direct replacement for Munoz but as we have seen it hasn't worked because frankly the entire formation is in error. If it was in any way functional we wouldn't be in 19th place, but here we are.

 

[elgin eeagle]

Surely relegation is an expense we can afford even less.

if it means the corporate bodge stand gets shelved for something half the cost with a much higher capacity then thats a win in itself imo.

 

[PatrickA]

I echo these sentiments. We were fourth at the beginning of December. Then Munoz suffered his injury, Sarr became unavailable and we had a terrible run of form.
Others on here have complained about tactics, but in my opinion it is the drop off in quality of player that is the main reason for our current level of performance. Sage is a dead man walking and we will probably lose by two or three this afternoon. But whoever replaces Sage, it is very unlikely to result in a significant improvement in performance. With our current squad we will still be in the bottom 3 at Christmas.

Indeed after Christmas as well as being without Guehi, we had spells without Munoz , Sarr and Mateta for a variety of reasons reinforcing the view the difficulty of implementing the system without players who could implement it properly.

We had the warning in the form post Christmas about the absence of players to suit the system.

In the first part of the season when all the components were available we had I think the longest unbeaten run in Europe and an outstanding defensive record.

 

[Lanzo-Ad]

from 25/26 some random matches,
Liverpool H 28% 2-1
Brentford H 36% 2-0
AZ Alkmar H 35% 3-1
Fulham A 37% 2-1
Shaktar A 29% 3-1

Larnaca H 67% 0-1
Spurs H 62% 0-1
Macclesfield 72% 1-2
Forest A 67% 1-1
Burnley H 65% 2-3

 

[JHB]

Indeed after Christmas as well as being without Guehi, we had spells without Munoz , Sarr and Mateta for a variety of reasons reinforcing the view the difficulty of implementing the system without players who could implement it properly.

We had the warning in the form post Christmas about the absence of players to suit the system.

In the first part of the season when all the components were available we had I think the longest unbeaten run in Europe and an outstanding defensive record.

People keep talking about the system but Sage’s system is very different to Glasner’s.

Sage plays with the wing backs almost permanently pushed on, the two midfielders pushed up close to the front three and trying to win the ball high up. This means every time we lose possession or are played past the opposition have a more or less clear run at our back three.

Glasner played with a compact, defensive, system with the midfielders shielding the back three and the number tens dropping into midfield to block passing avenues. It was heavily reliant on playing on the break, the wing backs picking when to overlap and the centre forward doing a huge amount of work.

About the only thing the two have in common is they notionally are 343

 

[MarkA333]

I don’t think it matters who our manager is. We are 4 players light of a capable premiership team. The best we can hope for is not to be too far adrift in the window and bring in two or three excellent defenders and replacements for Sarr and Mateta.

 

[JHB]

Absolutely this. I feel for Sage as he has been thrown under the bus, and because the players are giving 100% for him to the final whistle i dont think he deserves the sack, but if he starts Richards and Cannot with Disasi ahead of Chilwell and Lerma then i think Liverpool will win easily and that will then do for him. The defence was weakened with the loss of Lacroix and Munoz in the summer, and then further weakened with the loss of Riad and Tomiyasu.

Which was 100% predictable. In both cases they are injured 80% of the time and occasionally pop up to play a handful of games. Riad has played under 40 senior games in his whole career! Relying on those two was never a good option.

Also not sure Riad weakens anything. When he has played for us he’s not looked very good. Physically under powered for the Premier League with dubious positioning

 

[rikz]

Who remembers when leeds were getting battered by man city, Farke was getting sacked. What did he do ? Completely changed formation at half time, they came back and won, im sure it was around Christmas time, he's still manager, they play a completely different style of football and they're doing fine.

So anyone who says you can't expect the manager to change his philosophy or the way we play, is just complete rubbish, thats exactly what needs to happen, blame the players all you want, the squad is going to remain the same. If we play today how we have been all season then he needs to go, if we stick then blame now shifts from the manager to the board.

 

[PatrickA]

People keep talking about the system but Sage’s system is very different to Glasner’s.

Sage plays with the wing backs almost permanently pushed on, the two midfielders pushed up close to the front three and trying to win the ball high up. This means every time we lose possession or are played past the opposition have a more or less clear run at our back three.

Glasner played with a compact, defensive, system with the midfielders shielding the back three and the number tens dropping into midfield to block passing avenues. It was heavily reliant on playing on the break, the wing backs picking when to overlap and the centre forward doing a huge amount of work.

About the only thing the two have in common is they notionally are 343

I agree with this in terms of the different approaches to the system but believe our current squad don’t have the players to make the system work either way.
In fact it could be argued that Sage’s gung go method of implementation makes the frailties exposed even more.

It may be a new manager will seek to solidify us even if 3 centre backs are retained e.g make it more of a 5 at the back with 3 in midfield.
The thing is without Sarr, we don’t have the pace to counterattack.
Interesting times ahead.

 

[JHB]

I agree with this in terms of the different approaches to the system but believe our current squad don’t have the players to make the system work either way.
In fact it could be argued that Sage’s gung go method of implementation makes the frailties exposed even more.

It may be a new manager will seek to solidify us even if 3 centre backs are retained e.g make it more of a 5 at the back with 3 in midfield.
The thing is without Sarr, we don’t have the pace to counterattack.
Interesting times ahead.

I agree with you. It’s crying out for a back 4 and an extra man in midfield.

 

[eaglesdare]

Kinda feels like a date with destiny today. Either we pull somthing out of the hat and have a season turner or we get wolloped and sage is goes

 

[park the bus]

I don’t think it matters who our manager is. We are 4 players light of a capable premiership team. The best we can hope for is not to be too far adrift in the window and bring in two or three excellent defenders and replacements for Sarr and Mateta.

The latest round of cheapo and free transfers could give the impression that Parish hasn't got a pot to piss in. Where's the money coming from for the additions you recommend? Releasing Sarr and Mateta maybe, but they would have to be replaced thus bringing us back to square one.