Okay... I'm hurting right now. That was unbelievable poor, although the red was harsh at best - but at that point I was expecting 3 points, or 1 if the worst happened. But why contrast it it Bournemouth who are ... 2 points behind us and ... have played 1 game more... There are big things to sort out at Watford but lets not overreact from one game, If we do that we may as well support Arsenal and take part of Robbie's TV channel. The players were poor today but I think Mazzari comes out worst as he assumed we could wander our way through the game.
There can be no excuses for that. Seems we have a team of players content with 40 points and premier league football next year, rather than players with ambition and desire to win games. Shocking decision by the manager not to go for the throat straight after Hull went down to 10 men. We got exactly what we deserved from that game. 0 points and embarrassing ourselves against one of the worst teams in the league. Hull fought well and they deserve credit, but that was 1 dimensional and **** poor from us.
Sorry have I woken up in a cartoon? Even if I re-write your whole post for you I'm quite clear on the context. You think it's down to the manager to motivate the players, my quite straightforward response to that is that fantastically paid premier league footballers have a heavy responsibility to motivate themselves to deliver better than that. Is there some other magical way to read what you have written?
Because we came up together and without doing the maths, have spent a similar amount of money. So for me it's a natural comparison. They may be two points behind but tell me who's had more fun this season? Look at how Howe has got Josh King firing, an average player has now scored (I think) 14 goals this season? And despite all their gung-ho football, they STILL have a better goal difference than us.
Ok, fine. You claim that me saying "it is literally Mazzarri's JOB to prevent the players from playing that badly/being that lazy/performing that tactically ineptly. Further to that, was it the players' choice to change nothing whatsoever to adapt to the very fortunate situation we found ourselves in having been gifted an extra man for 2/3rds of the game?" means that I am somehow lacking in understanding about player's responsibility, in a lovely condescending way, of course. So explain to me travis, exactly how does overarching responsibility NOT fall on the manager for the way players play, in terms of both tactics and attitude? For not making correct changes or substitutions?
Comfortably midtable team loses to team scrapping to get out of the relegation spots is an absolute certainty this time of the season. Lets not get too excitable about it, it's absolutely natural for teams that feel comfortable to lose their intensity at this time of the season. Hopefully it's a little post 40 points lull and they'll lift themselves for the games against the big boys, knowing they can have a say in the top four chase.
Like you say, they sat everyone behind the ball... it would be hard not to have loads of possession. What did we do with it? After half time when Silva made the changes he wanted to we were restricted to passing the ball around our defense. Apart from long balls what did we do? Wingers were ineffective (would have benefitted from a few more overlapping runs from the full backs) and I'd be interested in seeing how many shots we had second half. Wasn't many and most of those were speculative efforts from outside the box.
I'm not going to bite ... but seriously you must are most pessimistic person ever. If they get something at Old Trafford then they have a chance to survive - BUT WE WILL NOT GO DOWN
Yeah but come on, it's been awful for the majority of the season. Not having a clue what to do in games is the norm now but against a ten man Hull City it's verging on unforgivable. No tactics, no urgency, no fight, nothing from either coach or players.
With the greatest of respect, it seemingly is very 'beyond' you. In modern football, possession doesn't count for much...it certainly isn't the most important statistic for today's game. 2 shots on target against a relegation threatened team with 10 men... Whether anyone is for, or against Walter, that's another argument. But today's performance can simply have no defence, whatever camp you're in. If you believe it was acceptable in any way, you are deluded.
Walter will probably say the sending off affected us more as it meant we were the team who should be attacking..
Completely agree with this. If i was paid £20k+ a week for what is essentially a part time job im sure i could motivate myself, or show some professional pride at least. It does highlight a problem with this team that has been there all season - the lack of any sort of leadership from amongst the players. Deeney especially needs to take a look at himself because not for the first time this season, when we have needed someone to step up, he's disappeared
You're an odd guy, let's leave it there. I made quite a simple and reasonable counter argument about the responsibility of big grown multimillionaire men in all of this, and you've emptied your bladder.
Which goes against every fibre of his being. The extent of Mazzarri's ambition is to scrape 1-0 wins at home and scrape 0-0 draws away from home, regardless of who we're playing or the match situation. Has anyone actually genuinely enjoyed watching us play this season?
It was acceptable, yes. I'm going to accept it. I've said it before and I'll say it again - we cannot win every game. People calling for the manager's head after every defeat is tiresome. As I said previously - any team, even those in the Top 6 would have trouble playing their way through that defence. We tried hard, but the quality (nor the space to give Hull credit) just wasn't there. Then, as can happen, we pushed a little bit too far forward, there was a bit of pinball around their box, a fortunate deflection then a decent pass and they're away. Shouldn't get caught on the counter like that, but it happens. I accept it. Then the second, it looked like Holebas had got a decent header away and enough distance but that Clucas lad hit a pearler. Just caught it sweet. It can happen. I accept it. We pushed hard to try to get one back and then make the last 10 mins or so exciting, but nothing came off. Hull did well at seeing the game out. Credit to them.
?!? I don't follow the hatred on this forum that many spout towards Bournemouth (I'm not suggesting you do either, but lots here do), but my point point is they aren't any better because of whatever they've done this season. Since when has goal difference counted more than points? And who's to say King is average? Heck - I've had in my fantasy football team for some time now - I'd love to have in our team I guess having supported Watford for so long long looking like we'll be in the top 15 of England is a good result for me. Is the best we could do? No. Is Mazzari bringing he best out of the team? No. We've had an average season, no more and no less
No conviction anywhere from anyone. No desire to take the game by the scruff of the neck. No pace or meaning to any of our attacks. No willingness to take on their defence. Players waiting for the ball to slowly trickle to their feet. The majority of passes, if you can call them that, are floaty balls up to Deeney who flicks the ball onto nobody, then moans. What's most ridiculous about the complete upheaval that has occurred throughout the last two seasons is that it has resulted in such little change - we still see the same soulless, unattractive football which brings the odd narrow win but never manages to excite for any substantial amount of time. The way we played today was exactly the same as the way we played in the last few months last season, and indeed most of this season. Hull on the other hand took any opportunity they had to counter with pace and conviction and they beat us comfortably. This was in spite of a horrendous refereeing decision which should have helped us. We were dreadful and I'm genuinely baffled that we are where we are at this stage of the season. Mazzarri should stay on the basis that we'll survive relatively comfortably in spite of some terrible luck with injuries, but there's just no joy to our play. It's such a shame. I miss Joka.
And you fail to understand the role of the manager in motivating his squad and implementing tactics. Regardless, I fail to see where the post you quoted overlooks the players responsibility. It simple puts emphasis on the manager doing his job sufficiently
First, fair play to Hull. They defended well and killed us on the counter. Justice was probably done in the end, after a harsh red and a poor turnout from us. I think it's easy to put it down to lack of effort, or the manager, but it's probably abit of everything - including a distinct lack of quality through the middle. We have 3 central midfielders who are athletic and can cover alot of ground, but the situation didn't play to their strengths at all. We were crying out for someone who would get between the lines and do something creative - but no one really took charge. Deeney had an absolute shocker, offered next no nothing. I won't sit here and put all the blame on him, it was obvious his lack of mobility was an issue and no attempt was made to try and get him into the game till Okaka came on. At the least it exposes the lack of options we have. Amrabat and Niang were ok, and suffered from slow passing into them. Whenever they got the ball 2 players had already moved across to cover, but the midfield 3 rarely made use of the resulting pocket in the middle. Mazzarri should have made changes sooner, particularly bringing Okaka on. People will claim their second was a wonder strike but putting all 11 players in the box just invited Clucas to shoot unchallenged. Having said that, the loss wasn't all down to the coach's tactics. The players weren't looking up for it, and I think we lack the right kind of players to unpick such a compact unit in the manner we tried. We looked alright towards the end of the first half - but in the second they shut us out and we were clueless. The reaction at the end was pretty toxic, not sure if it was completely warranted but people are entitled to their view.
Home TeamHullAway TeamWatford Possession Home34%Away66% Shots Home8Away13 Shots on Target Home3Away2 Corners Home4Away7 Fouls Home10Away11 Certainly doesn't tell the story of the second half or make me feel any better.
Says a lot that Deeney and Gomes were the only two to come over at the end and that Troy apologised for us bottling it today. Also said that the manger not speaking English isn't helping.
Today was an opportunity for players free of relegation fears to show they are actually quite a good team and deserve to be half way up one of the best leagues in the world. They failed to do this -even against ten men. For me that shows either they are not as good as they think they are, they are not hungry for success or they are not managed or coached properly.
Two games stick out for me the wins against Man U and Everton, games that we unlikely to win "on paper" but went out and got the win, West Brom was great backs to the wall stuff as well and Arsenal away would have been another game I think for those who were there. Generally though the games have been poor or worse with little entertainment levels, the fact we are tenth at the moment is a joke.
Yep - well put. Obviously you can't tar even player with this synopsis - as being a team game its often difficult to work out those that tried hard and had no support from the team and those that didn't care. But its difficult to lol on many players in a positive manner after tonight.
Agree with all your points. If we stay up, and that totally depends on other teams, then we've dodged a bullet. There's nothing good about the team at all. We've not progressed from last season, where we were a club in our debut season. In fact I think we've gone backwards as there have been so many performances like the one today. The players show no hunger and just go through the motions to fulfil an obligation to attend a match. There is fundamentally something wrong with the coaching side of the club and if it all remains in place next season, nothing will improve.
He hasn't argued his point or debated at all, but cried at being challenged on a point. Get yourself back to attempting to be funny.
I don't know, if i was paid £20k a week in my current job I'd sure as hell motivate myself to perform well every week because if I didn't I'd soon get the sack. If my company said here, have a £20k a week for the next four years guaranteed, I'd probably feel less inclined to bust my balls, which is the problem with some footballers. This becomes even more of a problem when they hit the 40 point mark, have absolutely nothing to lose or gain as they have done what they perceive to be their job already.
Not really. He put out a very strong lineup today and was very clear before the game on the importance he put on the players putting a shift in. They didn't, so a lot of the blame today sits with those on the pitch.
