We’ve now failed to score in EIGHT of Gracia’s 13 matches in charge. It’s a free society. People are more than entitled to criticise those of us who don’t fully endorse him as our Head Coach. But for me that is a very damning statistic. Yes we are creating chances. Yes he inherited his forwards when he arrived. Yes we’ve had injuries. But he is the Head Coach. He lives or dies by results under him. And they simply haven’t been good enough.
The culprits are the players, not the coach. Gary Neville pointed out the first goal we had a great shape to defend, then Holebas let's the cross in for the 10,000th time in his career, and Karnezis inexplicably drops a chest high ball. You can't go back to the training ground and work on brain dead mistakes I'd prefer we actually gave Javi the players he wants to go again next season. I'm bored of changing coaches every ten seconds
I'd rather take relegation than change coaches again, I feel so embarrassed when the pundits talk about it.
Positive performance today, quality of finishing was the difference as was always going to be the case. Some of our midfield play was excellent and good base to build on for next season. PLEASE just give Gracia a chance to build, instead of replacing him for another unknown southern European coach. Sacking Gracia will get us nowhere. There's a good team in there which is close to emerging. I'm confident we will get a tidy win next Saturday which will send us into the Summer with an air of positivity. We can put our feet up for the World Cup watching Will Hughes guide England to an unlikely semi final appearance.
We had enough chances. How can we blame Grazia for the players not finishing - if we had Kane we probably would have scored 3 Richarlison -40m
He should wear some of his low crotch designer shorts. That way at least he might trap the ball there on occasions.
Sure but do you feel the Head Coach bears no responsibility them for the performance of the players he selects? He’s the one coaching them all week. Under Gracia, who do we feel has improved? Has our defence got any better? Is our finishing better? Under him, our leading scorer has failed to score. Richarlison (who was in decline anyway, it’s true) has yet to score. Neither has Okaka or Gray. He’s probably got more out of Hughes than Silva managed, Capoue’s hit some form but usually does during the lighter days, and Pereyra was showing some form too until the inevitable injury. But has he really improved us that much? With Gracia’s supposed input, we signed three players soon after he arrived. Only one has had any impact. One hasn’t even kicked a ball in anger for us. Hmmm.
That was actually better than I expected. We were neat and tidy for a lot of it. Holebas covering for Richarlison for 90 minutes.
I thought the defence was quite well drilled tonight, it was individual errors that let us down. Gracia had clearly instructed Mariappa and Holebas to tuck in and not go wider than the width of the penalty box to stop Spurs getting in down the sides of the centre backs. Ok, it left us vulnerable to a lot of crosses coming into the box but we were dealing with them ok until Karnezis' howler. I'm not sure what he was supposed to do tonight - our squad has two left backs that are mentally incapable of concentrating for a full 90 minutes, Janmaat who is good on the ball but one of the worst one on one defenders I've ever seen, and Mariappa who is quite a good defender but one of the worst passers of the ball I've ever seen. Deulofeu wasn't fit enough to start so Kiko had to play further up the pitch, and whatever selection of centre backs he put out (tonight's was probably the best), they're all 5-6 out of 10 centre backs prone to errors. Cathcart had a good game but why oh why did he move away from Kane for the second goal? He was right next to their main goal threat, who stood still seven yards out and Cathcart just ran straight past him to leave him unmarked. Same as against Bournemouth, he was marking Ake for the free kick in the last minute, then just wandered off into space and gave him a free header. I don't think any amount of coaching can stop a 29 year old with 300 odd career appearances from just inexplicably leaving their man.
As much as Kabasele and Cathcart are upgrades on Mapps and Prodl at centre back, as the latter pair are prone to do both today made significant mistakes which contributed to the opposition's goals. People are pointing the finger at Karnezis for the first goal, but have a look at Kabasele who dives across the box as if to head it out, only to duck at the last minute just in front of Karnezis' eyeline. One would hope Karnezis should still hold it, but it's clear that he got distracted by Kabasele and Neville pointed that out at half time. Cathcart fell asleep twice for the Kane goal as well. We look better with Gray up top away from home, of course, but he just has no composure in front of goal. Richie at least looked a bit sharper and livelier than in previous months, but his final ball remains dreadful. Can't be too disheartened though, it was a better performance overall than I expected given the opposition, but the same issues persist. Fyi, Gracia sounded like a broken man in the interview on Sky at the end of the game - and dodged a question about whether he was hoping to regain form going in to next season by saying that he is just thinking about the next game. Sounds like a dead man walking imo.
By the last portion of the game, you could see it on his face, he knows he's going to be invited to leave. He can feel it in his waters, it was almost literally written all over him. Getting the exact same feeling as we did when Wally was sent packing, and Quique before it. A gradual winding down, until we reach a point where there aren't any results-based excuses anymore. I would be shocked, whether it's the right thing or not, if we don't start seeing leaks about Gracia knowing he's gone at the end of the season within the week.
Spurs were there for the taking tonight. They were off-form, possibly still down after losing their semi final. But we couldn’t and didn’t take them. We’ve now equalled our longest winless run since our promotion. Excuses seem to be everywhere again tonight. We deserved better. We shouldn’t expect to win against such more esteemed clubs. The Head Coach doesn’t have any input in actually coaching the players. Injuries. Loss of form. Etc etc. Excuses abound everywhere. But not all of us buy them. If we don’t beat Newcastle, chances are we will end this season with nine games without victory. Do we really want to take that form and this current set-up into next season?
Just back, yes we left early but even then the station was rammed with Spuds. Two things sum it up. 1. Stop giving away p*ss soft goals. 2. Take our chances when they come. Otherwise a few things to note. Did you know the Wembley Arch flashes when Tottenham score? It's really sh*t. Tottenham fans get REALLY wound up when you sing "Same old tottenham, won f*ck all again". Stewards in our bit were superb. Still enjoyed the game despite the score.
Muff already there from fair play league, you can't foul when lying on the floor feigning injury whereas we have Deeney and Holebas.
Like Malteser said, we have been playing good football, including tonight but our results have been far from good enough. It seemed that our early season form got us of trouble for the third season running. As a fan, I was excited at this Watford side looked as good as anybody in the autumn, it just disappoints me how we have never played a 4.4.2 when we need to buckle up when injuries, change of boss, goals conceded etc. We needed to become hard to beat again ala early 2015-16. Janmaat at RB, Britos as LB (It would work in a deep, narrow formation), JH ,MZ ,Chas, GF or RP on the wings or up front with TD or SO if needed. Ok it sounds like a QSF style but we certainly had more options than Jurado and Abdi on the wings from then. Ighalo was a technician and had a good first touch. Now it seems despite our endeavour and playing promising football, our attack almost seems to implode through sheer effort but lacking in finesse
it's clear there were individual defensive errors here, it's hard to escape the fact that karnezis inexplicably dropped the ball is anything but his fault. saying that, there was more than one occasion when we were exposed from crosses and just looked clueless. we simply did not know what to do, holebas dummied the ball for their second, mariappa inadvertently handballed one, vertonghen hit the post. there was enough to suggest a pattern which goes beyond any one player.
This was right in front of us, Karnezis clearly and loudly called that the ball was his then Cathcart ran right across him and looked like he was trying to clear the ball, (at least I thought it was Cathcart).
Couldn’t have any been any more toothless if we tried. Capoue, Hughes and Doucoure worked their socks off, the others can take a running jump.
Of all the sticks to beat Gracia with, I don't think transfers is fair. I doubt he asked for us to sign a suspended defensive midfielder who was in and out of the Championship's bottom team and an unproven winger who just so happened to be represented by Gino's favourite Belgian agent (responsible for previous hits such as Oulare, Sven Kums and Okaka). He's played Deulofeu whenever he could, it's hardly his fault he got injured so early on. I'd imagine he has even less input on transfers than Quique, Mazzarri and Silva, as he's a lower profile coach - he seems like the ultimate "Yes Man", willing to work with whatever he's given.
Agree. That was my reply to the suggestion that he would get the summer to bring in all the players he wanted.
Only saw the last half hour and it was good to see GD playing again. I suppose Gravy is toast,which is a shame as he seems a decent,honourable man at least. Who's next I wonder? Will Ossie Ardiles ever pay me the £10 he owes me from 1988? See you Saturday!
Kabasele and Cathcart look our best two at CB - I agree. But yet, they still can't concentrate or stop basic errors for 90 minutes. Sorry, just not good enough and for that I cannot blame Gracia. Much the same as I cannot blame Gracia for Richarlison failing to get back in for the 2nd goal. Nor can I blame him for Richarlison blazing over...or Karnezis dropping the ball. He's not out there catching or kicking so he can't be blamed for those individual things.... But.....he can be blamed for all of them collectively. He is the manager. It's down to him. And he's not coaching them to be better. Its as simple as that. The stats are damning against him and he's not showing nearly enough fire to change it. He continuously drags off our best player. What did he say in those 15 mins at H/T today??? That lot came out looking completely deflated. The last two seasons have showed that the likely death-knell of our PL life will be a poor start to any given season - given the way we finish them. Can anyone honestly say that they would expect us to start a season well under his tactics given what we have seen? Remember, both home and away! I definitely have sympathy with those saying they don't want to sack him because they are bored of us sacking managers and want stability and/or the embarrassment of continuously doing so to stop. I want the same. But I want it to stop because we have the right one in charge. This guy will see us relegated next year if he stays in charge. He may not be the one on the touchline come May 2019 - but I feel the damage will be done long before then. Gino must act and get both - another progressive manager in, and also invest in some quality defenders. The time is now. If it means selling Doucoure or Richarlison to fund it, so be it. This isn't 'entitled'. This isn't 'bed-wetting'. This is based on everything I have seen from him since he was brought in. He's kept us up (most likely) but his audition after that has been a disaster.
Very fair. But it's a stick to beat someone with. We were well stocked in midfield and desperately needed defenders and a striker. And as much as we love Deloufeu and I would not retract his signing, we bought 3 midfielders. There is something fundamentally wrong with recruitment.
