Of course it was by comparison, the championship is a woeful standard, especially when gate receipts make up 90% of the clubs income and it was taken away. There is a reason us and Norwich walked the league, what do you think it was? Two genius mangers who coincidentally can’t cope a league higher, or just something far more simple like having considerably better players?
Inadequate to survive in the Prem, for sure, but the squad that Xisco had at his disposal in the second half of the season was brilliant for the Championship. We have strengthened since then, to the extent that with a decent manager we would have a chance of staying up (although Etebo is a blow for sure), but I can't say Xisco gives me much confidence of even giving us a fighting chance
Don’t disagree but some say we actually have a weaker squad in some areas like midfield (or at least older ) but like you say there is the quality and ability to put in a performance at Leeds or v Newcastle at least .
As a team we can play well but be beat by a better team on the day and lose. That is a completely normal situation, but this situation does not relate to Xisco. A manger can set his team up and get it wrong. In doing so he evaluates what is not working and makes changes to turn the tables and get back on track. The team is losing and the manager makes a game changing substitution based on how the game is glowing to turn the tables and we gain the win. The above 2 scenarios are probably the most common in management and yet Xisco has executed neither of the above, yet Watford are in these situations weekly. A manager with any sort of character can read the game and makes changes accordingly and at this level it is absolutely paramount that we have someone at the helm to do just that. I'm sick of watching aimless football with 0 ball retention and an actual plan to execute on the pitch. Are we playing wide to cross in? Are we playing our from the back? Are we playing the long ball picking up the 2nd ball? It's all basic principles that Xisco does nothing with game after game. I have every confidence that with a new manager we will comfortably avoid relegation. I've seen enough from the team to suggest we have enough quality to play some decent football but we are a Tesla on autopilot on course to crash.
Suffering two injuries in a match takes away a lot of a managers ability to change a game, as you’re fighting fires rather than able to go on the attack. Saying that, I think Xisco should probably go for our total nativity in the way the team was set up in the last two matches, and our total lack of bravery and commitment in 50-50s.
"best championship squad ever" ???? We didn't walk it - we finished 4 points clear of third. No adequate goalscorer. 35 year old free agent and FT from muff in midfield after losing Capoue, . Lazarr getting games at LB. Cathcart. Sema one of our key players. Strong squad, yes of course. One of the 3 favourites, of course. But as our chosen manager Ivic showed, promotion was certainly not guaranteed. Munoz deserves credit for turning it round but looks like he may be out of his depth at this level.
Had a look at Oddschecker just now, where he’s quoted at 9/4. Interestingly, there’s three times as much money for Arteta at 16/1. No massive gamble on Munoz just yet.
Hughes would definitely get into our midfield now that Etebo is injured, although Chalobah has never been a consistent Premier League level player. Sissoko and Tufan are upgrades on what we had last season
One of the best comparatively, taking into account the impact of Covid and FFP. That had a double benefit in that we kept players we otherwise may not have and the rest of the league were financially crippled and couldn’t strengthen. There may have been stronger championship teams on a like for like basis in years gone by, but they were competing against many other teams willing to chuck money at trying to get promoted pre FFP and Covid. Just compare the Derby play off final team of a few years back to their team now. The only outlier last season was Reading, in seasons gone by there would’ve been 6/7 Readings spending money beyond their means on chasing promotion. The fact we could afford to sack Ivic and bring someone else in and still get promoted just strengthens the point further. This is the first time in a long time 2/3 relegated teams bounced straight back and the 3rd also came very close, and the reason is a very simple and obvious one.
Well given our next run of games hope any new manager is given time ! He’ll need it. I agree last 2 games haven’t been good tactics wise though being outplayed by Leeds and probably more worryingly Newcastle.
Waking up and scanning my timeline to see that tweet was like pre-manna from heaven. The actual manna will be the corner flag, of course. I was particularly enraptured by this sentence:
To be fair, the lack of commitment isn't his fault. The camera clearly showed him clapping and shouting 'vamos!' A few times.
The likes of Cleverley, Sema, Kiko and Troost were all excellent at Champ level. At Prem level they're dross. This is why we were good enough to go up and bad enough to go down.
I haven't seen a single pattern of play from us this Season, where the coach sets us up to press or contain the oppo in a certain manner. I remember under Javi where the entire team made a coordinated press that sent the oppo back from our box eventually to their GK as everyone knew where and when to push at home. I have never seen that since. Nobody has a defined role outside of "play your game" and it is painfully clear when teams aren't open or clearly a class below we come undone.
History has a great habit of being re-written in the sporting world. So many words being written to trash the achievements of Xisco. He took over when we seemed in a state of unrest and most of us bored witless by the standard of play. We were slipping out of play-off contention. Yes he got ‘lucky’ with the Deeney injury. And after that we rarely looked back. But you don’t finish top two in the very tough Championship by merely smiling and keeping everybody happy and shouting vamos occasionally. Xisco didn’t win a lottery ticket to manage in the Premier League. He earned that ticket, by taking an unhappy but talented side and eventually, with a little help along the way, moulding it into a promotion winning machine. BUT BUT BUT Clearly the Premier League has proved a step up too far for this genial but inexperienced coach. We’ve not made a totally disastrous start. We have two wins, after all. Four clubs still have none. But we’ve not played well, not looked well coached or set up, and not taken the points we might have hoped for from a relatively kind set of fixtures. It’s time for a parting of the ways. But let’s not rewrite history, with the added benefit of hindsight too. Without Xisco we may well be a bankrupt Championship club right now. We owe him thanks. And to begrudge that with the ‘anybody could have done what he did last season’ approach is wide of the mark in my humble opinion.
Like QSF, he's welcome back anytime as a guest of honour but not as a head coach. Like Malteaser said, we can't disregard his achievments here but he had his shot at the Premier League and was clearly out thought and eventually out fought.
I would have loved to keep him as just a coach - but that doesn't happen these days. When we wanted Gracia gone early doors we turned to the worst possible option and guaranteed relegation. Hope they've learned from it.
Harsh but if we bring in the right man then it's justified. Wish him nothing but the best wherever he ends up
I wanted to stick £10 on him winning the sack race but when I looked on the Sky bet app a few weeks ago I couldn’t find the market. Bit annoyed now I didn’t try a little harder.
they aren’t run like us. Norwich will not sack Farke even if rock bottom. You’d be an idiot to bet on him going.
Good, nice bloke but not good enough to keep us up. Assume we already have someone lined up so announcement later today or tomorrow.
I hope we've already made the decision and it isn't a case of the two sackings two seasons ago where firstly we made the wrong call, and then secondly, we made the call to sack QSF without anyone lined up
I love it when this happens because it triggers morons like him. SkySports News having a melt down. Hahaha. Making out they know better than us what happens at our club. They look at league position currently but don't look at the bigger picture, i.e. what a kind start we had with fixtures and we've not taken advantage. Our next 8 are incredibly tough and would've seen us firmly in the bottom 3 under Xisco, no doubt.
Xisco did his job but his time was up. Grateful for his role in steering us away from potential oblivion, only a moron can’t see he did that. Just not experienced enough for the top table.
