Ranieri Sacked

Discussion in 'The Hornets' Nest - Watford Chat' started by Relegation Certs, Oct 4, 2021.

  1. Knight GT

    Knight GT Predictor extraordinaire 2013/14

    Was decent yesterday to be fair
     
    watto1 likes this.
  2. Oscar calling

    Oscar calling Squad Player

    Or have Burnley's manager who only needs basically journeyman players to retain Premiership status year after year!
     
  3. Chumlax

    Chumlax Squad Player

    Mmm, that's essentially the very defined identity and specific style, though.
     
  4. Burnsy

    Burnsy First Team

    Hardly a standout game either! There’s a huge body of evidence that supports my view sadly.
     
    wfcmoog likes this.
  5. Cassetti's Beard

    Cassetti's Beard First Team

    Utd, Leicester, Chelsea and City up next. Good chance CR could be 1 W 7 L
     
  6. LondonOrn

    LondonOrn Squad Player

    It's not that bizarre, Kiko strikes me very much as a confidence player, and it's possible performing well in the Championship and being arguably our player of the season, as opposed to being in a team that was losing many games and didn't have a settled personnel in terms of players and manager, may have rejuvenated him. If Sarr can get performing at or near his best again and thus recreate that chemistry between them that was so effective last season, and Kiko has a run of games under his belt where he plays the full 90 minutes and has more solid displays like yesterday, then we'll be in a good position to judge whether or not he has improved. Players can have resurgences even in the twilight of their career - don't forget that then 34-year-old Holebas was one of our standout performers in 2018/19 after many wanted him out previous seasons and Capoue was probably our best player the same season after blowing hot and cold since 2015/16.
     
    Supertommymooney likes this.
  7. a19tgg

    a19tgg First Team

    It is bizarre, utterly bizarre. One season in the championship isn’t going to magically elevate a 30 year old players ability and talent beyond the levels they hit in the other 10+ years of their career. If anything it’s likely to blunt it even further when suddenly faced with opponents of a much higher quality. At 30 years of age competing against lower quality opposition isn’t going to do any player any good. The only way for anyone to improve their skills (if it’s even possible beyond your physical peak of 27.5 as an athlete) is to pit themselves against the best.

    Beyond the top 2/3 teams it’s a league totally bereft of any quality, the explanation really isn’t any more complicated than that.

    If he was an 18 year old kid who went out on loan then you could make the argument, but he’s 30, the championship doesn’t have magical cocoon like nature and logic defying qualities.
     
    Jumbolina, Burnsy, wfcmoog and 2 others like this.
  8. Moose

    Moose First Team Captain

    I’ve seen enough to convince me we will stay up.

    It’s going to be fugly, tense, exasperating, but ultimately triumphant. Ranieri in!
     
    SkylaRose and lutonh8a like this.
  9. Knight GT

    Knight GT Predictor extraordinaire 2013/14

    No you're absolutely right but I feel credit where it's due, I thought he played well against Arsenal.
     
  10. ITK platypus

    ITK platypus Squad Player

    Just to play devil's advocate, your analysis completely ignores confidence and form. Kiko had a very good PL season the year before we went down, a lot went wrong the next year and a lot of players looked crap. A year of taking the piss out of Championship full backs may well have helped Kiko regain some of that previous form. We're not talking about a 35 year old.

    He's not a world beater, but he's good enough for us at the moment.
     
  11. Chumlax

    Chumlax Squad Player

    This is hyperbole, and also ironically completely ignores confidence and form in the context of the entire team playing better as a collective for 2/3rds of that season than they had at any other point in that five-year Prem run. Femenia has always been an average-at-absolute-best full back at Prem level, only rendered so by his pace allowing him to recover, and yet still severely susceptible to balls in behind him and being caught up the pitch/out of position.

    He's had that one supposed good season in his time here - that's the outlier, not the converse; this idea of his previous 'form' is fantastical, as is the idea that the only reason anyone has an opinion of him other than 'good Premier League full back' is because of some misguided judgement taken solely from a relegation season (which actually does also reflect on him - especially as he was one of the senior players, in his prime, during that season).

    When all it takes is Nathan Jones noticing any of this to make him look like such a mug he gets sent off and we lose to our second most hated bunch of rival cloggers during that season he was 'taking the piss out of Championship full backs', that should really tell you something.
     
    Last edited: Nov 9, 2021
    wfcmoog likes this.
  12. a19tgg

    a19tgg First Team

    Confidence only gets you so far, how many times over the years have we seen an unfancied team from the championship get promoted, do well for a period then fall away. The momentum from the previous season carries them so far, but ultimately they find their natural level eventually, dictated by their actual talent.

    Obviously it’s all a matter of opinions, but nobody will convince me that a 30 year old player can get better by playing against inferior opposition, my view is that if anything, it will make them worse. To be the best you need to test yourself against the best and learn from it.

    Extra confidence from running rings round inferior opposition is living in a fools paradise, gravity will always get you at some point.
     
    wfcmoog likes this.
  13. WatfordTalk

    WatfordTalk First Team

    -Player is an average PL full back
    -Player has a poor season in a poor team and has low confidence leading to further poor performances
    -Player has excellent season at a lower level, regains confidence in ability
    -Player refinds their level as an average PL full back

    Not sure why that's such an outlandish scenario.
     
  14. Chumlax

    Chumlax Squad Player

    In my opinion, of course - because average PL full back is generous, and because he relies almost exclusively on pace in a defensive sense whilst now being the wrong side of 30 and demonstrably made of glass; a heady cocktail.
     
    wfcmoog likes this.
  15. Relegation Certs

    Relegation Certs Squad Player

    I can't help but think kiko is the least of our worries.
     
    miked2006 likes this.
  16. Chumlax

    Chumlax Squad Player

    I don't greatly disagree with this, but that isn't the ringing endorsement that it could be, of anything at all.
     
  17. WatfordTalk

    WatfordTalk First Team

    Fair enough, agree to disagree. Personally think he's always been pretty average, occasionally having poor games (positioning always been an issue) and occasionally having good games.
     
    Chumlax likes this.
  18. wfcmoog

    wfcmoog Tinpot

    Kiko is gash, but he's better than Sarr.
     
    CarlosKickaballs likes this.
  19. LondonOrn

    LondonOrn Squad Player

    At the moment he's probably our best defender behind Nkoulou and Sierralta but of course many people will say that's not saying much.
     
  20. LondonOrn

    LondonOrn Squad Player

    So are you saying that any elevation in his performances from those of 2019/20 as a result of the confidence Kiko has gained from playing well in a lower division will only be fleeting, and soon he will return to his "natural level", ie that of the aforementioned season? Not sure I agree with you in the case of Kiko; what you described in your first paragraph applies more to players who are totally new to the Premier League and starry-eyed and eager to prove themselves against the best opposition, who may underestimate them. I think it's more likely that unless he has actually been on the decline at this level (and I'm not convinced that could be true, after all 30 is not that old for a full back) that this increased confidence could result in him returning to the effective level he was at during 2017-19 when he was keeping Janmaat out of the team for long periods (and I don't remember any criticism of him before the FA Cup final).

    Players can have ups and downs at any stage of their career for whatever reason - look at the Newcastle team who woefully underperformed and got relegated in 2008/09 and completely ran away with the Championship the following season before surviving comfortably back in the Prem with largely the same group of players. Who's to say Kiko couldn't have that resurgence if he's given a good run of games?
     
    WatfordTalk likes this.
  21. Burnsy

    Burnsy First Team

    Kiko is an above average Championship right-back yet a poor Premier League right-back.

    Looked great last season because the gap in quality allowed him pretty much to play as a second, more defensive, right winger almost and constantly play close to Sarr and have lots of interaction in the middle and final thirds of the pitch.

    In the PL, the interaction with Sarr is so much less because he’s called upon to do far more of what he’s not that good at - being defensive. He’s not awful, and as others have said, he’s far from being our biggest problem….but an upgrade will be needed sooner rather than later. He’s yet another that I think if we made him available to any other PL club, none of them would take him. See Masina, WTE, Kabasele, Cathcart. It’s a damning indictment that over half our defenders are only known as PL players because they are contracted to us, rather than their actual ability to be one.

    But if I was a betting man, I’d still wager Gino will give new deals to over half the names above instead of doing anything major about it.
     
    Last edited: Nov 9, 2021
  22. Chumlax

    Chumlax Squad Player

    The 09/10 season they played in the Championship was the season Andy Carroll became a starter for them, having managed a paltry 500 minutes over the course of 14 appearances the season they were relegated - going on to register 17 goals and 12 assists to fire them to promotion at the first time of asking.

    On top of that, during the summer of 2010, in preparation for their return to the Prem, they signed Danny Simpson on a permanent deal (having been on loan for the second half of the previous season), Cheik Tiote, and Hatem Ben Arfa. Of course, Carroll went on to get 11 goals and 8 assists in the 19 appearances that made up the first half of season - earning him his fabled big money move to Liverpool.

    The idea that Newcastle were promoted and comfortably stayed up the next season with largely the same team doesn't really give a full/accurate reflection of what actually happened there.
     
  23. a19tgg

    a19tgg First Team

    I’m not sure how you're argument can possibly hold up when surely confidence is a two way street?

    We’ve lost 7/11 games this season, conceded 19 goals and failed to keep a clean sheet.

    If last season gave him confidence, then is this season somehow unable to take that confidence away, despite our defence being absolutely abysmal?!

    Let’s not even mention the fact he can never make it through a full 90 minutes, I’d imagine despite all this, that magical talent elevating confidence gained running rings round Wycombe Wonderers defenders is still coursing round his veins, completely unhindered.
     
  24. WatfordTalk

    WatfordTalk First Team

    Let's not, seeing as he played 90 against Arsenal, and Leeds.

    Oh and 24 times last season.
     
  25. RS2

    RS2 Squad Player

    He's made five appearances in the PL this season and has had to come off after an hour in three of them. It's hardly great and probably a point worth making.

    Also last season he failed to play the full 90 in thirteen games, basically a third of all the games he played. I understand some of those are probably due to games being won already, giving Ngakia minutes etc. Kiko is probably the most unreliable player in the squad though, I genuinely expect him to go off every game.
     
    Last edited: Nov 10, 2021
  26. Forzainglese

    Forzainglese Reservist

    Kiko is a good out-and-out wing-back when Sarr is playing well. It is not an exaggeration to think he could convert back into a right winger in an emergency. He is a blow-average Premier League defensive right back, however. If Sarr remains well below his most effective we may be better off playing Ngakia at right back, as he is marginally a better defender and arguably a young improver, IMO.
    If Sarr perks up (not guaranteed) play Kiko.
    It is not really true Kiko has had a long career as full back; he was a winger for a while. And I don't actually believe it is impossible for a 30 year old to continue learning and improving. It depends on the player.
    Having the pace to get yourself out of trouble as a full back is not a crime and it didn't do Lloyd Doyley any harm (and he really couldn't kick a ball straight!).
    Finally, wasn't it established at one time that Kiko had genuine depression problems? Now that doesn't do wonders for your confidence.
     
  27. WatfordTalk

    WatfordTalk First Team

    I didn't say he always makes it through every game. I disputed that he 'never' makes it through a game
     
  28. miked2006

    miked2006 Premiership Prediction League Proprietor

    If we get relegated under Ranieri, there is no way we can blame the manager.

    We're half a team away from a decent side.
     
  29. CarlosKickaballs

    CarlosKickaballs Forum Picarso

    Pozzo won't be getting new defenders in January so lets just save the poor old guy the indignity and sack him now
     
    NorwegianOrn likes this.
  30. The undeniable truth

    The undeniable truth First Team Captain

    He’s had his chance.
    It’s “Pardew time”.
    Could do a job.
     
  31. The undeniable truth

    The undeniable truth First Team Captain

    We don’t have the funds to assemble a decent prem side. This is as good as it gets unless we want to take big financial gambles…… Jumbo’s Louza post and my Bayat response.
     
  32. folkestone orn

    folkestone orn Squad Player

    This. Looking forward to Pozzo apologists justifying not strengthening the defence on February 1st.
     
  33. folkestone orn

    folkestone orn Squad Player

    Kiko is literally the least of our worries when it comes to having a passable defence.
     
  34. Hogg-DEENEY!!!

    Hogg-DEENEY!!! Squad Player

    That might still be true, but right now I think just 2 players, a new LB and a new CB, would make me sooooo much more confident
     
  35. a19tgg

    a19tgg First Team

    At the moment it’s like the poor guy is trying to play a computer game on hard mode, where at least 2/3 defenders are actually plants who are actively trying to sabotage the outcome.
     

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