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I think this is a good and important point. You can change the smell of the place in one afternoon if you get a professional involved that doesn't suffer chancers and charlatans. As plenty of others have said in plenty of threads - a fresh football CEO and a genuine 'football man' DOF could completely change the look and feel of the place overnight.
I also wonder whether tackling the opposition might have helped.
Actually just introducing ourselves at the start of the game giving the opposition the impression there are two teams on the pitch would do compared to that absolute fcking heinous joke of a first half.
This is the tightest division in world football. If you're even a tiny bit 'off' from a physical and mental standpoint you'll be found out. It's hardly a leap - given that half the squad seem to have had some sort of injury issue at some point all season - that those that ARE injury free perhaps don't feel like they're at peak physical fitness. Last night and Sunday it looked like every one single of them was running on fumes from kick off.
Of course the injuries are a problem but it doesn't end there. There are rumours of serious discontent behind the scenes. Most seem to revolve around our Director of Performance. There are rumours some players are so dissatisfied with their training and preparation they've employed their own trainers or left the club or both. Of course you don't have to believe rumours but there's a heck of a lot of smoke about the place and has been for a couple of years.
It's not as simple as 'getting players back'. We've had Varane and Saito back and they're arguably both in the worst form of their careers at the moment. I'd put that down to poor physical preparation and / or a lack of confidence in their bodies.
We started the season AGAIN like an oil tanker in a speed boat race. Looked dreadfully ill prepared and physically inferior to our opponents for at least a month.
There have been some promising recruitment signs I shan't deny that but before the farcical injuries hit a lot of us already had large concerns about the shape and depth of the squad. Thin in both full back positions, thin in creativity. Thick in lightweight runners that depend on physical mismatches to excel.
It's fair to question whether we have enough know-how and character throughout the squad. Don't make me bring up Clint Hill and Shaun Derry. Whoops I just did. The only player in this entire squad I'd class as having genuine congnitive fortitude would be Cook. And we started the season by whipping his captaincy away.
We all sat and observed our club publicly fall out and bicker with our head coach at the end of last season. It was embarassing.
We still have information withheld. Nobody knows where Chair is, he appears to have vanished. And some of the information we are given is misleading at best and outright lies at worst. We were told condescendingly last year that we probably will start seasons slowly so that our squad is better prepared for the second half and last quarter of the season. How the fck is that playing out? We were miles off it at the start and we're further off it now.
Consider all that and tell me this is just a bump in the road or a blip and that great times are just around the corner. For me it's far more likely that these runs that we seem woefully prone to are the real reflection of what it's like playing for this club as a whole. The better times we've seen is the overperformance. The norm is this crap.
I don't have any time for speculative excuses but if there is substance behind the rumours that the fitness and preparation at the club is so bad that the likes of Chair and Frey felt they had to go rogue and employ their own trainers... That will without doubt descend into these sorts of occurrences.
This league is so tight that if you turn up with 98% effort in any game at all you'll get beat 3-0 or worse. If the players themselves - even subconsciously - are worried about getting injured and / or don't feel 100% tuned then you simply won't get their best effort. They won't be able to give it. That's not me condemning the players or their psyche by the way - it's just the nature of sport at this level.
Here's another speculative conspiracy for you by the way. Cook was supposed to have had the hump with the club before yesterday. Almost guaranteed to not be here next season. Possibly / probably got an axe to grind. Get's picked. Goes down injured in second half. Could that be his way of trying to force the hands on the tiller to act as a parting shot?
Yes they definitely can both be true - For me, they definitely ARE true.
I just want it called out that we went through what we went through with Marti so that CN could situ his own man. Well here he is and this is where it's got us. I just want it marked that we've arguably / probably gone backwards with coaching this season after that ego trip and character smirching propaganda that Nourry conducted 12 months ago. It's yet another bad smell emanating from HQ. Nobody wins. Super.
Well we've just lost our last three games 11-0 on aggregate. Two of those at home.
Over 5 games we've been edged out 15-4.
We've conceded more goals than everyone in the divison excepting Sheff Weds, who absolutely should be excepted.
I'm not saying he's THE problem but I'm starting to believe he's a part of it. It's not normal to defend as passively as they did for 90 minutes yesterday. It's not normal to lose league games in the Championship 7-1. And as stated earlier Ainsworth himself never conceded 4 goals as many times as Stephan has.
Everything is a mess. Including the current coach for me.
I'm not advocating sacking him now and I certainly don't think JUST replacing him will fix anything long-term. But I equally think it's important we don't just meander past the fact that he is Nourry's guy. We went through all that horrible snide Marti stuff 12 months ago to end up with THIS. Not only has Nourry put this medical / performance staff in place, he's also appointed a coach that manages to get the crap we've watched over the last three weeks out of the players that are available. Nourry is accountable for it all and right now Stephan looks like another tally in the 'absolute w@nk' column.
I'd add one more thing to this list around the strange communication and social media behaviour in the CN era, which is probably the root cause of your penultimate paragraph. It terrifies me how many things I read and hear in support of Nourry over football people. I think we're seeing propaganda in action. Not only are we left with performances like yesterday; we also have divisions within the fan base. It's scary stuff.
I mean do you want me to write the same paragraph again about changing managers definitely does bring changes?
I can't stand Nourry for far more reasons than just the farcical injury / fitness issues we've had for multiple seasons... But that doesn't mean Stephan should get a free ride. As Jack Supple tweeted yesterday, we have conceded 4+ goals in 4 different league games under Julien Stephan - twice as many as under Marti Cifuentes (2) and one more than under Gareth Ainsworth (3). He's had a far more talented set of players to pick from even considering the injuries he's had to suffer. At least four times this season we've sent teams out that have completely folded and tossed it in. We've done it three times in the last four games and the last three games consecutively.
We're being coached far worse than we were last season. That's yet another nail in Nourry's coffin from my perspective but Stephan himself is proving to be a total disaster and deserves far more criticism than he's getting at the moment.