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Tim Sherwood…gone \o/

Do you want Tim Sherwood to stay as manager?


  • Total voters
    125
  • Poll closed .
Re: Tim Sherwood - Head Coach

I think levy has made his decision, Tim is the man unless results start to go against him, I don't think he's actively trying to recruit anyone.

I do wonder about Baldini though, the body language between the two at the emirates was pretty interesting.
 
Re: Tim Sherwood - Head Coach

I think we could have sorted out the problems with the 4231 with some tweeks to players positioning with regards to supporting the striker. 442 has suddenly seen us getting men in the box for crosses, likely because two strikers are better than one for this sort of situation. If we had managed to get our #8 or #10 into the box alongside Soldado more often as well as the other wide forward ghosting in at the back post, then we would have seen more goals.

We play 4-2-3-1 and 4-3-3 in the U21s and youth set up when Sherwood held responsibility for them. I think that it is likely that we will move towards that once the ship has steadied and we get players back from injury.
 
Re: Tim Sherwood - Head Coach

My thoughts are pretty well summed up in this article:
http://www.theguardian.com/football/blog/2008/dec/18/4231-442-tactics-jonathan-wilson
(sorry to infect your browser with communism by going to that site ;) )

Especially the bit at the end about midfield flexibility. The 4-3-3/4-2-3-1/4-5-1 can become so many other formations with an individual's role changing very little and with very few adjustments to allow that. I don't believe the same can be said about 4-4-2 - mainly because of the way the midfield is set out. A player like Ade can drop deep to make a 4-5-1 or a 4-4-1-1 but that's not the same as the Eriksen/Siggy type that would normally inhabit that role. The 'wonky' goes some way to solving that problem - it allows you to play a creator-type without using one of your midfield two roles for it. Problem is, if that creator is tucked into the midfield to make up numbers then they're not where they can do the most danger in transition from defence to attack. One of your strikers is also likely to be out very wide to cover the width that your creator has left when tucking in to make up numbers.

The alternative is to give up the midfield battle, but that's not for me. Firstly it means you'll almost certainly lose to a good team, but secondly (and most importantly) I want to see my team passing the ball around and playing football, not chasing around whilst the opposition plays football.

OK so I had a read at this. It's a good article. Strangely it seems to both support and argue against my points regarding 442.

Further back in the thread I'd mentioned that it is the players chosen and how the manager sets up the team that dictates the formation when in posession of the ball. So although you start the game in a 442 formation, once in possession that changes. The article states something similar here;

'a side playing 4-4-2, with the wingers pushed high and one of the centre-forward dropping deep, is effectively playing a 4-2-3-1. When Manchester United beat Barcelona in the 1991 Cup-Winners' Cup final, for instance, they had Bryan Robson and Paul Ince holding, with Lee Sharpe and Mike Phelan wide, and Brian McClair dropping off Mark Hughes. Everybody still referred to it as 4-4-2, but it was in effect a 4-2-3-1.'

"It was the most symmetrical way I could find of playing with four forwards. One of the great advantages is that having the forwards high allows you to play the midfield high and the defence high, so everybody benefits.

You can do this with any formation. It's just a case of working the space and defending from the front.

Which actually is the point of tactics: to achieve this mulitplier effect on the players' abilities.

Supports my point that you play a system which suits the players at your disposal rather than employ a system and force fit players into it.

The changes to the interpretation of the offside law mean that defences tend to play deeper these days, and the game is therefore more stretched than it was even a decade ago; given that, it is perhaps logical to split the midfield into holders and creators and so play in four bands rather than three.

This is a fair point. Although you could argue (as the article sets out at the beginning), that playing two holding midfielders, two attacking wide players and a centre forward that drops deep in a 442 will end up playing as four bands rather than three due to the nature of the players.

All of which begs the question of whether, given many 4-4-2s were effectively 4-2-3-1s, it matters what we call it. Should we really hail Lillo as a pioneer, when his breakthrough was to do self-consciously and give a name to something that was already happening? Isolating and naming something, though, as Wittgenstein argues, is a highly significant step. Once an idea is understood fully enough that it can be described by a simple term – 4-2-3-1 – then work can begin on developing it. What happened in Spain in the early part of this decade, as the basic template moved from 4-4-2 to 4-2-3-1, was nothing less than a paradigm shift.

I suppose the bold is the crux of my point really. He makes a fair point that once it is understood it can be developed, although once you set your team up in that specific formation as a starting point you lose the unknown factor of setting them up in a 442 but having players move in ways that are not expected of your traditional 442.

His points about midfield flexibility are good but I don't agree with him that the attractive and successful football is a result of the system Barcelona play. The players they have are the key thing here (obviously system is a factor, but not the ,ajor one).

For me, the major sentence in the article is this one;

All tactical systems are relative and, as Lillo stresses, all are reliant on the players available and circumstance.

If TS feels that he can get more out of the players starting with a 442 formation than 4231 then that is the formation he should go with, nomatter the opposition. If, when he has everyone fit, he feels he can get most out of them playing 442, 433 or 451 or 4231 then that's the formation he should go with, again no-matter the opposition.
 
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Re: Tim Sherwood - Head Coach

that article reminds me a lot about AVB and how he tried to create a stronger team at the expense of individual talent and flair.
 
Re: Tim Sherwood - Head Coach

playing a lone forward only works if you have an exceptional clinical man up top and attacking players who also chip in with plenty of goals. unfortunately this isnt the case for 99% of sides, us being one of them
 
Re: Tim Sherwood - Head Coach

playing a lone forward only works if you have an exceptional clinical man up top and attacking players who also chip in with plenty of goals. unfortunately this isnt the case for 99% of sides, us being one of them

Yeah I think we have seen that Solly on his own doesnt work......we have seen plenty of evidence of this....Ade can I spose but he is too hit and miss and generally not clinical enough for the role.

I would suggest we stay as we are and work hard in training on our movement & passing. In essence with Ade playing a free role it is 4-2-3-1 although he doesnt off loads in defensive work....although at OT he did this pretty well.
 
Re: Tim Sherwood - Head Coach

Yeah I think we have seen that Solly on his own doesnt work......we have seen plenty of evidence of this....Ade can I spose but he is too hit and miss and generally not clinical enough for the role.

I would suggest we stay as we are and work hard in training on our movement & passing. In essence with Ade playing a free role it is 4-2-3-1 although he doesnt off loads in defensive work....although at OT he did this pretty well.

I don't that the issue was Soldado playing up front on his own. I think that the issue was a lack of support from the players immediately behind him.
 
Re: Tim Sherwood - Head Coach

Yeah I think we have seen that Solly on his own doesnt work......we have seen plenty of evidence of this....Ade can I spose but he is too hit and miss and generally not clinical enough for the role.

I would suggest we stay as we are and work hard in training on our movement & passing. In essence with Ade playing a free role it is 4-2-3-1 although he doesnt off loads in defensive work....although at OT he did this pretty well.

We never saw Soldado with the two Eriks playing the advanced supporting roles though, providing him the kind of service he wants.

It was never going to work with Lennon and Townsend as the two inside forwards, albeit they were the two players in form earlier in the season.
 
Re: Tim Sherwood - Head Coach

We never saw Soldado with the two Eriks playing the advanced supporting roles though, providing him the kind of service he wants.

It was never going to work with Lennon and Townsend as the two inside forwards, albeit they were the two players in form earlier in the season.

Edit
 
Re: Tim Sherwood - Head Coach

I don't that the issue was Soldado playing up front on his own. I think that the issue was a lack of support from the players immediately behind him.

Yep I agree. I think we lack the fluency to pull of a 4-3-3 though (I accept we may have got their in time).....we have a lot of work to do before we look good with that formation. With Ade its pretty obvious he will be closer to solly and provide that crucial link between cm & cf.

At least with our current set-up solly shouldn't get to isolated & frustrated. We might not win the possesion battle every game but as we have found out this season, possesion isnt everything.
 
Re: Tim Sherwood - Head Coach

I read this and thought of this thread

Really good article that was, very on point and absolutely bang on about today's fans, of which I am of course one.

It's been developing on here for the last few years. You either back the Harry style or the AVB style and the other is, as he says in the article, alien to that person.

I probably fall slightly onto the side of the non mainstream but I do have a real intrigue in to what Tim's ideas are and if he can implement them.
 
Re: Tim Sherwood - Head Coach

I read this and thought of this thread

That's very good (with my beard, love of vinyl and distaste of tv/pop culture, I definitely fit one of those stereotypes).

Who could be our unifier though? The last one we had was a jolly Dutchman. FDB would possibly be more appealling to the pop fans than LVG?
 
Re: Tim Sherwood - Head Coach

Really good article that was, very on point and absolutely bang on about today's fans, of which I am of course one.

It's been developing on here for the last few years. You either back the Harry style or the AVB style and the other is, as he says in the article, alien to that person.

I probably fall slightly onto the side of the non mainstream but I do have a real intrigue in to what Tim's ideas are and if he can implement them.

Which link / thread, are you referring to, please?
 
Re: Tim Sherwood - Head Coach

I read this and thought of this thread

That's a fantastic article, and whilst the stereotyping is well used to produce some good humour, I don't think it's all that wide of the mark.

He did miss out a third group though. Those that avoid the simplistic side of life but are also socially well-adjusted and get the promotions. They're busy sneering at both groups ;)
 
Re: Tim Sherwood - Head Coach

Results will dictate Sherwood's support. At the minute, we don't have much to go on as he hasn't had many games. So there are some people who take the view that he's a thick c**t with no clue how to manage a team. And there are others who take the view that his approach will be better than some convoluted, poncey foreign nonsense.

If results go well, the people who think he's thick will appreciate the management style. If they don't go well, the people who enjoy the simple approach will turn on him and request something more poncified and sophisticated.

I just want the team to do well, I don't care about the method.
 
Re: Tim Sherwood - Head Coach

Don't know if it's been said as I skipped lots of pages,but the big problem I see with Sherwood against arsenal in particulari s that he absolutely went for it, that was his philosophy, personally thought it was idiotic suicide to not play Capoue if he wanted to play two up top, bentaleb just simply doesn't have anyou standing abilities, just very competent and an exciting prospect, he's not a recoverer or destroyer like sandro/Capoue (which we needed) he isn't as good on the ball and driving forward like dembelr and he isn't as attacking as Paulinho. To play him ahead of protection for the back 4 was stupid.

What made the whole thing worse (and I've thought this a bout pretty much all of times subs) is he subbed a striker when we went 2-0 down, then when we were against 10 men he didn't bring any more forward players on.... It was weird. He "went for it" when it was almost suicide, then when you could understand him rolling the dice he didn't....

Aside from this, I don't want to judge to harshly but I think he's been lucky in the opposition tobe honest. It's great he's made us go for it, we have better players than most so actually feel we'll win more games than not and importantly the GAMES we SHOULD, which will be nice. But feel ANY TIME we need something different, a bit of tactical nouse, we'll lose.
 
Re: Tim Sherwood - Head Coach

I think that article does ring true. People either prefer the Good Old English 442 manager way or the tactical foreign coach and can never see the merits of the other. What is funny seeing is the double standards that people apply to support their arguments. It's quite plain to see on here those who didn't want AVB in, who have dogmatically stuck to their views on him, using every single stick to beat him with. ie With regards to asking the fans to be louder, he wasn't criticising us, he was passing on an opinion that the players themselves had expressed. Yet when fan favourite 'Arry told us that " Spurs fans were stupid, as good as it gets" etc he wasn't torn into as bad as AVB was despite what he said being a lot less constructive and more offensive.

I myself was found in two minds about Sherwoods appointment. Firstly I thought he would be a good coach despite his experence, as I had heard that He and Ramsey had done wonders with the youth team and playing a 4-5-1 variation. However I never liked him personally due the way he behaved when he was a player with us, his blatant arsenal connections and him being associated to a period of time when we were frankly quite crap. However when he came out playing the way he did in the first game I started doubting him as a coach and tactician. Now they youth team are back to playing 4-4-2 and believe that this will be a major regression tactically as this formation, especially when playing with no DM, is nullified to easily now. It seems like he is the exact polar opposite of AVB, whether by purpose or design. The ideal thing would be to have someone like Klopp who is smack bang in the middle of the two.


I will never take to Sherwood, but I am a Spurs fan, and will continue supporting regardless of who the manager is.
 
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