[Slick_Footwork]

No hands up I have never liked Allerdyce since he was bad mouthing us decades ago, but OMG where to start with this Allerdypullisaurus football, I thought the only player we had that looked remotely bothered was Conner Gallagher, as for Maitland-Niles the only time I heard his name mentioned was during the team announcements.  Do we even have a player that can sprint and win a foot race?  Spurs where just streets ahead in every department, except possibly goalkeeping.  The two goals we had disallowed obviously they were both offside,  but when you watch the replays look out for the Spurs defender in both, in the first the defender pushes Diagne into the offside position, just as the pass is made.  In the second Diagne tries to get back onside but is held off so he can't by the defender, defensively very good play.  Pereria our playmaker and top goal scorer in 2021, left on the bench, can someone please tell me how they can be happy with this clown of a manager.   I do have one suggestion for the club perhaps instead of showing adverts on the pitch side displays perhaps we could get arrows put on them which shows which way we are suppose to be kicking, just so the players are sure they seem a little confused most of the time.

I'm the opposite in terms of effort, I thought the lads tried hard today. Threw bodies in front of the ball. Had Grant making tackles in his own box. Peltier coming in from the cold and performing heroics.

The problem for me was quality...

(Or lack of it)

Their first goal with Kane is simply down to Sawyers not marking. The most basic concept of football, standing next to the options for the passer. But admittedly, it's a bad mistake from Allardyce picking him...

The second goal was down to Bartley not bringing down Moura when he's breaking and taking a booking. Lack of quality and awareness. Every other team with Prem players stop the break...

I sympathise with Sam for dropping Pereira though. I mean, the lad didn't break sweat against Sheffield United. Do you keep giving him a "free pass" because he's our best player on the rare occasions when he can be arsed to turn up? I don't think being a top scorer has that much value when they were all but one penalties. He missed on against Blackpool too...

I'd rather play him than Grant for sure. But at some point he has to start breaking sweat. Even jogging into a defensive shape would be an improvement.

As for AMN, I agree he was largely anonymous but did show one glimmer of quality with a good ball to Snodgrass that resulted in our chance first half. He showed glimpses and will get better, as will all of the lads when the midfield is anchored by Yokuslu rather than the defensively inept Sawyers.

We'll see what the next 3 games bring. I don't think there's anything wrong with the Allardyce "brand of football". He picks a team with some attacking intent and we are finally getting players forward and carrying a threat from open play. But if he continues to pick the likes of Sawyers then he can gladly go in the same direction as Bilic. He will deserve it.

[bomberbrown1968]

The argument for bringing Fat Allardyce in has failed within his first 10 games - to keep us up - to tighten up at the back and to make us hard to beat. 5 points from his 10 games, 8 goals scored, 28 conceded, so exactly what is the point in letting him see us through to inevitable relegation.

Anyone who thinks we stand the remotest chance of staying up is living in cuckoo land, 12 points from 23 games, -36 goal difference and 11 points adrift having played a game more with 15 left to play.

New signings might make an impact, but tell me where the next win is coming from or the next clean sheet for that matter, whoever they are in front of them, our defence is the same as it was at the start of last season and concedes goals like a sieve, they have for the past 18 months.

So spare Allardyce "relegation" on his CV and pay him off and get him out, most of us could say "I told you so". Plenty of young managers about who understand the game has moved on since the prehistoric age, working hard and being hard to beat will only get you a point if you can see out 90 minutes at 0-0 or scrap a goal from a set piece.

Plan for next season and start to put things in place for a promotion charge from the championship, or do we wait until May or worse still let Allardyce impose himself on us next season as well

[BaggieSteve]

I know we’ve been split over the Bilic v Allardyce issue and I appreciate the arguments over the squad Allardyce inherited but I think that boat has sailed now and we have to judge him without comparison with Bilic. He’s now been in charge for ten league games which a decent number of games in which to make an impact. My own view is that he has had an impact but it’s entirely negative. I cannot see any pattern to our play beyond defend and try not to concede. There is precious little focus on ball retention and creativity. Years ago Allardyce was incredibly innovative in his use of technology, training techniques etc but that was years ago. His approach now is so out of date, it’s painful.
I didn’t see the game v Sheffield United so will take Slick’s word that Pereira’s contribution was underwhelming but we desperately need to win games; we are unlikely to battle to a hard fought 1-0, with a goal on the break, as we have the worst defence in the league. So we need to play on the front foot with some ambition and creativity- for me, Pereira is the only player we have even close to being able to provide that. So, if Pereira doesn’t bust a guy in defending, I will give him a pass on that because none of the other gut-busters are capable of creating much. That’s what depressed me about Allardyce’s tactics today in leaving him out. He’s the only player, with the exception of Johnstone, who is close to PL class so you just don’t leave him out.
I agree with Slick that I thought we worked hard today...but we are long past hard work being our salvation. If hard work is the answer, bring back Pulis

[Dingle-Dingle]

Is Bobby Gould available?? Asking for a friend.

DD

[drewks]

Is Bobby Gould available?? Asking for a friend.

DD    

https://tse2.mm.bing.net/th?id=OGC.03a73...G%2bCvs%3d

[Salopbaggie]

No hands up I have never liked Allerdyce since he was bad mouthing us decades ago, but OMG where to start with this Allerdypullisaurus football, I thought the only player we had that looked remotely bothered was Conner Gallagher, as for Maitland-Niles the only time I heard his name mentioned was during the team announcements.  Do we even have a player that can sprint and win a foot race?  Spurs where just streets ahead in every department, except possibly goalkeeping.  The two goals we had disallowed obviously they were both offside,  but when you watch the replays look out for the Spurs defender in both, in the first the defender pushes Diagne into the offside position, just as the pass is made.  In the second Diagne tries to get back onside but is held off so he can't by the defender, defensively very good play.  Pereria our playmaker and top goal scorer in 2021, left on the bench, can someone please tell me how they can be happy with this clown of a manager.   I do have one suggestion for the club perhaps instead of showing adverts on the pitch side displays perhaps we could get arrows put on them which shows which way we are suppose to be kicking, just so the players are sure they seem a little confused most of the time.

I'm the opposite in terms of effort, I thought the lads tried hard today. Threw bodies in front of the ball. Had Grant making tackles in his own box. Peltier coming in from the cold and performing heroics.

The problem for me was quality...

(Or lack of it)

We will have to disagree on this one Slick which is unusual For me yes they were on the pitch, but it was more like they were going through the motions, already accepting the inevitable. It is fine for us as fans to do that, but we are not being paid tens of thousands of pounds a week to do something different. As an example how many 50/50s did we win? Every time there was a ball which required a sprint to get there, we were always second to it. Yes in our goal quarter of the field they did better, but every where else they were sloppy and on the few occasions they did get out of it, they gave the ball away far to easily.

[Slick_Footwork]

I know we’ve been split over the Bilic v Allardyce issue and I appreciate the arguments over the squad Allardyce inherited but I think that boat has sailed now and we have to judge him without comparison with Bilic. He’s now been in charge for ten league games which a decent number of games in which to make an impact. My own view is that he has had an impact but it’s entirely negative. I cannot see any pattern to our play beyond defend and try not to concede. There is precious little focus on ball retention and creativity. Years ago Allardyce was incredibly innovative in his use of technology, training techniques etc but that was years ago. His approach now is so out of date, it’s painful.
I didn’t see the game v Sheffield United so will take Slick’s word that Pereira’s contribution was underwhelming but we desperately need to win games; we are unlikely to battle to a hard fought 1-0, with a goal on the break, as we have the worst defence in the league. So we need to play on the front foot with some ambition and creativity- for me, Pereira is the only player we have even close to being able to provide that. So, if Pereira doesn’t bust a guy in defending, I will give him a pass on that because none of the other gut-busters are capable of creating much. That’s what depressed me about Allardyce’s tactics today in leaving him out. He’s the only player, with the exception of Johnstone, who is close to PL class so you just don’t leave him out.
I agree with Slick that I thought we worked hard today...but we are long past hard work being our salvation. If hard work is the answer, bring back Pulis

I agree, now he has a few of his own players in, Allardyce needs to be judged on his own merit.

So far, his persistence with selecting Sawyers and constant chopping and changing is making me think he might not be quite as sharp as he once was...

I'm struggling to give him the benefit of the doubt, despite the fact I thought he would be the best man for the job.

The one thing I disagree with though, is that his tactics are prehistoric. Many people say this and use dinosaur terms, but I'm not sure what it means. Maybe it's me being blind to something, but I don't see his tactics being different to the vast majority of managers - young, old, British or foreign - who take teams at the bottom to the top sides away. If anything, I personally feel we are more progressive than under Bilic. We are at least getting players into the box from open play. In the week, a midfielder even scored a tap in, which we haven't seen for years in the top flight - dating back to pre-Pulis. Even today, as dreadful as we were, we managed to create a few decent changes. If Diagne knew the offside rule, we would've created numerous presentable opportunities.

On his future, I don't see the point in sacking him yet. I don't think any manager would keep us up now - Guardiola, Klopp, Mourinho - so don't see the benefit in letting him go when he's not had chance to play all of his new players together. I feel a lot of fans want him sacked already just so they can say "I told you so" as bomber alluded to above. They want it to happen before he's even had chance to turn it around.

But if he's really so dreadful, that statement will still ring true in 3,4,5,10 games time... It will just have more clout.

My opinion is that the players he has brought in are better than what we had. Diagne already looks an improvement, while Yoluslu looked more combinative in 5 minutes than Sawyers has all season. We know AMN is a decent player, which is why he's been in and around the England squad. Allardyce might as well have a few games with them all playing together, at least the next 3 if not 4, to see if he can at least make us look reasonable.

Although I do think not playing Yokuslu today was a massive mistake. If he continues to make them in the next 3-4 games, he can gladly bugger off.

I know I'm in the minority here, but I'm not overly enamoured with Matheus Pereira and that's why I'm giving Big Sam the benefit of the doubt for dropping him. For me, Matheus Pereira only cares about 1 person and that's Matheus Pereira. You can see when he plays, he will ignore the simple ball just so he can do something outrageous to make the highlight reel. Even last season, when we stumbled to promotion, he failed to impose himself on the must win games. It's frustrating because he's by far our most creative player and the one who has that knack of spotting the killer pass, but I don't think he's willing to do any dirty work for the team. And sadly, I don't think we're good enough to carry his lack of defensive contribution which is sometimes as lazy as not even being arsed to jog 5 yards into a player's break out path. I'm sure that's why he was dropped, because Chris Basham was Sheffield United's best player in the week marauding out of defence and not once did Pereira make any attempt to engage him. Allardyce has mentioned a few times that you have to defend from the front and I agree.

He will be the first to go when we go down, I'm sure. But I'm not sure where he will go because almost all of the decent sides in the Premier League demand work rate, even from their offensive players. I can see him going to a mid table side for big money and spending most of the time on their bench, playing in the odd cup game against lower league opposition.

[bomberbrown1968]

I think I'd use Sawyers in a comparison with the Pereira dilemma and at the risk of sounding like a broken record I struggle to see exactly what it is Sawyers brings to the team either defensively or going forward. Whatever it is that Allardyce & Bilic before see in training then it's become blatantly obvious that he doesn't bring it with him on matchdays. It's a shame and all that and because he originally came through the ranks there's a little more sympathy than I'd normally afford to most footballers. But Sawyers is no more a premier league player than I am, he'd do a job in a mid table championship club but that's about his level. If we're talking about carrying Pereira when we haven't got the ball, we've done exactly the same with Sawyers every game this season.

I don't want to harp on about Sawyers, he gets enough stick, justifiably, from all of us. Where I use the comparison is that Pereira at least can turn a game or even win it, yes he can be a luxury but he's had nobody to do his dirty work for him like most luxury players. I agree mid table Prem is probably where he is, but we've got 12 points for god sake from 23 games, a couple of 0-0 draws and the odd 1-0 smash & grab is never going to keep us up. 15 games left and we might have to win 10 of them, so today we rock up with Sawyers as the holding midfielder, Pereira on the bench and Yokuslu sat next to him, where's the intent to try and win. This is my reason why there's no point keeping Allardyce, he was purely appointed to keep us up and it's not going to happen, and I'll never understand the 18 month contract, the 3 new boys won't win us 10 games on their own. Diagne might score 2 in a game but we'd still concede 3, Yokuslu might improve the cover in front of the defence, but I doubt we'll keep another clean sheet this season.

I've seen worse teams for the Baggies but never ones that don't seem to be able to compete.

[WBA-Josh]

I'm not sure Sawyers has been used properly since he came back to Albion. For Brentford he had one of the highest pass success rates in the final 3rd playing almost as a 10 in a 433 or as an 8 in a 343 but with a sitter next to him (Mokotjo). Sawyers doesn't have the defensive awareness to play as a 6 but both Bilic and Allardyce have consistently used him there.

Of course Sawyers can be criticised for his inability to adapt to the Premier League and his constant wanting an extra 2 or 3 touches before passing the ball.

[BaggieSteve]

I know we’ve been split over the Bilic v Allardyce issue and I appreciate the arguments over the squad Allardyce inherited but I think that boat has sailed now and we have to judge him without comparison with Bilic. He’s now been in charge for ten league games which a decent number of games in which to make an impact. My own view is that he has had an impact but it’s entirely negative. I cannot see any pattern to our play beyond defend and try not to concede. There is precious little focus on ball retention and creativity. Years ago Allardyce was incredibly innovative in his use of technology, training techniques etc but that was years ago. His approach now is so out of date, it’s painful.
I didn’t see the game v Sheffield United so will take Slick’s word that Pereira’s contribution was underwhelming but we desperately need to win games; we are unlikely to battle to a hard fought 1-0, with a goal on the break, as we have the worst defence in the league. So we need to play on the front foot with some ambition and creativity- for me, Pereira is the only player we have even close to being able to provide that. So, if Pereira doesn’t bust a guy in defending, I will give him a pass on that because none of the other gut-busters are capable of creating much. That’s what depressed me about Allardyce’s tactics today in leaving him out. He’s the only player, with the exception of Johnstone, who is close to PL class so you just don’t leave him out.
I agree with Slick that I thought we worked hard today...but we are long past hard work being our salvation. If hard work is the answer, bring back Pulis

I agree, now he has a few of his own players in, Allardyce needs to be judged on his own merit.

So far, his persistence with selecting Sawyers and constant chopping and changing is making me think he might not be quite as sharp as he once was...

I'm struggling to give him the benefit of the doubt, despite the fact I thought he would be the best man for the job.

The one thing I disagree with though, is that his tactics are prehistoric. Many people say this and use dinosaur terms, but I'm not sure what it means. Maybe it's me being blind to something, but I don't see his tactics being different to the vast majority of managers - young, old, British or foreign - who take teams at the bottom to the top sides away. If anything, I personally feel we are more progressive than under Bilic. We are at least getting players into the box from open play. In the week, a midfielder even scored a tap in, which we haven't seen for years in the top flight - dating back to pre-Pulis. Even today, as dreadful as we were, we managed to create a few decent changes. If Diagne knew the offside rule, we would've created numerous presentable opportunities.

On his future, I don't see the point in sacking him yet. I don't think any manager would keep us up now - Guardiola, Klopp, Mourinho - so don't see the benefit in letting him go when he's not had chance to play all of his new players together. I feel a lot of fans want him sacked already just so they can say "I told you so" as bomber alluded to above. They want it to happen before he's even had chance to turn it around.

But if he's really so dreadful, that statement will still ring true in 3,4,5,10 games time... It will just have more clout.

My opinion is that the players he has brought in are better than what we had. Diagne already looks an improvement, while Yoluslu looked more combinative in 5 minutes than Sawyers has all season. We know AMN is a decent player, which is why he's been in and around the England squad. Allardyce might as well have a few games with them all playing together, at least the next 3 if not 4, to see if he can at least make us look reasonable.

Although I do think not playing Yokuslu today was a massive mistake. If he continues to make them in the next 3-4 games, he can gladly bugger off.

I know I'm in the minority here, but I'm not overly enamoured with Matheus Pereira and that's why I'm giving Big Sam the benefit of the doubt for dropping him. For me, Matheus Pereira only cares about 1 person and that's Matheus Pereira. You can see when he plays, he will ignore the simple ball just so he can do something outrageous to make the highlight reel. Even last season, when we stumbled to promotion, he failed to impose himself on the must win games. It's frustrating because he's by far our most creative player and the one who has that knack of spotting the killer pass, but I don't think he's willing to do any dirty work for the team. And sadly, I don't think we're good enough to carry his lack of defensive contribution which is sometimes as lazy as not even being arsed to jog 5 yards into a player's break out path. I'm sure that's why he was dropped, because Chris Basham was Sheffield United's best player in the week marauding out of defence and not once did Pereira make any attempt to engage him. Allardyce has mentioned a few times that you have to defend from the front and I agree.

He will be the first to go when we go down, I'm sure. But I'm not sure where he will go because almost all of the decent sides in the Premier League demand work rate, even from their offensive players. I can see him going to a mid table side for big money and spending most of the time on their bench, playing in the odd cup game against lower league opposition.

Slick, my problem with his tactics are not limited to us playing away at higher level grounds, it’s at home as well. I basically don’t see any tactics or pattern beyond one that bypasses the midfield and punts the ball long. I accept that to play through the midfield you need the players who are technically capable of that but I believe we have those. I watch Fulham and Brighton and I see two teams who move the ball through the midfield, break quickly and create space. I watch us and I see balls knocked long or medium/long which just gift possession to the opposition- I haven’t looked at them but I’m guessing our possession stats in most games will be well below the oppositions. We either do not want to, or are not capable, of playing a possession game but our opponents are and it’s killing us.
I’d also say that, in the current situation with no crowds, home or away is largely irrelevant as can be seen by the number of away wins this year. Home advantage counts for little so there is not really any excuse for differing the tactics by ground - by opposition definitely but not by venue. That works for Allardyce as we play the same way regardless.
I’m with you in thinking there’s no point changing the manager now; I do think he’s awful but I believe we’re fu*ked already. I’d rather part company at the end of the season but start the process of identifying a replacement now for next season’s championship campaign