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Author Topic: Dean Smith - Confirmed  (Read 1522671 times)

Offline SoccerHQ

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  • Location: Down, down, deeper and Down.
  • GM : 19.06.2021
Re: Dean Smith - Confirmed
« Reply #6990 on: February 26, 2020, 08:49:42 PM »
Jota would still be with us. He may not be Premier League but he'd do just fine in the Championship.

O'Hare would be back and ours. Young Barry would no doubt get games too.

I don't want us to go down but to suggest it's the end of the world is typical doom mongering.

We survived last time with vastly shitter owners. This time we'd be fine. The trick would be recruitment for the next season in the top flight with a largely settled squad.

Jota couldn’t get into a shit Blues team. Buying him was entirely pointless.

O'Hare? Barry? Or is everyone that we have on the books (excluding Grealish, Mings and McGinn) shit?

No they're not all shit.  Hourihane would still do a job at that level, as would the likes of Targett and Gilbert.  Picking somebody like Jota who IS shit by virtue of being too physically incapable at either Premier League or Championship level isn't a great way of reinforcing your point though.  He's probably the worst player to make an appearance for us this year.

Jota was great at Brentford.

It depends where you play him. Hopeless out wide at this level as he was when SHA put him out wide in their narrow 4-4-2 last season.

At number 10 he can certainly be more than decent at championship level. Not going to play there here while Grealish is around but could be o.k as a rotation option next season (we will obviously buy a replacement if/when Jack goes).

Offline SoccerHQ

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Re: Dean Smith - Confirmed
« Reply #6991 on: February 26, 2020, 08:56:23 PM »
I don’t want Smith gone nor do I want to rip it up and start again.  I was just observing that without Jack, McGinn and Mings I think the squad would really struggle against the better Championship teams.  At the moment I don’t really trust Suso to fill those gaps with adequate replacements.

I dread us going down, I really do.

You don't know who we'd sign though. We'd obviously sign player who replace the 5-6 who'd leave and just generally strength for extra 10 games a season which you get down there.

We can still attract decent players not getting games at premier league young and old. Chester, Snodgrass, Kodjia, Jedinak, Whelan, Tammy, Adomah, Neil Taylor.

Various opinions on those (especially the last one!) and we attracted seven of them from premier league clubs and they played big parts in our two play off seasons.

No worse if not better than some of the players we signed last summer.

Obviously the little elephant is FFP. We got away with it being promoted as likes of Bournemouth and Leicester have done in the past so a concern what would happen given they've charged Derby and Sheff Weds this season who've massively overspent on their squads.

Offline nigel

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Re: Dean Smith - Confirmed
« Reply #6992 on: February 26, 2020, 10:11:11 PM »
If we went down, assuming Grealish, Mings, McGinn and Heaton would leave, I can’t see any others going, we could still field a strong enough team to bounce straight back.
Perm 11 from 17

                                   Steer/Nyland

                          Konsa/Engels/Chester/Hause

Gilbert.                            Nakamba.                           Targett

                AEG/O’Hare/Barry/Hourihane/Luiz/Trezeguet

                                    Sammata/Wesley

Offline N'ZMAV

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Re: Dean Smith - Confirmed
« Reply #6993 on: February 27, 2020, 07:15:56 AM »
not sure about re-signing Gareth Barry.

Offline GarTomas

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Re: Dean Smith - Confirmed
« Reply #6994 on: February 27, 2020, 07:22:37 AM »
Continuity is obviously preferable, but it’s only worth sticking with a manager for a long period of time if you’ve got the right one. Dean Smith isn’t the right manager to be giving time to

Only if that particular manager is doing well over that time. The league apart (and some very dodgy performances), I think promotion and a Cup Final is not bad going bearing in mind the length of time he has been here. Mind you, promotion was all down to Grealish obviously. (rolls eyes).

It clearly wouldn’t have happened without him. I don’t see how this can be disputed in view of the league position before his return led to 10 straight wins.

You'll never know that for definite, but what is undisputed is the fact that Dean Smith got us promoted and on Sunday he will become only the eighth manager in almost a century to lead us out at a Wembley final.

No we might not know it for definite, but what we do know for definite is that under Smith, without Grealish we were generally pretty appalling. The same problems that exist now, existed then in the run before Grealish came back. Smith didn’t know how to sort it

Can we agree that Grealish return to the side went hand in hand with our ten game winning run? Yes.

Can we agree that Grealish has got better and better in the past 12 months, and surpassed expectations of how he was expected to perform this year in the Premiership? I think yes.

Could we then agree that maybe Smith is helping Grealish get to these levels?

Online eamonn

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Re: Dean Smith - Confirmed
« Reply #6995 on: February 27, 2020, 07:59:41 AM »
not sure about re-signing Gareth Barry.

Louie Louie

Offline Mister E

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Re: Dean Smith - Confirmed
« Reply #6996 on: February 27, 2020, 08:14:26 AM »
As I've said before I think we have an inexperienced manager and an inexperienced squad and those 2 together make us incredibly naive.

This season will be touch and go regardless of what we do from here but if we stay up and stick with everyone I think we'll be in a better place next season with just a handful of signings to replace people like Lansbury and Taylor who are 'senior' players but don't really offer anything.
I agree next season should be better, if we stay up, and that season will tell us whether Smith is the right man.  But on recruitment I think that handful of signings will be needed to replace some current first teamers, with them dropping down to replace Lansbury, Taylor, etc.
I think there's a critical addition to what you say - will the likes of Ramsey, O'Hare and Vassilev have the capability and coaching support to step up into the first team? We're led to believe they might have the potential, and if we can blend them into a squad that has had the experience of fighting for and saving Premier League status we may have the opportunitiy to resally push on next season; with the addition of 2-3 more experienced and better quality additions.

Offline Mister E

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Re: Dean Smith - Confirmed
« Reply #6997 on: February 27, 2020, 08:20:27 AM »
Continuity is obviously preferable, but it’s only worth sticking with a manager for a long period of time if you’ve got the right one. Dean Smith isn’t the right manager to be giving time to

Only if that particular manager is doing well over that time. The league apart (and some very dodgy performances), I think promotion and a Cup Final is not bad going bearing in mind the length of time he has been here. Mind you, promotion was all down to Grealish obviously. (rolls eyes).

It clearly wouldn’t have happened without him. I don’t see how this can be disputed in view of the league position before his return led to 10 straight wins.

You'll never know that for definite, but what is undisputed is the fact that Dean Smith got us promoted and on Sunday he will become only the eighth manager in almost a century to lead us out at a Wembley final.

No we might not know it for definite, but what we do know for definite is that under Smith, without Grealish we were generally pretty appalling. The same problems that exist now, existed then in the run before Grealish came back. Smith didn’t know how to sort it

Can we agree that Grealish return to the side went hand in hand with our ten game winning run? Yes.

Can we agree that Grealish has got better and better in the past 12 months, and surpassed expectations of how he was expected to perform this year in the Premiership? I think yes.

Could we then agree that maybe Smith is helping Grealish get to these levels?
To your question - No, you're making a big assumption.
Smith may be enhancing JG's ability; but he may not! we don't know.
I don't like Smith playing JG on the left: I don't think that is helping Greaslish to be the best he can be.

Offline Allan C

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Re: Dean Smith - Confirmed
« Reply #6998 on: February 27, 2020, 08:42:22 AM »
Under Bruce, McLeish and Lambert it was both.
Agreed, but something isn't working.
What isn’t working is time. Smith and the rest have had a year to rebuild how many years of neglect and mismanagement??? They need time to arrest that and steer us to where we belong.  I agree that we need to stay in this division but I don’t see it as a total disaster if we slip provided that the end result is us maintaining a rebuilding in the right way. The continuity must be there and changing to another “saviour” isn’t that

Offline andyh

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Re: Dean Smith - Confirmed
« Reply #6999 on: February 27, 2020, 08:59:42 AM »
If we went down, assuming Grealish, Mings, McGinn and Heaton would leave, I can’t see any others going, we could still field a strong enough team to bounce straight back.
Perm 11 from 17

                                   Steer/Nyland

                          Konsa/Engels/Chester/Hause

Gilbert.                            Nakamba.                           Targett

                AEG/O’Hare/Barry/Hourihane/Luiz/Trezeguet

                                    Sammata/Wesley

I agree, we know we would lose jack, SJM, Mings and Heaton. That's a given.
I understand how and why you have listed the the players you have, but I think we would also lose a fair few of those listed because of 'billy big bollox' syndrome and their agents demanding moves because they are 'too good' for the championship.

 

Offline Drummond

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Re: Dean Smith - Confirmed
« Reply #7000 on: February 27, 2020, 09:35:46 AM »
I don't think there's a single 'Billy big bollocks' in the squad barring, potentially, Luiz. (maybe Engels if rumours are to be believed).

I also think we'd retain Heaton due to his injury.

Offline Risso

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Re: Dean Smith - Confirmed
« Reply #7001 on: February 27, 2020, 09:49:00 AM »
Heaton's the one player we could probably afford to lose.  I think Nyland has shown enough to suggest that he's a perfectly adequate replacement.

Offline paul_e

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Re: Dean Smith - Confirmed
« Reply #7002 on: February 27, 2020, 09:49:29 AM »
I agree, i can't see who'd kick up a stink and force a move from the list Nigel gave, Luiz maybe but I don't think so.

Offline Risso

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  • GM : 04.03.2025
Re: Dean Smith - Confirmed
« Reply #7003 on: February 27, 2020, 09:50:15 AM »
Under Bruce, McLeish and Lambert it was both.
Agreed, but something isn't working.
What isn’t working is time. Smith and the rest have had a year to rebuild how many years of neglect and mismanagement??? They need time to arrest that and steer us to where we belong.  I agree that we need to stay in this division but I don’t see it as a total disaster if we slip provided that the end result is us maintaining a rebuilding in the right way. The continuity must be there and changing to another “saviour” isn’t that

There's no point in having continuity for the sake of it if the manager isn't good enough.

Offline paul_e

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Re: Dean Smith - Confirmed
« Reply #7004 on: February 27, 2020, 09:57:38 AM »
Heaton's the one player we could probably afford to lose.  I think Nyland has shown enough to suggest that he's a perfectly adequate replacement.

As has Steer, and Sarkic did superbly in Scotland and deserves a chance.

 


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