Quote Originally Posted by sanctum of blue View Post
For me I think it is time for a change, I cannot watch this dire football any more!
We have proved we can pass the ball but with the emphasis on long balls to win a set piece we are going backwards.
Yes we are winning games and will not get relegated with this style but it is crap, predictable and boring.
With a younger progressive manager I think it would not take too long to TWEEK the style of play.
The youngsters at U23 level are playing possession based fooball and the cameos we have seen so far indicate
they are comfortable on the ball, it is the senior players who are so used to getting rid of the ball as quickly as possible in an 'anywhere up front will do' mentality that has been coached into them over the last three managers.

As fans we want to be entertained, we would be mauled to death if we ever got back in the premiership and played this way again.
Other clubs have reset quite effectively and for those who say it will take 2-3 transfer windows just look at Derby, as much as we all hate them, they play much better football than us with a weaker squad and restrictions
We could go down the road of sacking Mick and replacing him with Steve Morison from the U23's
Or take a punt on one of these leaving Morison to bring through more talent.

Matt Taylor Exeter P168 W71 D51 L46 WIN PERCENTAGE 42.3
Rob Edwards Forest Green P59 W24 D9 L26 WIN PERCENTAGE 40.68
Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink Burton Albion P210 W84 D 62 L64 WIN PERCENTAGE 40.0
Simon Weaver Harrowgate Town P574 W236 D 133 L205 WIN PERCENTAGE 41.11 (Mostly Non league)
I can remember the pre season friendlies with Exeter and Forest Green where they both played more football than us and there was a Harrogate game on Sky last season, at Bradford I think, I watched where they were very impressive. Trouble is, having gambled to some extent by appointing Trollope, appointing a young, up and coming manager whose side play attractive football seems too big a leap for Vincent Tan to make to me.

That's one of the things that gets me thinking, do we continue to appoint "pragmatic", old school managers with reputations for playing, to be charitable, functional football because that's the way the people in charge of the club like their football to be played, do they do it because they think the fanbase likes the way we've been playing for most of the past decade, do they think the players we have can only play one way, so they pick their managers accordingly (that one seems very unlikely to me) or are they always looking for "a safe pair of hands"?

I've struggled for years to see some logic in our policies for recruitment, youth development and style of play and have now given up. Hopefully, this is changing now, but we haven't been producing our own players so the Academy has, essentially, been a black hole we have ploughed millions into for very, very little return and our recruitment has seen us consistently signing players of an age which means they have little resale value. Is it any wonder we are forever being told that Vincent Tan is having to put in seven figures sums every month to make ends meet?

Furthermore we play in a manner that surely makes some clubs reluctant to loan their good young prospects to us and, if and when we do get someone in like a fit and firing Tomlin, a Harry Wilson or a Tom Lawrence even, we don't play in a manner designed to get the best out of them - if there has been a plan in place since Russell Slade was appointed, it's too cunning for me to figure out what it is.