STFC Transfer Rumours

[UTR]

Stevenage a couple years back are the perfect example of a team just being good at the old fashioned basics that will get you promoted. They were big, physical and high work rate. They also competed to the level where they were even bollocking eachother on the pitch and made themselves a thoroughly unenjoyable side to play against.

My opinion is that there’s no right style, the style that wins you football matches is the best option and you can do that with technical players or with a team of big bully type players. Those who snob at the Stevenage’s (or Lincoln from a good few years ago) because they’re not playing soft, tippy tappy, total football are wrong in my opinion.

Now obviously the ideal is a mix of both and a good style but if you want to go down the 100% technical route in League Two then you’ll struggle without a few physical, bully types unless your team is full of players so technically good that they can play around that and if they can do that well enough to get promoted then those players won’t be playing in League Two.

Too often we’ve been a side that’s nice to play against, tippy tappy with no steel or fight to respond when a team tries to rough us up. Put a sprinkling of technical players like McGurk and Glatzel in with a mix of physical, battling players like Ollie Clarke, a couple of Piergianni type CB’s and a big striker that can batter around opposite CB’s and you’re off to a good start.

[Riddick]

The branding of 442 as 'dinosaur' by the Pep disciples, in their roll necks and expensive trainers, is a crying shame.

The great Man Utd teams of the 90s were absolutely brilliant to watch. A team playing fast, counter attacking football like that now would rip open these stats padding wankers, I'm sure of it!

Paolo's title winning team very much played in that Ferguson style I thought.

It would be interesting to see for sure. However remember that in the face of that Pep team, Ferguson himself changed his historic 442 to 433 in order to compete. So if Ferguson thought he needed to change as his swawchbuckling 442 wasnt as effective, then i doubt many lesser minds would disagree.

Now there is a big difference between Peps system and the way a lot of imitators run it.

[Kinky Tom]

We were very direct under Paolo but like you say in the best way, every time we had possession it was with a view to creating a chance quickly but it was aways on the deck.  

It was such a shame the rug got pulled out from under us when it did, I don't think it would be farcical to suggest we could have flirted with promotion to the PL if Black had the balls to see it out.  Proper 'sliding doors' moment.  I'd love to see an alternate universe where we didn't get shafted in 1990, we could easily have positioned ourselves as a decent top tier side with that team at the dawn of all the money coming in.  Off on a tangent there, sorry.

[Cowley38]

We were very direct under Paolo but like you say in the best way, every time we had possession it was with a view to creating a chance quickly but it was aways on the deck.  

It was such a shame the rug got pulled out from under us when it did, I don't think it would be farcical to suggest we could have flirted with promotion to the PL if Black had the balls to see it out.  Proper 'sliding doors' moment.  I'd love to see an alternate universe where we didn't get shafted in 1990, we could easily have positioned ourselves as a decent top tier side with that team at the dawn of all the money coming in.  Off on a tangent there, sorry.

It has nothing to do with lack 'Not having the balls'

It was all to do with Di Canio being a bellend when it came to transfers

And Jeremy Wray not having the balls to say no to him

[Kinky Tom]

While that is true, an extra 6 months of funding would have had the most upwardly moving club in the country in the championship, the value of the club would have been the strongest it has ever been. He would have had a return on investment, instead he chose to just pull out and lost loads.

[Ƭ̵̬̊: The Artist Formerly Known as CWIG]

Yeah there is a poker saying of "pot committed" which he was. Someone should have told him it.

[Kinky Tom]

Yeah there is a poker saying of "pot committed" which he was. Someone should have told him it.

You'd think he'd understand this better than anyone too. 

[Peter Venkman]

Something that Kennedy said is what I have been saying for years about our team and style, its something that gets missed by so many "passing tiki-taka philosophy" managers. And that is as basic as it gets.....

You play a formation and style thats suits the players available and not shoehorn them into a system they blatantly cannot play and are not comfortable in playing.

Look at Kemp, at Swindon we built a side around his style of play (for 4 months), at MKD they put a square peg into a team full of round holes and it did not work for him or the club. At Swindon he was the key piece so thats why it worked so well.

If you have 2 big lumps of CB's who can head and tackle but not pass then give them a role that allows them to play their natural game, as long as they can find a team mate with a 4 yard pass then thats all thats needed.

Not everyone can be a Beckenbaur or David Luiz.....I would rather 2 Shaun Taylors at this level than a wanna be ball playing CB who loses possession with awful long passes 8 times out of 10.

I know its the fashion currently but I have lost count in the last 3 seasons we have tried bringing the ball out from the back only to be caught in possession and ...bang.... we have conceded a goal rather than finding touch or making the simple pass.

Stockport and Wrexham (for instance) both hoofed the ball into touch against us whenever they were in trouble and they both got promoted.

So play a formation that suits the players you have rather than squeezing them into formations that do not suit them, simple. Thats basically what Kennedy alluded to last week rather than Gunning with his "heavy metal football" which turned out to be more like "The Nolans".

[Kinky Tom]

Agree totally, one manager I've noted who builds teams and tactics around the players available is Pardew, he seemingly never forced any preferred tactics onto a group of players and instead found tactics to suit them.  

I think we could have found a better way to use our squad last season but we didn't have anyone in place to figure it out, we would still have been bottom half of the table but probably not our worst ever finish.

[Peter Venkman]

Absolutely, the best managers get the best out of their players by playing to their strengths, the higher up the league you go the more likelihood is that you can afford to get the players in to play your prefered style.

But in the lower leagues you dont want a massive turnover of players so you try to get the best from them and play a style that compliments them and get a good team spirit going.

Under Macari we played a basic style of football that was solid at the back but still scored goals, many late on in games, created through a great team spirit and incredible fitness level but rarely did we have any real stars, certainly in the early years.

[OOH! SHAUN TAYLOR]

We were very direct under Paolo but like you say in the best way, every time we had possession it was with a view to creating a chance quickly but it was aways on the deck.  

It was such a shame the rug got pulled out from under us when it did, I don't think it would be farcical to suggest we could have flirted with promotion to the PL if Black had the balls to see it out.  Proper 'sliding doors' moment.  I'd love to see an alternate universe where we didn't get shafted in 1990, we could easily have positioned ourselves as a decent top tier side with that team at the dawn of all the money coming in.  Off on a tangent there, sorry.

It REALLY annoys me when the transfer rumours thread veers off course but now I'm going to add to it... 1990 and 2012 are two massive 'what if' moments (or sliding doors as you put it) which I often find myself contemplating. To that, I would add 1969. With just some modest investment so that we could have actually added a few players to that squad rather than see it get slowly dismantled over the next 2-3 seasons, who knows where we might be now... always so near and yet so far...it's the Swindon way...

[Anonymous77]

A 3pm announcement could leave room for more today?

[Peter Venkman]

It REALLY annoys me when the transfer rumours thread veers off course but now I'm going to add to it...

I agree, it annoys me too and yes I am as bad

Lets get back to Transfer Rumours now

[Kinky Tom]

[Kinky Tom]

I agree, it annoys me too and yes I am as bad

Lets get back to Transfer Rumours now

It's difficult not to veer off topic on such a visited thread, there will always be tangents to be taken from posts in such a busy thread.