Team shape, tactics and personnel

[TomC]

5 hours ago, tomsky_11 said:

I think my point was that many have been calling for a more out and out defensive midfielder to replace Luiz in the deepest midfield role of the three, which is where he has tended to operate for us, and that actually if he maintains his defensive numbers so far this season is he himself actually becoming the type of player we want there? Kamara and Cheik Doucoure are the first two players I could think of that have been suggested/linked for this role, but Luiz defensive numbers are for the most part better than these players this season so far.

Fully agree that the higher McGinn operates the better, mostly because his passing is too erratic for him to play deep. As it stands, I think the McGinn Luiz Ramsey midfield is actually pretty good, with Luiz central and deeper and Ramsey and McGinn up and down either side of him.

 

And I was agreeing with you for the most part. Replacing Dougie is a bad idea, I agree. But you need 2 DMs in the side, one who also needs to be able to pass the ball. Dougie is the one who can pass. Now we need a better Nakamba to go alongside him. Deano has tried to have two DMs who both like to join the attack (Dougie and McGinn), but as a result, Dougie gets pinned back and the talents that you referred to are wasted.

 

 

[romavillan]

59 minutes ago, villa4europe said:

Jose did it at utd, can definitely remember that 

Yeah he did it at Inter too IIRC.

I think Smith can still turn this around, we need everyone back fit and working hard now then I think if we can field something like:

--------------------- Martinez ----------------------

Cash ----- Konsa ------ Mings --- Targett

---------------- Luiz -------- SJM -----------------

Buendia --------- Sanson ----------- Bailey

---------------------- Watkins ----------------------

For a few games on the bounce then we'll start picking up results again. In the middle of the 3 could be Chuk or Ramsey.

Main point being we haven't put out our best eleven consistently, and with injuries and internationals they haven't even all been fit and training together consistently. Not even sure we've seen our best eleven in the best shape yet at all. 

[romavillan]

Just now, jacketspuds said:

To still have no discernible tactic or style of play is just not good enough.

Er, we have had both  in the past under Smith it's clearly not true to put "still" in that sentence at all. We've definitely lacked togetherness, shape and cohesion since what happened with Wolves. Saying we haven't had a style of play or any discernible tactics under Smith is nonsense.

[OutByEaster?]

I think the squad still needs a huge amount of work.

This is a depth chart in which I'm only including players that I think have the ability to play in a top half Premier league side.

• --------------------------------Martinez-----------------------------
•  
• Cash-------------Konsa------------Mings-----------Targett
• ------------------Tuanzebe----------Hause----------------------
•  
• ----------------------------------Luiz----------------------------------
•  
• -------------------xxxxxxx-------------McGinn------------------
•  
• Buendia----------------------------------------------------Bailey
• Traore----------------------------------------------------------------
•  
• --------------------------------Watkins-----------------------------
• -----------------------------------Ings-------------------------------

I'd also add that I think that there's a chance that Kesler, Chukwuemeka, Philogene-Bidace and Barry might come through.

But for me, if you want to compete for Europe, you need two really good quality players in every position, so we're short:

A GK, a LB, a RB, a DM, a CM, another CM, another CM and a LW.

That's eight players - and it could be ten at the end of the season if Tuanzebe goes back and Hause lets his contract run down.

I'm worried that this board think we're one or two players short, or that we're already in a position to compete, I'm worried that people think a new manager will miraculously make this squad into contenders.

We're a couple of hundred million away yet.

 

 

[Vive_La_Villa]

5 minutes ago, OutByEaster? said:

I think the squad still needs a huge amount of work.

This is a depth chart in which I'm only including players that I think have the ability to play in a top half Premier league side.

• --------------------------------Martinez-----------------------------
•  
• Cash-------------Konsa------------Mings-----------Targett
• ------------------Tuanzebe----------Hause----------------------
•  
• ----------------------------------Luiz----------------------------------
•  
• -------------------xxxxxxx-------------McGinn------------------
•  
• Buendia----------------------------------------------------Bailey
• Traore----------------------------------------------------------------
•  
• --------------------------------Watkins-----------------------------
• -----------------------------------Ings-------------------------------

I'd also add that I think that there's a chance that Kesler, Chukwuemeka, Philogene-Bidace and Barry might come through.

But for me, if you want to compete for Europe, you need two really good quality players in every position, so we're short:

A GK, a LB, a RB, a DM, a CM, another CM, another CM and a LW.

That's eight players - and it could be ten at the end of the season if Tuanzebe goes back and Hause lets his contract run down.

I'm worried that this board think we're one or two players short, or that we're already in a position to compete, I'm worried that people think a new manager will miraculously make this squad into contenders.

We're a couple of hundred million away yet.

 

 

What’s even more worrying is that some of the names on there don’t even look good enough for top half team at the moment. 

[Indigo]

For me there's no discernible style of play and that's the most worrying thing right now. I don't think the long and direct stuff is intended and is just what happens as a result of being completely unable to retain possession or deal with being pressed. Teams can often be more than the sum of their parts due to a coherent identity and we unfortunately appear to be the complete opposite of that right now and I struggle to see how it changes.

[jim]

Have we ever had a style of play?

Everything just went through Grealish when he played. When he didn’t play we looked rudderless much like we do now. Is it on the coaching team not instilling a philosophy and style of play for 3 seasons and now the star man has gone we don’t have a clue what to do? The constant chopping and changing certainly points in that direction.

[Kuwabatake Sanjuro]

6 minutes ago, Indigo said:

For me there's no discernible style of play and that's the most worrying thing right now. I don't think the long and direct stuff is intended and is just what happens as a result of being completely unable to retain possession or deal with being pressed. Teams can often be more than the sum of their parts due to a coherent identity and we unfortunately appear to be the complete opposite of that right now and I struggle to see how it changes.

How often do we try play it out from the back and it ends up with a hoof from a centre back who has been boxed in near the corner flag? You'd wonder what does be going on at Bodymoor Heath during the week.

[MaVilla]

6 minutes ago, Kuwabatake Sanjuro said:

How often do we try play it out from the back and it ends up with a hoof from a centre back who has been boxed in near the corner flag? You'd wonder what does be going on at Bodymoor Heath during the week.

yeah i noticed that, we trey to play around the back, but we dont have the midfielders to hold and pass the ball, so we always lump it, time and time again.

We dont have a style of play, other than long ball punting, and all this in a fairly small team!

[useless]

I think what we need to do from now is to play as settled a team as possible and try avoiding chopping and changing, decide who our best eleven is and give them a run of games to into a rhythm. Also I really think we need to drop this idea of playing with a No.10 in central midfield, we're not good enough to do that, neither are most teams...

I'd give this line up a run...

Martinez, Targett, Mings, Konsa, Cash, Luiz, McGinn, Ramsey, Buendia, Bailey, Watkins...

Buendia, and Bailey haven't been brilliant, but give them a run of games in a settled team and I'm sure they'd improve, same for Watkins, give him a run of games in a system and position that he's used to.

[Villarocker]

On 06/11/2021 at 07:24, allani said:

Again this is a general comment rather than specifically a response to you.

For me it isn't about a bad month of results (just as if we go and win 5 on the bounce now I won't suddenly think that Dean is the best things since sliced bread).  This is a longer term thing and there are a number of factors that have now happened several times during his tenure that are concerning.

I have pointed out several times in the last day or so that our poor form extends back to January.  Our stats in 2021 are considerably worse than they were in 2020 - won / drawn fewer matches (despite playing more matches), lost more matches (more than 50% of the matches played), scored fewer goals, conceded more goals, etc.  I think since being promoted we have had four runs of 12 plus matches where we have picked up 9 or fewer points.  We are now on another run of 10 points in 11 matches - which shows no sign of ending at the moment.

When we are "hot", Dean's consistency seems to help us go on excellent runs.  But when we are "cold" we seem to really struggle to turn things around.  This has been my biggest concern for a while - our form seems to be on or off with little in between.  At the start of last season I would have been delighted with our points tally and our final league position - but that ignores the fact that we had spells of relegation form mixed with a spell of title winning form.

My other concern (which is to an extent linked) is that we seem to be too passive to react to what is happening in a match.  Now in the past you can excuse Dean to an extent because our bench has been a joke - but we've upgraded our squad considerably and we still seem too slow to change formation, approach, intensity, personnel, etc.  We improved second half against Arsenal (partly because they'd won the match already and so eased off slightly) and yesterday - but that ignores the fact that their keeper didn't have to make a meaningful save and Emi made two top drawer stops.  We were much closer to a 3-0 defeat yesterday than we were to a 1-1 draw (at least in terms of chances created) and whilst 3-0 would probably have been harsh, us getting a point would have been even more harsh on Southampton.

We have made huge strides under Smith no question.  Getting us promoted, keeping us up and then getting us into the mid-pack are all major plus points.  He has been a big upgrade on what has come before - we'd not have achieved half of that with Bruce or some of our previous managers at the helm.

However, ignoring our first season back when FFP really ****ed our chances of competing because it prevented us from buying quality / experienced players, with the quality of the players at our disposal last season and this season we shouldn't be having the kind of spells we keep having.  The lack of control that we have in midfield has been an issue for a long time now and Smith has clearly not made this a priority.  You can't build a midfield around McGinn - the guy just isn't good enough and the fact that he is almost never subbed / dropped irrespective of how badly he is playing is insane.  We can't use the excuse that "he can only play what he has" because he should have made sure that we signed a proper defensive midfielder that would allow Dougie and maybe McGinn (although the jury is still out on that for me) to play their natural roles.  Our three summer signings have all struggled but Ings, Buendia and Bailey are all excellent players.  But when our tactics seem to be to just play long, high balls down the channels we aren't playing to their strengths.  Buendia's "improvement" yesterday was more down to us suddenly playing the ball on the deck and making runs around him rather than just smashing the ball upfield or giving him the ball in the middle of the park with 6 Southampton defenders and Ollie in front of him.  Unless we are in full attack mode (which happens when we are on one of our "hot" spells) we really struggle to dominate matches and seem to resort to the "tactics" of last night's first half.  Defend deep.  Defend the ball (rather than opposition players) which results in us always leaving opposition midfielders in acres of space at the edge of the area (for all that Dean moans about them scoring a wonder goal last night - they had 6 or 7 other similar chances from the same range).  Pump the ball long, giving the ball straight back to the opposition.  And repeat.

I hope that Dean doesn't suffer the ignamy of relegation.  He doesn't deserve that after what he has done to help us over the last 3 years.  He deserves to be remembered as one of the decent / good ones.  But I just don't have faith that even if he saves us from relegation this season that we won't be in a similar position next season or the one after - a team that when "hot" are a delight to watch, with attacking intent and capable of giving almost anyone a decent game - yet at the same time only a couple of results away from a spell of looking like they've never played the game professionally before.

I don't know who the answer is.  Any change is a gamble.  But so is not making a change.  I would have preferred to make the change when a new manager had time to come in assess the squad, target new signings, etc.  In the summer I think we were a potential "hot ticket" - on the back of a decent season, lots of youth prospects coming through, lots of players emerging as important cogs in their national teams, ambitious owners who were prepared to spend relatively big, a side that looked like they might be challenging Europe, etc.  Now I think we might struggle with the sell - we've lost our best player and we are looking more like relegation candidates than European contenders.  I still think that our squad is strong enough and the off-field infrastructure impressive enough to be attractive.  But I can't help thinking that anyone considering taking over will be worrying about the "risk" to their career of a relegation battle rather than the "opportunity" of getting us into Europe.  So I think we have fallen back a rung, maybe two, in terms of the quality of manager that we can bring in.  This would be the only excuse to not make the change now - that the only managers we can now attract are not a big improvement on Dean.  So hold fire and hope that we go on a "Dean special" glory run that gets us back closer to mid-table and a chance to re-sell the opportunity for next season.  But that seems like a massive gamble to me and probably even less fair on Dean.

You say "Dean's consistency helps us go on runs" when we're "hot". That's not Dean, it's the players. The best Villa team has not been seen this season for varying reasons. I really cannot wait to see this lineup:

------------------------Martinez----------------------

Cash-------Konsa------Mings-------Targett

------------------Luiz--------McGinn--------------

Traore-------------Buendia--------------Bailey

-----------------------Watkins------------------------

[MrBlack]

37 minutes ago, Villarocker said:

You say "Dean's consistency helps us go on runs" when we're "hot". That's not Dean, it's the players. The best Villa team has not been seen this season for varying reasons. I really cannot wait to see this lineup:

------------------------Martinez----------------------

Cash-------Konsa------Mings-------Targett

------------------Luiz--------McGinn--------------

Traore-------------Buendia--------------Bailey

-----------------------Watkins------------------------

Buendia can't play in the middle. He may be able to, but he never has played there and on the limited displays we've seen so far he is not yet ready to make that transition. 

Ings also seems better than Watkins on current form.

There in lies the problem Dean has though. We have zero idea what our best 11 is. And even if Dean thinks he does, he hasn't been able to play it thanks to injuries, and other unlucky reasons. 

Not sure it excuses 5 defeats in a row though. We need a huge shift in both luck and effort, and we may end up never knowing if Dean would have turned it around with a fully fit squad.

[M_Afro]

49 minutes ago, Villarocker said:

You say "Dean's consistency helps us go on runs" when we're "hot". That's not Dean, it's the players. The best Villa team has not been seen this season for varying reasons. I really cannot wait to see this lineup:

------------------------Martinez----------------------

Cash-------Konsa------Mings-------Targett

------------------Luiz--------McGinn--------------

Traore-------------Buendia--------------Bailey

-----------------------Watkins------------------------

I like this formation but we don’t have the players to play it effectively. To play 4-2-3-1 you need 2 absolutely top class DM’s and 2/3 really hard working AMs. Luiz is probably good enough with the right person next to him to compliment his weaknesses. SJM is woeful in that position.

I think Buendia can play that position with the right people behind him but the other two are way too poor defensively. 

I think we have to go 4-3-3 with a narrow front 3. I would bring in Young for Targett otherwise I would stick with your back 5. A midfield 3 (6 and two 8’s) of Luiz, SJM and Sanson. A front three of Buendia, Ollie and Bailey. Until we address our terrible midfield though, we will have issues with all formations.

[allani]

54 minutes ago, Villarocker said:

You say "Dean's consistency helps us go on runs" when we're "hot". That's not Dean, it's the players. The best Villa team has not been seen this season for varying reasons. I really cannot wait to see this lineup:

------------------------Martinez----------------------

Cash-------Konsa------Mings-------Targett

------------------Luiz--------McGinn--------------

Traore-------------Buendia--------------Bailey

-----------------------Watkins------------------------

Disagree.  When things aren't going right it is the manager's job to try and sort them, to come up with a plan and make sure the players understand that plan.  You can blame the players if they fail to execute that plan once or twice - **** happens after all.  But we have had three (and potentially now about to have a fourth) spells where we have failed to pick up more than 10 points over an extended period of 12 / 13 or 14 matches.  If the players aren't executing a plan over that long a period then it is manager's job to either (a) replace those players (we still have Doug and McGinn in central midfield despite 18 months of evidence that neither is a No 6) or (b) come up with a new plan that they can execute.  The fact that so many players are failing to do the things that they are good at well suggests to me that the issue isn't with them.

[JAMAICAN-VILLAN]

A bloke on a Post Match analysis just said " Douglas Luiz is a natural sitting midfielder, meanwhile Nakamba is more of a natural Footballer " lmao.

Just sums us punditry and how much these blokes know about our players.

Nakamba will be delighted to hear that haha

[Villarocker]

2 hours ago, M_Afro said:

I like this formation but we don’t have the players to play it effectively. To play 4-2-3-1 you need 2 absolutely top class DM’s and 2/3 really hard working AMs. Luiz is probably good enough with the right person next to him to compliment his weaknesses. SJM is woeful in that position.

I think Buendia can play that position with the right people behind him but the other two are way too poor defensively. 

I think we have to go 4-3-3 with a narrow front 3. I would bring in Young for Targett otherwise I would stick with your back 5. A midfield 3 (6 and two 8’s) of Luiz, SJM and Sanson. A front three of Buendia, Ollie and Bailey. Until we address our terrible midfield though, we will have issues with all formations.

I totally agree about our need for a combative midfielder who can get about the pitch and fully protect the back four. We've been screaming a need for one for years but, for whatever reason, we don't seem to get one. 

[villalad21]

4-3-3 Please.

1 DM and 2 hard working box to box midfielders.

None of that number 10 nonsense.

[ender4]

So what formation did Gerrard like to play at Rangers?

[dont_do_it_doug.]

Time to cut out this 2-man midfield bollocks. I will be slightly peeved if we see it again, at least until we have reinforcements. 

[Reivax_Villa]