Adkins - Pros and Cons

[Zana Badawi]

I know how I'd feel playing for us at home right now. Nervous and demotivated.

Are you saying that your skills are comparable to those of a professional footballer?

[bcubed]

It's all very easy to blame adkins for the players looking sluggish, but the fans are an obvious factor.

Stop repeating this absolute bollocks

I was going to reply but this seems to cover it!

[P!ssed Off]

You are obviously a very sad and lonely inadequate who has nothing better to do than pick holes in everything anyone else says. Well good luck with that. I hope your tiny victory in pointing out a small error on my part has given you joy at this Christmas season. And so as you go home tonight please do take pleasure at my expense.

But the point remains that Bolton have a strong squad.

Sorry.
But if you thought Bolton were playing Kevin Davies up front on Saturday, then I've absolutely no interest in your opinion of the Bolton squad.

[handbags_harris]

For all those who want Adkins out did you hear the Hammond interview on Saturday on BBCRB.

NH basically admitted that Adkins had been shafted by Anton and all the promises made had been reneged on. And it is hardly motivational to many of our out of contract players to know they have no future at the club because the Thais cannot invest or even offer new contracts without breaching the FFP rules. We have also faced the worst injury list I can ever recall over the last 18 months and frankly the club behind the scenes has been a complete mess.

Whether we like it or not unless there is a remarkable turn round of form in the second half of the season the best we can hope for this season is likely to be survival.

But what we can rejoice in is that 6 of the 14 who played on Saturday are Academy products and there two more on the bench. Few clubs will have 8 Academy products in the match day 18. And that does not even include the likes of Federici and Andersen who both joined at a young age too.

Assuming a play off run does not emerge and that we are fairly safe from relegation, the best thing NA can do will be to give the likes of Tshibola and Kuhl more time as the season progresses and then with a few additions next summer to fill the gaps, we should have a half decent squad next season.

Then judge NA this time next season if he does not deliver.

I don't really want him out. I just want him to win a few games.

We are mid-table for Pete's sake - several other teams did a lot better in our position. Look at Saints and Wolves after they came down and went straight down to League 1. Our fans really have much too high expectations of Adkins - spoiled through the success in previous years despite continuous lack of investment has made them expect that level of success year in, year out.

tend to agree with this, although in recent years you can't put it down to lack of investment, rather too much unsustainable egg-laying in two baskets that turn out to have dodgy yokes. Interesting the years before as well, despite the perceived lack of investment we still had a £20+ million wage bill the season we went up, which I believe was up in the top quarter of wage bills for the division. That, in my eyes, is far from a lack of investment, rather an imbalanced level of investment.

[Ian Royal]

It's all very easy to blame adkins for the players looking sluggish, but the fans are an obvious factor.

Stop repeating this absolute bollocks

Carry on in your dream world then.

[Royal Lady]

It's all very easy to blame adkins for the players looking sluggish, but the fans are an obvious factor.

Stop repeating this absolute bollocks

Carry on in your dream world then.

If they were solely playing for the fans, they would have started off better this season! Come off it Ian - you know perfectly well they are paid good money to do their job, However they have limitations and the buck rests with the manager in not putting players in their best positions, not coaching them with right tactics, not having a plan B when the tactics he does use are rubbish and always seemingly bigging up the opposition

[sandman]

Hate to break this to you Ian and I know you love this romantic "the fans make a difference" notion but the vast majority of players really don't care about what fans think or do. It's easy for them to blame the fans if they are in a bit of poor form or pay lip service to "how great the fans are" when they are in a bit of good form but they really don't give a flying one.

Our support really isn't as bad as people like you try to make out, it's not been great for the best part of 20 years and we've done quite well on the pitch in that time.

[Royal Lady]

Hate to break this to you Ian and I know you love this romantic "the fans make a difference" notion but the vast majority of players really don't care about what fans think or do. It's easy for them to blame the fans if they are in a bit of poor form or pay lip service to "how great the fans are" when they are in a bit of good form but they really don't give a flying one.

Our support really isn't as bad as people like you try to make out, it's not been great for the best part of 20 years and we've done quite well on the pitch in that time.

Agreed - atmosphere changed once we moved to Mad Stad imo. Considering some of our results and the way we've been playing, I'd say our fans have been pretty restrained.

[AthleticoSpizz]

We all know "its different these days" but the current difference is up to 10k more fans than what used to turn up to some of our decent (the old Championship) Div2 matches.

We, and Reading FC, just have to weather the current sh1tstorm...the fans will be the least of the problem.

[Lower West]

Interesting the years before as well, despite the perceived lack of investment we still had a £20+ million wage bill the season we went up, which I believe was up in the top quarter of wage bills for the division. That, in my eyes, is far from a lack of investment, rather an imbalanced level of investment.

Too often players bought in simply don't settle in. In years gone by. Players soon moved on. Now far too often players sit out their contracts by playing with the youth team. The academy has to be the way forward. Along with the purchase of very specific players that have been clearly identified as being able to offer something to the team.

[Ian Royal]

Stop repeating this absolute bollocks

Carry on in your dream world then.

If they were solely playing for the fans, they would have started off better this season! Come off it Ian - you know perfectly well they are paid good money to do their job, However they have limitations and the buck rests with the manager in not putting players in their best positions, not coaching them with right tactics, not having a plan B when the tactics he does use are rubbish and always seemingly bigging up the opposition

Another person seemingly incapable of understanding what I said.

[Ian Royal]

Hate to break this to you Ian and I know you love this romantic "the fans make a difference" notion but the vast majority of players really don't care about what fans think or do. It's easy for them to blame the fans if they are in a bit of poor form or pay lip service to "how great the fans are" when they are in a bit of good form but they really don't give a flying one.

Our support really isn't as bad as people like you try to make out, it's not been great for the best part of 20 years and we've done quite well on the pitch in that time.

Our support is mostly fine. It was desperately poor on Saturday though. I'll trust my instincts and every professional footballer and coach I've ever heard mention the effect of fans over you ta.

[Royal Lady]

But you don't trust what McD said recently, so why would you take anything else anyone in the profession says as gospel

[Whatevs]

Hate to break this to you Ian and I know you love this romantic "the fans make a difference" notion but the vast majority of players really don't care about what fans think or do. It's easy for them to blame the fans if they are in a bit of poor form or pay lip service to "how great the fans are" when they are in a bit of good form but they really don't give a flying one.

Our support really isn't as bad as people like you try to make out, it's not been great for the best part of 20 years and we've done quite well on the pitch in that time.

Our support is mostly fine. It was desperately poor on Saturday though. I'll trust my instincts and every professional footballer and coach I've ever heard mention the effect of fans over you ta.

only one way to test this out. Track the 'atmosphere' (i.e. sustained noise or whatever metric) and map it against results

[Silver Fox]

Another person seemingly incapable of understanding what I said.

People are capable of understanding what you said, that's why they know it's a load of bollocks

[Royal Rother]

Every time they are asked, Williams and Gooding (and every other player I've ever heard offer an opinion on the subject) confirm that when the atmosphere is charged and positive it helps pull out another percentage from the players.

To suggest that the amount they are paid should be enough anyway shows a laughably staggering ignorance of how human beings function.

Or just an indication that some people will argue with everything Ian Royal says just for the hell of it no matter how stupid it makes them look to those with a functioning brain. Still, at least it appears there's a degree of comfort in their collective ignorance.

[Royal Lady]

Every time they are asked, Williams and Gooding (and every other player I've ever heard offer an opinion on the subject) confirm that when the atmosphere is charged and positive it helps pull out another percentage from the players.

To suggest that the amount they are paid should be enough anyway shows a laughably staggering ignorance of how human beings function.

Or just an indication that some people will argue with everything Ian Royal says just for the hell of it no matter how stupid it makes them look to those with a functioning brain. Still, at least it appears there's a degree of comfort in their collective ignorance.

Presume that's to me.

You want try watching a few Reading games, you might not be so high up on your horse then.

To suggest that the players are playing badly "because of the fans" is ridiculous, as you well know. My comment about their pay was that, it shouldn't matter whether they are liked or not, they are paid very well to do their job. To be honest though, I think they are all doing the best they can within the constraints of the tactics, positioning given to them. I've been to many games where fans have been brilliant and really got behind them, but it won't change the results at the moment because tactically we are just inept.

[Ian Royal]

But you don't trust what McD said recently, so why would you take anything else anyone in the profession says as gospel

You really are incredibly thick. As you demonstrate again with your latest post yet again failing to understand anything i said.

It shows how stupidly entrenched and incaple of reason people are, that i raise a possibility of a contributory factor to our recent nerves at home and its misrepresented as a statement of fact that everything wrong with us is 100% caused by tge fans and dismissed out of hand in favour of 'everything's Adkins fault'.


Because what McDermott said recently directly contradicts other information some of which he gave us himself.

[wingnut]

Hate to break this to you Ian and I know you love this romantic "the fans make a difference" notion but the vast majority of players really don't care about what fans think or do. It's easy for them to blame the fans if they are in a bit of poor form or pay lip service to "how great the fans are" when they are in a bit of good form but they really don't give a flying one.

Our support really isn't as bad as people like you try to make out, it's not been great for the best part of 20 years and we've done quite well on the pitch in that time.

Our support is mostly fine. It was desperately poor on Saturday though. I'll trust my instincts and every professional footballer and coach I've ever heard mention the effect of fans over you ta.

only one way to test this out. Track the 'atmosphere' (i.e. sustained noise or whatever metric) and map it against results

That's no good either as it won't be clear what's cause and what's effect.

The problem with blaming the crowd (or even partly blaming the crowd) is that it's difficult to prove either way - if not impossible. So folk can charge around on their high horses pompously declaring they're right with neither side having the proof behind their argument.

[leon]

But after a win away followed by a fairly poor home performance, has it occurred to anyone that it's not Adkins who's lost the players... but the fans?

Using a sample size of two games is an interesting approach to proving a point. If we widen it out to the season so far then presumably we've done better away from home then?