2020/21 Carlo Ancelotti

[Lanolin]

Do think there was a plan I just don't think the players were good enough to carry it out.

The issue is, Carlo should know that and know that the best thing to do with this lot is keep it simple, especially with our three best players out and, with Coleman, the four most important players to the 4-3-3 system we have been playing.

The plan seemed to be to just keep really compact. But issue is we just had no attacking threat, as our full-backs pressed so high and Delph and Doucoure - who is our only midfielder with any pace once he gets going - dropping into those spaces.

It was a really bad system and he should have changed it at half-time.

One tweak - Gordon or Bernard or Iwobi even - on for Gomes and you could have tweaked it to having Nkounkou left wing if that's what was wanted, with an attacking midfielder off Dom and Doucoure not having to play as a right-back.

Or, bring Brainthwaite on and go to a back three.

It's a mixture of three factors for me yesterday: not changing a system that clearly didn't work, the players not being good enough past the first XI and, then no.2 is compounded by our failure to add a key piece at the end of the window.

Clearly he had a plan though, it was a plan that proved to be unsuccessful.

I'm not a massive fan of throwing people under the bus, but Gomes makes a big mistake. After they we are 1 paced and would always struggle to get back into the game. It was a team set up to win ugly and keep possession.

I'd add in now, that Godfrey, and probably Holgate will need to come back into this team when he is fit. While we have both acknowledged Holgate is probably not the world beater I and other have said he might be but he is a good partner for Keane stylistically. It can also allow us to push up the pitch.

Sorry I didn't mean he literally didn't have a plan. There are things that you don't think you need to spell out, but I should know better by now. Of course he didn't just send them out and say do what you want, I just meant that I had hoped he had a plan which would win the game, and clearly he didn't.

 

[Papa Shango]

I fear he still rates him. It's his blind spot.

He doesn't get in his first 11 if everybody is fit.

 

[granter79]

Got it wrong from the start and expected him to change it at ht as clearly wasnt working. Had have changed it and dragged gomes n siggy off we would have kicked on. Newcastle were terrible. First time hes disappointed so wont get too disheartened. Need a win this week to cling onto that early season positivity

 

[degsy]

Out of interest who would you have picked and in what formation considering , Ricarlison ,Digne ,Coleman ,Holgate and James were unavailable

Not Siggi or Gomes
Yes Gordon and Godfrey. 3 at the back and maybe a bit wider in MF with more pace and go up front.

 

[Jadubsee]

Out of interest who would you have picked and in what formation considering , Ricarlison ,Digne ,Coleman ,Holgate and James were unavailable

4-5-1. Gordon on the left from the start and Bernard or Iwobi on the right, Sigurdsson off DCL. Gomes on the bench, Delph booted into space.

 

[catcherintherye]

Sorry I didn't mean he literally didn't have a plan. There are things that you don't think you need to spell out, but I should know better by now. Of course he didn't just send them out and say do what you want, I just meant that I had hoped he had a plan which would win the game, and clearly he didn't.

No I appreciate that, but sometimes in defeat people knee-jerk to a point he had no plan. I have seen some Everton managers where you get the sense there's no real plan, but yesterday less so.

We are missing probably 5 key starters yesterday, Digne, Coleman, Holgate, Richarlinson and James. He has patched together an 11 but ultimately we need to get those players back so we can go back to plan A.

A big problem is, with a couple of exceptions we do not have players who can come close to replicating what they do. There's nobody close to Richarlinson in style, or James. We have no right back as good as Coleman and Digne is on another level on the otherside. Godfrey could give us a lot of what Holgate does, but he was injured too.

It's not just a gulf in class, but in styles as well.

It's a good team, but losing 5 key starters hits us very hard.

 

[catcherintherye]

we havnt been playing well for weeks and hardly made any chances in the last two games.
Should stop showing faith in some of these players from now on they were not good enough when he came and are not now, we He had got the it wrong the last few weeks and we have gone back to the standards that made us bad last season.
He has been let down by not getting in replacements for a few ,
this season will drift away unless we get some players in in jan.
If DLC got injured we would be in big trouble.

The issue is, who do you change too? There aren't a lot of options below the first 11.

 

[vinvinvin]

Carlos' post match:

“We knew it would be this sort of game, without a lot of opportunities. Until the penalty, the game was in the balance. We didn’t have a lot of opportunities, Newcastle didn’t have a lot of opportunities - we just needed to continue like this, don't let them have a gift and keep the match balanced and we could open at the end."

Sounds like he went for the classic Italian 1-0. Tbf before the penalty Newcastle had created zilch and we were under no pressure, albeit not applying much pressure ourselves. If Gomes had been switched on and not given away the penalty it's conceivable we could have finished the game stronger with a couple of attacking subs and nicked it - then it would be a tactical masterclass from Ancelotti - but it's fine margins in football, particularly when you set up for a 1-0. It didn't come off on this occasion but as others have said I'd rather have a manager who at least tries to play tactically to beat the opponent in front of him rather than flogging a dead horse and calling it his 'system', repeating the same mistakes week after week. If you could choose any manager to set your team up tactically Carlo would be up there so we just have to chalk this one off and keep the faith that he'll get it right more often than not.

 

[tsubaki]

The issue is, who do you change too? There aren't a lot of options below the first 11.

there are, he just isn’t using them

 

[catcherintherye]

there are, he just isn’t using them

Such as? I mean I appreciate Gordon is the obvious one.

 

[Toffe3m4n]

If he genuinely feels as though there are no better starting options than the likes of Sigurdsson, Iwobi, Kenny et al when we're in these situations then it simply needs addressing as a matter of priority in these next two transfer windows.

We badly lack pace in key areas of the pitch and it's something that needs addressing. We can't just come up against the likes of your Liverpool's and Southampton's and have no answer to them simply because they have quicker, more energetic players..

 

[Lanolin]

No I appreciate that, but sometimes in defeat people knee-jerk to a point he had no plan. I have seen some Everton managers where you get the sense there's no real plan, but yesterday less so.

We are missing probably 5 key starters yesterday, Digne, Coleman, Holgate, Richarlinson and James. He has patched together an 11 but ultimately we need to get those players back so we can go back to plan A.

A big problem is, with a couple of exceptions we do not have players who can come close to replicating what they do. There's nobody close to Richarlinson in style, or James. We have no right back as good as Coleman and Digne is on another level on the otherside. Godfrey could give us a lot of what Holgate does, but he was injured too.

It's not just a gulf in class, but in styles as well.

It's a good team, but losing 5 key starters hits us very hard.

No I agree with all that, I think we're losing the context of the point I was making here. I was replying to somebody who said the team looked fine on paper. I'm saying it really didn't, it looked a total mess. I was hoping that there was some tactical genius behind it that a peasant like me couldn't understand, and we would actually produce a cohesive performance where people knew exactly what they were doing, and we won the game. There wasn't though. We played exactly like it looked we would play with that team, disjointed, slow, completely lacking in attacking threat etc. Ancelotti is a great manager, but to have a squad that's cost as much as ours has and send them out trying to huff and puff their way to a 0-0 draw with Newcastle by getting 10 men behind the ball is pretty disappointing, whether players are missing or not.

 

[Saint Domingo]

These players have struggled to win away games under multiple different managers. Sometimes we’ve only won 3 in a whole season. We won the first two this season yet we expect these players without five of our first team players available to suddenly start turning over decent midfield table teams away from home regularly? Not going to happen. These types games would have been difficult for us last season even with a full first team out.

It takes longer than a few months to flick a switch and erase decades of a culture of mediocrity. Everyone at the club before Carlo arrived has had a mindset of ‘a point here will do’ ‘expected losses’ ‘best of the rest’ ‘we’re good at Goodison’. This had gone right from the top down to the players. People can’t expect that to change in a few months and the likes of Sigurdsson Iwobi Mina etc to go from being players comfortable not having to turn up every game to being ones who suddenly start being prolific winners. Not going to happen.

I can’t tell if Carlo is getting it right or wrong because some of the attitude of the players is still so poor. When players are pulling out of 50:50s, underhitying simple passes, over hitting crosses and set pieces, making simple positional errors defensively. Is that his tactics? If Gomes has defended that situation slightly better and some of our midfield players had tried to be premier league footballers rather than passengers was that game not possible for us to win? Of course it was. We went away from home and dominated possession and limited them to a handful of half chances. From that foundation you’d expect our attacking players to go and make stuff happen and our defenders not to make silly mistakes. The quality and concentration wasn’t there which is exactly what Carlo said in his post match interview.

 

[GwladysBlue]

You don’t start Sigurdsson and Delph and expect to get points in the Premier League.

 

[catcherintherye]

No I agree with all that, I think we're losing the context of the point I was making here. I was replying to somebody who said the team looked fine on paper. I'm saying it really didn't, it looked a total mess. I was hoping that there was some tactical genius behind it that a peasant like me couldn't understand, and we would actually produce a cohesive performance where people knew exactly what they were doing, and we won the game. There wasn't though. We played exactly like it looked we would play with that team, disjointed, slow, completely lacking in attacking threat etc. Ancelotti is a great manager, but to have a squad that's cost as much as ours has and send them out trying to huff and puff their way to a 0-0 draw with Newcastle by getting 10 men behind the ball is pretty disappointing, whether players are missing or not.

All very reasoned and fair.

To try to put balance, as I'm sure Ancelotti would say the plan was to stifle Newcastle, nick a goal and hold out for a 1-0 with players who should be able to keep the ball. That plan was working until Gomes made a really poor mistake.

There are legitinate questions as to whether that ought to have been the gameplan against Newcastle, and I suppose it's why I am putting the context in that this is clearly Ancelotti working with a team bereft of several of his key players.

But yes, 5 central midfielders in a team is rarely going to look balanced.