2020/21 Carlo Ancelotti

[Jim Hopper]

Just on midfield, it looked to me like Doucoure was playing wide right. I can't fathom that. We seemed to do the same at Newcastle and it didn't work ther either.

Think Carlo knows Coleman is a spent force. It’s little wonder Fulham targeted that right hand side from the first minute think that’s why Carlo put Doucoure out there to help him out, he was gassed though Doucs.

 

[Terrarian]

These performances are shocking...But...You have to look at the cowardice of the players, refusing to pass forward it just isn't good enough, that was a bottom 3 side whose players passed it forwards with more purpose and intent than us, AGAIN.

You may not have agreed with that line up and I agree these are as bad as anything any other manager has served up but at this point I'm looking at the players, once on the pitch the onus is on them to play with more aggression and intensity and bravery on the ball.

It's like groundhog day with overpaid players who earn more than their trophy cabinet suggests it should(bar James). They can't seem to motivate themselves to play and it has become ingrained in the fabric of the club it seems.

I really don't know the solution, they will still be paid millions for putting in performances like that.

 

[ToffeeTim]

You've not answered my question.

You said;



King come on with plenty of time to go and 1-0 down, we didn't improve. He's not fully fit.
Iwobi stunk the place out in the previous game - quantifiable by fan ratings. Rightly dropped.

But the main question I'd like to ask you is on your shout of;

• The side had 3 luxury players in midfield who can't tackle, run or track opponents. An arrogant team selection thinking we just had to turn up.

I agree the midfield was the problem - it's too passive and off the ball a waste of space.

You've said his team selection was arrogant thinking we just had to turn up.

So please, do tell me what other options in midfield he should of used.

I did answer the question. If you want all those attacking midfielders who don't offer anything off the ball, then you have to pack the defence. You don't play Coleman and Digne and inexperienced centre backs. You either have attacking full backs and two deep midfielders or you have a defensive 4 at the back.

I would have played James and Holgate or Iwobi and Coleman on the right. Not James and Coleman, it's too passive. I would have played Godfrey at left back with Digne in front and Richarlison through the middle. I would not have put Sigurddson through the middle. I would not have picked both of Sigurddson and Gomes.

I would have preferred to get an hour out of King and then sub him. That issue of lack of midfield runners could have been mitigated by having cover in wide areas and a solid base. It's about balance as much as personnel. We tried to have our cake and eat it.

 

[catcherintherye]

I did answer the question. If you want all those attacking midfielders who don't offer anything off the ball, then you have to pack the defence. You don't play Coleman and Digne and inexperienced centre backs. You either have attacking full backs and two deep midfielders or you have a defensive 4 at the back.

I would have played James and Holgate or Iwobi and Coleman on the right. Not James and Coleman, it's too passive. I would have played Godfrey at left back with Digne in front and Richarlison through the middle. I would not have put Sigurddson through the middle. I would not have picked both of Sigurddson and Gomes.

I would have preferred to get an hour out of King and then sub him. That issue of lack of midfield runners could have been mitigated by having cover in wide areas and a solid base. It's about balance as much as personnel. We tried to have our cake and eat it.

I think you are both right really.

With our midfield you need a strong defence. But in honesty, there is not really a stronger midfield available for us.

In the intervening time, we should pack the defence, probably get Digne into Midifeld, which can hopefully allow us to carry 1/2 players in the middle.

 

[lungo]

Think Carlo knows Coleman is a spent force. It’s little wonder Fulham targeted that right hand side from the first minute think that’s why Carlo put Doucoure out there to help him out, he was gassed though Doucs.

No he has to play there because Rodriguez only walks around when we dont have the ball. Coleman had no cover what so ever without Doucoure. Rodriguez has nothing to do in the premier league!

 

[MikeH72]

I'm not really sure any of them press high up the pitch. West Ham and Villa sit quite deep. None of them are top teams who put us under lots of pressure and try to retain possession.

Fulham aren’t a top team and they absolutely did put us under pressure and dominate possession, so did Leeds at Goodison, neither of them sat in and tried to break or nick one. Teams in mid table and down at the bottom don’t fear us, and why should they?

 

[Lanolin]

Yes I remember and you're point was a perfectly valid and well made one. I have a different view but it doesn't mean I'm right and you're wrong as we (like everyone else) are two guys on a football forum giving a view.

However, as a point of order, we did not try 4 CB's, loading the team with height and relying on set pieces in the same way. Or if we were trying that, then it would be a reall foolhardy plan, as you're leaving out our two biggest players.

I am quite happy to accept the point that 4 CB's my not work. That the 7 game run we've had is a bit of an abheration (and probably not quite long enough to generalise from, it's kind of on the boundary) and that if we play more games we get mean reversion. I'm very open to that theory, but it hasn't happened yet.

I'll be completely honest as well, I don't think Coleman is good enough anymore. I try to avoid writing people off, and he's been a great servant, but thats where we are now. I'm not saying Godfrey or Holgate are good enough either but they are
1) Younger, 2) achieve better results and 3) (and this is just my opinion) better.

As for Mina, I'm not sure he's the solution to our defensive woes, he played midweek when we conceded 4. I do think he would help on set peices though, as he's very big and very good in the air. But the evidence doesn't really show any single change makes a big difference, it's more that when they have played together, the back 4 of Holgate, Mina, Keane and Godfrey have been very solid. At present I cant say that about any of our other back fours.

So I mean if we asre trying the same tactics as when we had 4 CB's (2 of them huge) with 2 smaller CB's and two full backs, that doesn't seem sensible to me at all. I think he tried to play a different way and failed. It's up to Ancelotti if he wants to use the rest of this season as a trial and error exercise, but me personally I would go back to what has worked best so far.

Yeah thats all fair. I'm not saying i'm right and you're wrong, the point was more that just hoping you get to capitalise on a set piece and that you'll keep a clean sheet isn't a great way to win games. It will work sometimes, of course, but I think we'd have lost some of these games playing that way too, simply because it's not a sustainable way to win games.

 

[Ebrell22]

Carlo has been a good manager for us but this losing at home to crap teams has to stop if we want to achieve something.

 

[jamieni]

Fulham aren’t a top team and they absolutely did put us under pressure and dominate possession, so did Leeds at Goodison, neither of them sat in and tried to break or nick one. Teams in mid table and down at the bottom don’t fear us, and why should they?

Teams know if they get about us and put us under pressure then we’ll crumble. Desperately need Allan back plus we need to sign another athletic Cm in the summer since I’m assuming Gbamin is finished.

 

[Egil Olsen]

I'm not really sure any of them press high up the pitch. West Ham and Villa sit quite deep. None of them are top teams who put us under lots of pressure and try to retain possession.

Leeds and Southampton are the two teams that have the most intense pressure on the opposing half (PPDA).

 

[Jim Hopper]

No he has to play there because Rodriguez only walks around when we dont have the ball. Coleman had no cover what so ever without Doucoure. Rodriguez has nothing to do in the premier league!

He’s a luxury galactico player James. Not the type of player you need in your team when the opposition is squeezing the life out of you and giving no time on the ball and getting stuck into you. A couple of years ago he would have been the ideal player to have on against a Fulham type club, times have changed now it seems, teams just come here and don’t even allow us to play on our pitch anymore and we simply don’t even have a response. It’s heartbreaking.

 

[BornBlue76]

Maybe it is knee jerk.. maybe I’m just mad after the most embarrassing I’ve ever seen... but I have to ask.. the question that’s been rolling around since about November...

watching us get lucky against Arsenal and Chelsea along the way that seemed to justify the anti football we throw out every week. I hated those wins.. thanks for the three points but was this the new Everton? Was this what I would have to endure every week? Every win would just mean more of the same.. Fans argued that is a great defensive performance against good sides.. truth: we got lucky.

Then we dish up the same against Leeds, Leicester.. basically play as if we scared of every team that walks into the pitch.. they’re faster, more skilled, we only have player X or Y... whatever excuse we could come up with to justify dishing up anti football week in and week out.. hoping that 15 minutes a game we could turn it on and get something out.
Well it worked on occasion.. especially against better teams that had zero respect for us.. the lesser teams still played like we could hurt them but realised all you have to do is press and run at the midfield. So they are much tougher as they didn’t let themselves get too loose.

keep them out and nick one.. from Utd, to Leicester, to Leeds and Fulham. Do we not believe that players individually costing over £20m across the pitch can’t string 2 passes together at pace?
Can these players not receive the ball under pressure and look to move forward?
Why does our midfield not show for the ball? Why do we literally pass from the opposing third all the way back to our keeper without getting the ball into the box?

I can’t get my head around any of those questions.. I have often moaned about every one of those points during the matches but let it go after. I keep hope that we waiting on this player or that.. that those moments of inspiration during mostly rubbish games will ignite the team to believe in themselves and to attempt to play football .. not this absolute embarrassment of anti football we dish up every single week.

I say it every game.. I believe we are better than the play they dish up. Which leads me back to the tactics and team psychology.
Which leads me back to Carlos.

and the question.. is Carlos just a better groomed version of Sam Allardyce.. I can’t shake the question that no matter who we have in our 11... this is what we have to look forward to. Negative, slow, lethargic football until they score or we get lucky.

Rant over. I normally just hide in The Ale House thread till my cloud dissipates .. this time I had to get it off my chest.

Just noticed my rant called Our manager Carlos.. not once but twice ... appreciate actually that the responses focused on the content not the silly spell check

 

[GrandOldTeam]

I did answer the question. If you want all those attacking midfielders who don't offer anything off the ball, then you have to pack the defence. You don't play Coleman and Digne and inexperienced centre backs. You either have attacking full backs and two deep midfielders or you have a defensive 4 at the back.

I would have played James and Holgate or Iwobi and Coleman on the right. Not James and Coleman, it's too passive. I would have played Godfrey at left back with Digne in front and Richarlison through the middle. I would not have put Sigurddson through the middle. I would not have picked both of Sigurddson and Gomes.

I would have preferred to get an hour out of King and then sub him. That issue of lack of midfield runners could have been mitigated by having cover in wide areas and a solid base. It's about balance as much as personnel. We tried to have our cake and eat it.

It's easy to say "I would not have picked both Sigurdsson and Gomes" but he's got to play someone.

If you point the finger at Ancelotti with emphasis on arrogantly playing 3 luxury players in midfield then you have to give the alternative, your alternative of playing Iwobi...

Not for me.

Inexperienced centre back or not, Holgate was the clubs player of the season last year.
Godfrey has been great.

If both aren't capable of playing in their preferred positions at home to Fulham then we should pack their bags now.

Ultimately, that team should be beating Fulham.

They didn't, like with Newcastle - quite simply because they didn't fancy it.

Sometimes it's that simple.

After Newcastle Ancelotti said;

"Disappointed. Frustrated. We lost an opportunity. The reason was quite clear – Newcastle showed more spirit than us. They won a lot of duals, they won a lot of second balls – we gave them presents with a lot of corners.

“We have quality but without spirit, you are unable to show your quality.

When asked what Everton need to do in response, Ancelotti said: “It’s not difficult, just switch on your mental attitude.”

“We are not happy. The key point was that we didn’t have the same spirit as Newcastle.

“I know we have quality. The good run in the past is because we showed fantastic spirit on the pitch.

“Today, we forgot our spirit. We left it at home. We tried to play with quality but in this game, in all games to just try to play with quality isn’t enough. You have to sacrifice, concentration, motivation, ambition – we forgot this today”


In short then, they wanted it more. After Fulham, he's said;

"Now we have two difficult games to play but I think we need to have hope because usually, in these kind of games, we play better.

"We have to have focus but in the difficult games usually we play well and I think we can do the same on Wednesday.

If we're going to criticise Ancelotti, then it's asking why his players aren't fancying playing 'lesser' teams and why they're upping their game against the bigger teams.

I think it's a bit of a nonsense to slate him as arrogant for playing that 11 last night. Even more of a nonsense to think Iwobi changes anything.

 

[jamieni]

He’s a luxury galactico player James. Not the type of player you need in your team when the opposition is squeezing the life out of you and giving no time on the ball and getting stuck into you. A couple of years ago he would have been the ideal player to have on against a Fulham type club, times have changed now it seems, teams just come here and don’t even allow us to play on our pitch anymore and we simply don’t even have a response. It’s heartbreaking.

We need to have a team setup that allows James to express himself. Unfortunately having no focal point up front and a midfield full of slugs isn’t really the way to achieve that lol

 

[the sniderman]

Carlo has been a good manager for us but this losing at home to crap teams has to stop if we want to achieve something.

thank u buddy now over to studio.