Where (& why) has the Team Spirit gone

[tomphil]

Just now, Tyrone Shoelaces said:

What are we running here Tom ? A football club or an investment bank ?

An offshore tax haven for an Indian conglomerate ,,,,,,,,,,?

[SBlue]

That photo of Dack kneeling in a garden finally got round the dressing room.

 

It's a blip I hope and the test is this weekend - at home, against a poor team.

If we don't outfight this non-fighting Wednesday side I'll start getting worried.

[RevidgeBlue]

20 hours ago, Paul said:

Ah yes the "false 9" and other associated total nonsense spouted by "expert" commentators who are nothing more than end of career pros squeezing a few more ££££s out of the game. All of which is eagerly lapped up by a gullible audience before being regurgitated in the pub.

"False 9" means we don't have a striker available so we are going to stick the bloke most likely to score in that position.

Football, and our squad and manager would do well to remember, is simple. We have defenders, midfielders and attacking players. Each has to work hard in their role and help with other aspects of the game such as defending from the front. Good players pass the ball, bad ones hoof it long for someone else to deal with. We have a mix of passers and hoofers.

As for the team spirit. I'm sure it's still there. We had a poor performance at Preston and a diabolical one at Wigan - the worst league performance under Mowbray, we have been even worse in at least one cup game. It's human nature to fall out and argue after such a performance. I would fully expect seasoned pros like Mulgrew and Graham to have something to say in particular to players like Dack who has failed to contribute for weeks.

However the world hasn't ended, no one died, the sky hasn't fallen in. I'm confident team spirit will return on Saturday and Tony will sort out the problems. I would drop Dack, play Brereton with Graham so the lad can learn from a proper professional footballer while Danny is still around. Don't ask me how but I'd like to see Bennet, available?, and Rothwell in there. I think, much as I hate to say it, we defended better without Mulgrew. To an extent I think the other defenders constantly look to Mulgrew to sort everything out. This was very much in evidence last season but this year Charlie isn't coping with it so well.

It's no time to panic but a real shame we've missed great opportunities. This week alone we could have gone sixth and other games with more concentration the same, at least, applies. I'm sure both manager and players know this.

Myself I'm disappointed but not angry and on occasion last season I was angry. It was noticeable amongst the fans at the DW there was little anger just tangible disappointment we could play so badly following a poor performance at Deepdale.

Hmmmmm............ football isn't such a simple game when players are being played out of their normal position where they're not particularly  comfortable and I wouldn't say Palmer was  anywhere near the next most likely player to score up front either. Having spent £9m on two strikers over the summer I'd have thought they'd be the obvious candidates.

Still, TM claims the "clear the air" meeting went well so lets see what happens this afternoon.

[Vinjay]

As Mowbray said it's "good to a point" and I agree. There has to be a balance though. I remember a post on here mentioning 97-98 and what was the catalyst for the downturn in form. Some people put it down to the intense training philosophy at the time but as we saw quite a number of players started to fall out with Hodgson. The aforementioned post mentioned the loss at Old Trafford in November 97 and arguments between the players AND the manager afterwards. Which created a rift which never quite healed. Now the form didn't collapse right away but by March it fell off a cliff. Then it continued the following season not entirely helped by a truly disastrous injury list.

It looks like the players didn't argue with Mowbray here. The arguments with each other are something the manager needs to keep an eye on. Make sure it does not create rifts and divisions. It won't help in January if there's interest in Dack and he starts being unprofessional (not entirely unheard of with him) if the club don't accept the first bid that comes in from anywhere that interests him. 

[Tyrone Shoelaces]

1 hour ago, Vinjay17 said:

As Mowbray said it's "good to a point" and I agree. There has to be a balance though. I remember a post on here mentioning 97-98 and what was the catalyst for the downturn in form. Some people put it down to the intense training philosophy at the time but as we saw quite a number of players started to fall out with Hodgson. The aforementioned post mentioned the loss at Old Trafford in November 97 and arguments between the players AND the manager afterwards. Which created a rift which never quite healed. Now the form didn't collapse right away but by March it fell off a cliff. Then it continued the following season not entirely helped by a truly disastrous injury list.

It looks like the players didn't argue with Mowbray here. The arguments with each other are something the manager needs to keep an eye on. Make sure it does not create rifts and divisions. It won't help in January if there's interest in Dack and he starts being unprofessional (not entirely unheard of with him) if the club don't accept the first bid that comes in from anywhere that interests him. 

You're dead right about that game at Old Trafford. We'd been running away with game playing 4-4-2 with Gally and Sutton up front prior to that game. Roy Boy loses his bottle in team selection and we go out 4-5-1 with a lone striker and got rightly battered. There's a lesson in that. Subsequently the wheels gradually fell off and the internal differences caused by that game saw us tumble down the League