Managers, Players, Systems and Money

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ucandomagic

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For me the whole thing with Chris Wilder was his hugely innovative approach to the game. He saw that many many goals are scored by getting round behind the opposition and hitting low crosses for tap ins. If you have a fast skilful winger they will do that for you - but they cost a lot of money.

So Chris devised a scheme where reasonably skilled players could get an overload and so get in a position to deliver those balls without having to beat a man. Pose that threat down either flank and the opposition is permanently stretched and lower quality teams simply can’t cope. Cue JOC and Bash to terrorise L1, be hugely effective in the Champ
and take their confidence and almost intuitive experience into the Prem.

But that system is quite complex and better opposition, more skilful adaptive players and managers see where its weaknesses are. Our players are not the highly intelligent and adaptable cream of football or the most skilled - but last season their drilling and knowledge of the system carried them through.

Take away key components of that system without equivalent back-ups and it falls down. Your threat down both sides fades, teams are not stretched but your weakness down an exposed centre remains.

Generally, low-budget sides only survive in the Prem playing very simple 4-4-2, 4-2-3-1 or 4-1-4-1 schemes and the less intelligent, less adaptable, less skilled players know very clearly what their task is.

Chris Wilder will be hugely effective at the highest level if he gets the funds to have more adaptable, skilful players and to have the depth of squad to cope with injuries and suspensions. We did not have that.

I think if Chris had swallowed his pride and gone into survive mode when he lost key players we could have held out until we got our well-oiled machine back on the road. The 10 men against Villa showed what effort and discipline we had under the bonnet.

I hope Chris can get to a place where his innovative thinking can be matched financially by providing the depth and skill of squad needed at the highest level if they are to prosper with complex football. If he can, then for him the sky is the limit.

For us, with our current budget, and without our tactical genius, we will need to accept a more traditional system if we are to get back and survive at the top table. It will be interesting...

...and, as the Chinese curse goes - “May You Live in Interesting Times”!

Let’s hope we can find a new kind of magic as the Bladercoaster rolls on.
 

Chris isn't the one who created this system. It was created by Atalanta but we put our own twist on it. Knill is the one who does all the coaching and tactics. Pretty sure we all found out about this about 4 years ago.
 
I still don't understand why he didn't try to recreate the version of the strategy that got us promoted in the first place. Yes I can see why he might have preferred that flat midfield 3 as a more defensive approach when playing against some of the best in the world, but when the season was basically fucked anyway why not try a young, pacy player in behind the strikers? The idea of dropping Didsy in there when chasing the game showed he still had the idea in mind, but it was half-arsed and usually too late.

My one big hope about heckingbottom's approach is he goes back to what worked in the promotion years and to be fair that's how he had the U-23s playing.
 
Chris isn't the one who created this system. It was created by Atalanta but we put our own twist on it. Knill is the one who does all the coaching and tactics. Pretty sure we all found out about this about 4 years ago.
I used the word innovative for Chris quite deliberately. There is a difference between creativity and innovation. Creativity is inventing new ideas and systems, innovation is exploiting those new ideas to your advantage.

Alan is a football nerd, researching and trying new ideas and systems. With Chris’s drive and Alan’s technical research we have been able to innovate very successfully. If Chris gets an attractive new club it takes no guessing as to who his first appointment will be.
 
I still don't understand why he didn't try to recreate the version of the strategy that got us promoted in the first place. Yes I can see why he might have preferred that flat midfield 3 as a more defensive approach when playing against some of the best in the world, but when the season was basically fucked anyway why not try a young, pacy player in behind the strikers? The idea of dropping Didsy in there when chasing the game showed he still had the idea in mind, but it was half-arsed and usually too late.

My one big hope about heckingbottom's approach is he goes back to what worked in the promotion years and to be fair that's how he had the U-23s playing.

Oddly enough Wilder wasn't wrong, the system works. Problem with Wilder is he was insisting on using a defensive version with the flat 3 and then started putting square pegs in round holes. You could argue he was doing the latter to make a point to the board. All it really did was prove the point that Wilder spent money in the wrong areas of the team.
 
That's the point mate the defensive version failed us so why not hammer the original, more offensive one? Strange.
 

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