bricktop
Well-Known Member
I think what Micky Adams needs to do is build from the back. I would like to see go out and play with a 4-4-2 formation, with wide men who can get down the flanks and get balls in the box, and with a playmaker in the middle who can play the ball through to a quick striker who can create something.
The first thing we will need to do is make ourselves hard to beat, this has to be done with a strong spine to the team. A solid reliable keeper. A big ugly centre half who does the dirty work. Someone who can get stuck in midfield, win the midfield battle and get the ball to his more gifted midfield partner (or as some know it a clogger or a water carrier), and someone who can do the donkey work up front and bring in his a quicker, more skilful striker.
The keys aspects of next season will be firstly making ourselves very hard to beat. I might bang on about this, but by becoming hard to beat, it gives ourselves a fighting chance of building up a run of form, and eventually kicking on forwards again. For far too long this season we haven't been seen as being a side that is hard to beat, and that is the first thing that needs to change. When sides become hard to beat, that is when teams begin to play with confidence, play more freely and that is that when we will be more than likely to see the free-flowing attractive football that people are wanting to see, but i think we will only get it if we put the spade work in.
Something else that we need to see next season is a lot more tactical consistancy. We have played two styles this season, firstly it was Speeds slow, and laboured style of passing play without players skilful enough to make this effective, and this was followed by Micky Adams more unadventurous, long ball style of play. What we need to do is pick a team, and stick to that style and only amend it if circumstances dictate that we need to. There will be no point in picking a front two of two small, fast strikers if we are to play it direct, and there will be no point in picking two big lumps up front if we are to go direct. We will need to have a balanced side built with the cloggers and battlers and complemented by the artisans.
League 1 will be a tough league to get back out, and we need to go in to the season under no illusions that will be anything else. Like i've already said the first thing we need to do is to become hard to beat, and another key ingredient in being hard to beat is having players who go out there and will run through brick walls, put their bodies on the line, and give every game their all. We don't want to see any more half-arsed displays, neshing out of challenges, and players going out and going through the motions (and i'm looking at you here Mr Bogdanovic). It's got to be quite simple, if your not going to put a shift in, then you can either ship out, or spend the rest of your time in the reserves.
I don't think my simulatenously promoting all the youth team squad is going to be a quck fix, because it is not. We need to go in to next season with a nucleus of the first team of made up of battle hardened, experienced professionals who will know what it will take to be hard to beat, and win games, and i would only start with a couple of the youngsters at first, with a couple of more on the bench and utilised more sensibly as and when the circumstances dictate it, and then blood the youngsters a lot more when they gain more experience at their own pace without being unnecessarily being thrown in to the first team under the weight of expectation and choking under the pressure. Its better to let them grow and develop within the framework of the first team
Another problem the club is carrying is that the playing staff is divided up in to three different groups, the First Teamers, The Development Squad and The Youth Team. I don't like the idea of a Development Squad, it should be one big squad of first team players, and if your good enough, and performing well then a shirt should be yours, if your not then you go and play with the reserves until you either shape up or ship out. At a club fighting for promotion there can't be any players who are guaranteed a first team shirt, and any players consigned to playing an extended period in the reserves without any hope of breaking in to the first team squad, as that will bring complacency and a lack of hunger within the first team squad.
What has happened at Bramall Lane in recent times is that we have seen too much skipping and changing between different ideas, tactics and ways to manage the club and improve things. What there needs to be is a clear plan, a clear way of thinking of how to get the most of out the players we have, and the plan will need to be stuck to, and not ditched at the first sighting of troubled waters, and we will need to persevere with it. Next season will not be for the feint-hearted, but if we show enough spirit, bottle whilst living within our means, spending what we can afford on wages and transfer fees to build a squad rather than a series of botched quick fixes then a promotion season may well still be on the cards. We just need to show, spirit, bottle, stick with it when we hit a sticky patch, and show the will to win again.
What i've said might be regarded as a load of bollocks, but its a way of looking towards the future, a few ideas of how we might take things forwards, and if a way of thinking is implemented and is successful, it might just mean that a season in League 1 is just a single promotion season, if it works out then we might just get the whole lot moving in the right direction once again with a fresh purpose, and this season might not have been all bad as it will have enabled us to purge the rotten core of this club, and rediscover the soul, and the Sheffield United that we all once knew and loved.
The first thing we will need to do is make ourselves hard to beat, this has to be done with a strong spine to the team. A solid reliable keeper. A big ugly centre half who does the dirty work. Someone who can get stuck in midfield, win the midfield battle and get the ball to his more gifted midfield partner (or as some know it a clogger or a water carrier), and someone who can do the donkey work up front and bring in his a quicker, more skilful striker.
The keys aspects of next season will be firstly making ourselves very hard to beat. I might bang on about this, but by becoming hard to beat, it gives ourselves a fighting chance of building up a run of form, and eventually kicking on forwards again. For far too long this season we haven't been seen as being a side that is hard to beat, and that is the first thing that needs to change. When sides become hard to beat, that is when teams begin to play with confidence, play more freely and that is that when we will be more than likely to see the free-flowing attractive football that people are wanting to see, but i think we will only get it if we put the spade work in.
Something else that we need to see next season is a lot more tactical consistancy. We have played two styles this season, firstly it was Speeds slow, and laboured style of passing play without players skilful enough to make this effective, and this was followed by Micky Adams more unadventurous, long ball style of play. What we need to do is pick a team, and stick to that style and only amend it if circumstances dictate that we need to. There will be no point in picking a front two of two small, fast strikers if we are to play it direct, and there will be no point in picking two big lumps up front if we are to go direct. We will need to have a balanced side built with the cloggers and battlers and complemented by the artisans.
League 1 will be a tough league to get back out, and we need to go in to the season under no illusions that will be anything else. Like i've already said the first thing we need to do is to become hard to beat, and another key ingredient in being hard to beat is having players who go out there and will run through brick walls, put their bodies on the line, and give every game their all. We don't want to see any more half-arsed displays, neshing out of challenges, and players going out and going through the motions (and i'm looking at you here Mr Bogdanovic). It's got to be quite simple, if your not going to put a shift in, then you can either ship out, or spend the rest of your time in the reserves.
I don't think my simulatenously promoting all the youth team squad is going to be a quck fix, because it is not. We need to go in to next season with a nucleus of the first team of made up of battle hardened, experienced professionals who will know what it will take to be hard to beat, and win games, and i would only start with a couple of the youngsters at first, with a couple of more on the bench and utilised more sensibly as and when the circumstances dictate it, and then blood the youngsters a lot more when they gain more experience at their own pace without being unnecessarily being thrown in to the first team under the weight of expectation and choking under the pressure. Its better to let them grow and develop within the framework of the first team
Another problem the club is carrying is that the playing staff is divided up in to three different groups, the First Teamers, The Development Squad and The Youth Team. I don't like the idea of a Development Squad, it should be one big squad of first team players, and if your good enough, and performing well then a shirt should be yours, if your not then you go and play with the reserves until you either shape up or ship out. At a club fighting for promotion there can't be any players who are guaranteed a first team shirt, and any players consigned to playing an extended period in the reserves without any hope of breaking in to the first team squad, as that will bring complacency and a lack of hunger within the first team squad.
What has happened at Bramall Lane in recent times is that we have seen too much skipping and changing between different ideas, tactics and ways to manage the club and improve things. What there needs to be is a clear plan, a clear way of thinking of how to get the most of out the players we have, and the plan will need to be stuck to, and not ditched at the first sighting of troubled waters, and we will need to persevere with it. Next season will not be for the feint-hearted, but if we show enough spirit, bottle whilst living within our means, spending what we can afford on wages and transfer fees to build a squad rather than a series of botched quick fixes then a promotion season may well still be on the cards. We just need to show, spirit, bottle, stick with it when we hit a sticky patch, and show the will to win again.
What i've said might be regarded as a load of bollocks, but its a way of looking towards the future, a few ideas of how we might take things forwards, and if a way of thinking is implemented and is successful, it might just mean that a season in League 1 is just a single promotion season, if it works out then we might just get the whole lot moving in the right direction once again with a fresh purpose, and this season might not have been all bad as it will have enabled us to purge the rotten core of this club, and rediscover the soul, and the Sheffield United that we all once knew and loved.
