Overlapping centre backs - the worst thing to happen to Wilder

[bruce]

It worked well when we had the personnel to employ it while it was still a novel concept. Then we didn't and better coaches worked out a counter strategy. Which may well have been as simple as let us cross, win ball back, quickly distribute to quick striker and let hilarity ensue vs Egan.

It worked more times than not until we lost O'Connell and replaced him with Robinson.

Edit. That sounds harsh on Robinson, who we have now discovered (because we are doing so much better without him) was probably better than we thought. He just wasn't an overlapping centre back.

 

[Valleyblade]

Covid totally fucked us up.

Ultimately, it's way down on the list of things covid caused everyone to lose.

But right down the bottom of the list of all the things that I lost during covid, and it's very long for me, I always add, that sheffield united were about to qualify for Europe, or win the fa cup.

It was on, until the pandemic.

We had a team on the verge of greatness just before ww2 as well.

 

[Sothall_Blade]

Covid killed us completely, lead to JoC's injury, the fall off a cliff of Stevens, Fleck and Norwood to a degree, they were all flying on confidence and momentum and that break completely killed it dead.

Although as has been said, our recruitment since January 2020 has largely been pathetic, Bogle was a relative success, other than that I can only think of Anel and Cooper as permanent additions who you can call a resounding successful purchase, and we probably ended up with not as much money as we could have done from Anel.

I think “Championship player of the year” Hamer can definitely be called a successful purchase.

Burrows for a relatively small fee. O Hare, Campbell and McCallum on free transfers. They’ve all contributed at some point and we would make a large profit if we chose to sell them.

 

[Inter_blade83]

I think there seems to be an agenda floating round that Wilder had little to do with the innovative 5-3-2 overlapping centre backs tactic and that it was all Knill, or someone else, or just luck, or magic maybe. It doesn't suit the agenda because people want to believe Wilder is some kind of footballing dinosaur. All absolute bollocks.

I believe it came about because in the first 4 games of that season, we weren't strong enough in midfield so to counter that, we played with 3 CB's. This also meant that Jake Wright fitted in better as he was a great organiser but had no pace. The next bit was how to combat teams sitting off and the answer was for the 2 CB's to go forward creating overloads. Wilder was as much part of that as any of the coaching staff, he had to be, he was the manager ffs.

What I think is often overlooked is how good JOC was at crossing a ball. Once Bash came back in, and that was slightly later because it started with EEL on the right, Jake in the middle and JOC on the left, he looked like a completely different player, transformed from a 'nothing' player into a marauding DRC.

Yet some fans don't think Wilder should get any credit for it. Bizarre.

To me, there are two ways a manager can set up when he comes into a club. You can instil your favourite tactics and get your players to adapt to it (like Amorim has done at Man Utd, which has taken some time), or, you can adapt your tactics to best suit the players at your disposal.

If you're Pep, well you can just go out and buy all the players you need to carry out your tactics. If you're Wilder, you have to adapt with the players you've got until you've had chance to slowly build the squad to deliver your preferred tactics. Unfortunately, our board sacked him while he'd started that rebuilding and now he's even worse off than he was before!

It was luck.

 

[ATL Recs]

It worked until we lost O'Connell and never replaced him with someone who could also perform that role.

But spent 24 million on a potential striker - nowt changes