Yes I know, a masochist, but it seemed to me there was something that didn’t add up. Well lots actually, but it was the Europe stuff that had me interested. Did it really have such an impact on our season? Was tiredness or a lack of fluency within the team a cause for concern?
When I wrote the earlier article that highlighted the bad run mid-season there weren’t any European games causing the distraction. Also before Christmas we played a different side in Europe to the side we played in the Premier League so tiredness wasn’t a factor.
Now someone suggested that since Pardew is a thorough with his preparation for games the midweek games cut down on his preparation time hence the poor results. So I thought I’d compare results after the European games where after the Thursday we had played at the weekend with games where we had had the whole week to prepare. I also wanted to see if there was any difference between the early rounds of the Europa League before Christmas and the later rounds after Christmas where we tended to play a stronger team and so tiredness could have been more of a factor.
To start with I just looked at the games that followed European Thursday nights. But I noticed that when I looked at the games that happened after other midweek games or midweek games after the weekend the results were consistent. It wasn’t just Europe that was the problem. It appeared to apply to any game where we had limited preparation time. I tried looking at the first part of the season, and the end of the season after we restarted in Europe, but we had midweek games over the Christmas period as well. Eventually It turned out to be a lot simpler than I had thought. Another flash of the blindly obvious.
Surprisingly we actually played 19 Premier League games with five days or more preparation and 19 where we had only two, three or four days and it starts to make interesting reading when you examine them simply. Looking first at the games where we had time to prepare. We played eight at home and 11 away. At home we won three and lost five. Away we won two drew six and lost three. Although both gave us just over a point per game it is clear that at home we were looking for a result whereas away a draw would do. Still interestingly only 21 points from 19 games where we had time to prepare.
It was where we had less time to prepare that things become odd. We played 11 games at home where we won six drew one and lost four. That’s 1.73ppg with a win ratio of 54%. Where did that come from? However, on the flip side away from home we played eight with no wins, one draw and seven defeats. That is crystal clear. Playing away from home with limited time to prepare we were awful. Now I can understand that and it is clear that it must be addressed. But why the wins? I did not expect that.
Looking into the figures a little more deeply. Only two of those wins came early in the season when we beat Norwich and West Brom. But the rest of them came later on. Two factors seem to occur to me here. One was the midweek games were now featuring our full strength team so there was some more consistency to team selection and tactics, although this did not appear too helpful over the Christmas period. Secondly and more importantly the squad had now been strengthened following the January transfer window.
So is Alan Pardew a man that benefits from having time to prepare thoroughly? I suspect he is. There are other factors such as instability of players available that affect that and we only played a series of games with long preparation at the end of the season, after our exit from Europe. However, it is clear that our tactics are very different away from home than at home. It is also clear that having a run of games even twice a week where we are fielding our strongest available players also helps.
There is however clearly a problem with fielding teams away from home with limited preparation especially if we fielded a weakened team a few days before.
So does this leave me with any great confidence in our manager? Sorry to say not really. It appears to me that when things are normal or going well he can motivate the players and get good results and runs together, but I have yet to see any evidence that he can handle a crisis.
All I can hope for is a good pre-season and a settled start to the season.
Aussie 😆
richietoon(Quote)
jabba,owlheed,pardew oot 😆
icedog(Quote)
Richie he’ll need to be a miracle worker, its hard enough to work out what he’s on about here.
Newkie does that mean that the gooner fans you know have a better eye for a good player than you and Aussie 😆
Big Dave(Quote)
Big Dave, I like Saylor but I just don’t think he is as good as he thinks he is 😉
Aussie Magpie Fan(Quote)
its great picking up the papers with every club linked to players 🙄 and we’re not even mentioned.
Still early days but I wont build up my hopes.
We should of sacked Pardew weeks ago and brought in Kinnear like BD said.
mark(Quote)
Aussie did you keep a copy of your article as it could have been deleted by mistake offcourse 😆
Or maybe Toonsy opened it and thought it was spam
Big Dave(Quote)
Saylor is not good enuf for Arsenal. Maybe we could get 5mil + walcott for him 😛
mark(Quote)
Didn’t you get a copy as well BD
Aussie Magpie Fan(Quote)
bring back fat freddy
icedog(Quote)
It’s been misread, it’s a Tailor they’re after, they want new suits, *** suit 😳 🙄 😆
richietoon(Quote)
“I hate Ashley” 😈 “Must kill Ashley!” 😈
Aussie Magpie Fan(Quote)
Dave-you think Saylor is better than Colo? 😯
I knew the reality train has had a fair few crashes but I never imagined it could have affected your thinking so badly 😀
Newkie(Quote)
Ice atleast FFS had ambition for the club yeah he made mistakes but not anywhere near as bad or as many as Jabba’s.
Big Dave(Quote)
pardew oot,bring back richie the pie store is failing 😀
icedog(Quote)
Ice 😥
richietoon(Quote)
Newkie when did I say Saylor was better than Colo.
But atleast Saylor have loyalty for the club Colo is only here cause we didnt let him leave for free.
So would you rather have a player that has no loyalty at all and would leave at the 1st chance, or would you take a decent player that loves the club that is part of them, and would put themselves on the line and are 100% loyal 😕 as I know which one I would prefer
Big Dave(Quote)
DAVE joking aside freddy had people to come in with money to increase ground build hotels ect,fans forget he was nee dummy when it came to making money hes still doing it well,he always gave his managers money to spend we were always doing well in the PL twice in CL and europe his problem was choseing the wrong managers to spend the cash,and lets be honest do fans really care what the club is loseing/makeing imo they mostley care about the team they go to watch week in week out and want a decent team “they”pay for with their hard earned cash not some “billy wiz”at makeing money and talk of millions of pounds go over the head of most fans,talk of jabba saving us from a fate worse than death is ****,fat freddy even said there will always be someone who would put money into nufc and i think hes right as i said hes nee dummy when it comes to making money
icedog(Quote)
Dave-well it looked like you were agreeing with the arsenal fans I said I knew who rated Taylor above Colo.
Loyalty to the club? Here we go. He gets an estimated 40k+ pw and most of the time is sat on the bench, or when he’s playing sat on his **** after someone like sessegnon gets anwhere near him. No other club would be paying such a bit part player those wages, even QPR would think twice, that is why he is still here!
Colo didn’t leave us at the first chance, that would have been relegation surely? I was very critical of his actions in January so I’m not sure what your on about, loyalty in football is dead anyway, Colo is the better player and our only guaranteed starter at CB, it’s pretty much that simple. Would much rather we kept Colo than staylor if thats what you’re asking.
Newkie(Quote)
Ice I agree 100% with you
Big Dave(Quote)
I agree with Icedog @ 317
brisvegas(Quote)
Ice-agree @317, too much money thrown away on ***** managers unfortunately.
Newkie(Quote)
I think Pardew is rubbish and I simply cant get excited about the new season with him at the helm. I don’t see anything changing. Same old tactics, same old excuses, same old boring one dimensional football.
I would love nothing more than for Ashley to go and poach Laudrup from Swansea with the apparent disharmony. Ashley may well back his manager with money, but what does that matter when the players are given shocking tactics and played in the wrong positions. The additional games is rubbish, the players thrive on playing regularly, and certainly in Europe. What have we to offer potential signings now? No Europe, not a top half club, haven’t just finished 5th and looking to push on, we are looking to cement a top 10 place. Great.
We aint going to attract what we need with that massive target.
V underwhelmed and not remotely surprised that Cabs and HBA are linked away, I will be surprised if neither have left come 1st Sept
Raffo(Quote)
Newkie who wanted to take Colo on his estimated £80k a week ? I can’t think of one team that was after him ❓ after the way he played before we went down I would be surprised if any championship side would have took him even without his £10mil tag and £80k a week 😉
Big Dave(Quote)
RAFFO sick off saying the same thing myself,i am not looking forward to a new season,how sad is that 🙁 🙁
icedog(Quote)
Wow! Aussie is getting hammered again! 🙂 🙂 😯
Icedog
The anti Shepherd **** was propaganda spewed out by the Ashley regime to make them look good.
Troy Stavers(Quote)
Dave-Weren’t Man city after Colo last year? There’s one team and I bet they’d be paying him a lot more than his 60-80k. Yes you’re right he was **** for that one season when he arrived, luckily he showed his quality in all the other seasons while Steven Taylor showed us he can warm Owen’s seat for only half or 1/3 the price 😆
Staylor has been in the prem for 10 years and still seems to struggle.
Newkie(Quote)
Don’t quite get the Colo bashing. He’s been our best player for a few years and seems pretty loyal to me. He’s been here 5 years after all. What I would ask is what would you do if your wife and kids up and moved thousands of miles away, permanently?
georgio(Quote)
TROY@325 your spot on again imo,now try and sell that to stardust you might be good but not that good 😆 😆 😆
icedog(Quote)
Newkie so are you agreeing with me that Colo never had the chance to leave when we got relegated ?
The first team that came calling was San Lorenzo and he tried to jump ship without a worry about us.
As for Saylor yeah it’s all his fault that he is injuried and would rather get paid to sit on the bench rather than play 😆 if slagging A loyal player helps your case for Colo whack away 😀
Big Dave(Quote)
Georgio-Exactly. Although in response to your last bit I’d like to think I wouldn’t get myself into that position by playing too many away games 😀 I’m guessing that is what happened after all, although nowt conclusive.
Newkie(Quote)
Troy – the pro Shepherd stuff is pretty imaginative. Must be the sun.
georgio(Quote)
ICE – I know it isn’t very good. Usually I am sucked in totally by it, my wedding anniversary is 31st August so I am usually a little distracted from it! Once a year and all that!
I think people should also just bear in mind the debt that Freddie left us with. Obviously we have debt to Ashley but the club is in a healthier financial position which cant be argued. Having said that, it isnt the be all and end all. But money doesnt play the game, and money doesnt pick the team and tactics. Our poor show has been down to the manager. Ashley does pick him, so for that he has to take blame.
Raffo(Quote)
Dave-I see your ignoring the other points I made though, you admit that city were linked with him after they were champions? I’d say that’s a sign of quality wouldn’t you? As for not having the chance well he was still well thought of in spain/italy, he could probably have forced a move if he had wanted as players hold the power. He didn’t want to obviously, maybe he is too loyal? 😆 Just because newcastle and english fans wrote him off after one season (as we often do) doesnt mean everyone in the world thought he was ****.
Also if a player is injury prone they will get stick for it mate that’s how football works. If owen hadn’t been so injury prone he might have been a top player for us while still being an absolute c*nt. It also limits their ability. Taylor promised a lot early on, although he was never on a par with Woodgate. But look at woodgate now because of his injures..he WAS a quality player, now who would even take him in the prem? He’s at boro ffs!
My case for Colo 😕 Colo is just a better defender than Steven Taylor, its a fact. If you can’t see it then I’m not surprised you find Taylor’s clown antics so enjoyable
Newkie(Quote)
Newkie calm down not once did I say Saylor was a better player than Colo ? So why make that up
As for Man city being after Colo yeah I seen a bit in the daily fail about that 😆 do you really believe that if they wanted Colo he would be with us 😀 the only team that was properly linked with wanting Colo wanted him for free
Big Dave(Quote)
Newkie – that bit about playing away. Do we really know what went on there? Or the supposed fall out with Pardew? I’d believe the last one over the first and I think if I was a player under a manager like him sitting on an 8 year contract then I’d want to leave too. Actually, as a fan, if it wasn’t in my blood I’d leave right now.
georgio(Quote)
Little snippet of information lads – we have submitted a bid of £6m for valbuena. Joke really for a player of that class.
Liam Southern Toon(Quote)
Valbuena? Probably made up. £6m, 28? He has about 30 caps but I’ve not really noticed him. The Journal reckons he could be Cabaye’s replacement.
georgio(Quote)
Dave-just seems to be the way your angling, “I want a player who is loyal” etc etc. If Colo stayed and didn’t really give a toss about bleating to the fans but played at close to his best form for however many years he was here I wouldn’t give saylor a second thought. You just seem very upset we couldn’t sell him after relegation because he was on big wages, not too sure why you bring it up 😕
Ah properly linked, well this is the same for Taylor then, he’s been linked with arsenal for about 6 years and they’ve never put a bid in for him, even when he was listed with less than a year on his contract! Should tell you all you need to know about his stock in the eyes of good managers 😀 Yes san lorenzo wanted him for free..as would most of the premiership teams and a fair few top sides in europe i would guess so…. 😕
Georgio-we don’t, but why would his family move away if he had a row with Pardew 😕 Unless he and Pardew were, y’know… 😆
Newkie(Quote)
Georgio – he is a quality player no doubt about that.
Liam Southern Toon(Quote)