Roberto Martinez Discussion - Including Live Poll (Poll Reset 1st May)

[nsno-chris]

Nope but we do turn up hoping to see great football

Football is a sport, right? The idea of a sport is to win, correct?

I wouldn't give a flying monkeys arse if i turned up every week and we had 1 shot on target that resulted in a 1-0 win that took us to the title.

 

[oldblue]

Football is a sport, right? The idea of a sport is to win, correct?

I wouldn't give a flying monkeys arse if i turned up every week and we had 1 shot on target that resulted in a 1-0 win that took us to the title.

Fair enough. I don't agree but fair enough. But it does beg the question why you made a statement deriding the quality of the football.

 

[willo30]

Or he's looked at us and decided he sees progress beneath the surface and won't interfere with managerial decisions for awhile. Can't help but feel he's not come here thinking it's his job to change the philosophy of the side. He agrees with that I'd assume or he'd taken his investment elsewhere.
But it's interesting that people have worked out that he's studied the club and decided to invest despite thinking the manager is incompetent and there being a board in place who appears to support him

It would be very short sighted for any business not to discuss these types of things on a regular basis. A bloke I knew a while back that knew a board member at Utd told me that even SAF had 8-10 game targets that had to be met and if they weren't met his future could be be discussed. I said surely he would have gone early on then but his reply was there is too much money in the game now for any club to take a chance on anything, back then it didn't matter as much. It will be getting weighed up either way.

 

[Eric Djemba-Djemba]

We haven't played great football for ages.

 

[nsno-chris]

Fair enough. I don't agree but fair enough. But it does beg the question why you made a statement deriding the quality of the football.

Because we aren't winning; if all those games were we have played torrid, boring, side to side tika taka had resulted in wins i'd be happy. What I cannot accept is a manager who is unable to solve the issues we have, issues that have been going on (in fact slowly getting owrse) for 18 months.

We have no fight and no heart, its horrible to watch. Goodison is a free for all nowadays, and apart from the odd game this season we have been awful at home

 

[Kaiser Soysauce]

You're right. The players probably didn't even need to be there

Of course the players needed to be there! What kind of comment is that?! My point was RM's decisions throw games just as much as players not being 'on the ball'. We need a proper manager that will take us somewhere. He's not the messiah! I swear, any manager who comes in and says "the peoples club" or brings a positive spin to every interview isn't necessarily the answer to our problems. They're just good salesmen!!

 

[Saint Domingo]

Would like to know where the notion of 'great football' under Martinez has come from. 1st season was ok, we played 2 defensive mids but the full backs overlapped well. The pace of passing was quite slow but the results were good so it was alright to view.

2nd season was quite possibly some of the worst football I've ever seen. Absolute dirges of games with two sometimes three defensive midfielders, two strikers playing on the wing, mindless ineffective passing that wasn't going anywhere, at times we went through games with less than 2 shots on target. Incredibly boring and turgid to watch with even some wins being booed.

This season we have played well on the counter attack away from home, whilst this can be exciting to watch Barkley and Rom tear at an opposition it's hardly champagne football. There's not much clever interplay anywhere which has been shown up at home where we've failed to break resolute defences down. To add to this anyone who enjoys elegant defending has been sorely shortchanged this season with arguably some of the worst defensive performances in our prem history.

Across all three seasons there's been no pressing off the ball, no organisation at set pieces, and no creative central midfield players brought in. There's also been an unerring number of long balls hoofed to Lukaku which is apparently alright because he's not doing anything with them unlike Fellaini who could actually utilise them (rudimentary as that was). In other words as long as the media doesn't pick up that you play long balls it's actually alright to hoof a mother load of them every game.

Can someone please explain where all this so called 'good football' is? No idea in defence and one very direct route of attack by hitting Lukaku early either with a quick break or a long ball.

At times under Moyes we got called Arsenal lite. People recognised that Arteta Pienaar Osman and Baines were capable of some devestating togger. Nothing we have done under Martinez remotely represents anything Arsenal do never mind Barcelona. There's barely one of our players (perhaps Deulofeu occasionally) who is renowned for their flair and we have produced nothing close to the intricate play we rolled out consistently between 07-10 under Moyes.

Beautiful football is another Martinez myth. It happens in the odd game now or then but mostly it's just an incoherent mess with a 30 mill striker at the top of it. All that's happened is that the number of backwards and sideways passes before someone hoofs it had increased.

 

[FisherEFC]

It's a win win, if we go out the cup then I think he's a goner with the fan base and hopefully that trickles through to our board who hook him, if he wins it then great we have a trophy and European football to look forward to.

 

[riddick]

Because we aren't winning; if all those games were we have played torrid, boring, side to side tika taka had resulted in wins i'd be happy. What I cannot accept is a manager who is unable to solve the issues we have, issues that have been going on (in fact slowly getting owrse) for 18 months.

We have no fight and no heart, its horrible to watch. Goodison is a free for all nowadays, and apart from the odd game this season we have been awful at home

Almost 2 years at this point. It was April 6th, 2014 that we beat Arsenal in THAT match. Started going downhill soon after.

 

[toffee matt]

Almost 2 years at this point. It was April 6th, 2014 that we beat Arsenal in THAT match. Started going downhill soon after.

Started going hill the next home game against palace

 

[CrustySack]

Would like to know where the notion of 'great football' under Martinez has come from. 1st season was ok, we played 2 defensive mids but the full backs overlapped well. The pace of passing was quite slow but the results were good so it was alright to view.

2nd season was quite possibly some of the worst football I've ever seen. Absolute dirges of games with two sometimes three defensive midfielders, two strikers playing on the wing, mindless ineffective passing that wasn't going anywhere, at times we went through games with less than 2 shots on target. Incredibly boring and turgid to watch with even some wins being booed.

This season we have played well on the counter attack away from home, whilst this can be exciting to watch Barkley and Rom tear at an opposition it's hardly champagne football. There's not much clever interplay anywhere which has been shown up at home where we've failed to break resolute defences down. To add to this anyone who enjoys elegant defending has been sorely shortchanged this season with arguably some of the worst defensive performances in our prem history.

Across all three seasons there's been no pressing off the ball, no organisation at set pieces, and no creative central midfield players brought in. There's also been an unerring number of long balls hoofed to Lukaku which is apparently alright because he's not doing anything with them unlike Fellaini who could actually utilise them (rudimentary as that was). In other words as long as the media doesn't pick up that you play long balls it's actually alright to hoof a mother load of them every game.

Can someone please explain where all this so called 'good football' is? No idea in defence and one very direct route of attack by hitting Lukaku early either with a quick break or a long ball.

At times under Moyes we got called Arsenal lite. People recognised that Arteta Pienaar Osman and Baines were capable of some devestating togger. Nothing we have done under Martinez remotely represents anything Arsenal do never mind Barcelona. There's barely one of our players (perhaps Deulofeu occasionally) who is renowned for their flair and we have produced nothing close to the intricate play we rolled out consistently between 07-10 under Moyes.

Beautiful football is another Martinez myth. It happens in the odd game now or then but mostly it's just an incoherent mess with a 30 mill striker at the top of it. All that's happened is that the number of backwards and sideways passes before someone hoofs it had increased.

Absolutely spot on.

 

[Pienaar's gloves]

Towards the end of last season I tried to be balanced, pointed out that back then he had one boss season and one poor season under his belt.

I said I would judge him after this season. Given that it's almost an impossibility that he's going to get us far enough up the table for me to think this season was acceptable, I think it's Bobby out time.

Good showing in the cups this season has been nice but even if we win the FA, it's still miles from good enough.

 

[Ashtonian]

Yeah but don't forget mate he had to slash the wage bill by about 250% despite only selling one big player, and had them playing dead nice football (when they weren't getting beat 9-1 and 8-0 like)

But im sure wigan fans would have preferred a tony pulis style team and not have to fight for relegation every year rather than fancy football that could win one week and be thrashed the next.

 

[Kaiser Soysauce]

He's brought in Mori, introduced Cleverley, given Barry a key role, introduced Lennon, finally dropped Howard.
All decisions you may not agree with but I'd argue were designed to tighten us up.

Tightening up after the season has been thrown is reactive. We need a manager who is proactive, who can see what the problems are and immediately deal with them thus giving us half a chance.

If we are content with mid table mediocrity then RM is the man to fulfil our dreams.....

 

[witchdoc187]

I for one will be celebrating wildly if we lose the semi final.