Noticeable Improvements

[Joey66]

Did the same when he came in for Howard and kept a few clean sheets if I remember right, but instantly displaced and normal service resumed. Another master stroke.

Still got an error in him but you just don't get a Southall or Schmeichel these days

hes improved a lot since then yet I agree with you should never have been dropped for Timmy the star jump keeper!

 

[rochdaleblue]

We agree that defence has improved. Based on Premier league games we are only 2 clean sheets away from equalling our totals of the last two seasons with 15 games left to play. If we concede less than 15 goals in the next 15 games we will have had a better defensive record than all of Martinez's seasons. Definitely possible but not definitely not guaranteed.

Our attack still needs to improve but we are sitting on a goal difference of +10. We finished previous seasons +4, -2 and Martinez's first year +22.
Credit where credit is due we played very well, for the most part, that first season. Then we didn't play well at all, for the most part, for the next 2 seasons. I'm not certain Koeman will hit the same heights as Martinez did that first season but I think he has the ability to make us perform much better more consistently, which is definitely an improvement.

Those stats are even more impressive when you consider we conceded 8 goals in two away games at Watford and Chelsea. We are much better defensively if you take those two matches into account.

 

[Aberblue]

Lies

Don't you mean "alternate facts"?

 

[Woolly Blue]

A chip dipped in mayonnaise is still a chip but now it has mayonnaise on it and tastes like mayonnaise

Mayonnaise is the food of the devil.

Everton are slowly improving and may well end up being dipped in a much tastier dressing.

 

[Kever10]

I'm going to begin this reply by saying you imply that my post is primarily anti-Martinez - which in some ways it was - but it's more about the improvements that can be seen by the team he left behind after 3 years in the job and the team we have now under a new manager. You can only improve on things which were lacking in the first place. If things were good, there would be no room for improvement. The difference between what Martinez left us with and what he have now is undeniably large.

Anyway. Keeper first. I said Joel had improved massively. He has. This could be down to personal development or a change in training or both. Who knows. I'm not sure what your first point is here because you didn't really say anything other than Martinez signed him - which we can both agree on because it's a fact and not opinion.

Defence. You say that the team that Martinez inherited from Moyes was nearing the end of it's cycle, which implies that they were past their best and left Martinez with a massive rebuilding job. This isn't really true considering 4 years later, 3 of the back 4 (Coleman, Jagielka & Baines) are still playing under Koeman, and playing much better than they were during the last 2 years of Martinez's tenure. Admittedly Jagielka is now more of a squad player with a limited part to play but that has only happened this season. In fact the only thing that Martinez changed from the Moyes defence was replacing Distin with Stones (whom, it could be argued, was mismanaged but that is no longer relevant). So we have 3 of the same back 4 Moyes left behind still playing yet we are a much more defensively sound team. If it's not the players then it's the manager/tactics that has improved.

Fitness. New manager steps in with a new fitness coach and a new fitness regime that focuses on intensity and suddenly we are much fitter. Barry admitted in his interview that the standards of near enough everything slipped under Martinez. Koeman won't let that happen. That is an improvement.

Set pieces. It's established that Martinez did not pay much attention to set pieces. It was evident from the woeful way we defended them and tried to utilise our own. New manager and suddenly we aren't as bad. Perhaps Koeman realises them for what they are - opportunities. It takes practice to upkeep skills. I learned to ride a bike when I was young. I haven't been on one for a long time. If I suddenly got on one today I probably wouldn't fall but I wouldn't be very stable either. Maybe that's a poor analogy but my point is that if enough time is spent in practice on set pieces (both attacking and defending) then they wouldn't have been as poor as they were. We have improved.

Midfield. I acknowledged that our improvements were perhaps more to do with recruitment than tactical changes. Maybe things would have been different if Martinez had Gueye but I - and probably many others - doubt it would have made an overwhelming difference.

Attack. Rom does score our goals. Correct. He is our striker. But as I said, we've improved in terms of how direct we are now in and around the box. This is perhaps down to confidence but that would be the confidence instilled in our team by a new manager.

The fact is that Martinez was probably ultimately responsible for whatever happened behind the scenes in terms of confidence. Whether it was, as you say, his relentless positivity in the face of disappointment or his tactical stubbornness, it clearly left a void between himself and the team.

Our new manager is probably our greatest improvement overall. Look at the game against Stoke, where he changed tactics drastically at half time in order to combat a difficult Stoke side. When did Martinez do that? That, in my eyes, is a massive improvement. We have a manager who is pragmatic and realistic and unafraid to tell the team when they haven't been good enough. That is improvement.

I've tried to keep this post in line with the theme of "improvements" as it fits the thread, but I won't be drawn into any further Martinez talk because he has his own thread now.

I agree with a lot of what you said mate, but we have to look at the negatives from last season in order to see the positives this season, that's how we measure improvement. Unfortunately our last manager was responsible for a lot of those negatives.

I understand your post wasn't primarily anti Martinez and was about improvement, and In the same way, mine wasn't primarily a pro Martinez comment, I was offering a counterpoint to a lot of the Martinez negativity, which started in year 2 and still continues to build 9 months after he left. . I agree, a lot of what happened under him needed changing, which is why he was sacked and replaced. You can always improve on things unless things are perfect, and in football they rarely are. And noone can deny as of now that there have been some drastic improvements. But going back a month or so ago, that wasn't necessarily the case. Far from being better, they were just different.

My point about Joel is that Joel has always needed games and experience. I always think it's a paradox that people level a lack of experience as a negative when gaining experience is the only remedy for a lack thereof. I agreed that Martinez should have made the change earlier, and that is 1 of the biggest mistakes that cost him in the long run, as replacing Howard earlier may have given the team the confidence they seem to be finding in him now.

And you are right, I did say nearing the end of the cycle, but I said team, not just defence. That included Howard, Hibbert, Jagielka, Distin, Neville, Osman, Gibson, Jelavic, etc. Neville left, and he got 1 more good season out of Distin before he was, incorrectly in my opinion, blamed for our poor defensive start to season 2, when I believe it was Jagielka who was largely to blame. But Distin was undoubtedly not the player he was, and time was catching up with him regardless.

Anyway, point being, Martinez did have a big rebuilding job to do, and he chose to address the goals 1st and spent the majority of his budget for 2 years on who is now probably our best/most valuable player, and probably assumed, wrongly, that the defence was fine for a couple of years while Stones, Galloway and Holgate developed. To say Stones was mismanaged is an easy point to make. He's an international at 21 and was sold for £40M to 1 of the top teams in the league to the so called "best manager in the world", but don't let that detract from your point.

Fitness, we have improved, but we play a different system and so it had to. I know people who can run marathons and can't last 20 mins playing 5aside. Different needs for different goals. I'm not arguing the point, but for me, it's a tactical switch, and the idea that all of our players were overweight and out of shape as some would have you believe is frankly insane.

Set pieces, my point is a simple 1. Leighton Baines is a "dead ball expert". If 2 years of Martinez training has diminished his corner taking skills to the effect that it did, then that is some voodoo. Defensively, maybe we were vulnerable, but like I say, it's amazing what confidence and circumstances can do to a teams collective psychology. If you concede late goals in consecutive games, you are more likely to panic in a similar situation next time out. The same way keeping cleansheets, goal sprees, purple patches, undefeated streaks work, so too do all the negative things that come with the dark side. See Leicester City as a gigantic case in point.

Gueye would improve most teams, as did Kante. See Leicester City and Chelsea.

Lukaku is still scoring our goals. Martinez big gamble. But please don't tell me that we are generally better offensively than we were for anything but the last 4 months of Martinez reign, because it's just not that true.

Koeman has improved us in a few ways. He has decided to make us difficult to beat, which we started out as, and have returned to recently, he has made us more efficient and he has tried to promote a higher tempo to our play. He has also been backed with a project that has allowed him the freedom of reducing the "deadwood" from the squad with the assurance that he can build again in the summer and has a youth system which was developing nicely under Martinez, 1 of the things he was instrumental in pushing forward, to fill out the squad he has left.

My point here is that both managers were signed with entirely different objectives, regardless of how optimistic Martinez initial aspirations where. Moshiri coming in has reinvigorated the club, it's appeal and its long and short term goals.

Martinez, ultimately failed. That is undeniable. You will be an unlucky man if you are sacked on being successful. But there were other circumstances to consider, and it wasn't as simple as "Martinez is crap coz he can't defend" and "Koeman is boss coz he tells it like it is".

I just don't want people over exaggerating the "mess" that "el fraudo" left us in, and the "amazing" job Koeman has already done. I just think a bit more reason should be applied. And that isn't aimed at you perse, it is a general comment, I just happened to be replying to you.

Good conversation though man, and I appreciate a well thought out response, and you raised a lot of good points.

 

[davek]

We agree that defence has improved. Based on Premier league games we are only 2 clean sheets away from equalling our totals of the last two seasons with 15 games left to play. If we concede less than 15 goals in the next 15 games we will have had a better defensive record than all of Martinez's seasons. Definitely possible but not definitely not guaranteed.

Our attack still needs to improve but we are sitting on a goal difference of +10. We finished previous seasons +4, -2 and Martinez's first year +22.
Credit where credit is due we played very well, for the most part, that first season. Then we didn't play well at all, for the most part, for the next 2 seasons. I'm not certain Koeman will hit the same heights as Martinez did that first season but I think he has the ability to make us perform much better more consistently, which is definitely an improvement.

In that first Martinez season we actually had almost identical GF and GA at this stage: 35 GF 24 GA versus 34 GF 24 GA, so it suggests we got a real shift on in that last third and a bit of the 2013/14 season in terms of scoring and retained a tight grip defensively - in fact we dramatically increased the points total from 42 points to 72.....so that'll be a tough ask from the rest of this season.

 

[ToffeeTim]

I understand your post wasn't primarily anti Martinez and was about improvement, and In the same way, mine wasn't primarily a pro Martinez comment, I was offering a counterpoint to a lot of the Martinez negativity, which started in year 2 and still continues to build 9 months after he left. . I agree, a lot of what happened under him needed changing, which is why he was sacked and replaced. You can always improve on things unless things are perfect, and in football they rarely are. And noone can deny as of now that there have been some drastic improvements. But going back a month or so ago, that wasn't necessarily the case. Far from being better, they were just different.

My point about Joel is that Joel has always needed games and experience. I always think it's a paradox that people level a lack of experience as a negative when gaining experience is the only remedy for a lack thereof. I agreed that Martinez should have made the change earlier, and that is 1 of the biggest mistakes that cost him in the long run, as replacing Howard earlier may have given the team the confidence they seem to be finding in him now.

And you are right, I did say nearing the end of the cycle, but I said team, not just defence. That included Howard, Hibbert, Jagielka, Distin, Neville, Osman, Gibson, Jelavic, etc. Neville left, and he got 1 more good season out of Distin before he was, incorrectly in my opinion, blamed for our poor defensive start to season 2, when I believe it was Jagielka who was largely to blame. But Distin was undoubtedly not the player he was, and time was catching up with him regardless.

Anyway, point being, Martinez did have a big rebuilding job to do, and he chose to address the goals 1st and spent the majority of his budget for 2 years on who is now probably our best/most valuable player, and probably assumed, wrongly, that the defence was fine for a couple of years while Stones, Galloway and Holgate developed. To say Stones was mismanaged is an easy point to make. He's an international at 21 and was sold for £40M to 1 of the top teams in the league to the so called "best manager in the world", but don't let that detract from your point.

Fitness, we have improved, but we play a different system and so it had to. I know people who can play marathons and can't last 20 mins playing 5aside. Different needs for different goals. I'm not arguing the point, but for me, it's a tactical switch, and the idea that all of our players were overweight and out of shape as some would have you believe is frankly insane.

Set pieces, my point is a simple 1. Leighton Baines is a "dead ball expert". If 2 years of Martinez training has dismissed his corner taking skills to the effect that it did, then that is some voodoo. Defensively, maybe we were vulnerable, but like I say, it's amazing what confidence and circumstances can do to a teams collective psychology. If you concede late goals in consecutive games, you are more likely to panic in a similar situation next time out. The same way keeping cleansheets, goal sprees, purple patches, undefeated streaks work, so to do all the negative things that come with the dark side. See Leicester City as a gigantic case in point.

Gueye would improve most teams, as did Kante. See Leicester City and Chelsea.

Lukaku is still scoring our goals. Martinez big gamble. But please don't tell me that we are generally better offensively than we were for anything but the last 4 months of Martinez reign, because it's just not that true.

Koeman has improved us in a few ways. He has decided to make us difficult to beat, which we started out as, and have returned to recently, he has made us more efficient and he has tried to promote a higher tempo to our play. He has also been backed with a project that has allowed him the freedom of reducing the "deadwood" from the squad with the assurance that he can build again in the summer and has a youth system which was developing nicely under Martinez, 1 of the things he was instrumental in pushing forward, to fill out the squad he has left.

My point here is that both managers were signed with entirely different objectives, regardless of how optimistic Martinez initial aspirations where. Moshiri coming in has reinvigorated the club, it's appeal and its long and short term goals.

Martinez, ultimately failed. That is undeniable. You will be an unlucky man if you are sacked on being successful. But there were other circumstances to consider, and it wasn't as simple as "Martinez is crap coz he can't defend" and "Koeman is boss coz he tells it like it is".

I just don't want people over exaggerating the "mess" that "el fraudo" left us in, and the "amazing" job Koeman has already done. I just think a bit more reason should be applied. And that isn't aimed at you perse, it is a general comment, I just happened to be replying to you.

Good conversation though man, and I appreciate a well thought out response, and you raised a lot of good points.

Long post.

 

[MrGrumpy]

The reason Martinez kept playing Howard was so he could get the record, soon as he did he dropped him. The problem with Howard was you knew we would coincide and that left the defence shakey. We also went through a patch last season were 7 games running the ball hit Stones and flew in the net.

Fitness, we definitely lacked it and due to not having any serious fitness regime in the last 2 years that caused our mini slump after 4 games, the players were warn out, an the other teams were more fit. On the plus side the team now seem to be fitter then the opposition and that's why the results have improved. It's easy to see if fitness is improved. Google total kms run by team/players over the last 4 years and see the difference.

 

[Tel001]

In that first Martinez season we actually had almost identical GF and GA at this stage: 35 GF 24 GA versus 34 GF 24 GA, so it suggests we got a real shift on in that last third and a bit of the 2013/14 season in terms of scoring and retained a tight grip defensively - in fact we dramatically increased the points total from 42 points to 72.....so that'll be a tough ask from the rest of this season.

We got 72 points in RM first season? Nobody has ever mentioned that before... I thought it was less

 

[thebluenosebolt]

In that first Martinez season we actually had almost identical GF and GA at this stage: 35 GF 24 GA versus 34 GF 24 GA, so it suggests we got a real shift on in that last third and a bit of the 2013/14 season in terms of scoring and retained a tight grip defensively - in fact we dramatically increased the points total from 42 points to 72.....so that'll be a tough ask from the rest of this season.

You do have a point Dave, A cracking ...cracking first season So what the hell went wrong in season 2 and 1/2 ?
Whats your take on it ?
Spineless team or did Bob loose the dressing room and if so why ?
I'm only asking as you come on to defend the 72 point quite regular ...what went wrong ?
( I think we can all agree it went horribly wrong after that )

 

[davek]

You do have a point Dave, A cracking ...cracking first season So what the hell went wrong in season 2 and 1/2 ?
Whats your take on it ?
Spineless team or did Bob loose the dressing room and if so why ?
I'm only asking as you come on to defend the 72 point quite regular ...what went wrong ?
( I think we can all agree it went horribly wrong after that )

There's a thread for this in the World Football forum. Not being funny with you in particular. It's amazing to me that there are so many people who wish to bring our former manager up, but they don't feel the need to pursue it in its appropriate thread over on the other forum....it's like they can't be arsed because all they wish to really do is a have hit and run pot shot without wishing to seriously debate the matter. Funny that.

 

[thebluenosebolt]

There's a thread for this in the World Football forum. Not being funny with you in particular. It's amazing to me that there are so many people who wish to bring our former manager up, but they don't feel the need to pursue it in its appropriate thread over on the other forum....it's like they can't be arsed because all they wish to really do is a have hit and run pot shot without wishing to seriously debate the matter. Funny that.

Tbh mate, I forgot it was even there.

I'll go there and looksie x

 

[davek]

Tbh mate, I forgot it was even there.

I'll go there and looksie x

As said, it wasn't a pop at you.

 

[Zezti]

In that first Martinez season we actually had almost identical GF and GA at this stage: 35 GF 24 GA versus 34 GF 24 GA, so it suggests we got a real shift on in that last third and a bit of the 2013/14 season in terms of scoring and retained a tight grip defensively - in fact we dramatically increased the points total from 42 points to 72.....so that'll be a tough ask from the rest of this season.

Might have had something to do with the league being way more 'polar' back then... A bigger gap between top-half teams and bottom-half teams. Lots more points to go around.

 

[BigDunc'sFod]

Anyone who thinks we're a better attacking side now than under Martinez is clearly on smack