I highly doubt it’s anything to do with a 3 year deal…
What you are finding is coaches are becoming more and more stubborn. A head coach or manager has a limited shelf life, and you are either gonna be sacked or poached in this line of work. If you are going to be sacked, surely you want to go down with your own ideology and philosophy on how you want your team to play.
Look at Kompany at Burnley. Outstanding in the Championship, some of the best football played at that level, tried it in the Premier League and didn’t work. Obviously worked out well for him. Same with Russel Martin at Southampton, stuck to his guns. Ange at Spurs is the same, and Pep when they went through that awful run, he stuck with the same formation, same style of play etc.
Surely, if you’re going to be sacked, you don’t want that regret of “bowing to fan pressure”.
If I’m a 4-4-2 man, I’ll stick with it, Kev is a 3-5-2 man, so he’ll stick with it. I’d rather be sacked doing things how I want than regretting it afterwards.
Hiya, as you know I respect your knowledge and we speak quite frequently on Dms. I'd like to add one observation on what you said above, which I add, I agree with.
I got to thinking, by turning your point on it's head slightly, as, having named a group of managers, with the exception of Pep, who has suffered a bad run with proven players at one level, have all suffered in the top division and either got sacked or relegated.
I'd like to reflect on two of the most successful and respected managers in recent years.
With regard to viewing the matches from the stand, both Wenger and Fergie would spend 2/3 if not all the 1st half of games in the directors box. Trusting their assistants/coaching staff to run the game acting on their pre match instructions. It would give a greater view of the initial game plan of the opposition and see if there were any tweaks needed in their own. (I know they both had a telephone link to their benches
@Tom Lawrence - Don't forget to include that in the East Stand rebuild).
But not just once this season have we seen teams we play set up against us based on scouting knowledge about how we play and as an example, play long diagonal balls into the vacant gaps behind our Wing Backs and wider than our back three CBs. York opening game of the season was a prime example, but we didn't change, if at all, in the game until late and were put on the back foot due to their understanding of our tactics and our own lack of flexibility to counter such a game plan from our opponents.
We have, imo, a wonderfully skilled trio on the coaching staff, but are we or are they maximising their skills to their full ability would be my question? Darren Currie has managed at this level, Benno at level 4, won promotion and was top 6 at Level 3 when he left to join us, so they have ability, without a doubt. So could Kev use that to his advantage and take some time in the directors box himself at the start of games, to see how it pans out early on?
As you said, any formation we play is not going to be down to what is said on here, but the choice of KM.
But if things aren't working out in a game and causing a bad run, then maybe having that extra insight is better than, what seems to be happening now, stubbornly sticking to a fixed gameplan whatever and seemingly losing even a minority the fanbase?
After all, if he did do that, change formations, selections and using subs maybe a little earlier, with the additional input of that great observation opportunity, if we were still struggling, Kev would be demonstrating a full use of the tools available to him, an ability to adjust a game to give us stronger options and there may be more questions as to why KM seemingly isn't getting the backing from COSU in our current circumstances, when at the moment there are more questions and concerns about Kev's ability.
Just thinking out loud, or in print more to the point.
