gecko

Not that I disagree, but the stats would suggest that Serie A clubs fair pretty well against EPL clubs historically. Granted we're comparing the best of both leagues because it's the only time they actually face-off; not the complete garbage that we are. https://www.uefa.com/uefaeuropaleague/news/0232-0e9534dc4737-2f7b42d91e2e-1000--italy-v-england-whose-clubs-are-best/ (2016) Seem safe to conclude that a terrible EPL team (us) trying to play like we're in Serie A is going to work about as well as if we try to play like we're in the EPL.

I'm torn on him at the moment. There's been some pretty decent performances under him, and some truly abject ones as well. Trying to take variables out of our equation, his playbook is supposed to be broadly similar to the chap from Atalanta, having worked with him in the past - man-to-man marking, high press etc etc. A strategy that was/is clearly effective elsewhere, and against some very high level opposition - e.g. the undefeated Leverkusen, and they are currently sitting in 3rd in Serie A. As a result, I'm not sure the whole strategy needs to be binned off, but there obviously needs to be some analysis and tweaking to make us more effective. I think we're in a very similar situation to Amorim at Utd. His play was obviously very successful at Sporting, so he needs to work out why it's not so effective in the EPL. There's numerous reasons to explain it; pick and choose as many or more: The players aren't good enough - definitely true for us, we've already seen how crap they are before Juric arrived. The players arent' fit enough to play high press - probably, they're all blowing out their arse like the end of Hassenhuttl games, when we instigated the 70min fake injury/water break. The formation is a problem - I'm broadly fine with him having a preferred formation, but I am struggling to understand sticking religiously to it when it's leaving such gaping holes. And the pragmatic person in me would suggest that having a 4 at the back, to push another player into midfield is good, not just because it matches up against the opposition's likely formation (4-2-3-1 being the most popular in recent seasons), but because it's also what most defenders are used to playing in. Juric simply isn't as good a coach as Gasperini - again, almost certainly true. Some of the substitutions have been baffling, sure, but it's fair to say the depth of our squad is really poor I really want him to succeed as I'd much rather watch the attacking football he promised over the dross we had in the early part of the season. But without any uptick in competitiveness it's going to be difficult to maintain any level of optimism if it's him going into next season. On a more morbid note, if I have to see us lose every week I'd rather that it was because we were outplayed (like it is now) than from the never ending cock-ups we made at the back leading to goals (which it was before). I'm far less worried now about a terrible back pass, but it seems to have been replaced with an inevitable loss of possession on the halfway line, leading to break and likely goal when our one CB who has pushed right up is in no position to make the tackle. I'll support him for a good while more for now.

It was the same for Newcastle's third. The players obviously haven't quite clicked with it yet. As we've seen this happen quite a lot of late. Seems that as soon as the opposition win the ball around half way line, our CBs have a super high line and about 30yards of space between them. It's nuts. Juric needs to focus on it in training or switch something more standard. Anyway. Who cares, we won! After the last three games we played them, where we deserved so much more than we got, I'm glad we got one over on them.

They also played Brighton, who themselves played on the Thursday; so not quite the same. They were also soundly beaten yesterday, just like us... So it could just be that we both suck.

Really disappointing result in the end, but at least we saw some positives. I think the manager's tactics have made us more competitive (Brentford aside) in the 5 games he's been here, and that it's taking a little while to erase the garbage tippy-tappy nonsense from the players. It's good to hear comments from the manager afterwards where he's actually noticed what's wrong. The subs gave us nothing, and we need to be much better at game management - thankfully Juric's Torino were well known for tactical fouling, so here's hoping that's the next thing he focusses on with the team; late game capitulation has been an issue for us since Ralph. Trying to stay positive in an overwhelmingly negative season. Now let's go and ruin Forrest's party on Sunday.

I'm not his biggest fan, but to single out a game against the best team in the country as his undoing seems a little unfair (yes yes, i'm aware it wasn't their 1st team playing). My recollection is that he was absolute garbage when asked to play in CD early on in the season, but his DM performances, whilst not as good as Downes, were pretty okay. The other factors in play here are probably more of the reason we're calling him back - Downes is a sick-note, Les might be being recalled himself. Add to that SR probably don't want to dump a load of money on a new CDM in a season we are all but relegated, we may as well try blooding Charles in the prem, and in Juric's system.

Have to say that Fernandes is the one I think I'll be most disappointed to lose if he's gone in the inevitable relegation. The one time the SR scouting has unearthed an actual gem, for a bargain price, he's only 20, and we look likely to have him for a single season - kid's definitely going places, looks a class above the rest of the squad every time I see him play. Fingers crossed SR hold him to his contract, as he'll destroy the Champ

Credit to him. He fully deserved the MotM yesterday. I'll forgive the misses, and ignore the fact that the opposition were pretty dreadful - can only beat what's in front of you, and he was responsible for most of the good attacks we had. I thought he did a great job chasing down the keeper. Half-running then bursting into a sprint just as he got closer. Swans keeper seemed to crap his pants every time, underestimating his actual speed. Tough call. If he plays like that every week, I'd love to keep him. But that's a seriously big IF given what we've seen of him in 2 years. Can always hope.

Obviously not going to win any games if we can't score. But that performance was so much better than the dross we've been treated to this season... And Juric been in charge less than a week. I'm hopeful of seeing results pick up a bit from here onwards, but the finishing today was a big worry.

For teams like us, I think the most important attribute for a manager is their ability to make a team as a whole perform better than the sum of its parts This guy seems to have a solid history of doing this elsewhere. I see no reason to be anything other than optimistic for now. Welcome Ivan.

Not going to argue against the point, felt like there were more long balls last night, and they did (from recollection) generally just end up giving it back to the opposition. However, I never felt quite so on edge last night as I have done in all of Martins games. Like the pressure on our defence was a bit more "normal" as would be expected when any team plays against the Liverpool press, as opposed to our back four slinging it around at the back indefinitely until we've tied ourselves in knots and one of them cocks it up. Maybe it was just me, or that I simply wasn't paying enough attention to the game (also true)

Terrible decision at the end, but I for one am glad that the argument is over a guy and his linesman, who saw it once at full speed and made an incorrect decision. We all know that if VAR was in use, they'd have watched that 18 times and still concluded it wasn't a "clear and obvious error" - and stuck with no foul anyway. We'd still be arguing about getting shafted anyway.

This is one of my biggest concerns, too. On the assumption they are wanting to play the long game here and have factored in the onrushing relegation this season, I could understand why the board aren't jumping the gun. (doesn't mean I agree with it) But 15 games in, and so far he seems to have learnt absolutely nothing at all. So it's a colossal risk to expect that him at the helm - for the rest of this car crash season, and a subsequent year with even lesser players, against lesser opposition - will get us anything other than a repeat of this season were we to get promoted again.

So Everton have lost to two of the worst Southampton sides to ever stink up the Premier League... talk about embarrassing.

agreed. It's easy to say he needs better players for the system. And I fully expect that a team of better players would be doing better in this system. But I also think they'd mutiny soon enough, much like what we saw with Jones, where the better players clocked immediately that he was a total fraudster Better players would simply paper over some of the gargantuan cracks in Martin's playbook. The fact is, we don't have better players, and we still seem insistent on playing this "system" and expecting different results. (I'll caveat that with the latest few games where we have certainly been better going forward, but interspersed with the inevitable cock up at the back)