saintant

So his style of play is not slow, backwards and sideways and pass the ball until its surface is worn off then?

Presumably you don't exonerate yourself from being one of the 'I told you so's' seeing as your post contains a number of predictions which, if they come true, will give you the same opportunity as others to say 'I told you so.' Or does it only apply to those with different opinions to your own?

Well let's all bow down to the superior football knowledge of Rasmus who has on his CV the appointment of the one and only Nathan fucking Jones. If he says we should stick with Russ who are we mere mortals to question one of such wisdom and insight - he can make a huge pile of bullshit materialise from thin air, that's how brilliant he is.

He will go at some stage and the only question is, how long will SR leave it? The more games they allow him to continue with his vanity project which will not work the less games a new man will have to extract us from trouble.

Russball has us playing mainly horizontally which would be perfect if the goals were on the sides of the pitch. Obviously they are not which is why the better teams play mainly vertically as Bmuff did against us and Brighton and Spurs showed yesterday. Until he changes from horizontal to vertical we will continue to hamper our ability to make fast and effective progress upfield towards the opponents goal and we will continue to play meaningless football from side to side and back.

Give your head a wobble - it's a great game of football between two very good teams.

We'll do it plenty of times this season so don't worry.

Two sides going hammer and tong and getting the ball forward as fast as they can - it'll never replace Russ bore ball.

Brighton are a very good watch 🙂

Spurs are a very good watch. We can only dream of playing this type of football.

It's a no brainer but our Russ is convinced he can buck the trend but continues to prove himself wrong.

Save percentages on their own tells you nothing really does it? Two keepers could have identical save percentages of 65% but keeper a) might have made far more brilliant saves than keeper b) among the 65%.

It's a kind of Hobson's choice but you are offering but, if pushed, I'd have to opt for Rasmus choosing a new manager because I think there is a slim chance he'll finally get the decision right whereas I 100% believe that RM is not a Premier League level manager and needs to be gone immediately to offer us some slight chance of avoiding relegation or at least giving us the opportunity to accumulate a decent points tally.

Well, we can all have our own wish list and mine is to ditch the pair of them.

How about a third option - we get rid of both of them.

If bullshit was gold Rasmus would be one of the richest men in the world.

Unless RM has learned from our two games against Leicester last season this can only go one way. My worry is that they pressed us to death at St Marys and beat us comfortably but he set us up to play exactly the same way in the second game and, unsurprisingly, we were soundly thumped again.

Now is the ideal time to get rid as it gives a new manager the international break to get his feet under the table and prepare for the crucial Leicester match. My instinct tells me SR will stick with Russball.

I think this is harsh on Downes who is clearly being overloaded and needs some help. I will keep banging on that he needs to be played as one of a two man pivot in a 4-2-3-1 formation so that he can form a partnership that will provide more defensive stability. The poor guy must feel completely overwhelmed in games at the moment because RM is providing him with zero help and he is being asked to do far too much of the work load. Small wonder that mistakes are creeping into his games as with every other player being hung out to dry in this vanity project.

It's a good description of the players problems. RMs system and tactics is overloading the players mentally to the point where massive mistakes will inevitably occur in every game. We need a new manager to come in and drill the team to play a more simple and effective style that is easier to implement and reduces the catastrophic errors. Unfortunately, RM continues to live off small scraps of decent play but these small scraps are not enough to lead to the victories we need. Like many on here I am convinced a different manager and approach would get far more out of these same players but I fear SR will decide to stick with RM until it is too late. The next batch of games include some winnable fixtures and we just cannot afford to waste these chances by leaving RM to carry on doing what patently isn't and will not work for us.

We pretty much know what AA can do because he's had plenty of games to show us. A lot of us just want to see Tall Paul given a decent run in the team so that we can judge him based on more than the odd cameo appearance here and there. Do we know what RMs view of his contribution today was? Has he even mentioned him post match?

The way RM wants his teams to play strangles the life out of any creativity, it stops us playing with any freedom and the squad is suffering because of this rigid belief that we have to pass the fucking ball to death. It is boring to watch, uninspiring and results in soft goals being conceded time and time again. Nothing will change while RM is in charge and those thinking he will get results if we just persevere are just fooling themselves - it aint going to happen.

Every game is the Russell Martin X1 charity match.

You forgot to add that he's a player who has never been given much game time, has been continually ignored by Russ even though others are not performing, who has rarely been used to his strengths even in the few minutes he's played, has scored many great goals in his career and is a striker who none of us including you, RM and the tea lady know whether he can do a job at this level or not.

Spot on - Martin makes us easy to play and score against. He just doesn't learn and never will. Get rid.