Herdman new head coach

[narduch]

1 minute ago, _Vic_ said:

Small can be quite an advantage. It depends on how you run your team. Team size is like fire, it can cook your steak or burn your house down. There is a lot written about Nuno Santo and his 16 player squad at Wolves (plus three GK).

Sorry there is no way to defend this decision. 

It was short sighted. 

[Obinna]

Herdman's tactics seem to fluctuate between genius and madness. There's very little middle ground.

[frmr]

4 minutes ago, Obinna said:

Herdman's tactics seem to fluctuate between genius and madness. There's very little middle ground.

That shot of him after we won the penalty of him looking filled with deranged ecstasy with his hair all over hell made him look like a mad genius. Or just mad.

[dyslexic nam]

5 minutes ago, frmr said:

That shot of him after we won the penalty of him looking filled with deranged ecstasy with his hair all over hell made him look like a mad genius. Or just mad.

This is who my kids said he looked like:

 

[_Vic_]

Was thinking this same thing last night and a couple minutes ago but in a different context.

It's a great game, the beautiful game. And everyone can watch it and have an opinion, and everyone can think they're Pep Guardiola or Alex Ferguson. But like coaching, being a fan is a fine line between genius and madness as well. When you actually believe you're Jose Mourinho...

[Kadenge]

re the 4-4-2 formation, we deployed it after 30+ mins vs the USA and after 45 mins vs Mexico in the GC. So its not new to the players. Honduras overloaded the midfield and we did not adjust until the half after they had the lead and sat back a bit. So that's on Herdman.  We ended up with 14 corners v 3 without a single conversion and 66/34 possession. We were just not clinical. Larin had at least 3 chances including a free header, David skied at least 2  and should have squared to a wide open Tajon vs shooting at goal and then Ritchie's skied shot from close range. We have had a very good run  of games vs Suriname, Haiti X3, CR, USA & Mexico leading up to last night. Lots of blame to go around. Let's see how JH and the players respond v USA

[BearcatSA]

1 hour ago, _Vic_ said:

Small can be quite an advantage. It depends on how you run your team. Team size is like fire, it can cook your steak or burn your house down. There is a lot written about Nuno Santo and his 16 player squad at Wolves (plus three GK).

I agree.

We have NA taxi squad guys available (Brault-Guillard if Buchanon is not healthy, Akindele up top).  My feeling from this staff is that apart from keeper, we could see some signicant rotation for this USA game, including Piette and Fraser coming in as subs.  

[Joe MacCarthy]

 

[youllneverwalkalone]

Welp, Herdman a touch more positive than the Vs lol

[Approve My Account Pls]

27 minutes ago, youllneverwalkalone said:

Welp, Herdman a touch more positive than the Vs lol

Although we should be disappointed in dropping two points, everything else during the match is more or less easily correctible either by better tactics, better individual performance, or developing more chemistry within the lineup through game time. Despite having an overwhelmingly average or even below average performance, we still looked the better team for the majority of the match. If it was a matter of us being played off the pitch last night, it'd be another story... but as a collective I'd say we gave at best 50% of this teams ceiling so there is optimism in what we will look like as we progress

[kacbru]

4 hours ago, Approve My Account Pls said:

People need to get off Herdman's back in my opinion until we have a larger sample size against good opposition. We've all been begging to see Tajon and Davies on the wings, it didn't work. Maybe that's because we took power out of the centre of the park with Laryea being on, maybe it's even a lot due to Hutchison's poor start to the match. But how could we know that would happen til we tried it? We all were making lineups trying to include all the weapons and saying otherwise now is just revisionist history. We really cannot fault him for trying it IMO

The one major negative I will give him was swapping wings for 25 mins in the 1st half was a terrible idea. Otherwise, I don't think he did anything that wild and that poor that deserves this level of criticism we're seeing.  Let's see how he handles the next two. As long as we get the win against ES and are competitive with the US, no reason to push the panic button yet

Lastly regarding the calling 23 players, I think there's an element that he's banking on a few things. One, that if needed we're in North America and can quickly call upon local guys. Two, allowing some of our young guys with recent transfers (Corbeanu, Millar) time to gel with their new rosters and earn playing might benefit us in future windows if they're starting regularly and in good form as opposed to still struggling for playing time with both us and their clubs. Is it a risk? Yes. Is it the end of the world? No. If we're to make it to Qatar, it's on the backs of players 1-20 in this squad, not through depth options 21-30. 

Regarding your three points:

1) I agree to an extent, but the opening game of wcq at home is not where I would experiment. I guess it is high risk, high reward. 

2) agree 100%

3) But we are thin up front, by choice. It makes no sense. Herdman is all about team building and integration. Why not keep the 25-28 players that are likely to feature together from the start? 

Agree, some of the comments are extreme. It is not the ideal learning environment, but Herdman has demonstrated his ability to adapt.

[Approve My Account Pls]

30 minutes ago, kacbru said:

Regarding your three points:

1) I agree to an extent, but the opening game of wcq at home is not where I would experiment. I guess it is high risk, high reward. 

2) agree 100%

3) But we are thin up front, by choice. It makes no sense. Herdman is all about team building and integration. Why not keep the 25-28 players that are likely to feature together from the start? 

Agree, some of the comments are extreme. It is not the ideal learning environment, but Herdman has demonstrated his ability to adapt.

I agree not the ideal place to experiment. In fairness once Davies went out of the GC we weren't really left with any alternatives to try it out

As for roster size, I don't disagree with that take at all, I would've preferred to bring extra bodies. If we did bring Millar and Corbeanu, I can't see them getting much playing time anyways though. I was almost trying to give myself a viable reason to cling on to for why they may not be there. 

[jtpc]

Everyone knew "we can get that magic number of 21 points at home" was all about establishing the proper mentality, but I still expected the possibility to last more than one match.

After the 4-1 away loss to the US in Nations League, I remember reading the same sentiment here on the forum about Herdman overthinking tactics. I wonder what lesson he's taken from last night.

Edited September 4, 2021 by jtpc

[Dominic94]

He’s hit or miss with the tactics but I’ll give the las credit, he’s progressed as a manager with us. You can see it, I’m not sure he should have shuffled and played around in a must win in the opener and it cost us, but in the past he’s learned from his mistakes and he must do it again.

[youllneverwalkalone]

You saw Tata give him some respect after the GC. I don't think that was lip service.

[Bison44]

7 hours ago, Approve My Account Pls said:

Although we should be disappointed in dropping two points, everything else during the match is more or less easily correctible either by better tactics, better individual performance, or developing more chemistry within the lineup through game time. Despite having an overwhelmingly average or even below average performance, we still looked the better team for the majority of the match. If it was a matter of us being played off the pitch last night, it'd be another story... but as a collective I'd say we gave at best 50% of this teams ceiling so there is optimism in what we will look like as we progress

I think that when the offense became Davies down the wing.. rinse and repeat, rinse and repeat.. in the second half and it was not getting results, that would have been a time to make a correction.  It was all becoming predictable and we were rarely getting Larin/David involved.  Put in Oso or Kaye who looked to have good chemistry going with Eustaquio in gold cup...get out of the 4-4-2 experiment etc.  Something eh?? He's the coach its his job to try and tweak it and get that go ahead goal.  That the other thing..if we are going to qualify we need to not only be the better club for most of the match, we need to grind out the result..by hook or by crook, especially at home.  

[SthMelbRed]

15 hours ago, cronaldo7 said:

nolbertos has been a member since 2006. I am sure he is allowed an opinion, especially in the heat of the moment (and I am Team Herman).

15 years and still waiting on his first bit of real insight. 😅

[nolbertos]

9 minutes ago, SthMelbRed said:

15 years and still waiting on his first bit of real insight. 😅

Vice versa

[SthMelbRed]

8 hours ago, Approve My Account Pls said:

Although we should be disappointed in dropping two points, everything else during the match is more or less easily correctible either by better tactics, better individual performance, or developing more chemistry within the lineup through game time. Despite having an overwhelmingly average or even below average performance, we still looked the better team for the majority of the match. If it was a matter of us being played off the pitch last night, it'd be another story... but as a collective I'd say we gave at best 50% of this teams ceiling so there is optimism in what we will look like as we progress

I disagree with this. We were by far the second best team through 45 minutes.

[SpursFlu]

Am I the only one who doesn't think 3 games in one week is all that overwhelming to professional athletes especially since the people you're playing against are doing the exact same thing 

[SthMelbRed]

3 minutes ago, SpursFlu said:

Am I the only one who doesn't think 3 games in one week is all that overwhelming to professional athletes especially since the people you're playing against are doing the exact same thing 

Depending on the league in which they play their club football, or if they're involved in continental competitions, playing 3 games in 7-8 days is not out of the ordinary for many players. Adding long-haul travel and jet-lag into the equation is probably the bigger issue, though.

[SpursFlu]

1 minute ago, SthMelbRed said:

Depending on the league in which they play their club football, or if they're involved in continental competitions, playing 3 games in 7-8 days is not out of the ordinary for many players. Adding long-haul travel and jet-lag into the equation is probably the bigger issue, though.

Yah I'm for some rotation of course. Im just thinking carrying a bloaded rosters isn't essential 

[nolbertos]

3 minutes ago, SpursFlu said:

Am I the only one who doesn't think 3 games in one week is all that overwhelming to professional athletes especially since the people you're playing against are doing the exact same thing 

Playing 3 games a week is not good for athletes as it could cauae more injuries down the road.  I remember playing a small lightning tournament round in HS with 3 matches in 5 days and on the last match, one of our players tore his achilles.  That was HS.  For those trying to earn a living playing the game, its harder I think.

[Trois Reds]

I don't understand why calling up fewer players is such an issue.  At the end of this first qualifying week, if you look at the rest of the countries who called up a "full squad" I can pretty much guarantee you that none of them will have used 23 players, let alone all 26.  That's two full squads and a extra player for three games. Why do we need more players?

 

 

[gator]

Funny how this thread quieted down with a good result!😀 I was critical of some of what he did in the Honduras match and I stand by that but he sure got things right last night! The switching to 4-4-2 opened the match up and put us under some pressure but he pulled that back and we settled again, his substitutions were mostly well planned and in the end many of us are disappointed we didn't' take all 3 points! He clearly out coached his US counterpart, let's hope he gets things so right again Wednesday!