Bould's Defensive coaching

[The Tony]

Does he do any? Cant imagine any defensive coach being particularly pleased by that shambles of a back line. The ol' Bergkamp 1-2 past a square backline. shocking really. And since when have we adopted the AVB high backline? Crazy leaving Michu in acreeeeeees of space in behind.

[Doublespeak]

the midfielders can't win the ball, can't make a tackle and even worse seem to apologise for even attempting to be in the way.

[Bergkamp's Brain]

it is just that we were able to play it properly for the first 6 or 7.

[Doughboy-TSL]

in his car. He said to SB "You're doing a good job with the defence" to which SB replied "Really?" and gave him an icy stare before zooming off. #fact

[merce58]

Maybe the stories are right that Bould is just used as a yes man and AW is not interested in his ideas of changing the system

[JJSB]

[Steve Williams - gay for Mark Knopfler]

There is more to the current bout of ********ery than mere defensive issues.

[Classic Jorge]

The man's obviously a barely literate, semi-retarded and embittered fool

[Classic Jorge]

[Monty91]

at worst. Obviously too frequent for us to be where we need to be, but we are not seeing game after game of dire performances. Just three days before Saturday's holocaust, we played pretty damn well at one of the toughest grounds in the country. Seven days earlier, we secured CL qualification. Three days before that, we put five past our biggest rivals.

In other words, inconsistency as much as anything.

[Free SL]

but the performances against Villa, Norwich and Swansea are a concern all the same.

It's the consistency of us playing badly against "lesser" teams over the last few years that is worrying.

[Classic Jorge]

We played terribly against some "big" teams too

[Steve Williams - gay for Mark Knopfler]

To a degree we (or Arsene) got out of jail a little in the Spurs game as they were clearly on top and should really have had a 2 goal lead before Adebayor was sent off. Now even had it been 2 down and 11 v 11 we have no idea how the game would have panned out and of course we deserve credit for our performance after the card but imagine the mood of the Emirates massive had that result not occurred.

We could also have very well lost in midweek had the ref done what was probably the correct thing in awarding them a penalty.

In summary things could be a small degree worse.

[JJSB]

will see us safe anyway, worst case scenario http://www.awimb.com/images/smiley_icons/wink.gif

[Steve Williams - gay for Mark Knopfler]

He is there to carry out training drills under the instruction of the manager, to be a sounding board for discussion on team issues etc, to perhaps offer advice if he sees fit. We have seen comments from players praising the work he has done. Ultimately though when they cross the white line it is down to the players.

He is not the manager, he is not there to actually make the decisions.

I don’t know why we continually tie ourselves up in knots about the input and merits of our assistant managers, they are assistants for a reason. If we win something in the next few years we are not going to sing songs about Steve Boulds magic hat, probably not even his hair.

[Peter]

And i am afraid that since that westham game the spurs result sticks put like a sore thumb. Aside from that game we have been pretty consistently poor, the only Other league win in 8 games being a very poor, very fprtunate scrambled win over the worst side in the league.

The sheer hopelessness of saturday's performance cant be explained away by inconsistency.

[JJSB]

as a coach, now look at him as a manager. (excluding recent results)

And at Utd the likes of Quieroz were often said to have almost free reign over training methods. Again, he's had several decent managers roles in his own right.

[Peter]

He took a lot of blame for years.

[Bergkamp's Brain]

some poor finishing quite a few suicide passes that should have led to more and a penalty not given. First half we were not good, that night. 2nd half we were a lot better.

[Bergkamp's Brain]

[Steve Williams - gay for Mark Knopfler]

But ultimately the fundamental decisions that are made about the football team are made by one man.

That is why in our case he is paid the money he is, he dictates the football strategy of the club from top to bottom.

Boro Primorac is often alluded to as being AW's real right hand man, a bloke who has been with him on the training pitch every day for 16 or whatever years. I am not suggesting he is to blame for anything either, or indeed that anybody is, just don't know why we always pile on the default of Pat Rice and now Steve Bould.

Ultimately it is Wenger or the players, or both.

[PSRB]

which hopefully spurs will find out this weekend

[Peter]

[Billy Goat Sverige]

[Bergkamp's Brain]

We gifted them the ball in dangerous places, quite a few times. Apart from Walcott's goal, we never looked like scoring. I think we got out of jail, although I thought we were better in the 2nd half. We were piss poor defensively, in the 1st.

[Peter]

Same old problems there.

[Bergkamp's Brain]

[Monty91]

counts for literally nothing.

I'd say the last five games have seen three more than acceptable performances (and results).

[Bergkamp's Brain]

I get your point about Pat Rice not being at fault.

[Pokster]

they have been average at best and downright rubbish in places

[PSRB]

[PSRB]

[Monty91]

[Peter]

In my opinion, your description of our performance at everton as 'excellent' was bloody laughable. If that was excellent, we really are f**king ****. Good result, but a rotten game and a rotten performance. We were worse at villa.

Aside from the fact that our game without possession is still weak, our game in possession was simply not there on saturday. No movement, nobody creating angles, nobody showing for the ball. Possession just switched slowly across the back four, entering a static midfield via the full backs. Arteta and jack werent dropping to collect the ball.

I have never seen us that poor in possession under wenger. It is a really, really bad sign.

[Peter]

I only saw the second half. I understand we were worse in the first half http://www.awimb.com/images/smiley_icons/smile.gif

[Bergkamp's Brain]

but it looked like we were making a lot of unforced errors, more than Everton did imo

[PSRB]

[Pokster]

[Monty91]

happily acknowledge that I do.

I think your perspective has been warped by the general sense of doom.

Ultimately, if you adjust your mindset to consider us as merely challengers for the top four, then we're right there in the mix, amongst lots of other teams with similarly sketchy runs of form http://www.awimb.com/images/smiley_icons/shrug.gif

[Bergkamp's Brain]

[PSRB]

we were very surprised to see him start

[Peter]

Of course we are only five points adrift of the top four, of course we can turn it round.

My suggestion is that there is more to this than just inconsistency- and you know it.

I am teetering here monty. I could go over to the dark side by christmas if this carries on. The only thing that cheeredme up was hearing a fan slaughtering wenger on the radio-after 30 seconds or so i wanted to rip the c**t's throat out.

I still have some degree of faith, but it really needs a shot in the arm.

[Bergkamp's Brain]

[Peter]