Motherwell FC - A Thread For All Seasons

[2426255]

Just now, Handsome_Devil said:

I strongly suspect Tuesday was the players beginning to say 'change it' and I also suspect action will be taken if they say it again in Saturday.

Well good luck. This discussion actually caught my eye because of this quote I saw on the main forum page:

Quote

The only way you ever get control of these situations is by winning because in this country we are so knee jerk. We don't strip layers back and look at factors like budget, size of squad, injuries.

I thought, what a fair and well balanced view on things which is unusual for a fan, but when I came into the thread I saw it was actually quotes from the manager and the person who posted them was filled with rage over them.  That's Scottish football for you.

49 minutes ago, Swami said:

This quote from the article on the BBC has really wound me up. We’re all aware of these factors, but it may be worth mentioning that the signing of a load of horseshit to play up front and the fact that the defence look like they spend the weeks in between games binging on crystal meth are a bit more of an issue than our injuries. And our budget didn’t pick the team the other night, that was solely on the manager. 

[CoF]

51 minutes ago, AdamMFC said:

"he's a top manager who doesn't leave any stone unturned".

I’m absolutely convinced that’s Kettlewell’s problem. The players don’t need to look at every stone. Pick the most biggest most important stones, turn them, and leave the less important stones unturned.  Just leave them, they’re fine. Don’t get on your hands and knees, studying every pebble, looking at grains of sand through a microscope.
 

I sometimes wonder if it’s a sign of an inexperienced manager when they place so much emphasis on “getting as much information into the players as possible”. Detailed analytics is a skill and it probably feels great being able to tell your centre back that if the air temperature is 9c the opposition striker accelerates at 28km/h but only in the ninth quadrant of the pitch, and only if his first stride is his left foot. But communication is a skill and so is understanding individual learning styles. I think Hammell was similar in that he often spoke as giving players as much information as possible - could be wrong but it felt like there was little regard to how individuals actually receive that information. 

Despite my earlier post, I did actually listen to all 23 minutes of Kettlewell’s press conference (I still find him likeable , especially his hard-headedness) and to my relief I think he has at least acknowledged that he needs to simplify the message (or “change the stimulus” as he puts it…..). 

Edited December 7, 2023 by CoF

[ropy]

Win your headers, try and pass when you can, look out for the wee winger he is quite nippy.  Any more information required?

[SteelyDosser]

9 minutes ago, ropy said:

Win your headers, try and pass when you can, look out for the wee winger he is quite nippy.  Any more information required?

IIRC wee gingers have been a bit of a thorn in the side throughout  this season.

 

[Gianfranco]

It would help if he stopped playing square pegs in round holes. As Al B said a while ago just keep it simple.

['WellDel]

3 hours ago, capt_oats said:

The presser in question.

Managed the first 10mins or so, which included about 35 "This Football Club's" before chucking it. The media team have just followed suit with the defence's recent efforts and absolutely phoned that one in and made no effort at editing or shortening it at all. Just far too long to hold any interest.

My favourite bit of what I did see was when he said that on a Saturday you have to go out there and "empty your tank". By the performances they're turning in, I think half the team are cutting about Skoosh doing that on Fridays.

With our injury list and options limited as they are, along with St Johnstone picking up points and confidence in the past couple of weeks, I really don't see us getting a result on Saturday to help his cause any. It's definitely the death throes of his reign.

[ropy]

29 minutes ago, 'WellDel said:

Managed the first 10mins or so, which included about 35 "This Football Club's" before chucking it. The media team have just followed suit with the defence's recent efforts and absolutely phoned that one in and made no effort at editing or shortening it at all. Just far too long to hold any interest.

My favourite bit of what I did see was when he said that on a Saturday you have to go out there and "empty your tank". By the performances they're turning in, I think half the team are cutting about Skoosh doing that on Fridays.

With our injury list and options limited as they are, along with St Johnstone picking up points and confidence in the past couple of weeks, I really don't see us getting a result on Saturday to help his cause any. It's definitely the death throes of his reign.

Is Skoosh the latest iteration of the place at Motherwell cross?  A good night out?

[YassinMoutaouakil]

3 hours ago, 2426255 said:

He's not wrong. Fans are knee jerk and don't strip the layers back. They just want results and that's it. If you're aware of the factors then you'll know why you've signed horseshit players (budget). At what point did it start going wrong for Kettlewell just out of interest?

I'm probably still one of the more pro-Kettlewell guys on here (in that I'd give him one more game) so this is maybe a slightly charitable but hopefully fair view of the last few months.

We'd played a fairly eye-bleeding 4-3-3 for 2 years under Alexander and Hammell, Kettlewell immediately came in and recognised that in KVV we had a maverick striker that would be much better with a foil to play off, and two great young wingbacks in Johnston and Furlong. Switching to a 3-5-2 massively shored up the defence and got the best out of those 3, as well as Goss and Spittal. 

Of the 5 players mentioned, all of them left apart from Spittal, and he spent most of the summer-with a pretty significantly reduced budget- trying to replace like for like and moving on deadwood who didn't fit the system, leaving us with a squad who could pretty much only fit a 3-5-2. This continued to work fairly well until injuries either led him to stumble on/uncover a masterstroke in a quite unconventional 3-6-1. We won our first two games in this set-up, then narrowly lost to St Mirren, Rangers and Celtic, all while playing some genuinely brilliant stuff, before deservedly losing to Livi.

After that, the strikers whose absence had negated the 3-5-2 returned from injury, then probably our best midfielder (17 year old Lennon Miller) got injured, rendering the 3-6-1 obsolete again, although it had probably been found out by that point anyway. Since then the lack of any sort of winger in the squad has left him without any sort of tactical flexibility, and he's resorted to generally keeping the basic 5-3-2 system but with increasingly weird personnel choices, like Blair Spittal at LWB or Conor Wilkinson in midfield. We've picked up a few good points in that time period but they've mostly been second half fightbacks after he's made wholesale changes at half-time- usually swapping one of the strikers around and putting Gent- our only natural LWB- on.

Edited December 7, 2023 by YassinMoutaouakil

['WellDel]

3 minutes ago, ropy said:

Is Skoosh the latest iteration of the place at Motherwell cross?  A good night out?

Aye that's the one, although I'm not 100% sure it's still called that. Being 50 and well past all that shit, I'm not fully up on what nightlife Motherwell has to offer our budding Bob McHughs these days in the absence of Mega Bar.

[ropy]

14 minutes ago, 'WellDel said:

Aye that's the one, although I'm not 100% sure it's still called that. Being 50 and well past all that shit, I'm not fully up on what nightlife Motherwell has to offer our budding Bob McHughs these days in the absence of Mega Bar.

I’ve been away since before Mega Bar was a thing so was just wondering what the yoof were up to nowadays.

[2426255]

34 minutes ago, YassinMoutaouakil said:

I'm probably still one of the more pro-Kettlewell guys on here (in that I'd give him one more game) so this is maybe a slightly charitable but hopefully fair view of the last few months.

We'd played a fairly eye-bleeding 4-3-3 for 2 years under Alexander and Hammell, Kettlewell immediately came in and recognised that in KVV we had a maverick striker that would be much better with a foil to play off, and two great young wingbacks in Johnston and Furlong. Switching to a 3-5-2 massively shored up the defence and got the best out of those 3, as well as Goss and Spittal. 

Of the 5 players mentioned, all of them left apart from Spittal, and he spent most of the summer-with a pretty significantly reduced budget- trying to replace like for like and moving on deadwood who didn't fit the system, leaving us with a squad who could pretty much only fit a 3-5-2. This continued to work fairly well until injuries either led him to stumble on/uncover a masterstroke in a quite unconventional 3-6-1. We won our first two games in this set-up, then narrowly lost to St Mirren, Rangers and Celtic, all while playing some genuinely brilliant stuff, before deservedly losing to Livi.

After that, the strikers whose absence had negated the 3-5-2 returned from injury, then probably our best midfielder (17 year old Lennon Miller) got injured, rendering the 3-6-1 obsolete again, although it had probably been found out by that point anyway. Since then the lack of any sort of winger in the squad has left him without any sort of tactical flexibility, and he's resorted to generally keeping the basic 5-3-2 system but with increasingly weird personnel choices, like Blair Spittal at LWB or Conor Wilkinson in midfield. We've picked up a few good points in that time period but they've mostly been second half fightbacks after he's made wholesale changes at half-time- usually swapping one of the strikers around and putting Gent- our only natural LWB- on.

Sounds like he is being hampered by circumstances like he said in his presser: budget, injuries, squad size. The only thing in there is his player selection, what would you be recommending he do differently?

It seems pretty obvious he has shown something as a manager and is going through a tough time. Isn't it better to get behind him during the hard times as he has shown he can be good when things even out? It just seems to add to my thoughts that fans don't care about circumstances, they just want results end of.

Edited December 7, 2023 by 2426255

[Ceiling Granny]

2 hours ago, Gianfranco said:

It would help if he stopped playing square pegs in round holes. As Al B said a while ago just keep it simple.

It’s the same old story, the worse things get the more it looks like the team is picked by tombola. The more tactical genius “ideas” the manager tries out, the more they’re clutching at straws. I’m convinced it’s an ego thing once they’re so far down the road of trying different things it’s hard to admit back to basics is the right approach because it’s like admitting there’s not a complex answer.

[capt_oats]

44 minutes ago, 2426255 said:

Sounds like he is being hampered by circumstances like he said in his presser: budget, injuries, squad size. The only thing in there is his player selection, what would you be recommending he do differently?

It seems pretty obvious he has shown something as a manager and is going through a tough time. Isn't it better to get behind him during the hard times as he has shown he can be good when things even out? It just seems to add to my thoughts that fans don't care about circumstances, they just want results end of.

You could maybe get away with "fans don't care about circumstances, they just want results end of" chat if we'd lost a handful of games and folk were being a bit moany but I think it's fair enough for folk to be asking questions of the manager after 12 without a win - a run in which we've been ahead for precisely 24 of 1080 regulation minutes and failed to keep a clean sheet in any of those games.

Generally managers don't tend to come back from that sort of run. If Kettlewell manages it then absolutely fair play to him.

As @YassinMoutaouakil says, we played some genuinely brilliant stuff at points earlier in the season with the same group of players he has available just now which not only undermines the point about us signing "horseshit players" because it's all we can afford with our budget it also begs the question how we go from looking an entirely competent side to chucking a centre forward into the midfield of a starting XI 48 hours after the player himself had briefed the press that he'd literally never played there in his life when he was subbed on in the same position and had no idea what the f**k he was doing - a starting XI that, to the surprise of absolutely no one, ended up 2 down to Ross County inside 20 mins.

Tbh, if Kettlewell's finally forced to put out a team with players in their natural positions instead of the fuckery he's been up to for the past couple of months and they actually turn out to be good I will honestly laugh for days.

Edited December 7, 2023 by capt_oats

[Phillips455]

Ah, the simpler times of a few months ago.

 

 

[ropy]

If the reason that Gent doesn’t play is because he must play SOD then then playing O’Donnell in the back 3 frees up a space.  If the reason he doesn’t play Davor is because we have other midfielders than Tuesday showed that we don’t.  So they both come in.  The only selection issue is the front two.  Presumably Biereth plus one other.  We thought it was meant to be Wilkinson, Obika has had the nod.  Just pick one, he’ll change it in the second half anyway.

I would actually like to see Biereth play behind the main striker(s) and relieve him of the burden of battling with the central defenders.  Let him run on to the play.

[ropy]

1 hour ago, YassinMoutaouakil said:

I'm probably still one of the more pro-Kettlewell guys on here (in that I'd give him one more game) so this is maybe a slightly charitable but hopefully fair view of the last few months.

We'd played a fairly eye-bleeding 4-3-3 for 2 years under Alexander and Hammell, Kettlewell immediately came in and recognised that in KVV we had a maverick striker that would be much better with a foil to play off, and two great young wingbacks in Johnston and Furlong. Switching to a 3-5-2 massively shored up the defence and got the best out of those 3, as well as Goss and Spittal. 

Of the 5 players mentioned, all of them left apart from Spittal, and he spent most of the summer-with a pretty significantly reduced budget- trying to replace like for like and moving on deadwood who didn't fit the system, leaving us with a squad who could pretty much only fit a 3-5-2. This continued to work fairly well until injuries either led him to stumble on/uncover a masterstroke in a quite unconventional 3-6-1. We won our first two games in this set-up, then narrowly lost to St Mirren, Rangers and Celtic, all while playing some genuinely brilliant stuff, before deservedly losing to Livi.

After that, the strikers whose absence had negated the 3-5-2 returned from injury, then probably our best midfielder (17 year old Lennon Miller) got injured, rendering the 3-6-1 obsolete again, although it had probably been found out by that point anyway. Since then the lack of any sort of winger in the squad has left him without any sort of tactical flexibility, and he's resorted to generally keeping the basic 5-3-2 system but with increasingly weird personnel choices, like Blair Spittal at LWB or Conor Wilkinson in midfield. We've picked up a few good points in that time period but they've mostly been second half fightbacks after he's made wholesale changes at half-time- usually swapping one of the strikers around and putting Gent- our only natural LWB- on.

I expect this to be lifted and see it on the bbc website tomorrow.

[2426255]

19 minutes ago, capt_oats said:

You could maybe get away with "fans don't care about circumstances, they just want results end of" chat if we'd lost a handful of games and folk were being a bit moany but I think it's fair enough for folk to be asking questions of the manager after 12 without a win - a run in which we've been ahead for precisely 24 of 1080 regulation minutes and failed to keep a clean sheet in any of them.

Generally managers don't tend to come back from that sort of run - if Kettlewell manages it then absolutely fair play to him.

As @YassinMoutaouakil says, we played some genuinely brilliant stuff at points earlier in the season with the same group of players he has available just now so not only undermines the point about us signing "horseshit players" because it's all we can afford with our budget it also begs the question how we go from looking an entirely competent side to chucking a centre forward into the midfield of a starting XI 48 hours after the player himself had briefed the press that he'd literally never played there in his life when he was subbed on and had no idea what the f**k he was doing - a starting XI that ended up 2 down to Ross County inside 20 mins.

Tbh, if Kettlewell's finally forced to put out a team with players in their natural positions instead of the fuckery he's been up to for the past couple of months and they actually turn out to be good I will honestly laugh for days.

I'm not going to argue with you. It's your team. What would be required for him to turn it around?

[YassinMoutaouakil]

58 minutes ago, 2426255 said:

Sounds like he is being hampered by circumstances like he said in his presser: budget, injuries, squad size. The only thing in there is his player selection, what would you be recommending he do differently?

It seems pretty obvious he has shown something as a manager and is going through a tough time. Isn't it better to get behind him during the hard times as he has shown he can be good when things even out? It just seems to add to my thoughts that fans don't care about circumstances, they just want results end of.

Aye, this is why I'm pretty sympathetic to him, and since the middle of this bad, bad run I've been saying we'll be fine if we can tread water and grind out a few wins until January where he'll hopefully have the wherewithal to rectify his mistakes. This is probably what I expected to happen after we took a point at Parkhead but the County game and a lot of the Dundee game was really really poor. For me, he deserves the next game or two but they need to be pretty significant steps in the positive direction in terms of performances and results. A lot of other folk are probably past that point with him and tbf it does sound like he sit a pretty similar tailspin at Ross County that he couldn't get out of.

Edited December 7, 2023 by YassinMoutaouakil

[capt_oats]

10 minutes ago, 2426255 said:

I'm not going to argue with you. It's your team. What would be required for him to turn it around?

Ironically doing what he did when he was parachuted in to replace Hammell would be a good start: simplify things, play players in their natural positions in a way that plays to their strengths and focus on being difficult to beat.

I mentioned this in a post the other day but Kettlewell has been manager for 35 games - in his first 23 we conceded 20 averaging 0.86 goals conceded per game.

In the last 12 we've conceded 25 an average of 2.08 against.

On 06/12/2023 at 15:46, capt_oats said:

H/T to Narey's Toepoker for these numbers.

It's one for the smooth brain "it's because they sold KVV" takes...

In his first 23 games we averaged 1.69 goals for and 0.86 against

In the last 12 we've averaged 1.08 for and 2.08 against.

Edited December 7, 2023 by capt_oats

[Al B]

19 minutes ago, 2426255 said:

I'm not going to argue with you. It's your team. What would be required for him to turn it around?

Suggestion 1 - We have a left back that looks more than decent, and has changed almost every game he's come on in, albeit for about 20 minutes each time. Play him, instead of overlooking him for:

A - an extremely right footed right back, or:

B - Our most effective attacking centre mid.

 

Suggestion 2 - The aforementioned extremely right footed right back who Kettlewell plays at left back, is our best right back, so play him at right back rather than at left back ahead of our only actual good left back.

 

Suggestion 3 - We have a more than decent attacking centre mid who chips in with a few goals. Play him there, rather than shoe-horning him in at left wing-back when the right back who's playing left back ahead of the actual left back, isnt playing well because he's a right footed right back playing on the left.

 

Suggestion 4 - We have one supporting striker who looks like he can actually finish occasionally. Don't move him back to centre mid halfway through a game.

 

Suggestion 5 - When the aforementioned supporting striker who actually has some finishing ability says in the press that he'd never played centre mid before and had absolutely no idea what he was doing, don't then start him there in the next game.

 

Suggestion 6 - When we have a limited budget, dont spend it on players who are already injured, and then have to sign a 2nd player because the 1st one is always injured. Also, maybe try and make sure that this 2nd replacement player isn't also injured.

 

Suggestion 7 - Don't renew the contract of injured strikers that are already in our own treatment room, and then have to bring in someone else as well because they're injured.

 

Suggestion 8 - When you sign this replacement striker, don't pick one that's scored single digit goals in total in his whole career.

Edited December 7, 2023 by Al B