I thought Brighton might be interested in Cooper, but they've have gone with De Zerbi. I need to get reading about him tonight.
I agree that getting rid of Cooper would be a bad decision. It seems likely that - WHO FUCKING KNEW - integrating 21 new players into an entirely new squad in the Premier League might take a while (and might yet prove impossible, though it's still a touch early to say definitively).
If that is the problem, then Cooper is the exactly the guy you'd hire to get them into some coherent shape, because that's what he did at Forest when he first arrived there. I saw them early last season under Hughton and hoooooo boy, they were dogshit.
Considering everything, they're almost kinda there. They click in patches, and when they are on the front foot they look decent. But they're missing that coordination you need. The final ball ain't quite right. The cross doesn't clear the first man. The shape gets a little ragged. It's slightly dishevelled, but in important ways.
Same goes at the back. A defence is a unit, and knowing each others foibles, weaknesses and strengths isn't something that can be built by just chucking a bunch of defenders and a goalkeeper together. They're a team within a team, and it's all the more complicated these days, with wing-backs ahd all. It's possible to happen quickly, but it is a crapshoot; it's far from guaranteed. And when you've gone from a 46 game season to a 38 game season, you've lost a margin for error that you're used to.
So yeah, I'm not surprised to see them struggling early on. You'd expect them to improve but they need a good coach and man-manager to stop any progress being nullified by the players' heads going if the losses continue to stack up. And Marinakis has reputation for possession of an itchy trigger finger.
But if ever there was situation that would require patience and giving the manager more time, it should be this.
I agree that getting rid of Cooper would be a bad decision. It seems likely that - WHO FUCKING KNEW - integrating 21 new players into an entirely new squad in the Premier League might take a while (and might yet prove impossible, though it's still a touch early to say definitively).
If that is the problem, then Cooper is the exactly the guy you'd hire to get them into some coherent shape, because that's what he did at Forest when he first arrived there. I saw them early last season under Hughton and hoooooo boy, they were dogshit.
Considering everything, they're almost kinda there. They click in patches, and when they are on the front foot they look decent. But they're missing that coordination you need. The final ball ain't quite right. The cross doesn't clear the first man. The shape gets a little ragged. It's slightly dishevelled, but in important ways.
Same goes at the back. A defence is a unit, and knowing each others foibles, weaknesses and strengths isn't something that can be built by just chucking a bunch of defenders and a goalkeeper together. They're a team within a team, and it's all the more complicated these days, with wing-backs ahd all. It's possible to happen quickly, but it is a crapshoot; it's far from guaranteed. And when you've gone from a 46 game season to a 38 game season, you've lost a margin for error that you're used to.
So yeah, I'm not surprised to see them struggling early on. You'd expect them to improve but they need a good coach and man-manager to stop any progress being nullified by the players' heads going if the losses continue to stack up. And Marinakis has reputation for possession of an itchy trigger finger.
But if ever there was situation that would require patience and giving the manager more time, it should be this.
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