QuoteThe results that he's listed there are the reasons why he got the job, nobody is arguing with that, it's the results since his appointment, and more recently the performances, that are the reasons why his position is under threat
Very naive comments by Kenny. Whoever advised him is as media savvy as himself. Silly stuff indeed.
The results that he's listed there are the reasons why he got the job, nobody is arguing with that, it's the results since his appointment, and more recently the performances, that are the reasons why his position is under threat
The defeat in Greece was a massive blow. Needs 2 big performances in September. The draw was tough but a few better results in the Nations league could have all but guaranteed a playoff spot and unfortunately we've not done the business in this campaign when it mattered. (Home to Ukraine, away to Armenia, away to Greece) - if you turn those defeats into draws which we easily could have with better performances then he's not under as half as much pressure as he seems to be now.
I was always giving Kenny as bit of a longer lead as he's from an LOI background and he gets unwarranted criticism from those who are ignorant of the league - see VM2 last night again as an example. But at the end of the day he should get treated the same as every other manager - you get a campaign to bed in players tactics and when the next campaign comes around there needs to be improvement. There isn't, so unless there is a massive turnaround in fortunes both in and out of our group in September then his days are inevitably numbered. Think he knows this too - hence the soliloquy yesterday.
Exactly this.Originally Posted by tetsujin1979
His previous achievements made you hope that his ability to get players to over-achieve would continue to show, but now that he's up against a much higher level of opposition, it's fairly clear that it hasn't continued.
I'd argue that the players, limited though they are as a group, have still under-achieved more than they've over-achieved, under his management.
The same as a player who looks great in one league/division, then flops in a much higher one, and eventually finds their level somewhere in between...we are seeing where Kenny's level is, and who he can compete against, and who he can't.
Bakasetas is marked as a EL player in the list, apols for the formatting. for CL players, For others I've counted CL involvement in the last 2-3 years - I did after all count Matt Doherty for us.
I've happened to be at a couple of CL games with Greek clubs which maybe skews my view. Panathanaikos came to Stuttgart a few times when I lived there. I saw AEK in the Bernabau against Madrid, haul back a 2-0 deficit to draw the game 2-2 - They had 5K fans there going absolutely mental - it was a fantastic spectacle. I don't have any Irish soccer memories like this - John O'Shea's winners medal for being an unused sub in 2008 (15 years ago) summarises our last notable achievement in this premier tournament - reflect on that.
The fact remains that it's our soccer culture and infrastructure that's "shambolic". - there's not a manager in world football that could have guaranteed a better result last Friday with the material at our disposal. Maybe that's improving now, maybe it's not, but in the meantime Kenny is doing an OK job on which he is completely focused on and probably represents our best option (I'm including financial value for money in the criteria) .
Maybe any other manager would have lost that game, the criticism is that we were clearly being overloaded on the left side of defence by three Greek players, and he did nothing to change that. Poyet said after the game that they had figured out Kenny's tactics before kick off. That's not an isolated situation either - Armenia had the measure of us a year ago, Azerbaijan, Luxembourg, Wales, and so on. I've said it for a while that he doesn't know how to change tactics in a game when it's clearly not working.
Apologies. I'd pulled the stats from transfermrkt. I must have screwed up somewhere along the line.
Respectfully, I think you've found an arrow and drawn a bullseye around it.
Greece happens to have a league which is just about strong enough for it's teams to regularly qualify for the group stages of European competitions. The truth is that Greek clubs in Europe, a little like Scottish sides, tend to be there to make up the numbers in Europe and create an impression that European football is about more than clubs from 5 countries.
I imagine a table showing experience playing in the big 5 European leagues would skew the other way given the tendency of Irish players to make a living playing at the bottom end of the Premier League. 7 of our starting 11 the other night have played in the Premier League. From the Greeks only Mavropanos and Tsimikas have played in the big 5 leagues.
But that's a load of malarkey.
What is true is that our players are good enough to give Greece a very difficult evening.
What actually happened is that Gus Poyet had done his due diligence and took Stephen Kenny out to the woodshed.
https://www.irishtimes.com/sport/soc...ctical-battle/
Bring Back Belfast Celtic F.C.
Stephen also started three centre backs against the world worst team and we were at home.
The looping shot was a good save, for sure, but coming off his line was more routine I thought (and ironically of course it led directly to the goal). There was one or two other shots which were straight at him and were solid saves with good clean handling but still not "keeping us in the game" sort of stuff. He was certainly solid (which, again, is a big improvement on pretty much the entire past season and good to see) but I never got a feeling he was keeping us in the game. He kept us in the game against Serbia at home, and I think there's a clear difference between the two performances. I don't think he'd have gotten MotM if Greek players had been considered for example.
and your fireplace... What really happended!
Eh?
..
Craftytoe has reliably informed us that Gavin Bazunu broke into (or possibly was invited) your house where he went on to urinate on your Christmas presents and finish his business in your fireplace.
I'm just surprised you didn't tell us this before
YES! we should aim for that.
Thanks
d.
I...see.
I deny everything!
Thought coming off his line was timed perfectly myself. I've seen keepers stay put or come out too late in those scenarios but he judged it really well. That said, he also stood out more because everyone else was doing their level best to keep us OUT of the game. If he'd made the same number of mistakes as his teammates in the first half we would have been done for. I'm still struggling to think of a game more laden with individual errors and wayward passes.
Last edited by ontheotherhand; 21/06/2023 at 4:08 PM.
21 leagues and 25 cups.
I used to give CR the benefit of the doubt and assume he was playing an ignorant fool as Mr. Colbert did on the show. The doubt wore off though. Best ignored.
21 leagues and 25 cups.
Really? No player made his debut in a near decade before Kenny took charge? I'm going to be looking into this claim.
Then going on to blame COVID for poor results as if a global pandemic happened in a vacuum that only affected him personally, before going on to remind us of his mediocre low-level achievements as if he's Jose Mourinho.
Embarrassing stuff that's probably done him more harm than good.
Yeah, but is that solid keeping or keeping us in the game? I think just the former.
I was watching a bit of Austria v Sweden last night - Virgin Media were showing it while Scotland v Georgia was rained off. The Swedish keeper there really did keep the score down. Some great saves in the first half in particular - one right in the snot that nearly knocked him out cold - and it was only late on that they finally conceded. 8.87 rating and man of the match on whoscored for example. Bazunu with a 6.8 just. I think that's fair. Behind Collins (7.1), but well ahead of everyone else except, slightly surprisingly, Lenihan on 6.6.
Bazunu only turned 21 in February and has already become Ireland's number one, played regularly in the Premier League and transferred for an eight-figure fee.
I think he's going to be all right.
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