Gary O'Neil

Neil Dawson said:
Theres a strange media fixation with our fans thoughts on O’Neil that’s been often shown by Crook, Kris Temple, Dan Davies (who quickly stopped) and Neil Perrett (who I know now works for the club) on Twitter.

I don’t remember anyone saying ‘if we keep O’Neil we will never get another win\point’.

I think people are saying we have a better squad than the negative result poor season we are having and that in the last six months there were better choices than a man who had never managed at this level before.

We have 8 points out of 45. Dyche had achieved 6 out of 9 without the huge investment in players we had. Yesterday was a great; welcome backs to the wall performance but we won a game with our only meaningful shot on target. Forgive me for not switching to the media view we need to extend Gary’s contract. Even if we stay up nobody will convince me he was the only man that could do this.
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Or that Jack Stephens is actually ok?;-)
 
GON has to make more progress to convince me. We’ll done yesterday, especially with more considered substitutions, but there’s much ground to make up after that long dismal run. He seems to be making progress with the new signings - can this turn into a PL survival strategy?
 
langham said:
GON has to make more progress to convince me. Well done yesterday, especially with more considered substitutions, but there’s much ground to make up after that long dismal run. He seems to be making progress with the new signings - can this turn into a PL survival strategy?
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Maybe?…matches v Chelsea,Leeds,Stains, Leicester, Fulham ,Brighton, Palace, Villa,and West Ham will probably seal our fate…and avoiding to tonkings v Arsenil , Citeh, Manure and Liverpool will help!
 
langham said:
GON has to make more progress to convince me. Well done yesterday, especially with more considered substitutions, but there’s much ground to make up after that long dismal run. He seems to be making progress with the new signings - can this turn into a PL survival strategy?
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Whoever we got in there would be a relegation struggle. 18 month contract shows he isn’t the long term choice
 
All that matters is that Gary O'Neil is our manager through this next 3 months and he, the players and fans are polarised in the same aim...to stay in the top league.
Any negative talk around him now..is pointless...like incessantly banging on about other managers from Poland to Pyongyang to Peru....they are ALL bloody fallible...with Money .without Money...it's basically down to what players they have and how they gel naturally...and above all, their committment levels.

One of the comments on BBC Sports Report at 1700 was that "Bournemouth Win..albeit with a lot of gamesmanship tactics "... or words to that effect iirc !
So..if Gary has them playing as 'hard as coffin nails' and that spells ultimate Death in May for 3 other clubs..well that's my Sundays sated !
 
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Well I don't like GON for the simple reason that his tactics and ability to change mid game (or rather complete lack of them) have cost us many points. Leeds and Spurs were 6 points thrown away. Sitting deep cost us at Brentford, Fulham and Brighton. As for the home game against a dreadful Palace side well give me strength. Southampton at home !!!!!!
A quick example, if we had made a sub at Leeds to counteract their change early in the second half we would now be 7 points clear of them. These errors may haunt us.
Maybe he is changing but I am not convinced, it will depend on how he can bed the players in and whether the likes of Traore get turned into more defensive mindsets.
Having said all that I am not sure that a change in manager now would help much, no obvious candidates so I think we are stuck with him.
 
One thing you can certainly say about O'Neil is that he's got this team fully motivated, which is something that even Howe struggled with his final season.

The other issue is that there is a clear lack of alternative options judging by the struggles of Southampton and Leeds following their knee-jerk sackings.

Personally I think performances have been alright since the new signings arrived but results not good enough. Time will tell if this is a blip or turning point results wise. I think we need at least two points in the next three games.
 
SlowDownDerek said:
One thing you can certainly say about O'Neil is that he's got this team fully motivated, which is something that even Howe struggled with his final season.

The other issue is that there is a clear lack of alternative options judging by the struggles of Southampton and Leeds following their knee-jerk sackings.

Personally I think performances have been alright since the new signings arrived but results not good enough. Time will tell if this is a blip or turning point results wise. I think we need at least two points in the next three games.
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I think Neto is a great choice as captain and probably GON's best decision, he seems to really gee the players up and has great rapport with the crowd. Kelly may have some good points but captaincy and leadership are not amongst them.
 
redharry said:
Well I don't like GON for the simple reason that his tactics and ability to change mid game (or rather complete lack of them) have cost us many points. Leeds and Spurs were 6 points thrown away. Sitting deep cost us at Brentford, Fulham and Brighton. As for the home game against a dreadful Palace side well give me strength. Southampton at home !!!!!!
A quick example, if we had made a sub at Leeds to counteract their change early in the second half we would now be 7 points clear of them. These errors may haunt us.
Maybe he is changing but I am not convinced, it will depend on how he can bed the players in and whether the likes of Traore get turned into more defensive mindsets.
Having said all that I am not sure that a change in manager now would help much, no obvious candidates so I think we are stuck with him.
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His tactics and ability to change mid-game were demonstrated perfectly yesterday. Whatever he said or tweaked at half time (compared to what the famed Lopetegui did) worked admirably.
 
JohnHold said:
His tactics and ability to change mid-game were demonstrated perfectly yesterday. Whatever he said or tweaked at half time (compared to what the famed Lopetegui did) worked admirably.
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Agreed, he did the same at Forest when he brought Fredericks on and changed formation but then he regressed in following games to a defensive mindset. Yesterday he had his hand forced a bit with Lerma coming off, and lets be honest the first half was so poor that there was only one way to go.
The other point is why not start with the right tactics ?
But lets hope he has learnt. Of course the next 3 games are not really going to be easy to judge him on.
 
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As others said, it's not as simple as the GON brigade are either right or wrong as nobody knows what position we'd be in under a different manager, we might well have taken a lot more points from some very winnable games post world cup, or we might have had a Nathan Jones style implosion.

Clearly it's never been worth letting GON go without a suitable replacement lined up, especially given the lack of experience in our coaching team. That's a given. Promising signs last 3 games and great to see the team still playing with spirit, but that doesn't make anyone who's questioned the appointment of GON wrong.
 
redharry said:
I think Neto is a great choice as captain and probably GON's best decision, he seems to really gee the players up and has great rapport with the crowd. Kelly may have some good points but captaincy and leadership are not amongst them.
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Stephens too looks a real leader and organiser. I think both Kelly and Senesi are very good players but they clearly benefit from having a senior partner with experience at this level.

It appears to be the tactic to be very solid and let the new and returning forward players win us points - understand that it wasn't working very well when injuries kept our best players out.
 
AFCB_Liam said:
As others said, it's not as simple as the GON brigade are either right or wrong as nobody knows what position we'd be in under a different manager, we might well have taken a lot more points from some very winnable games post world cup, or we might have had a Nathan Jones style implosion.

Clearly it's never been worth letting GON go without a suitable replacement lined up, especially given the lack of experience in our coaching team. That's a given. Promising signs last 3 games and great to see the team still playing with spirit, but that doesn't make anyone who's questioned the appointment of GON wrong.
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Although you're right that we don't know how another manager would have done I think it's a fair assumption that anyone would have struggled with the injuries and lack of quality he had to deal with.
 
redharry said:
Well I don't like GON for the simple reason that his tactics and ability to change mid game (or rather complete lack of them) have cost us many points. Leeds and Spurs were 6 points thrown away. Sitting deep cost us at Brentford, Fulham and Brighton. As for the home game against a dreadful Palace side well give me strength. Southampton at home !!!!!!
A quick example, if we had made a sub at Leeds to counteract their change early in the second half we would now be 7 points clear of them. These errors may haunt us.
Maybe he is changing but I am not convinced, it will depend on how he can bed the players in and whether the likes of Traore get turned into more defensive mindsets.
Having said all that I am not sure that a change in manager now would help much, no obvious candidates so I think we are stuck with him.
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I think players bottled it at leeds under pressure and I think Neto would have helped the team cope with the pressure - GON responded at leeds by bringing on Stacey and he misses a sitter at 3-3 to get the winner. IF that had gone in, fans would be saying what a great coach he was after the changes he made at forest to win 3-2

Small margins at this level. At Brighton we could have been bolder with tav and Dom on the bench but we didn’t have great options imho. Traore subbed as GON worried about him doing an injury
 
The improvement since signings and one win against the run of play yesterday doesn't fundamentally change the situation re O'Neil. And nor should defeats to City and Arsenal (should they occur). Lets not get too up or down.

What yesterday and recent games have shown that O'Neil has the players, they are playing and battling for him, and that's worth something.

The window of time for any club making a managerial change is rapidly closing, as Leeds and Southampton are finding. There was a time we could have moved quickly on that front if we had someone lined up, but that moment is passing if not passed.

My personal line remains that he's been thrown in the deep end which wasnt fair on anyone and that he's probably not the long term answer. But it's probably a question to be parked until May now.
 
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