It was 98-99 that started really bad under Smillie - several games to get first point thanks to Dannie Bulman’s backside and well into October before got first league win.
The stark facts are that Bloomfield has only won 5 games as Wycombe manager. That’s sackable form. Clearly he seemed genuinely angry in his post match interview with Phil, however despite ‘ very eloquent words’ , the big question I have is, can he manage and motivate a team. Taking into account the end of last season and the start of this campaign, the evidence suggests no. I’m certainly not advocating sacking him now but if I was the owner, I would be looking for results to be turning around soon.
Just back from Lincoln! Not good enough!!! No fight, all looked lost. I was very positive after our loss last week, seems very different this time around.
Something has to change and quick. Outclassed, outplayed and outfought.
It will be very disappointing if we don't take advantage of what appears to be a rather gentle opening schedule. A lot of excellent teams yet to play us!
Back to the game. We played fine in the first half without threatening much, but looked utterly panicked after the first goal. The 3rd comes from us pushing and leaving huge gaps.
The big issue will be if we concede first on Tuesday. Any manager would struggle to stop the panic thatll set in after 2 straight 3-0 losses if that happens
We're only 4 points off the playoffs - positive from today.
The stats show that we had 7 shots at goal, with 4 on target. Lincoln had double both numbers. Massive improvement needed if we are to take 6 points from the Orient and Burton games.
Can’t comment on today’s performance but the comments on here at half time were broadly positive, so that’s a step up from last Saturday.
I’m not renowned for my positivity but we do have to be realistic and most of us were prepared to accept a rocky start to the season (although probably the Nemesis style gaping chasm drop took us all by surprise).
The close season signings were almost universally praised on here (obviously not by @trevor) so, in theory, we should have the required capabilities in the squad to turn it round).
We have (or should have) a solid 'spine' in terms of Max, Taf/Forino, Scowen and Vokes and there is a fairly decent mix of experienced and young players with potential to support it.
Which brings us back to the manager/coach. At the time I think most of us accepted appointing MB was a risk, but probably one worth taking, given the inevitable upheaval following GAs departure. The end of last season, whichever way you look at it, was a failure (relative to what could reasonably have been expected, but there were a lot of mitigating factors that you could bring in to explain that.
Clearly (and slightly unexpectedly in my view) MB has been backed pretty well to build a team in his image. Given the lateness its all come together though it shouldn't be a surprise we aren't functioning as a team that well (although the inability apparently to do the basics is concerning).
There has to be doubts about whether MB currently has a clear footballing vision that he can put in practice. The evidence of our eyes is that if he has, at best it is at the moment glimpsed only shimmeringly.
However, I'm pretty sure that before being offered the job GA would have been asked whether he thought MB was up to it and I am reasonably sure he would have believed he was (and he is likely to be a far better judge than most of us on here - @aloysius excepted).
So, I would image that MB will have been given minimum targets for the season (say 12-15 points for the first 10 games, 25-30 after 20, etc). In the event that we are falling short, I am confident that that is when the awkward conversations will come to fruition.
So, it is much, much too early I think to conclude MB isn't up to the job. Lets see where we are after 10 games or so and in the meantime offer our support at the games (and moan endlessly on here afterwards).
I definitely think a lot of the comments today are a reflection on football and society as a whole - we are just used to having everything at our fingertips and seeing instant results. We all knew this was going to be an up and down season (as was the end of last season), given Bloomfield is a very inexperienced manager and we have around half a new team, a lot of whom are youngsters. But when seeing the expectation in reality it is sometimes difficult to stay level headed in the midst of some poor results and performances. Completely understandable as we all, to a greater or lesser extent, live and breathe Wycombe Wanderers, but it doesn’t mean those feelings are necessarily correct. To suggest a young manager ‘cannot set up a team defensively’ or ‘cannot produce a team showing good enough attacking patterns of play’, and is INCAPABLE of learning these through knowledge and experience is frankly ridiculous (and quite depressing!)
Today we were certainly better in the first half than last week, we looked more solid and passed the ball around quite well at times, albeit showing little threat. In all honesty after 55 minutes it didn’t look like either team was good enough to challenge the opposition goalkeeper and it would probably drift to a 0-0 draw. Obviously though it was concerning that once we let a goal in, we collapsed as a team and never recovered. It wasn’t good enough, and listening to Bloomfield post match he agrees (in fact, I think that interview was possibly the most encouraged I have been since he has been in charge, he looked angry and upset and you could see he has A LOT more about him than his nice guy persona). But we are 2 games into a 46 match season. We all know that we absolutely do not have the firepower currently to challenge at the top of the table (Vokes is excellent with the right service, but behind that we have a young lad on loan, a very hit and miss wide player (who is frankly a very poor striker), a previously mercurial wide player who looks a little on the wain, and a completely unproven lad from Gibraltar) so expecting a mid table finish would seem reasonable. 2 consecutive defeats is not really going to put paid to that ambition, so there is no need to panic, especially as we have some good players.
I think in goal, defensively and in midfield we actually have a very good squad of players if deployed in the right way. Personally, I don’t like 3 at the back unless you have attacking game changers at wing back. KVY and Boyes look good players but it may be a lot to expect our main attacking threats out wide to come from them both, rather than as the supporting players they would be in a 4 at the back system. Also, to get the best at of wing backs, they need to play high which exposes the back 3, particularly the outside halves. Tafazolli, Keogh and Jacobson particularly are exposed for a lack of pace in that system. Jack Grimmer has played well for some time now but, for me, should be just a supporting player (off the bench, and back up starter) for a team with ambitions at the top of League 1.
Hopefully Bloomfield is not so wedded to a back 3 that he can’t show some flexibility when it’s not working. I would love to see KVY, Forino, Tafazolli, Boyes in a back 4. With McCarthy, Grimmer, Keogh, Low, Jacobson as options depending on injury and form.
In midfield, I think we are very strong. Scowen and Leahy are both excellent players at this level, and with Potts/Phillips/Breckin to make up the 3 we look well stocked.
The 4 at the back also allows an extra attacking threat with 3 players up top. Vokes should absolutely always be the focal point when fit, but this allows 2 wide players alongside him (Hanlan/McCleary/Taylor/a pacy wide loan player). Or a number 10 (McCleary/De Barr) behind a front 2 (Vokes/Taylor).
This isn’t to say a back 3 can’t work for us, but I think it’s relying on being a bit better and more incisive in our approach play, which could take a little more time. If we persist with a back 3 resolutely, and are at the bottom after 10 or 15 games with little signs of improvement, I think it would be much more reasonable to ask the serious questions then, but for now I do think it’s a bit early. For the record, I don’t think that will happen either.
I remember Ainsworth saying that he started out as a manager thinking he could be the players' mate before realising that he had to be the 'gaffer'.
Hopefully today's post-match video saw Bloomfield realise that Mister Nice Guy doesn't cut it and he , like Basil in Fawlty Towers' Waldorf Salad, has to bust some bottoms.
It's entirely possible that the board thought MB was the right man to pick up where GA left off and keep us on that trajectory (personally, I believe they went for the easy option, but I'm sure we all have our own views on that).
But it was a high-risk appointment - there would have been plenty of lower-risk options available to us - and it just feels like we threw away a genuine chance at promotion in order to uphold the GA culture.
Now, there is a place for that culture, but MB wouldn't have been the only manager who could have come in and upheld it.
TL;DR: the whole appointment still baffles me a bit and I think we've set ourselves back - although it's not too late to fix that and salvage this season.
Had a quick scroll through the Twitter commentary on yesterdays game. That alone tells a story. Grimmer missed chance. Forino goal disallowed. Vokes has a chance. That’s it. There are only 3 mentions of attacking intent. We are impotent as an attacking side. The squad is a classic case of all the right notes but necessarily in the right order.
Can we also bear in mind, for the last 10 years, GA has had his brand of playing, ugly at times but it got results. He also built up a squad who played in this way, who trusted him and would push themselves more than they had for anyone else.
Then he left and his naturally successor came which is Matt. He has completely changed the make up of the team, remove some of those that needed to go and (potentially) a few more might be moved on. However, these 10 new, untested but skilled players and then trying to find a system and way for these players all to gel together. Some of these players have very little or no experience in senior football & we need to give these players the opportunity to develop. Any squad with this high player turnover is going to struggle early on.
While I haven't seen the last 2 games, I struggle to get the change from amazing performance against MK, and the 1st half of yesterday to suddenly get Matt out and we've signed awful players.....
I think Matt is still in a difficult position, some of the players still see him as a team-mate, others a manager and some inbetween. He needs to develop a hard, cutting edge. Putting people in their place, making sure that everyone answers to him and only him. GA went through the same process, we gave him time and patience, so why isn't Matt allowed the same opportinties?
Time and patience is needed, knee-jerk sackings and demanding to win every week needs to take a back seat at the moment. These young teenage loanee players need our support to help them to achieve and become better. 2 games doesn't make a season, we need to take stock around Nov / 1st Round of the FA Cup and then progress from there.
I totally agree, I think we have a really good squad this season. MB in my opinion if nothing else has had a good transfer window. He just needs to be able to get them playing now, that's his job and down to him, and don't start all this need time to gel business, Exeter didn't need it last week ! 2 games in IS too early to start calling for heads, but if this carries on for another month I'll be worried
GMac and Vokes are the real class in our attack and they are both coming back from injury. Once they get going we'll be fine and they will bring out the best in the loanees. Plus Scowen hasn't had many training sessions, he's one of the best players we've ever had.
You can't judge a team after two games, especially when so many players haven't had a proper pre-season.
So what’s our best team is the question. And what’s our best formation. I’m not sure our transfers match either question. And there are going to be some very decent players not in the team. Having Scowen, Leahy, Potts, Breckin and Phillips in the team won’t work for example.
Matt has had full support from the owners. The back room staff are all his choice.
Matt’s team to succeed with his own tactics is plan A.
That said it is the strategic responsibility of the owners to ensure the continued long term success of the club.
Should plan A fail who is in a position to devise and implement plan B?
Who knows the English game, has the contacts, is willing to put in the hard yards?
We have largely inexperienced absentee landlords. Currently we don’t have the back of house staff to compensate for this (Phil Alexander temporarily fore filled that role).
An experienced Director of Football is required as a matter of priority. Someone to mentor Matt and, if necessary investigate the market.
Do we have the vision, budget, commitment for that?
Or will we be prioritising the urgent over the important?
A long way to go. Bloomfield needs a bit more time to work out exactly who or what he wants to be in terms of a manager persona / style / ethos opposed to just being a very long-serving player. He's still in the shadow of GA for the moment and although he's not got a great return so far in terms of results (back end of last season) and a couple difficult results this season we are in a transition phase.
Lots of new players, style not quite right yet (we look really slow) but he's still learning to be the "gaffer"and lot's of new players bedding into the club.
My instinct says we'll have a bit of an up and down season in terms of results but will have enough to stay up and eventually bob along in mid-table. Whether this is enough for the owners will be interesting to see as were definitely spoilt with over-achievement from GA tenure (Championships, playoff finals, promotions, final day relegation save etc).
As Lawrie Sanchez always said - Top 8, Middle 8, Bottom 8......We'll be bottom middle 8.
Might be worth a reminder that under a manager who had been in charge for 10 years we lost 3 of our first 4 league games last season and managed only 3 wins from the first 11. We recovered well enough to still be in contention for a playoff place a fortnight before the season ended.
Comments
FWIW I thought we'd finish anywhere between 5th-15th, thereby giving myself plenty of wriggle room.
I know that was a bad season, but we took four points from the first two games!
It was 98-99 that started really bad under Smillie - several games to get first point thanks to Dannie Bulman’s backside and well into October before got first league win.
That should have been 98/99!
The stark facts are that Bloomfield has only won 5 games as Wycombe manager. That’s sackable form. Clearly he seemed genuinely angry in his post match interview with Phil, however despite ‘ very eloquent words’ , the big question I have is, can he manage and motivate a team. Taking into account the end of last season and the start of this campaign, the evidence suggests no. I’m certainly not advocating sacking him now but if I was the owner, I would be looking for results to be turning around soon.
Just back from Lincoln! Not good enough!!! No fight, all looked lost. I was very positive after our loss last week, seems very different this time around.
Something has to change and quick. Outclassed, outplayed and outfought.
😡😡
It will be very disappointing if we don't take advantage of what appears to be a rather gentle opening schedule. A lot of excellent teams yet to play us!
Back to the game. We played fine in the first half without threatening much, but looked utterly panicked after the first goal. The 3rd comes from us pushing and leaving huge gaps.
The big issue will be if we concede first on Tuesday. Any manager would struggle to stop the panic thatll set in after 2 straight 3-0 losses if that happens
We'll win Tuesday, surely.
All the ingredients for a mental FA Cup run
We're only 4 points off the playoffs - positive from today.
The stats show that we had 7 shots at goal, with 4 on target. Lincoln had double both numbers. Massive improvement needed if we are to take 6 points from the Orient and Burton games.
If we don't and Burton also lose then we'd meet them next Saturday for the fourth consecutive game where both teams were on zero points. A record?
Can’t comment on today’s performance but the comments on here at half time were broadly positive, so that’s a step up from last Saturday.
I’m not renowned for my positivity but we do have to be realistic and most of us were prepared to accept a rocky start to the season (although probably the Nemesis style gaping chasm drop took us all by surprise).
The close season signings were almost universally praised on here (obviously not by @trevor) so, in theory, we should have the required capabilities in the squad to turn it round).
We have (or should have) a solid 'spine' in terms of Max, Taf/Forino, Scowen and Vokes and there is a fairly decent mix of experienced and young players with potential to support it.
Which brings us back to the manager/coach. At the time I think most of us accepted appointing MB was a risk, but probably one worth taking, given the inevitable upheaval following GAs departure. The end of last season, whichever way you look at it, was a failure (relative to what could reasonably have been expected, but there were a lot of mitigating factors that you could bring in to explain that.
Clearly (and slightly unexpectedly in my view) MB has been backed pretty well to build a team in his image. Given the lateness its all come together though it shouldn't be a surprise we aren't functioning as a team that well (although the inability apparently to do the basics is concerning).
There has to be doubts about whether MB currently has a clear footballing vision that he can put in practice. The evidence of our eyes is that if he has, at best it is at the moment glimpsed only shimmeringly.
However, I'm pretty sure that before being offered the job GA would have been asked whether he thought MB was up to it and I am reasonably sure he would have believed he was (and he is likely to be a far better judge than most of us on here - @aloysius excepted).
So, I would image that MB will have been given minimum targets for the season (say 12-15 points for the first 10 games, 25-30 after 20, etc). In the event that we are falling short, I am confident that that is when the awkward conversations will come to fruition.
So, it is much, much too early I think to conclude MB isn't up to the job. Lets see where we are after 10 games or so and in the meantime offer our support at the games (and moan endlessly on here afterwards).
I definitely think a lot of the comments today are a reflection on football and society as a whole - we are just used to having everything at our fingertips and seeing instant results. We all knew this was going to be an up and down season (as was the end of last season), given Bloomfield is a very inexperienced manager and we have around half a new team, a lot of whom are youngsters. But when seeing the expectation in reality it is sometimes difficult to stay level headed in the midst of some poor results and performances. Completely understandable as we all, to a greater or lesser extent, live and breathe Wycombe Wanderers, but it doesn’t mean those feelings are necessarily correct. To suggest a young manager ‘cannot set up a team defensively’ or ‘cannot produce a team showing good enough attacking patterns of play’, and is INCAPABLE of learning these through knowledge and experience is frankly ridiculous (and quite depressing!)
Today we were certainly better in the first half than last week, we looked more solid and passed the ball around quite well at times, albeit showing little threat. In all honesty after 55 minutes it didn’t look like either team was good enough to challenge the opposition goalkeeper and it would probably drift to a 0-0 draw. Obviously though it was concerning that once we let a goal in, we collapsed as a team and never recovered. It wasn’t good enough, and listening to Bloomfield post match he agrees (in fact, I think that interview was possibly the most encouraged I have been since he has been in charge, he looked angry and upset and you could see he has A LOT more about him than his nice guy persona). But we are 2 games into a 46 match season. We all know that we absolutely do not have the firepower currently to challenge at the top of the table (Vokes is excellent with the right service, but behind that we have a young lad on loan, a very hit and miss wide player (who is frankly a very poor striker), a previously mercurial wide player who looks a little on the wain, and a completely unproven lad from Gibraltar) so expecting a mid table finish would seem reasonable. 2 consecutive defeats is not really going to put paid to that ambition, so there is no need to panic, especially as we have some good players.
I think in goal, defensively and in midfield we actually have a very good squad of players if deployed in the right way. Personally, I don’t like 3 at the back unless you have attacking game changers at wing back. KVY and Boyes look good players but it may be a lot to expect our main attacking threats out wide to come from them both, rather than as the supporting players they would be in a 4 at the back system. Also, to get the best at of wing backs, they need to play high which exposes the back 3, particularly the outside halves. Tafazolli, Keogh and Jacobson particularly are exposed for a lack of pace in that system. Jack Grimmer has played well for some time now but, for me, should be just a supporting player (off the bench, and back up starter) for a team with ambitions at the top of League 1.
Hopefully Bloomfield is not so wedded to a back 3 that he can’t show some flexibility when it’s not working. I would love to see KVY, Forino, Tafazolli, Boyes in a back 4. With McCarthy, Grimmer, Keogh, Low, Jacobson as options depending on injury and form.
In midfield, I think we are very strong. Scowen and Leahy are both excellent players at this level, and with Potts/Phillips/Breckin to make up the 3 we look well stocked.
The 4 at the back also allows an extra attacking threat with 3 players up top. Vokes should absolutely always be the focal point when fit, but this allows 2 wide players alongside him (Hanlan/McCleary/Taylor/a pacy wide loan player). Or a number 10 (McCleary/De Barr) behind a front 2 (Vokes/Taylor).
This isn’t to say a back 3 can’t work for us, but I think it’s relying on being a bit better and more incisive in our approach play, which could take a little more time. If we persist with a back 3 resolutely, and are at the bottom after 10 or 15 games with little signs of improvement, I think it would be much more reasonable to ask the serious questions then, but for now I do think it’s a bit early. For the record, I don’t think that will happen either.
Lets hope for a win against Orient!
Have our playoff hopes ended again already?
Gets earlier every season.
4 points of the playoffs.
S'all good.
I remember Ainsworth saying that he started out as a manager thinking he could be the players' mate before realising that he had to be the 'gaffer'.
Hopefully today's post-match video saw Bloomfield realise that Mister Nice Guy doesn't cut it and he , like Basil in Fawlty Towers' Waldorf Salad, has to bust some bottoms.
It's entirely possible that the board thought MB was the right man to pick up where GA left off and keep us on that trajectory (personally, I believe they went for the easy option, but I'm sure we all have our own views on that).
But it was a high-risk appointment - there would have been plenty of lower-risk options available to us - and it just feels like we threw away a genuine chance at promotion in order to uphold the GA culture.
Now, there is a place for that culture, but MB wouldn't have been the only manager who could have come in and upheld it.
TL;DR: the whole appointment still baffles me a bit and I think we've set ourselves back - although it's not too late to fix that and salvage this season.
I think we need to address the elephant...
Had a quick scroll through the Twitter commentary on yesterdays game. That alone tells a story. Grimmer missed chance. Forino goal disallowed. Vokes has a chance. That’s it. There are only 3 mentions of attacking intent. We are impotent as an attacking side. The squad is a classic case of all the right notes but necessarily in the right order.
This is a coaching and management issue.
He wont change from a 3 at the back.
Can we also bear in mind, for the last 10 years, GA has had his brand of playing, ugly at times but it got results. He also built up a squad who played in this way, who trusted him and would push themselves more than they had for anyone else.
Then he left and his naturally successor came which is Matt. He has completely changed the make up of the team, remove some of those that needed to go and (potentially) a few more might be moved on. However, these 10 new, untested but skilled players and then trying to find a system and way for these players all to gel together. Some of these players have very little or no experience in senior football & we need to give these players the opportunity to develop. Any squad with this high player turnover is going to struggle early on.
While I haven't seen the last 2 games, I struggle to get the change from amazing performance against MK, and the 1st half of yesterday to suddenly get Matt out and we've signed awful players.....
I think Matt is still in a difficult position, some of the players still see him as a team-mate, others a manager and some inbetween. He needs to develop a hard, cutting edge. Putting people in their place, making sure that everyone answers to him and only him. GA went through the same process, we gave him time and patience, so why isn't Matt allowed the same opportinties?
Time and patience is needed, knee-jerk sackings and demanding to win every week needs to take a back seat at the moment. These young teenage loanee players need our support to help them to achieve and become better. 2 games doesn't make a season, we need to take stock around Nov / 1st Round of the FA Cup and then progress from there.
I totally agree, I think we have a really good squad this season. MB in my opinion if nothing else has had a good transfer window. He just needs to be able to get them playing now, that's his job and down to him, and don't start all this need time to gel business, Exeter didn't need it last week ! 2 games in IS too early to start calling for heads, but if this carries on for another month I'll be worried
GMac and Vokes are the real class in our attack and they are both coming back from injury. Once they get going we'll be fine and they will bring out the best in the loanees. Plus Scowen hasn't had many training sessions, he's one of the best players we've ever had.
You can't judge a team after two games, especially when so many players haven't had a proper pre-season.
“Amazing performance at MK”
Wow
So what’s our best team is the question. And what’s our best formation. I’m not sure our transfers match either question. And there are going to be some very decent players not in the team. Having Scowen, Leahy, Potts, Breckin and Phillips in the team won’t work for example.
It has been a very difficult start to the season.
Matt has had full support from the owners. The back room staff are all his choice.
Matt’s team to succeed with his own tactics is plan A.
That said it is the strategic responsibility of the owners to ensure the continued long term success of the club.
Should plan A fail who is in a position to devise and implement plan B?
Who knows the English game, has the contacts, is willing to put in the hard yards?
We have largely inexperienced absentee landlords. Currently we don’t have the back of house staff to compensate for this (Phil Alexander temporarily fore filled that role).
An experienced Director of Football is required as a matter of priority. Someone to mentor Matt and, if necessary investigate the market.
Do we have the vision, budget, commitment for that?
Or will we be prioritising the urgent over the important?
On to Orient…..
A long way to go. Bloomfield needs a bit more time to work out exactly who or what he wants to be in terms of a manager persona / style / ethos opposed to just being a very long-serving player. He's still in the shadow of GA for the moment and although he's not got a great return so far in terms of results (back end of last season) and a couple difficult results this season we are in a transition phase.
Lots of new players, style not quite right yet (we look really slow) but he's still learning to be the "gaffer"and lot's of new players bedding into the club.
My instinct says we'll have a bit of an up and down season in terms of results but will have enough to stay up and eventually bob along in mid-table. Whether this is enough for the owners will be interesting to see as were definitely spoilt with over-achievement from GA tenure (Championships, playoff finals, promotions, final day relegation save etc).
As Lawrie Sanchez always said - Top 8, Middle 8, Bottom 8......We'll be bottom middle 8.
Might be worth a reminder that under a manager who had been in charge for 10 years we lost 3 of our first 4 league games last season and managed only 3 wins from the first 11. We recovered well enough to still be in contention for a playoff place a fortnight before the season ended.
We lost 3/4 at the start of last season mainly because we didn't have a proper goalkeeper