Those signings were made with Data too. They didn’t just sign them off the back of Vibes.
Now, if we were to discuss the fact that is mind blowingly more information/data around players today than 10 years ago, then yes, absolutely.
But physically sending a scout out to look at a player was always a data gathering exercise. You can just scout more players, quicker by using a computer than sending humans out to look at anyone you’re interested in and can narrow down the field to a few key targets for those humans to go and look at.
I think when evaluating the two Sams, performances matter more than results, as we seriously could have won all three or lost all three. The way I see it:
Mansfield: Good performance at a difficult venue. Draw possibly fair result, but we gave as good as we got at one of the best teams in the league.
Northampton: Generally poor performance, but I believe this was more a product of the lineup and harder to be too negative about.
Barnsley: Great performance, could have thrashed them on another day.
I definitely think we need a head coach other than Grace for the long term, but I think that if you look at the performances above with a bit of context, I would not be too worried about the interim period going on longer. We'll see how that changes (or not) after Cambridge!
You make a good point and I guess part of the reason I’ve felt that we are moving away from that approach is the comments from some of the fans of the clubs where we have recruited players from. It has to be taken with a pinch of salt, of course, but there have been numerous comments about individuals having ‘bad attitude’.
Maybe I have got it all wrong and that Rice wants to keep the same values that we have had as a club for the past 10 years.
Of course it was data driven back then, and there were other factors that played into who we could and couldn’t sign. Gareth eluded to it many times, about how we were ‘misfits’.
Let me rephrase the point I’m trying to make. Let’s take someone like Joey Barton for example. If he was still playing today, and coming to the end of his career… would Ainsworth or Bloomfield have signed him if given the opportunity? Probably not. Would someone like Rice have signed him? I would say it would be much more likely (albeit without anything that back up my opinion).
I am so fed up with this Bloomfield is the nice guy and Rice is the bad guy bullshit. Bloomfield wnt 17 games without a win with the players he brought in. The players we have now were bought in by Rice and Sam and Sam have them playing better than last month. And believe me Know would have gone now without Rice . So get a life people.
Of the signings we have made since ML took over, there have been many rumours and things said, but signing Dickhead players hasn’t been one I have heard.
edit: well, The guy from rangers: some of there fans said he had a poor attitude, but he was 19 (I think) when his mum died of cancer so I’ll give him a pass.
I actually agree. Last season was a right "mish mash" of players. He signed players that never even played!
Unproven as a manager and that will become evident unfortunately. He had the respect of the Wycombe players because of his connection with our club and what he did for us. Luton won't be so forgiving with that lack of sentiment.
Ignore them. If we all had the same views it would be a very boring forum.
I personally think you (and others) have overdone the "Blooms has been hard done by" theme, but i respect your right to do so.
Professional football clubs at or above Championship have to be run as a ruthless business to be successful and unfortunately unpopular decisions are made to achieve its aims. I'm sure Alan Sugar "your fired" has upset a lot of employees to get where he is now!
Yeah, I just struggle with the letting people have the floor to make snarky digs about Blooms thing. I always try and have people's back when I think they deserve it.
Completely agree . I think a lot of people have under estimated how much Bloomfield doesn't take any prisoners when it comes to his ambition. I believe he doesn't let much get in his way . He seems a very respectful and amicable person but I think this hides a ruthlessness within . Who knows what actually happened between him and rice. The only evidence that Rice ill treated him comes from internal rumours from gang Bloomfileld .He said himself he hates losing and I do not believe this is restricted to match day. Bloomfield is now history . Rice is clearly working very hard to make the squad as strong as possible . I have no doubt that his data model also includes using common sense in order not to recruit the next Jimmy Saville . People needing to use him as their bogeyman only serves to ease their own denial that it just could be that as far as Bloomfield is concened Bloomfield comes first. We have had a culture of recruiting players of a personality type because we have been historically skint and needed to compensate for their lack of technical ability . This has now changed. As long as we dont recruit any proper wrong uns and they are commited footballers ,I don't really care whether they agree with net zero or whether they like Trump or not .
Comments
Mike Dodds is surely the name of a 70 year old retired accountant, not some hipster developer of footballing youth?
Those signings were made with Data too. They didn’t just sign them off the back of Vibes.
Now, if we were to discuss the fact that is mind blowingly more information/data around players today than 10 years ago, then yes, absolutely.
But physically sending a scout out to look at a player was always a data gathering exercise. You can just scout more players, quicker by using a computer than sending humans out to look at anyone you’re interested in and can narrow down the field to a few key targets for those humans to go and look at.
I think when evaluating the two Sams, performances matter more than results, as we seriously could have won all three or lost all three. The way I see it:
Mansfield: Good performance at a difficult venue. Draw possibly fair result, but we gave as good as we got at one of the best teams in the league.
Northampton: Generally poor performance, but I believe this was more a product of the lineup and harder to be too negative about.
Barnsley: Great performance, could have thrashed them on another day.
I definitely think we need a head coach other than Grace for the long term, but I think that if you look at the performances above with a bit of context, I would not be too worried about the interim period going on longer. We'll see how that changes (or not) after Cambridge!
You make a good point and I guess part of the reason I’ve felt that we are moving away from that approach is the comments from some of the fans of the clubs where we have recruited players from. It has to be taken with a pinch of salt, of course, but there have been numerous comments about individuals having ‘bad attitude’.
Maybe I have got it all wrong and that Rice wants to keep the same values that we have had as a club for the past 10 years.
Of course it was data driven back then, and there were other factors that played into who we could and couldn’t sign. Gareth eluded to it many times, about how we were ‘misfits’.
Let me rephrase the point I’m trying to make. Let’s take someone like Joey Barton for example. If he was still playing today, and coming to the end of his career… would Ainsworth or Bloomfield have signed him if given the opportunity? Probably not. Would someone like Rice have signed him? I would say it would be much more likely (albeit without anything that back up my opinion).
I am so fed up with this Bloomfield is the nice guy and Rice is the bad guy bullshit. Bloomfield wnt 17 games without a win with the players he brought in. The players we have now were bought in by Rice and Sam and Sam have them playing better than last month. And believe me Know would have gone now without Rice . So get a life people.
And I'm fed up with posts like this. What is one to do?
perhaps just ignore the ones that you find to be disrespectful?
Life is too damn short to keep getting narked by someone whose opinion/view you will not change
I've spent so much time looking at bettingodds.com that I'm convinced the Milk Tray man is our next manager
Agree with your last point, although that's probably as much down to ML as DR
There’s only one way to know if this is true or not and that’s to have access to the dataset they are working too. Which we don’t.
Rice could be working from the same model Brentford use and that is a “no dickheads” model.
https://www.theguardian.com/football/football-league-blog/2019/feb/13/thomas-frank-brentford-interview-people-who-care
Of the signings we have made since ML took over, there have been many rumours and things said, but signing Dickhead players hasn’t been one I have heard.
edit: well, The guy from rangers: some of there fans said he had a poor attitude, but he was 19 (I think) when his mum died of cancer so I’ll give him a pass.
I actually agree. Last season was a right "mish mash" of players. He signed players that never even played!
Unproven as a manager and that will become evident unfortunately. He had the respect of the Wycombe players because of his connection with our club and what he did for us. Luton won't be so forgiving with that lack of sentiment.
https://www.readytogo.net/smb/threads/mike-dodds-wycombe-head-coach-rumour.1648992/
Some thoughts from Sunderland fans on the Mike Dodds rumour from their forum.
TL,DR: they think he's a fantastic coach but was an awful manager.
Equally, this is the same fanbase that thought Josh Scowen was a waste of space so probably wise to take everything with a pinch of salt.
The revisionist history here is insane. We are probably only a month away from people calling Blooms the worst manager in our history.
I just don't understand why people keep having to get digs in.
He also signed Kone, Morley, Harvie, Udoh, Bez, Fred...
Ignore them. If we all had the same views it would be a very boring forum.
I personally think you (and others) have overdone the "Blooms has been hard done by" theme, but i respect your right to do so.
Professional football clubs at or above Championship have to be run as a ruthless business to be successful and unfortunately unpopular decisions are made to achieve its aims. I'm sure Alan Sugar "your fired" has upset a lot of employees to get where he is now!
Also, why would he have 'had the respect of the players because of what he did for Wycombe'? Most of them never played with him.
He had their respect because he was a decent coach and a decent bloke
Three days away if Kone walks
Yeah, I just struggle with the letting people have the floor to make snarky digs about Blooms thing. I always try and have people's back when I think they deserve it.
People can always ignore me too!
Completely agree . I think a lot of people have under estimated how much Bloomfield doesn't take any prisoners when it comes to his ambition. I believe he doesn't let much get in his way . He seems a very respectful and amicable person but I think this hides a ruthlessness within . Who knows what actually happened between him and rice. The only evidence that Rice ill treated him comes from internal rumours from gang Bloomfileld .He said himself he hates losing and I do not believe this is restricted to match day. Bloomfield is now history . Rice is clearly working very hard to make the squad as strong as possible . I have no doubt that his data model also includes using common sense in order not to recruit the next Jimmy Saville . People needing to use him as their bogeyman only serves to ease their own denial that it just could be that as far as Bloomfield is concened Bloomfield comes first. We have had a culture of recruiting players of a personality type because we have been historically skint and needed to compensate for their lack of technical ability . This has now changed. As long as we dont recruit any proper wrong uns and they are commited footballers ,I don't really care whether they agree with net zero or whether they like Trump or not .
wE cAn NeVeR kNoW.
There was that period he had us top 2 in league 1 against even the most deluded fan's wildest predictions.
Following a superb turn around of form of January 2024.
Outside of that year he's not done much.
not exactly the name or experience we expect/need
True - we should really have sacked him after his 3rd League One Manager of the Month award of 2024.
I will never be able to scrub the traumatizing memories of winning constantly throughout an entire calendar year out of my brain. 😂
I'd love someone to go back through the gasroom and list every quote of every poster that wanted him gone.
Not again people !
We all have different views, move on
Or the positive comments when he was our manager from those now saying "wot did 'e ever do for us?"
The point is he had a terrible start, but look what he'd turned it round into!
It's a real shame he wasn't able to see it through to a richly deserved promotion. Whatever anyone's individual belief is of what's gone on.