In all seriousness, I think a fairer way of comparing Dodds is not to Blooms, but to Sam Grace, as Grace had the same dynamic of following Blooms with a team that had gone slightly off the boil.
Grace P-4 W-2 D-2 L-0 GF-5 GA-3 Goals per game: 1.25 Goals against per game: 0.75 PPG: 2.00
Dodds: P-7 W-2 D-3 L-2 GF-6 GA-4 Goals per game: 0.85 Goals against per game: 0.57 PPG: 1.28
A small sample size, but the attack has gone backwards from Grace to Dodds, while the defence has tightened up slightly. But in the most important statistic of all - points - we have gone backwards.
This is a fairer comparison, and the fact we are worse off with a full-time head coach than the preceding interim is not a good sign so far. Grace benefitted somewhat from knowing the players and having some semblance of continuity, but he should still not have outperformed Dodds in scoring and points to this degree.
The Grace games were, I think, all against bottom half teams. Dodds has had Bham and Disney FC in his shift. Comparisons on such small sample size will always have some form of statistical bias.
Having said that, I would have been happy for a Grace/Volks partnership to be given the rest of the season.
”Rotherham are one of the most direct sides I’ve ever come up against” - while that’s true normally, that’s absolutely not the case tonight. They had more possession than us. Bizarre comment.
Fair point, but we beast Mansfield away (back when they were decent) and Barnsley at home in the run of Grace, and were terribly unlucky to get Bradley sent off when leading Cambridge.
Today's result probably gets Dodds fairly close to par with Grace, I would say.
They weren't particularly direct but they had close to zero meaningful possession. Barely went near our box. Whenever we attacked with any purpose or defended with any authority we looked streets ahead of them.
Most striking thing really was the idea that I was left thinking almost anyone on here or at home picking a standard kind of formation with a couple of things for the players to concentrate on would have been able to get a win tonight. I thought Rotherham offered nothing.
Have to hope that he's learnt a lot tonight and those that played well will be banging on his door and somehow we kick on. It's probably how managers get going far more often than anyone would care to admit.
We have a great chance of automatics with just a bit more structure and positivity. It wasn't all Morley or all luck. We have a good squad.
People knowing what happened and being upset/wanting to discuss it are closely related. It has also been pretty well spoken about by various posters, all of whom were in agreement.
I'm not trying to be antagonistic here - I understand if the debate is not your cup of tea. I would just point out why it is probably better to just skip posts you don't like than take people to task over wanting to hash out something that they are not going to just get over in a couple of months (and likely never).
The underlying principle is that the club is changing/has changed fundamentally, and that the treatment of Blooms has been the most significant symptom so far. This is going to be a reality that keeps unfolding, so it is likely to remain an issue people want to debate. Even if Bloomfield's name was never spoken of again, the direction the club is going is causing plenty of angst and concern, irrespective of on-pitch achievement.
Speaking personally, even promotion would feel massively diminished and even sullied by what has gone on, though of course I still want it to happen. Many others have spoken of feeling disconnected in a strange way, when they should be having the time of their lives.
I'd ask you yourself out of interest - how have you been feeling about the club? Do you feel every bit as engaged and connected as before? That's great if so, and nothing wrong with that, but there are definitely many feeling the opposite.
Great result tonight but this feels very much like the directionless team we had the season MB replaced GA - the difference being that we do have Kone (instead of an aging - but still wonderful - Bayo) and probably better quality players which should be sufficient to get us into the play-offs (really can’t see us gelling sufficiently for 2nd).
I’m not going to properly judge Dodds though until he’s had a full pre-season to work on whatever squad he’s given. I do think it would be helpful to get any new players in sooner rather than later though.
Having said all that I do fear that peak Doddsball may not exactly be that entertaining
Comments
Smoking gum
@bluequarters and @OxfordBlue will be thinking they must be fucking mad after reading this.
They can just ban Congo.
I hope they'll be able stop people having multiple usernames at the very least.
In all seriousness, I think a fairer way of comparing Dodds is not to Blooms, but to Sam Grace, as Grace had the same dynamic of following Blooms with a team that had gone slightly off the boil.
Grace P-4 W-2 D-2 L-0 GF-5 GA-3 Goals per game: 1.25 Goals against per game: 0.75 PPG: 2.00
Dodds: P-7 W-2 D-3 L-2 GF-6 GA-4 Goals per game: 0.85 Goals against per game: 0.57 PPG: 1.28
A small sample size, but the attack has gone backwards from Grace to Dodds, while the defence has tightened up slightly. But in the most important statistic of all - points - we have gone backwards.
This is a fairer comparison, and the fact we are worse off with a full-time head coach than the preceding interim is not a good sign so far. Grace benefitted somewhat from knowing the players and having some semblance of continuity, but he should still not have outperformed Dodds in scoring and points to this degree.
But they always come back home eventually🎃
But sometimes only when the 'Sold' sign is already in the yard! 😂
Where should we moving to though?
But then we'll be down to about 7 regular posters rattling around
Someone said earlier that Bradley had to start. Nostra-fucking-damus!
Fuck me!
Dodds listened to me, should never have been dropped in the first place.
In fairness to Dodds, an update to the Grace comparison, which looks rosier:
Grace P-4 W-2 D-2 L-0 GF-5 GA-3 Goals per game: 1.25 Goals against per game: 0.75 PPG: 2.00
Dodds: P-8 W-3 D-3 L-2 GF-9 GA-6 Goals per game: 1.12 Goals against per game: 0.75 PPG: 1.50
The Grace games were, I think, all against bottom half teams. Dodds has had Bham and Disney FC in his shift. Comparisons on such small sample size will always have some form of statistical bias.
Having said that, I would have been happy for a Grace/Volks partnership to be given the rest of the season.
”Rotherham are one of the most direct sides I’ve ever come up against” - while that’s true normally, that’s absolutely not the case tonight. They had more possession than us. Bizarre comment.
Fair point, but we beast Mansfield away (back when they were decent) and Barnsley at home in the run of Grace, and were terribly unlucky to get Bradley sent off when leading Cambridge.
Today's result probably gets Dodds fairly close to par with Grace, I would say.
The most boring thing on this forum by a long chalk is you telling people to move on.
...closely followed by telling people who know what happened that they can't ever know what happened!
They weren't particularly direct but they had close to zero meaningful possession. Barely went near our box. Whenever we attacked with any purpose or defended with any authority we looked streets ahead of them.
Most striking thing really was the idea that I was left thinking almost anyone on here or at home picking a standard kind of formation with a couple of things for the players to concentrate on would have been able to get a win tonight. I thought Rotherham offered nothing.
Have to hope that he's learnt a lot tonight and those that played well will be banging on his door and somehow we kick on. It's probably how managers get going far more often than anyone would care to admit.
We have a great chance of automatics with just a bit more structure and positivity. It wasn't all Morley or all luck. We have a good squad.
Bloomfield Left on 14th January. Over 2 months ago. Posters repeating the same old posts about what happened that’s boring.
You keep telling them that several times a minute, nothing dull about that at all..
Oh, how careless of me to forget about all those people in the know. J
You need to move on @davecz
People knowing what happened and being upset/wanting to discuss it are closely related. It has also been pretty well spoken about by various posters, all of whom were in agreement.
I'm not trying to be antagonistic here - I understand if the debate is not your cup of tea. I would just point out why it is probably better to just skip posts you don't like than take people to task over wanting to hash out something that they are not going to just get over in a couple of months (and likely never).
The underlying principle is that the club is changing/has changed fundamentally, and that the treatment of Blooms has been the most significant symptom so far. This is going to be a reality that keeps unfolding, so it is likely to remain an issue people want to debate. Even if Bloomfield's name was never spoken of again, the direction the club is going is causing plenty of angst and concern, irrespective of on-pitch achievement.
Speaking personally, even promotion would feel massively diminished and even sullied by what has gone on, though of course I still want it to happen. Many others have spoken of feeling disconnected in a strange way, when they should be having the time of their lives.
I'd ask you yourself out of interest - how have you been feeling about the club? Do you feel every bit as engaged and connected as before? That's great if so, and nothing wrong with that, but there are definitely many feeling the opposite.
Great result tonight but this feels very much like the directionless team we had the season MB replaced GA - the difference being that we do have Kone (instead of an aging - but still wonderful - Bayo) and probably better quality players which should be sufficient to get us into the play-offs (really can’t see us gelling sufficiently for 2nd).
I’m not going to properly judge Dodds though until he’s had a full pre-season to work on whatever squad he’s given. I do think it would be helpful to get any new players in sooner rather than later though.
Having said all that I do fear that peak Doddsball may not exactly be that entertaining