The slating of Andy Thorn (1 Viewer)

[oldskyblue58]

i think the majority of fans are not suggesting AT to go but question some of his decisions. Are we not allowed to do this ?

Even those suggesting his time is up have a valid opinion, you might not agree with it but it isnt less valid because of that. Are they not allowed to do this? Resorting to name calling of someone simply because they see things differently is not a worthy expression of words

As it stands AT is part of the problem just as much as he is part of the solution........ argueably just as much as the players, the coaches, the Board, SISU, the finances are. He maybe held in high esteem by a large number of fans but should that or does that exclude/absolve him from questionning ? no of course not. He may have restricted resources in terms of players and finance but should that stop fans from expressing an opinion or questionning his tactics? again no of course not. We can shield him behind excuses of lack of finance etc but when it is 11 vs 11 on the pitch the tactics he uses are nothing to do with that - and in my opinion he has at times been found wanting. Nor has utterances at a press conference anything to do with finance- some of his comments were ill conceived in my opinion

I question his tactics in some matches, his use of substitutes, his public utterances in some cases - am I slating him - No and in my opinion he has made some mistakes (strangely everyone does so he is human!) It certainly doesnt make me a moron to ask those questions or to disagree with his actions........ :facepalm:

I dont want AT out but I will question what he does and says - would do the same to any other character at CCFC. It is not slating him, it is done because I care about our club and want the best for it!

 

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[TheSnoz]

Common sense as always Oldskyblue. AT's comments on Gary Deegan throw fresh light on the situation he was facing on Saturday. Though you have to ask the question - if he didn't want to play him why have him on the bench. Pointless. Though he doesn't have that many to choose from does he. Perhaps better might have been introducing Cameron to shore up defence. Thorn's hands are really tied behind his back. We know this.
AT is reported as saying - “Deegs had a groin injury from the Leeds game but he was good enough to go on the bench on Saturday because we were down to the bare bones.
“But I was reluctant to use him because I didn’t want to risk making the injury any worse.”


​

 

[oldskyblue58]

Got to agree Snoz if Deagan was injured there was no point him being on the bench because AT was never going to use him. If he did get on he could have been injured further so waste of a bench space. But there were other options eg Cameron. I dont think AT's thought process was very clear Saturday

 

[Nonleagueherewecome]

Humiliated? I totally don't get the fuss about what Thorn said. Have i heard a different interview to everybody else or something?! Player does something wrong, manager says player did something wrong. OUTRAGE!

The dear precious Bigi is not capable of doing anything wrong. HA! He got exactly what he deserved off AT and the number of slight misquotes of his interview I've seen in a bid to use it against him are disgusting. Frankly, if Gael think's he can walk around like the big "I am", then he also has to take the brick-bats when he fucks up. Can anyone tell me what he's contributed this season anyway? Good 45 mins against Leeds, good 45 mins against Burnley. I thought he was awful against Leicester and Ipswich. The red on Saturday was stupid, naive and cost us the game.

I can't believe this forum in the past 2-3 days, it's amazing how some people act once they decide it's all the managers fault. I'd class that as nothing other than a big win for SISU!

Maybe I should try GMK? Or is it just as pathetic over there :thinking about:

 

[oldskyblue58]

Not heard many say that GB didnt mess up or that the tackle wasnt deserving of a red card NLHWC. Also dont think many would disagree that the manager should put the point across to him bluntly that he has got to be better than that. Radio interviews where AT is clearly angry and disappointed are not the place to do it..... managers have to be cleverer than that. It isnt about the game thats just gone its about the games coming up, and i think the things need to be said but in the dressing room. Players start thinking they are going to be publically blamed for the results by the manager then thats going to inhibit performance - they wont want to risk in a game for fear of making a mistake. Just to be balanced I dont think managers should over enthuse about players either that can create pressures of another kind. GB made a mistake thats all

His mistake contributed to the defeat certainly but "cost us the game" no. We were on the back foot before then, Burnley had worked us out and were bossing the game from 60 mins onward. There were other contributing factors which when combined with GB's mistake cost us the game - that includes decisions by the manager. That is the general feel i get from this discussion and is certainly my take on the match.

Is GB the shining star some think - nope but he has good potential. I think Cyrus has more strength & energy and Thomas is more mature in the way he plays. They are all the clubs future along with a few others thats for sure though.

As you put it if he takes the praise he can take the brick bats also. So can managers. They are entitled to make mistakes too and for those perceived mistakes to be discussed. Admittedly some have taken their conclusion on AT a little too far for my liking but it is only opinion. AT has made mistakes.... and the reaction here is no more than some players/ex-managers have had, infact a lot less than some of those

Hold on to your GMK transfer request ..... i for one enjoy your input here

 

[TheSnoz]

Football is an emotional game. Even at parks level it can get heated. AT was speaking minutes after the game, he's wound up, probably exhausted with nervous tension. He shouldn't be pilloried for comments there. They are bound by league rules I understand to do these post match talks. But I'll bet he didn't want to do it Saturday. Come on, can you imagine the dressing room? AT possibly said far worse in there. His hands are tied behind his back. In fact he's like a modern day Harry Houdini, (youngsters ask your dad) - with Sisu holding the key as he tries to avoid going over the edge of the falls in a barrel. He has even less cash than Coleman, than Boothroyd. We all know this.
Apparently Bigi is a devout christian so he'll take it in his stride. Very much doubt there will be bad blood between him & AT. They'll all calm down.
Conor Thomas? He never seemed to get his foot in on Saturday, chasing shadows mostly. I've hoped for more from him, but temper that knowing he's just a kid and could still be wearing a school blazer. He'll be good. But we need people now.

 

[BIG G]

I first started going in 1967 so over 40 years following the club through thick and thin, so i can also claim to be a long suffering fan. Over the years i have followed the club home and away and up until 3 years ago i had missed only a handfull of home games in the last 40 years. But there comes a time when you decide if its worth buying the season ticket
as work commitments mean i miss the night games, and you can easily get out of the habit of going. Then all of a sudden you get used to not going and you dont miss it anymore. I have not given up, but i need the club to give me and all the other stay away fans a reason to come back again. Unfortunately this Chairman and Sisu have failed to do that. .
I will be at the next home game and my heart will always be Sky Blue. I havent given up totaly yet!

 

[Nonleagueherewecome]

Conor Thomas? He never seemed to get his foot in on Saturday, chasing shadows mostly. I've hoped for more from him, but temper that knowing he's just a kid and could still be wearing a school blazer. He'll be good. But we need people now.

You should have seen the report raving about him in The Sunday Mercury. They (rightly IMO) enthused about the way he closed down and tackled in the first half, saying that Burnley simply couldn't live with him. Every time Burnley brought the ball out of defence, we were all over them like a rash and took the ball off them. I actually thought the same could have been said about Bell (and Cody), and they along with Sammy and Gael played some superb, one-touch football in the first half. The best I've seen in years. The problem was we didn't convert it into goals.

And ultimately the biggest problem was not having much left in the tank after such a high-tempo, pressing first-half, especially when reduced to ten men. For all that, it was still US attacking when Gael got his red (check where on the pitch it was...), and we didn't get into such a threatening position as that again in the match. That means he takes a huge slice of blame for the result, and to claim otherwise is a bit silly, really. I've seen claims on here that Chelsea did OK with 9, so what's wrong with us!?! Please.

The grief Thorn gets is for not making changes. I think these incidents that are portrayed as easy-call, black and white decisions are anything but. I'll try and explain why I think that, from what I feel is an objective perspective, and not because I "feel sorry" for Thorn. All his calls were entirely justifiable, but rendered fallible by defensive errors in the 93rd minute that should have been avoided whoever was on the pitch.

One of those is a defensive adjustment; Cameron on for Cyrus. But even experienced managers don't like to re-jig the back line mid-game, or to bring a defender on "cold" when a side is under pressure. Martin Jol brought Aaron Hughes on to shore up his defence for Fulham against Everton. The result was that the first chance afterwards that Everton created, Hughes was caught cold and at fault for the goal by Saha. He was clearly off-the pace of a high tempo game. With Cameron being a player lacking the experience of a stalwart like Hughes, who is to say that something similar would not have occurred? If we'd had anyone on the bench who could have stepped directly into the RB position it would have been a different matter, but Clarke is still injured and Keogh was playing superbly at CB until the last few minutes. I'd have even considered Cyrus off for Deegan, with Thomas switching to RB, but again that's rendered meaningless by Deegans lack of full fitness.

Then the argument of bringing on Deegan: it's emerged that he had a knock and wasn't fully fit. "What's he doing on the bench, then?" comes the accusatory cry. Well, who else is there? Maybe Josh Ruffles, but after his Palace experience, do you want to be throwing him into such a similar scenario? The other bench option was the similarly-unfit Carl Baker: not exactly the renowned ball-winner that the situation called for, really! Suddenly the early-season calls for Carsley to have come out of retirement make sense...he'd have offered a better option in that situation than anyone we had available.

The other call was to get O'Donovan off. Thanks to the appalling performance he delivered, he's an easy target. He was worse than I've ever seen him play before. But in any other circumstances, and bearing in mind the limited options I've outlined above, there is a very stong argument for keeping a substitute who has just been introduced on the pitch:
-He should have fresh legs.
-He'd have been massively de-moralised by being hauled off immediately.
-He's a player who is meant to have pace, so should offer a counter-attacking outlet. That's the most sluggish he's ever looked.
-By sitting back we would have just invited more pressure.
-O'Donovan played most of his games for Sunderland and Blackpool on the right-wing, so he has some experience in a deeper role.
-By taking off an offensive player, we'd have been admitting that we couldn't win; I think Thorn thought we could, or could snatch something on the break, and at least by keeping an attacking player on he can't be accused of being negative, which he has been on here plenty of times!

 

[SkyBlue_Bear83]

The dear precious Bigi is not capable of doing anything wrong. HA! He got exactly what he deserved off AT and the number of slight misquotes of his interview I've seen in a bid to use it against him are disgusting. Frankly, if Gael think's he can walk around like the big "I am", then he also has to take the brick-bats when he fucks up. Can anyone tell me what he's contributed this season anyway? Good 45 mins against Leeds, good 45 mins against Burnley. I thought he was awful against Leicester and Ipswich. The red on Saturday was stupid, naive and cost us the game.

I can't believe this forum in the past 2-3 days, it's amazing how some people act once they decide it's all the managers fault. I'd class that as nothing other than a big win for SISU!

Maybe I should try GMK? Or is it just as pathetic over there :thinking about:

What has Gael done this season? He has performed very well imo apart from 45 mins vs Ipswich and outshone a lot of our senior players, not bad for a guy just turned 18 imo. Gael of course needs to take criticism as well as praise but I would counter you that Andy Thorn also needs to take criticism as well when he fucks up then.

It is easy to blame the defeat on the red card but imo there was only looking like 1 winner before the red card, obviously it was a major factor but I felt the game had gotten away from us before the red card.

Thorn can be a good manager for us given time and backing from board and fans but I think he was inconsiderate as his manager and as a human to say he didn't care how Gael was feeling in the dressing room.

 

[Nonleagueherewecome]

There are times for the arm around the shoulder, and there are times for the boot up the arse. This, for me, is very much a case for the latter. He didn't go out of his way to talk about Gael, it was in response to a question. He did not say "I do not care how Gael feels", he was asked "how does Gael feel"-and he said "I don't care". Subtle difference! The alternative is to talk about how Gael feels and, lets face it, if Gael is feeling sorry for himself it's tough titties! Thorn was pretty mild by comparison to the sort of things a Warnock would have come out with in such circumstances.

 

[SkyBlue_Bear83]

There are times for the arm around the shoulder, and there are times for the boot up the arse. This, for me, is very much a case for the latter. He didn't go out of his way to talk about Gael, it was in response to a question. He did not say "I do not care how Gael feels", he was asked "how does Gael feel"-and he said "I don't care". Subtle difference! The alternative is to talk about how Gael feels and, lets face it, if Gael is feeling sorry for himself it's tough titties! Thorn was pretty mild by comparison to the sort of things a Warnock would have come out with in such circumstances.

Fair enough but "How does Gael feel" "I don't care" to me that is Thorn saying he doesn't care how Gael feels at that time, Gael already knew he had messed up and let his team mates down with that tackle. I just thought it was inconsiderate of Thorn to say that as his manager and don't see what positive effect it could have. I have no problem with him coming out and saying Gael messed up and it cost us the opportunity of a point etc.

 

[Nonleagueherewecome]

Sure, I see what you mean CCFC, and AT was maybe naive if anything in not realising how it would read (he needs to play more Football Manager!). But my point is that it wasn't uttered quite as explicitly as it might appear...but if it had been, I'm not adverse to a bit of stick alongside the carrot.

 

[rob9872]

I think his interviews expose him as not being very bright outside football and this was just one example of that. With a little more experience he would have chosen the "I don't know I haven't spoken to him yet" line which is just as damning but without hanging the dirty washing out in public. However, I think its unfair to use this as a weapon to judge his ability as a football manager which seems to be happening here. Saturday he got a few things wrong, very wrong. I'm sure he would accept that, I hope he learns from it - he is still, despite his age, very raw at this. If he does lean from the mistakes I think he'll be ok, but will he get the chance and time to prove that?

 

[SkyBlue_Bear83]

Sure, I see what you mean CCFC, and AT was maybe naive if anything in not realising how it would read (he needs to play more Football Manager!). But my point is that it wasn't uttered quite as explicitly as it might appear...but if it had been, I'm not adverse to a bit of stick alongside the carrot.

Yea I think it was a bit of a throw away comment by Thorn, it didn't really mean anything at all it was just an instant reaction to the question as he was peeved of and said without really thinking.

 

[Otis]

Fair enough but "How does Gael feel" "I don't care" to me that is Thorn saying he doesn't care how Gael feels at that time, Gael already knew he had messed up and let his team mates down with that tackle. I just thought it was inconsiderate of Thorn to say that as his manager and don't see what positive effect it could have. I have no problem with him coming out and saying Gael messed up and it cost us the opportunity of a point etc.

Interesting blog here;

October 25, 2011 Coventry 1 Burnley 2 - Don't blame it on the Biggy

Kids come in for criticism from Thorn, but core issues still unresolved.

Saturday saw a disappointing conclusion to what was shaping up to be a positive result for the Sky Blues. You all know how things went by now; we took the lead, began to fall dangerously deep, Bigginho then got sent off, and we pretty much invited Burnley (ugly off the ball; slick on it) to have a right go until they got their winner. We relied heavily on Burnley to miss chances, rather than preventing the opportunities and retaining possession. Just a little bit of composure when we had the ball in the final ten minutes, and I'm sure things could have been different.

I wasn't entirely pleased with Thorn's post-match comments either, as all accuracy went out the window, and he took it upon himself to focus on the young guys in the team. Don't get me wrong, I love a manager who's not scared to give the players a good bashing. Tossing away another three points in the manner we did certainly warranted some strong words about the team. But the individual criticism of the three youngest members of our group didn't sit comfortably with me, for a few reasons.

Okay, he was cross (good), but singling out the youngsters for mistakes they didn't even make? That's a bit cheap, Andy. It's easy to hide behind the kids. If things go wrong, you can be sure the "we've got a team full of kids" catchphrase will find its way into the match analysis somewhere.

Demand high standards by all means. But when you have a go, it's got to be for the right reasons. I assume this is either an attempt at psychology, or him just boiling over, but either way, I think he picked on the wrong things, and the wrong people. Especially as we've also a bunch of senior pros with chunky new contracts, many of whom are failing to contribute - and on a far grander scale than the kids.

Thomas and Christie found themselves criticised for not stepping out quick enough, which led to Austin being onside for the Burnley winner. I've had a look, and Bell was the main culprit, still stood as the ball hit the net. Thomas especially didn't seem to be anywhere near fault, yet found himself accused.

As well as the sending off, Thorn was quick to note that Biggy was also at fault for the equaliser, although I'd be far more concerned with the gaping hole in our defence, and Wallace drifting past Sammy Clingan straight into the middle of it. If he wants to give them a lesson, maybe he should start with one on how to see out games by keeping the ball. That'd be good.

He was right about one thing - Biggy was daft for tackling in the manner that he did, and whether you agree or not - them's the rules and a sending off was inevitable. The shape of the tackle was clearly enough to warrant red, but there was zero malice in it. You could see that from the soppy expression on his face after it'd happened. Either way, I agree he deserved some jip for that.

But our style of play was starting to alter before the sending off, and even with ten men, there's little excuse for the frequency with which we surrender possession as we try to hold onto points. It was Forest all over again, but this time we weren't playing a team insanely low on confidence; we were playing a fast-paced side who appeared to thrive on the challenge. They didn't have to press us too hard - they knew they'd get the ball back immediately if ever they gave it away.

On a side note, it should be noted that they were also a bunch of sneaky so-n-so's who prospered from a referee not stamping down on their naughty tricks earlier. Jay Rodriguez in particular was a right swine with late tackles.

I understand why Thorn was annoyed afterwards, but we have to learn how to soak up pressure and hold possession in tight areas better than we do currently. That was the main issue for me, and that should come from training, tactics and their general influence from the sidelines. Clearly going down to ten doesn't help, but in the closing moments of games when we're holding on, we play the same way with eleven on the pitch as we do with ten.

There's enough experience in the team and they too should be influencing the way these young players play, not blaming them when their smash-it-anywhere approach goes tits up. Which it will do most of the time. It's seen as a low risk strategy, but (in the mind of this fan, anyway) there's far more risk involved in simply returning the ball to the opposition each time you get it, than attempting to frustrate them with some periods of possession. It's not asking too much - we see plenty of teams do the same to us. Even keeping the ball for 5 passes could be enough to plant the seed of doubt in the opposition's mind. Teams get tetchy when they're chasing the game - you've got to do all you can to make it hard for them and make them feel rushed. Tamely returning possession to them every time they mess up is only going to offer encouragement. I wonder when we'll start to realise that.





This is what irks me the most. Okay, he may have said things in the heat of the moment, but why single out the kids when senior players were just as culpable?

 

[oldskyblue58]

After saying that I thought AT got his post match comments wrong (i havent changed in that opinion) I think these comments are far more considered and better

http://www.coventrycity-mad.co.uk/n...return_stronger_and_better_709102/index.shtml

 

[skyblueinBaku]

After saying that I thought AT got his post match comments wrong (i havent changed in that opinion) I think these comments are far more considered and better

http://www.coventrycity-mad.co.uk/n...return_stronger_and_better_709102/index.shtml

I agree, OSB. These comments are far, far better. Saturday's comments were obviously 'heat of the moment' stuff, and I'm sure AT realises they were a mistake.

 

[blueflint]

continuity is whats required now we dont need to swap and change manager we need fully fit and committed players we need pride and passion and goals get us a goalscorer and we would climb up this league