Familiarity breeds success

Mostly about rugby but be interesting to check out squad turnover and current league positions in Leagues 1 and 2. Cambridge are the surprise frontrunner and Newport were only one place above us last season - be interesting to check their squad turnover in the Lockdown period. I had it all in the Racing Post pre-season guide but I've chucked it. [url]https://www.theguardian.com/sport/blog/2020/oct/19/ben-darwins-theory-of-sport-evolution-familiarity-breeds-success[/url] The music industry stat is extraordinary...

Interesting read and some useful pointers as to why we have been junk for so long. I never took to Paul Hurst and wasn't bothered when he left but he did create some stability (by staying longer than most and keeping a few players for several seasons). After Hurst it's been chop and change every season.

Quoted from psgmariner

Interesting read and some useful pointers as to why we have been junk for so long. I never took to Paul Hurst and wasn't bothered when he left but he did create some stability (by staying longer than most and keeping a few players for several seasons). After Hurst it's been chop and change every season.

. If Ollie's strategy was to try and create that stability COVID has fecked that. I think he is hoping that a couple of the "bet to (virtually) nothing" signings from lower leagues come off and add to our pool of players for the nucleus of the squad for next season. The other stat that caught my eye was success being 40% correlated with cohesion and 2% coaching...

it's no coincidence that the teams at the top are the ones that have kept their team together with few changes,

Very interesting. You could add plenty of other examples like the Liverpool Boot Room in the 70s and 80s, the Class of 92 at United.

Quoted from KingstonMariner

Very interesting. You could add plenty of other examples like the Liverpool Boot Room in the 70s and 80s, the Class of 92 at United.

GTFC - Tom Casey's class of 76 - a good core of that relegated team stayed together for 5 / 6 years...

Quoted from psgmariner

Interesting read and some useful pointers as to why we have been junk for so long. I never took to Paul Hurst and wasn't bothered when he left but he did create some stability (by staying longer than most and keeping a few players for several seasons). After Hurst it's been chop and change every season.

But even he ravaged his own squad when we got promoted, that was one of the bigger fck ups in our recent history. The core of that promotion squad would have seen us more than ok in our first season back.

In truth, whilst it was sold to us as players/Hurst dismantling that squad, knowing what we know about the club I’d imagine the contracts offered weren’t great and players and hurst have said as much.

Like him or loathe him the last time we had a team that was connected with each other and relatable to the fans was PHs teams. Particularly the last three seasons in non league. Since then we’ve reverted to type and quite frankly nobody would arsed if any stayed or went.

Holloway may have been wanting to create something similar but I guess we’ll never really know now...

That's a really interesting article but I remember we reading an analysis of football stats which said that finance was the most important. Maybe those teams that can afford to keep their players longest, so stay together longer, are just richer.. it also said managers were important but not that important compared to resources, more than the 2% stated their tho, more like 10% I seem to remember.

Quoted from toontown

That's a really interesting article but I remember we reading an analysis of football stats which said that finance was the most important. Maybe those teams that can afford to keep their players longest, so stay together longer, are just richer.. it also said managers were important but not that important compared to resources, more than the 2% stated their tho, more like 10% I seem to remember.

Agree.

Whilst I think the article in the opening post is good like you have said the problem is at our level there is always the  threat of players/managers  moving on to want to better themselves both financially and career wise. At the top level of football I think stability is more likely to happen . Look at Son Heung -Min at Tottenham as a recent example  who looks set to sign a new 5 year deal worth £200,000 a week.