Hurst In

Quoted from MuddyWaters

It’s bad enough not being able to see a plan and a formation from the stands but the worst part is the amount of coaching that seems to be happening in the game. What do they do in the week? On Saturday, they looked no better coached than some Lincs League teams.

I too would love to know what goes on at the training ground. They literally look like strangers on the pitch. You could speculate there is too much emphasis on "giving100%" in training and not enough working on the formation and how to play it. To play with one up front and 13 games later still can't get anybody near him is really poor.

Just think about the 2 wide players on Saturday.  No service to them, no service from them and neither of them doing a wingers job or a supplementary strikers job, with a midfield who can barely pass 10 yards. It really is a very poor return after the extra backroom facilities that have been provided.

Quoted from 140381

I’ve always been a big fan of Clifton but he’s a shadow of the player of last season. I wonder how close he came to a transfer? Maybe that’s affected him.

Whatever, I hope he sorts it out. Him not performing is a real barometer of the squad.

I think it might just simply be a case that, although he's nominally a central midfielder, he's now reached the age of 25 and has made 200-odd appearances, almost none of which have been in central midfield. Most of his games have been played in wider areas where he's been effective most of the time, if not as a proper out and out winger, but he doesn't really have much experience of playing centrally. When you add to this the formation that the team as a whole is struggling with, it's perhaps more understandable that he's so far off his best.

Hurst in for sure at this stage. But I'm not sure you have made a good argument for it based on activity in the technical area, and which coach does what and when. Because as others have said, Paul is responsible for assigning matchday roles and responsibilities of all of his staff.

I have often wondered though what the matchday roles and responsibilities are on the bench and in the technical area. I don't perhaps have the right to know, because I should simply trust the manager, but it is something that does often intrigue me. For instance, I have noticed that very often Steve Croudson will be in the technical area giving outfield instruction, with notes/flip pad etc. in his hands. Yet Steve is the goalkeeper coach. So I've often been quite curious about the finer details of who is responsible for what on matchdays. It interests me.

Don't please misinterpret my post on this, as I am not saying it is wrong. It's just the football person in me being intrigued by the matchday touchline activity, that's all. One of those situations I guess, when you wish you could be a fly on the wall to understand the matchday organisation a bit more.

But yes, Hurst in for me too. I rate him, I have always have, and I am extremely hopeful that this blip will pass and things will come good again under his leadership.

Quoted from GrimPol

I hadn't realised up till now that players actually recruit and employ themselves. Up to this point, I was under the illusion that the Manager/management team did.
I stand corrected.

Yeah. The original post read like a wife who’s husband has had multiple affairs blaming all the other women he’s cheated on her with whilst exonerating her husband from any blame.

I get that some people have become so institutionalised by the dross we’ve had to put up with for 17 and a half years but there is life beyond Paul Hurst.

Quoted from DaleH

Hurst in for sure at this stage. But I'm not sure you have made a good argument for it based on activity in the technical area, and which coach does what and when. Because as others have said, Paul is responsible for assigning matchday roles and responsibilities of all of his staff.

I have often wondered though what the matchday roles and responsibilities are on the bench and in the technical area. I don't perhaps have the right to know, because I should simply trust the manager, but it is something that does often intrigue me. For instance, I have noticed that very often Steve Croudson will be in the technical area giving outfield instruction, with notes/flip pad etc. in his hands. Yet Steve is the goalkeeper coach. So I've often been quite curious about the finer details of who is responsible for what on matchdays.

Don't please misinterpret my post on this, as I am not saying it is wrong. It's just the football person in me being intrigued by the matchday touchline activity, that's all. One of those situations I guess, when you wish you could be a fly on the wall to understand the matchday organisation a bit more.

But yes, Hurst in for me too. I rate him, I have always have, and I am extremely hopeful that this blip will pass and things will come good again under his leadership.

I actually know this…

Hurst stands there emotionless.

Doig occasionally gets up and shouts at players and/or officials.

Croudsen holds the clipboard and waves at players warming up to come back to the dig out when they’re about to come on.

Davies sits there silently thinking he could do a better job than all of them put together.

Have I missed anyone out?

Quoted from GollyGTFC

Yeah. The original post read like a wife who’s husband has had multiple affairs blaming all the other women he’s cheated on her with whilst exonerating her husband from any blame.

I get that some people have become so institutionalised by the dross we’ve had to put up with for 17 and a half years but there is life beyond Paul Hurst.

In defence of those in defence of Hurst, I think it’s fairly easy to understand why some feel motivated to take a protective stance.

If we stick with your analogy, sometimes good, healthy relationships just break down. Sometimes the spark just fizzles out, but amidst the dying embers of the failing relationship lay many happy, shared memories, a lot of shared emotions. Even when the right thing to do is to part ways, it can still feel like a gut-wrenchingly difficult thing to do. I’m sure many of us have been there.

With Hurst, we have many shared memories. Not all of them good, but surely if you think about the very best of the 17 year period you refer to, all must be credited to Hurst. And there have been some truly great ones.

In the here and now, things just don’t appear to be working. The popular opinion seems to be that it’s time for a change, and it’s probably just about, begrudgingly, my own, when all the evidence is laid out on the table.

But if anyone feels passionately otherwise, I can thoroughly understand it all the same.

Quoted from Poojah

In defence of those in defence of Hurst, I think it’s fairly easy to understand why some feel motivated to take a protective stance.

If we stick with your analogy, sometimes good, healthy relationships just break down. Sometimes the spark just fizzles out, but amidst the dying embers of the failing relationship lay many happy, shared memories, a lot of shared emotions. Even when the right thing to do is to part ways, it can still feel like a gut-wrenchingly difficult thing to do. I’m sure many of us have been there.

With Hurst, we have many shared memories. Not all of them good, but surely if you think about the very best of the 17 year period you refer to, all must be credited to Hurst.

In the here and now, things just don’t appear to be working. The popular opinion seems to be that it’s time for a change, and it’s probably just about, begrudgingly, my own, when all the evidence is laid out on the table.

But if anyone feels passionately otherwise, I can thoroughly understand it all the same.

I use another analogy…

However many happy memories you have from a pet dog there comes a time when they can barely walk anymore and you can see they are existing and they have no quality of life anymore. If you love the dog you take him down the vets and let him drift off to sleep.

Just to be clear I’m not saying we should euthanise Paul Hurst though.

Quoted from GollyGTFC

I actually know this…

Hurst stands there emotionless.

Doig occasionally gets up and shouts at players and/or officials.

Croudsen holds the clipboard and waves at players warming up to come back to the dig out when they’re about to come on.

Davies sits there silently thinking he could do a better job than all of them put together.

Have I missed anyone out?

Greg- Who appears to be going grey poor lad, he's only my age

I do understand the 90-odd percent of posters calling for change in the aftermath of Saturday – the performance was shockingly poor. It was the worst I’ve seen a Town team play since we were last relegated out of this league. However, I’m also still “Hurst In” at the moment. Just. To my eyes, Saturday was the first time we went from being underwhelming/not executing very well to being genuinely, alarmingly, bad. As if the players had lost confidence in the system and the general way we’re trying to play.

However, I would much, much rather Hurst be given a chance to turn things around. Even just a few games. Perhaps that’s my age – I’m 31, too young to have appreciated Buckley the first couple of times, so Hurst is (by quite some distance) the most successful Town manager of my lifetime (probably makes Slade the second-best – imagine that).

The ethos of firing so quickly has come from the Premier League since it became mega-rich. Clubs up there are playing for hundreds of millions of pounds, so the gamble is always worth it. Plus they can always afford to pay off the outgoing staff, and you feel little sympathy for, for example, a Frank de Boer-type who lasts four games of the season before being ousted, because you know he’ll be walking away an even more affluent millionaire.

That’s not the case at our level, where people are trying to build careers and pay-offs can act as a millstone around the neck of club finances. Poojah’s signature “A smooth sea never made a skilful mariner” is particularly apt right now – we’re in choppy waters but surely Hurst has enough credit in the bank to have earned a few games.

He has stated himself – they’ve tweaked the style this year. It hasn’t worked. I’d like to see him scrap the possession-based stuff. Just throw it in the bin. Go back to what he knows best: solid, no-frills football. Pick up some points. Steady the ship.

**The one caveat to all this is that the owners are the only ones who actually know the inner workings of the club. If something has genuinely happened or changed or there has been some sort of player revolt or something equally disastrous, then obviously they should, and will, act. But I’d like to think our owners are the type of people who give people a chance to rectify mistakes, and only resort to firing as a last option.

Croudson is a nice enough kid but should warm up the keepers and that’s it nothing more