Player Watch: Gareth Bale - Retires

fuzzylogic said:

Loves a diagonal to regs,

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Shadydan said:

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Shadydan said:

I thought he was finished.

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BringBack_leGin said:

Where is the option for ‘I remained a believer but I never could convince that numpty shady to have faith’ ? ?

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Styopa said:

Anyone noticed how polarised so many of these threads have become? Everyone's boxed into extreme positions all the time: "Jose haters", "Bale haters" etc and then of course the "I told you sos" and the settling of scores should the team or a particular player hit a good run of form. Everything's either a disaster or world class, the best signing ever or the worst mistake we've made. It mirrors a lot of what is happening generally in Western culture actually.

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Shadydan said:

Go and jump in quicksand.

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Styopa said:

Anyone noticed how polarised so many of these threads have become? Everyone's boxed into extreme positions all the time: "Jose haters", "Bale haters" etc and then of course the "I told you sos" and the settling of scores should the team or a particular player hit a good run of form. Everything's either a disaster or world class, the best signing ever or the worst mistake we've made. It mirrors a lot of what is happening generally in Western culture actually.

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wrd said:

Yeah the Jose thread was particularly a smash head into keyboard zone over the last couple of weeks. There's a fair few who simply hate Jose and those can't be reasoned with but there those who I'd class as reasonably critical that want him to succeed but felt he wasn't striking the best balance with the squad and should be getting more out of them and he wasn't playing to the squads strengths and needed to use the talent at his disposal

That was completely dismissed with the reasoning that the squad is shit, no manager could get a tune out of them, you have to play that way because the defence is such a shit show. Though and behold Jose does make those changes, proved the squad isn't shit, that playing to the squads strengths is the way forward and integrates Bale and Dele. Now of course Jose deserves a huge amount of credit for turning it around but the thread was just people who were making the excuses bringing in sarcasm and memes of Jose as if the people who were being critical were being idiots for ever questioning him when the reality is Jose proved those peoples assertions correct. That for me is where the praise for Jose should be, for him to acknowledge his approach was wrong and course correct especially given the person he is, deserves a huge amount of praise. Those sarcastic posts and memes from people who were happy to completely write off our squad and not acknowledge Jose's part in things not being good enough up until the turn around make me want to take my jaw and pull it over my own face and encompass my skull.

That's where we are now though as you say, the loud voices are those who want to pick a side and won't accept any challenge to the contrary. Whether it's those who want Jose out putting our good performances down to luck or shit opposition or those that will follow Jose into the abyss willing to absolve the manager of the football club of any responsibility for what happens on the pitch. It's the same in the Winks thread, in the Sanchez thread, for a long time the Ndombele thread and this thread. Luckily there's a fair few who look at both sides of the argument and they make terrific posts, though sometimes they're considered flipfloppers or accused of contradicting for daring to look at both sides of the coin.

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Shadydan said:

I thought he was finished.

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wrd said:

Yeah the Jose thread was particularly a smash head into keyboard zone over the last couple of weeks. There's a fair few who simply hate Jose and those can't be reasoned with but there those who I'd class as reasonably critical that want him to succeed but felt he wasn't striking the best balance with the squad and should be getting more out of them and he wasn't playing to the squads strengths and needed to use the talent at his disposal

That was completely dismissed with the reasoning that the squad is shit, no manager could get a tune out of them, you have to play that way because the defence is such a shit show. Though and behold Jose does make those changes, proved the squad isn't shit, that playing to the squads strengths is the way forward and integrates Bale and Dele. Now of course Jose deserves a huge amount of credit for turning it around but the thread was just people who were making the excuses bringing in sarcasm and memes of Jose as if the people who were being critical were being idiots for ever questioning him when the reality is Jose proved those peoples assertions correct. That for me is where the praise for Jose should be, for him to acknowledge his approach was wrong and course correct especially given the person he is, deserves a huge amount of praise. Those sarcastic posts and memes from people who were happy to completely write off our squad and not acknowledge Jose's part in things not being good enough up until the turn around make me want to take my jaw and pull it over my own face and encompass my skull.

That's where we are now though as you say, the loud voices are those who want to pick a side and won't accept any challenge to the contrary. Whether it's those who want Jose out putting our good performances down to luck or shit opposition or those that will follow Jose into the abyss willing to absolve the manager of the football club of any responsibility for what happens on the pitch. It's the same in the Winks thread, in the Sanchez thread, for a long time the Ndombele thread and this thread. Luckily there's a fair few who look at both sides of the argument and they make terrific posts, though sometimes they're considered flipfloppers or accused of contradicting for daring to look at both sides of the coin.

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Styopa said:

Anyone noticed how polarised so many of these threads have become? Everyone's boxed into extreme positions all the time: "Jose haters", "Bale haters" etc and then of course the "I told you sos" and the settling of scores should the team or a particular player hit a good run of form. Everything's either a disaster or world class, the best signing ever or the worst mistake we've made. It mirrors a lot of what is happening generally in Western culture actually.

Click to expand...

Styopa said:

Anyone noticed how polarised so many of these threads have become? Everyone's boxed into extreme positions all the time: "Jose haters", "Bale haters" etc and then of course the "I told you sos" and the settling of scores should the team or a particular player hit a good run of form. Everything's either a disaster or world class, the best signing ever or the worst mistake we've made. It mirrors a lot of what is happening generally in Western culture actually.

Click to expand...

wrd said:

Yeah the Jose thread was particularly a smash head into keyboard zone over the last couple of weeks. There's a fair few who simply hate Jose and those can't be reasoned with but there those who I'd class as reasonably critical that want him to succeed but felt he wasn't striking the best balance with the squad and should be getting more out of them and he wasn't playing to the squads strengths and needed to use the talent at his disposal

That was completely dismissed with the reasoning that the squad is shit, no manager could get a tune out of them, you have to play that way because the defence is such a shit show. Though and behold Jose does make those changes, proved the squad isn't shit, that playing to the squads strengths is the way forward and integrates Bale and Dele. Now of course Jose deserves a huge amount of credit for turning it around but the thread was just people who were making the excuses bringing in sarcasm and memes of Jose as if the people who were being critical were being idiots for ever questioning him when the reality is Jose proved those peoples assertions correct. That for me is where the praise for Jose should be, for him to acknowledge his approach was wrong and course correct especially given the person he is, deserves a huge amount of praise. Those sarcastic posts and memes from people who were happy to completely write off our squad and not acknowledge Jose's part in things not being good enough up until the turn around make me want to take my jaw and pull it over my own face and encompass my skull.

That's where we are now though as you say, the loud voices are those who want to pick a side and won't accept any challenge to the contrary. Whether it's those who want Jose out putting our good performances down to luck or shit opposition or those that will follow Jose into the abyss willing to absolve the manager of the football club of any responsibility for what happens on the pitch. It's the same in the Winks thread, in the Sanchez thread, for a long time the Ndombele thread and this thread. Luckily there's a fair few who look at both sides of the argument and they make terrific posts, though sometimes they're considered flipfloppers or accused of contradicting for daring to look at both sides of the coin.

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rossdapep said:

Between them Mariano, Hazard, Vinicius Jr, Rodrygo, Asensio & Isco have mustered up 11 goals in total across all competitions.
Benzema has 18 - which is a good return.

Bale has 10 yet has only started getting serious game time.

With Ronaldo still going strong at Madrid with 20, it's safe to say that their treatment of their biggest and best contributors has been an embarrassment and they have what they deserve.

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JUSTINSIGNAL said:

Really agree with a lot you say.

The worst for me is this constant assertion that ‘the squad is shit’ ‘we need a total overhaul’ etc...etc.. without any acknowledgement of context for bad results. Without even trying to recognise that maybe coaching and tactics are a way of enhancing team performance - and this was the part Jose wasn’t getting right.

Funnily those voices have disappeared now we’ve had some positive results on the spin. The annoying thing is I’m sure they’ll be back as soon as results don’t go our way. And how the team (and ‘shit’ players) are performing now will be totally forgotten. It’s crazy how blinkered fans can be. I shouldn’t let it trigger me but it’s hard not to when you’re so emotionally invested.

I have never been a Jose fan but I’m big enough to give him credit for seemingly swallowing his pride and rethinking his tactical outlook. The dour football we played towards the end of last season, and the beginning of this, is exactly why I didn’t want him as our manager. But since the Everton match, despite some bad results, I’ve actually been able to watch our games without wanting to poke my eyes out. Hopefully this approach is hear you stay and not just a way of getting us through this season before we get defensive reinforcements...

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