Brendan Rodgers Discussion Thread

Fair point.

 

I don't think the games or performances at the end of Ange's tenure hold any weight, bar the cup final. The players' motivation was clearly not there once the league was won. Before that, we were relentless.

 

They arent good enough, he couldnt get the best out of kobiayashi, bernabei, oh, iwata, ideguchi, lets not think hed do any better with this current crop.

 

Do you know what is actually pretty crazy in where we find ourselves. I remember there being a poll here about Ange’s 22/23 team vs Rodgers 16/17, who was better. For me that 16/17 Rodgers team would have bullied the 22/23 team more times than not I believe.

Brown and Armstrong would dominate the midfield, Rogic 16/17 would have had plenty of space to operate in due to the lack of a defensive midfielder, Sinclair and Tierney would have roasted our right hand side. Dembele would have been effective. Forrest or Roberts 16/17 would destroy Taylor.

The only things I would give the 22/23 team is Maeda would have probably got joy out of Lustig and Kyogo out of the centre backs.

I guess my point is why did Rodgers not walk in and demand players to play how he likes to play? He mentioned power in the team back in June and signed no one with any of that.

We badly need a physical presence throughout this team a quick, strong left back, a powerful centre midfielder that is press resistant and can carry the ball, and a direct pacey winger with end product and a proper physical centre forward.

The issue is now we have duds filling in these positions in the squad, many of who have just been signed.

 

Think he knew he was away as well. Something was off. Cup final celebrations were a telling sign.

 

True, but when you say there must be a degree of scouting (which is obviously true), my question all along in this exchange has essentially been ‘whose scouting has it been?’ I.e. which club’s or clubs’ system(s)? Do we actually have our own, or is junior just lifting the blower to Feargal Harkin or whoever at City Group, and seeing who they’ve had a look at lately within our price range.

Like you say, hard to tell for sure, but nothing would be more typical of Lawwell Snr.

 

Agree totally, the dross he brought in near the end is frightening.

Only thing that concerns me with BR (apart from his pish playing style) is he has a hardon for England, and you overpay for pish players down there. Imagine how much Nat Phillips would cost, between £10-15m no probs.

 

Rodgers has a history of poor european campaigns. Starting at Liverpool.

In general, his teams issues throughout his managerial career have been well highlighted and its usually in the defensive organisation.
If he hasnt learned by now i fear he never will.

 

I wouldnt say schooled by mcinnes. Although we got beat, we still created chances. Thats the only saving grace for me; in the games when we have been poor ,domestically anyway, we have missed gilt edged chances to draw and/or win.

 

First half tbh we played some brilliant attacking stuff. The players really went out to win tbh. Then * happened in the second who knows. Can only blame that on Rodgers.

 

Aye that's a worry. I'm hoping the recruitment will still be handled by others but that Rodgers has made it clear to all that the standard of player that's been signed the past year is not good enough and he's no longer gonna except pish from Korea or Australia and they will start looking in better markets for 1st team ready players

 

Team drops off after cantering to the title shocker...Not to mention the players probably knew Ange was for the off by that point anyway.

You won't get me disagreeing that his last two transfer windows left us with some dross (although putting Haksa and Oh in there is harsh) but it's mental to blame anyone other the people who finalised this summers deals, ie. Rodgers and the board.

 

It's depressing when you think of what we had the last 2 seasons.
Under Ange there were games we struggled to make a breakthrough and score but you always believed we probably would eventually and we nearly always did.
Now when we struggle a bit (which is inevitable sometimes under any manager) you just can't see where a goal is coming from and you're fearing the worst - sometimes from midway through the first half. Even when we do get a goal you can't be confident we'll hold onto the lead (Motherwell and Killie) whereas under Ange you expected to go and get more goals.
I know there's no point harping back to Ange's time as the * left and that's that but it is depressing.
The difference between Ange coming in and winning the league while rebuilding a team against a decent Rangers team who had just won the league and Rodgers taking over a winning team and getting us to where we are now shows Rodgers isn't an elite manager. There are injuries but with the players we have available I think we would still be confident of playing better football and winning more games if Ange was still here.

 

Thats why I will let him off the hook for now, we've been good and poor in spells and the European performances for me have been decent and promising.

We've had no depth really barring about 1 month when Hatate was fit a few weeks ago.

First like 2 month of the season and the past month the bench has been non existant to dig you out a hole.

We're probably 4 first team quality players short of the squad we should have. We should be aiming for Starfelt, Juranovic, Mooy and Jota types back in the squad.

Then even with injuries you are not resorting to Phillips, Bernardo, Holm, Turnbull, Forrest, Yang and M.Johnston as the only guys to get a game.

______
Hart

Johnston CCV ______ ______
Ralston Lagerbielke Nawrocki Taylor
Scales

McGregor
Iwata

O'Riley Hatate
______ ______
Holm

Maeda Kyogo Palma
Abada Oh ______
Yang ______
​

If those gaps were filled with Forster, Starfelt, Juranovic, Christie, Rogic, Roberts and Griffiths then thats a good squad.

 

He affords a little bit of slack for the * squad but bear in mind in Ange's first season we beat Ross County away with:

Hart
Ralston CCV Starfelt Scales
McGregor Bitton Turnbull
Juranovic Abada Montgomery​

*Moffat was brought in for Montgomery and played the last 35 minutes.

We then beat St Johnston 3-1 away on boxing day with:

Barkas
Welsh CCV Starfelt Scales
Juranovic Bitton McCarthy
Rogic
Abada Dawson*
​

*Dawson replaced Kyogo after 15 minutes.

Lastly, even though it was a dead rubber, we beat Real Betis at home with:

Bain
Urhoghide Bitton Welsh Scales
Soro Shaw McCarthy
Abada Ajeti Montgomery
​

*Kyogo replaced Ajeti after 28 minutes but then got injured and replaced by Ewan Henderson on 78 minutes.

We were relying on the likes of M.Johnston, Forrest and Turnbull back then too. You also had McCarthy, Montgomery, Ajeti, Moffat, Dawson etc. getting minutes. So is the squad any worse now than it was back then? Not for me. It was far worse then.

 

Theres dropping off and theres completely capitualting at ibrox and Easter road in the manner that we did tho.

Haksa is currently on loan at stoke and not doing * of a much so he's certainly justified to be included with the duds. Oh maybe a bit harsh but basing it on the fact he's a downgrade on the guy he replaced was my thinking.

Ange spoke previously about his vast knowledge of south Korean market so certainly think he would have some involvment in both those deals and mite be a lazy link but Tilio being an Aussie you'd think he'd of been known too. Plenty of stories about all 3 having been scouted for months so no doubt Ange was involved at some level, even if it was just to say nah don't bother wasting ur time on him he's *. Which obviously never happened.

Rodgers has previously said a lot of the deals where well down the road before he came in and given how long it takes those fuckwits on our board to complete deals I reckon that has been the case. And in his defence if your head of recruitment comes to you and says we've watched this guy for a year and think he's gonna be good it's probably a difficult 1 to turn round and say no without having any knowledge of the player to argue the decision.

I think he's probably learned a valuable lesson in that the recruitment teams judgement on players can't be trusted and he's gonna need a lot more convincing before signing off on players going forward. Hopefully.