Brendan Rodgers

[smudgerfox]

I think to judge this season we need to return the narrative of last. 

We faded and finished fifth because the squad wasn’t deep enough, we were told. Most of us, despite huge disappointment at not securing a CL place after being top 4 for so long, accepted that in good faith. The squad was deepened with Bertrand, Vestergaard, Lookman, Daka and Soumare. KDH also joined. it was deepened so much there was no place at all  for Mendy or Praet. Head of recruitment was Brendan’s right hand man at Celtic.

 

And how did that turn out? Well the only full on success of that squad  strengthening is KDH, whom BR had nothing whatsoever to do with bringing to the club. Let’s be generous and say that Daka and Lookman appeared to have potential to be first team regulars without ever “owning “ the shirt.Their impact has not been insignificant, but largely marginal. You could argue that Bertrand made a promising start in pre-season but faded with Covid and then injury. That too would be generous, because if the poverty of his later performances was caused by injury or illness, then his incapacity really ought to have been spotted long before he took the field. At times his presence on the pitch was embarrassing. Soumare and Vestergaard have not deepened the squad one iota because the manager clearly does not trust two of his own signings to play Premier League football.

It’s perhaps worth adding that Benkovic was in the pre Christmas squad seemingly without there be any chance of him kicking a ball in anger. Mendy, who was excluded Pre Christmas was brought back in after it, starting games in front of Hamza who was in the pre-Christmas squad. 
 

And so we again had  a squad lacking the depth to see out a multi competition season. A squad refresh is now the answer, it would seem. Putting aside petty squabble how can any Leicester fan be confident about this refresh after that standard of top level decision making at the club? 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Muzzy_Larsson]

19 minutes ago, smudgerfox said:

I think to judge this season we need to return the narrative of last. 

We faded and finished fifth because the squad wasn’t deep enough, we were told. Most of us, despite huge disappointment at not securing a CL place after being top 4 for so long, accepted that in good faith. The squad was deepened with Bertrand, Vestergaard, Lookman, Daka and Soumare. KDH also joined. it was deepened so much there was no place at all  for Mendy or Praet. Head of recruitment was Brendan’s right hand man at Celtic.

 

And how did that turn out? Well the only full on success of that squad  strengthening is KDH, whom BR had nothing whatsoever to do with bringing to the club. Let’s be generous and say that Daka and Lookman appeared to have potential to be first team regulars without ever “owning “ the shirt.Their impact has not been insignificant, but largely marginal. You could argue that Bertrand made a promising start in pre-season but faded with Covid and then injury. That too would be generous, because if the poverty of his later performances was caused by injury or illness, then his incapacity really ought to have been spotted long before he took the field. At times his presence on the pitch was embarrassing. Soumare and Vestergaard have not deepened the squad one iota because the manager clearly does not trust two of his own signings to play Premier League football.

It’s perhaps worth adding that Benkovic was in the pre Christmas squad seemingly without there be any chance of him kicking a ball in anger. Mendy, who was excluded Pre Christmas was brought back in after it, starting games in front of Hamza who was in the pre-Christmas squad. 
 

And so we again had  a squad lacking the depth to see out a multi competition season. A squad refresh is now the answer, it would seem. Putting aside petty squabble how can any Leicester fan be confident about this refresh after that standard of top level decision making at the club? 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Insightful post. People probably get fed up of me saying these things but there are huge parallels with his time at Celtic in this sense. He'd moan about not having the requisite quality/depth and then when given money he'd sign a whole bunch of players who never threatened the first IX and then when he left he'd say he never had enough money to take us to the next level, etc, etc. I get we made a horlicks of the McGinn transfer in particular which would have frustrated him but no manager gets all their top targets.

He done the same last season at Leicester, went out and bought a whole bunch of players and not one of them has managed to nail down a starting spot which is telling and probably a large part of this season's downturn.

[Supergray22]

2 hours ago, sacreblueits442 said:

.. the corrections can only come from him or his immediate staff!!!

 This is a footballing problem not a club policy where you need to have strategies in place for everything. 

 We have taken back control of certain parts of his duties, if we continue to do this, then we may as well see Top doing the job himself. 

Ultimately the board are responsible and they will remove Brendan if they do not think he has performed well enough to remediate things outlined. Not everything starts and ends with the manager though although they are often the scapegoat as with other types of business. Otherwise why have a board or other roles. Football nowadays is very much run like a business. I am not disagreeing with what you say in principle or the issues but I am just setting out a way it will be resolved one way or the other and I don’t think you are reading what I have said or listening to me. So for an example he will be asked to explain the issues regarding injuries  and performances on the pitch including defensive frailties from corners or recent transfers. If he isn’t meeting expectations or they lose trust that he can fix then it’s their job to act and find someone who can if they can’t resolve another way eg by telling him to hire a new defensive coach as one example. Football is a team game on and off the pitch. 

Edited 16 May 2022 by Supergray22

[BKLFox]

25 minutes ago, smudgerfox said:

I think to judge this season we need to return the narrative of last. 

We faded and finished fifth because the squad wasn’t deep enough, we were told. Most of us, despite huge disappointment at not securing a CL place after being top 4 for so long, accepted that in good faith. The squad was deepened with Bertrand, Vestergaard, Lookman, Daka and Soumare. KDH also joined. it was deepened so much there was no place at all  for Mendy or Praet. Head of recruitment was Brendan’s right hand man at Celtic.

 

And how did that turn out? Well the only full on success of that squad  strengthening is KDH, whom BR had nothing whatsoever to do with bringing to the club. Let’s be generous and say that Daka and Lookman appeared to have potential to be first team regulars without ever “owning “ the shirt.Their impact has not been insignificant, but largely marginal. You could argue that Bertrand made a promising start in pre-season but faded with Covid and then injury. That too would be generous, because if the poverty of his later performances was caused by injury or illness, then his incapacity really ought to have been spotted long before he took the field. At times his presence on the pitch was embarrassing. Soumare and Vestergaard have not deepened the squad one iota because the manager clearly does not trust two of his own signings to play Premier League football.

It’s perhaps worth adding that Benkovic was in the pre Christmas squad seemingly without there be any chance of him kicking a ball in anger. Mendy, who was excluded Pre Christmas was brought back in after it, starting games in front of Hamza who was in the pre-Christmas squad. 
 

And so we again had  a squad lacking the depth to see out a multi competition season. A squad refresh is now the answer, it would seem. Putting aside petty squabble how can any Leicester fan be confident about this refresh after that standard of top level decision making at the club? 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

What's the 1 glaring issue you fail to mention which not only had a huge bearing on squad depth but to the actual starting 11 for half the season?

[smudgerfox]

6 minutes ago, BKLFox said:

What's the 1 glaring issue you fail to mention which not only had a huge bearing on squad depth but to the actual starting 11 for half the season?

Would that be injuries perchance? But they are related aren’t they? Squad depth and injuries. No one would suggest we should have a world  class defender waiting in the wings to replace the unfortunate Forfana. But we need someone the manager trusts to step in. That is what a squad is. And if the players you’ve brought in to deepen the squad in practice don’t deepen the squad, then you have failed and wasted a lot of money doing it. At one point NDidi was preferred at centre back to Amartey or  Vestergaard. What does that say about a deep squad? 

[Muzzy_Larsson]

23 minutes ago, pmcla26 said:

I get what you’re saying but I don’t think any of the signings we made last summer were expected to nail down a starting spot this season, to be fair. 

That's a novel approach to a transfer window, deliberately going out and signing a bunch of players no better than what's already at the club. The "improving the squad" argument doesn't wash either tbh as the way you improve a squad is by improving the starting IX. If that was indeed Rodgers' intention then I'm even more worried about him overseeing a rebuild than I was before.

[fuchsntf]

3 hours ago, Ric Flair said:

Here is the dilemma though. You have historically taken a very balanced/low key view on our aspirations as a club over the years in the midst of success and how that translates in to increased expectations and yet for the first regime I can ever remember you've got absolutely disgusted at the repeated mistakes under Rodgers. I actually think you remained less bothered in the horror months of Claude Puel than this, so if someone as amiable as you can be at the end of their tether with a manager then thst speaks volumes to me.

Yup..sounded like someone   had nicked his hanging gardens...

[LinekersLugs]

4 hours ago, walkerleeds said:

 

There has been absolutely zero pressure in the last two games. Let's not pretend otherwise eh. 

 

When the pressure is on the team and manager bottle it, exemplified on numerous occasions over the past two/ three seasons, barring one notable exception.

The one exception being the Fa cup only the 5th major trophy we have won in our whole history ! 
🤦‍♂️

Edited 16 May 2022 by LinekersLugs

[filbertway]

1 hour ago, Muzzy_Larsson said:

Insightful post. People probably get fed up of me saying these things but there are huge parallels with his time at Celtic in this sense. He'd moan about not having the requisite quality/depth and then when given money he'd sign a whole bunch of players who never threatened the first IX and then when he left he'd say he never had enough money to take us to the next level, etc, etc. I get we made a horlicks of the McGinn transfer in particular which would have frustrated him but no manager gets all their top targets.

He done the same last season at Leicester, went out and bought a whole bunch of players and not one of them has managed to nail down a starting spot which is telling and probably a large part of this season's downturn.

If he still is here, I hope he's not allowed any say on recruitment. The last thing we need is for him to further weaken the squad with his terrible choices and then be stuck with tonnes of overpaid players we can't shift. 

 

I wouldn't like it, but I could just about stomach him being around as long as his paws are nowhere near the transfer kitty. 

 

 

[TJB-fox]

If individuals aren’t comfortable with giving BR a large kitty for our summer rebuild then surely our scouting network and recruitment needs to be ripped up and rebuilt too. 

[filbertway]

1 minute ago, TJB-fox said:

If individuals aren’t comfortable with giving BR a large kitty for our summer rebuild then surely our scouting network and recruitment needs to be ripped up and rebuilt too. 

Why's that?

 

One is based on statistical analysis and has been proven to be useful in signing the talent that basically makes up Rodgers first choice XI today. The other one is an egotistical man's expensive hunches. 

[SafewayFox]

10 hours ago, Dahnsouff said:

@Babylon nailed it, if we get 8th, which is quite possible now, we finish where our budget would suggest we should. So a meh season but not a shocking position even if the football has been unremarkable 

@Babylon whilst I agree with the budget rationale/narrative.

 

Surely the fact we’re 20th for goals conceded from set pieces, have dropped a HUGE amount of points from winning positions that is why there is a level of angst.

 

That’s before we’ve even addressed the turgid football offered and/or Rodgers own salary not being the 8th highest in the league to identify the above points as a “different side of the coin” perspective.

Edited 16 May 2022 by SafewayFox

[BKLFox]

5 minutes ago, smudgerfox said:

Would that be injuries perchance? But they are related aren’t they? Squad depth and injuries. No one would suggest we should have a world  class defender waiting in the wings to replace the unfortunate Forfana. But we need someone the manager trusts to step in. That is what a squad is. And if the players you’ve brought in to deepen the squad in practice don’t deepen the squad, then you have failed and wasted a lot of money doing it. At one point NDidi was preferred at centre back to Amartey or  Vestergaard. What does that say about a deep squad? 

Daka & Soumare were brought in to blood slowly, Lookman has done a job i'd say leaving Bertrand & Vestergaard.
Much has been been said about these 2 & really its these 2 that pins the "Rodgers has a shocking record in the transfer market" badge which i feel is unjust as for all we know Daka & Soumare could go on to be world beaters like Fofana.
As i say much has been said about the other 2, Bertrand was brought in to cover for Thomas whilst the other 3 fullbacks were on the mend it made sense he'd been around a bit could pass on his experience to the whole squad, he was free & wasn't meant to be there as a starter, he then gets injured himelf.
As for Vestergaard i'm in the he's no good camp also but again i get why he came in, it was a week before the start of the season & we were down to 1x CB + Dan (who has since acquitted himself well).
He spent 15m he didn't plan on spending but needed a premier lge experienced CB maybe Vestergaard was the only 1 available for the money we could spend, bear in mind who ever was coming in knew he was coming in as cover only. Rodgers had also stated he wanted to buy a young up & comer CB to blood but the situation changed for him.

So 5 guys came in only 1 was really intended on being starting 11 material with 2 for the future & 2 as experienced cover but then 8 to12 were then out the squad at some point through injury 4/5 & at 1 point 6 of them were the 1st & 2nd complete back line.
 

[Guest454545]

1 hour ago, Muzzy_Larsson said:

Insightful post. People probably get fed up of me saying these things but there are huge parallels with his time at Celtic in this sense. He'd moan about not having the requisite quality/depth and then when given money he'd sign a whole bunch of players who never threatened the first IX and then when he left he'd say he never had enough money to take us to the next level, etc, etc. I get we made a horlicks of the McGinn transfer in particular which would have frustrated him but no manager gets all their top targets.

He done the same last season at Leicester, went out and bought a whole bunch of players and not one of them has managed to nail down a starting spot which is telling and probably a large part of this season's downturn.

To be fair though, you and I both know that it was a meds if epic proportions not getting McGinn. I also question whether Rodgers was behind the driving of Johnny Hayes. On top of that, there was not making Patrick Roberts permanent (although that was mostly on Roberts, I think). Lawell - as I don't need to tell you - had a clear pattern of signing managers targets in their first season, and then tightening the purse strings in subsequent seasons. That, more than anything in my opinion, is why Rodgers left for Leicester mid season, while on course for a treble treble. Promises not kept, which is probably why he felt he needed an ally on the transfer side, even if he was wojious.

[TJB-fox]

5 minutes ago, filbertway said:

Why's that?

 

One is based on statistical analysis and has been proven to be useful in signing the talent that basically makes up Rodgers first choice XI today. The other one is an egotistical man's expensive hunches. 

Is that how you think the club is run? We’ll just disregard all of our entire ‘statistical analysis that has been proven to be useful in signing talent’  and give the dosh straight to Brendan to spend? 
 

Top will probably just PayPal Rodgers the cash and let him go shopping with it won’t he 

[SafewayFox]

7 hours ago, BenTheFox said:

We can all see that. The debate comes from where you assign what portion of blame. 

That is down to management/coaching.

 

If I hear/read about Klopp’s mentality monsters one more times I may poke myself in the eye.

 

All joking aside, the fact that Klopp admitted to bringing someone in to “help with penalties” speaks volumes.

 

I’ve said it before and will repeat myself, Rodgers is staying it’s obvious but that doesn’t mean his back room staff as part of our “refresh” isn’t addressed as a priority - be prepared for continued/repeated mistakes aka goals conceded from set pieces.

 

[Dames]

I’ve accepted the fact that he will be here until Christmas at the least but its imperative that the club has a good transfer window. We need to be starting ASAP. 
 

I imagine though and this won’t entirely be Rodgers fault is that we will wait until very late to do business because clubs will low ball us for Tielemans and Soyuncu. 
 

Either way, after the summer his excuses won’t wash anymore. He’ll have had a chance to recruit players with the ‘right profile’ and he’ll have finally had the time he demanded to work on the issues in training. I actually think we’ll start well because this team and manager won’t have any pressure on them, it’ll be interesting when things start getting tough to see how Rodgers responds. 

[Guest ttfn]

2 hours ago, Corky said:

Ric made the most valid point I've seen about the approach needing to be better against teams from 7th/8th down. We have the attacking talent to win plenty of games versus those sides, if we could be bolder I think we'll be closer to where we want to be (and even Rodgers, deep down, will know we're capable of better than this).

We’ve been pretty ruthless against the worst sides in the division (Everton excepted). 20 points from 8 games against the bottom 4, 28 points from 28 games against the rest. 
 

8 of Maddison’s 17 league goal contributions are against the sides currently in the bottom 3 as are 10 (!) of Vardy’s goals. We haven’t shown up often enough against the mid-table sides.

[walkerleeds]

2 hours ago, Dahnsouff said:

You are speaking as if no other team is allowed to move forward, allowed to recruit staff and players to progress. This simply isn’t true.

 

I probably went off on a tangent there, but I was quoting a specific mention about "pressure". I was giving examples of when push came to shove, the pressure got to this manager and the team he sent out. 

[BKLFox]

12 minutes ago, filbertway said:

Why's that?

 

One is based on statistical analysis and has been proven to be useful in signing the talent that basically makes up Rodgers first choice XI today. The other one is an egotistical man's expensive hunches. 

Rodgers said: “We’ve got other staff in the recruitment team who are filling in and doing a great job. It brings more responsibility to Jon and myself to look at that. The work has never scared us. Thankfully here, we know the market we’re working and looking in.
 

“The guys behind the scenes are doing a fantastic job in terms of identifying the types of players we want to bring in here. In terms of negotiations and contracts, Jon takes care of that. Until there is someone who is appointed, that is something the club will look after very well.”

He added: “There will never be a player that will come in if I didn’t think he would suit how we work. Clearly players come in for different reasons but in the main I’ll always have an opinion. I would never say I would have a final decision because the club is much more than myself.
 

“I know the sort of types of players who I want to fit into the way I work. If you look at Wesley Fofana, these types, they suit the profile in terms of their aggressive nature, good on the ball, and can defend. Timothy Castagne, he’s quick and can get forward and is offensive-minded as a defender. James Justin, and these guys… so we know the type of profile we want and that can always make it easier that you’re not just searching for any player.

 

So doesn't get the final say & has identified 3 players that we can all get on board with as the type of player profile he wants & we want yes?

[Le Renard]

I have sat on the fence with Rodgers and I will continue to do so, which is probably most of us fans.  It gets a bit tiring(funny) reading the Rodger's thread, with the "I told you so" from both sides, too many seem to searching for any justification to back up their POV.  The club have given no indication that he will be given the push, so he will be here for at least another year barring a catastrophe, so those of us that are 'none of the above' will be swayed one way or the other by next season.  Although I don't warm to his Rodger ism's, he has probably earned the right to give it one more go......although I'm not sure I would trust him with my money!

[An Sionnach]

Whenever Rodgers says , "I know the sort of player who fits our profile " I give you good ol' Ayoze. A £30 million player now hardly used. When it comes to judgement of players , Rodgers is highly suspect. By the way Ayoze is an alright guy but fit our profile he certainly does not.

[SafewayFox]

11 minutes ago, Le Renard said:

I have sat on the fence with Rodgers and I will continue to do so, which is probably most of us fans.  It gets a bit tiring(funny) reading the Rodger's thread, with the "I told you so" from both sides, too many seem to searching for any justification to back up their POV.  The club have given no indication that he will be given the push, so he will be here for at least another year barring a catastrophe, so those of us that are 'none of the above' will be swayed one way or the other by next season.  Although I don't warm to his Rodger ism's, he has probably earned the right to give it one more go......although I'm not sure I would trust him with my money!

I agree with most of this just feel it’s too simple to put everyone in the same category as the majority of  both the in/out camp put together a rationale discussion with extreme comments only from a minority.

 

As an example, I’m def a Rodgers out but know like you say that other than a poll on the Leicester Mercury (not sure on here counts sadly) has there been any narrative that Top has even considered getting rid.

 

However, wanting to see big improvement both from:

 

1) Transfers - less scatter gun (Soumare/Vesty to an extent but understand Fofana’s injury played a part in that one) and signing players to fit our style of play/Rodgers vision which neither do in the slightest.

 

2) Learning from continued short falls of our style of play/tactics such as 60%+ possession but looking toothless (the amount of times I’ve turned to a mate and said we could play all day and won’t break x down) and the amateur defending from set-pieces - to be fair our attacking set- pieces also leaves a lot to be desired too.

 

[Daggers]

3 hours ago, Manwell Pablo said:

I haven’t been overly impressed by the signings but I’m not convinced how much input he has into them.

 

As for entertainment value I get that it’s not always great they do the same shit wrong every week and it’s not always easy to keep engaged when you know we are finishing mid table but f**k me I’m pretty sure we have sat through worse, well you and I have at least I know that for a fact. 

Levels though innit. Shit performances from shit squads can be suffered with a liberal dose of alcohol. Shit performances from a largely decent squad is an entirely different proposition - especially when you know what they’re capable of. I’ve grown to absolutely hate going to matches this season. 
 

Still, I’m even boring myself with my contributions to this thread now. I think it’s time for me to go watch non-league instead. 

[Le Renard]

6 minutes ago, SafewayFox said:

I agree with most of this just feel it’s too simple to put everyone in the same category as the majority of  both the in/out camp put together a rationale discussion with extreme comments only from a minority.

 

Yes you're right it is the vocal small minority who shout loudest.  I have my doubts about Rodgers and will continue to do so, and there are times when I wish he would shut his mouth and take responsibility for the defeats.  But I'm still not at the point of getting rid, although it has been very close. The two victories against the relegated clubs haven't really persuaded me that he is the man to take us forward, so I'm nervous about next season.  I just don't see a stand out candidate to replace him, yet!