Should we give up football?

Godzilla wrote: Terzino wrote: We don't need to give up football. What we need is a full on deprogramming of all players and coaches throughout the land. The deprogramming is required because football is a cult in this country - the Nick-a-Goal cult. Worse than Scientology, our own cult promotes a philosophy based around tight defence, total aversion to risk and taking the one chance you might get to score. In Italy they used to say that the perfect game of football would end in a nil all draw. In this country the perfect game of football is a 1-0 victory - the winning goal being a header from a centre-half from a corner kick. Any other attempts to play the game are denounced. The criticism by pundits and former players of Stephen Kenny always seemed over the top. He wasn't a revolutionary nor even a great risk taker. But it makes sense in terms of doctrine. The man wanted to do some things differently - pass the ball a round a bit, or in other words: commit heresy. It can be no accident that John O'Shea has taken charge of these last two games dressed as a priest. And he was assisted by Brian Kerr - a man who once denounced Roberto Martinez's Belgium for beating Tunisia by 5 goals to 2. Why have a game with so many goals when an orthodox 1-0 win would have done! The Nick-a-Goal cult is back in total control. Soon the 1-1 draws will return. This is a little extreme.  There's definitely a slight generational divide between some of our fans who have great memories of the Charlton era and who spent most of their teens/20's in the 80's and 90's, and those born after 1990 who are more familiar with the post 2007/2008 shift in football because of the influence of Spain/Barcelona.  I'd be the latter. Early 30's. I do a bit of coaching. I would mainly work on the technical side of things. Results shouldn't really matter until around U14/U15 level.

Get it in to the mixer to the big man up top! That's how we win football matches in these parts.... f**k the beautiful game!

Edited by Conan - 27 Mar 2024 at 10:07pm

Yeah it is our native style and seemed to work for us so why not? I'm not sure we could pull it off any more though any way as effectively. Only Brady can really even deliver a ball in to the box effectively. 

It’s utter sh*te football but it was effective to say the least. Can’t compare it to modern day though. We had some unbelievable headers of a ball back then in Quinn and Cascarino and McGrath could win his fair share too.

The Huntacha wrote: It’s utter sh*te football but it was effective to say the least. Can’t compare it to modern day though. We had some unbelievable headers of a ball back then in Quinn and Cascarino and McGrath could win his fair share too. There was a serious commitment to it as well. At the end, England try to play a long ball and we’re 2v1 at the back with everyone else pushing the English back.  Nowadays when we play long ball, it’s just hopeful stuff. Latter days of MO’N when it was being launched to an isolated Daryl Murphy was the low point.

The O'Shea wrote: The Huntacha wrote: It’s utter sh*te football but it was effective to say the least. Can’t compare it to modern day though. We had some unbelievable headers of a ball back then in Quinn and Cascarino and McGrath could win his fair share too. There was a serious commitment to it as well. At the end, England try to play a long ball and we’re 2v1 at the back with everyone else pushing the English back.  Nowadays when we play long ball, it’s just hopeful stuff. Latter days of MO’N when it was being launched to an isolated Daryl Murphy was the low point. The level of skill on show in that clip makes our current crop look like prime Brazil, basic crosses etc aimlessly launched towards the opposition goal. The only thing that made it work (in that case) was that the English kept booting the ball back to us, no modern team would do that, they'd play the ball out and force us back. You can't "put them under pressure" if you can't get the ball.

Trap junior wrote: I'd love to see the 1988 Wimbledon team play the 2024 Man City team

Shane long scored in a 1-1 draw vs Poland, he also scored in a 1-0 win against the Germans. Maybe you're thinking of John O'Shea and his last minute equaliser in Gelsenkirchen.

Edited by irelandfan - 29 Mar 2024 at 9:11am

I’m still unsure I’ll ever give credit to Kenny for the playing style. It relied heavily on knocking the ball around the back and holding possession in low pressure areas. As we got into more progressive areas of the pitch the old problems manifested themselves as we looked blunt. Our goals still generally came from headers, dead balls goalmouth scrambles and capitalising on opposition mistakes. Obafemi’s two against Scotland and Armenia stand out as class.in short, the quality of football was not materially better than hoof ball, and the outcomes were tangibly worse. 

Edited by Het-field - 29 Mar 2024 at 10:28am