Rafa, Jose, Carlo

Football changed but they also got older. Age changes people. People can lose that same enthusiasm and drive they had when they were younger, particularly if they've already won everything. They can become mellower or become more impatient like Jose. That said, they could still do good jobs at certain clubs under the right settings. Rafa could still go on to do good stuff at Everton.

This Steve Bruce defense is ridiculous.

Ignorance doesn't even come close.

I think Benitez has come out of the new age looking better tbh. Probably because his stock was lower than the other two 10-15 years ago, but people understand his place better now. Very good manager, NOT a great manager, never was.

Ancelotti was kind of doomed to fall victim to an era where tactics & coaching peaked. He's a man manager first & always has been, not a mug but he was susceptible to being tactically schooled in his prime let alone now.

Mourinho just became a victim of himself. Old dog with no new tricks.

If Alex (ignoring his age for a minute) had kept on going would he have gone the same way?
----------------------------------------------------------
No, because he would've put people in place to conceal any potential weakness he'd have on fancy new age tactics & training regimes. His assistant would've been someone like Lillo, City's #2 atm, someone who understands this era of football because he, in part, inadvertently helped create it

comment by Anne Ziety (U22412)
posted 1 hour, 13 minutes ago
This Steve Bruce defense is ridiculous.

Ignorance doesn't even come close.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Not really

https://twitter.com/capt_fishpaste/status/1450897177484615681?s=21

Jose has part lost to lost his love for the game I think. There was a point where he stopped being the Special One and just became the Grumpy Sniping One. Since then he's never really had the same kind of success. Most of the others just got old. Plus it has become increasingly harder to build a great team if you're not at one of the cash cow teams. Used to be that smaller clubs could hang on to their top talent for longer than "The first transfer window after he shines for 5 games." Youngsters would develop where they were longer, benefitting said team. Also prime starting 11 players weren't so keen on moving to benchwarm at a bigger club.

Talent always moved/got poached before but never on the scale it is now. When Sheik City was formed and allowed to buy 25 starting 11 players (many from the immediate rivals/competition) it drastically changed the "overall league talent" development dynamic. It's a struggle to build anything anywhere that isn't owned by a sheik or an oil baron. Because you can guarantee the second your team starts to have it's stars shining and you start to pick up a competitive head of steam, one maybe more of those teams is coming to gut your squad before you can really get anywhere.

The result of this is that in any given league over half it's top talent is at one super rich team. And at any given time half that talent will be rotting on that bench instead of starting week in week out at another team in the same league, making them stronger. Think of it as nowadays the'res a Real Madrid in every league not just the Spanish one. Talent and football generally are suffering for it.

comment by ◯ △ ▢ Quinn-Goldberg (U8966)
posted 5 minutes ago
comment by Anne Ziety (U22412)
posted 1 hour, 13 minutes ago
This Steve Bruce defense is ridiculous.

Ignorance doesn't even come close.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Not really

https://twitter.com/capt_fishpaste/status/1450897177484615681?s=21
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Benitez a)inherited a squad on a one way ticket to the Championship and b)had a negative net spend. Despite that he turned them into a solid mid table team.

Bruce inherited that solid mid table team added the likes of ASM (who many regard as one of the best wingers in the league), Wilson and Willock amoung others in a £160m spend and after two years of no progress now has them on a one way ticket back down (well would have if he stayed).

The fact their records are similar is damming of Bruce not a compliment.

The eye test is enough to determine Benitez's > Bruce's Newcastle ffs. Why is this even a thing?

Both incredibly dull, torrid teams to watch, but one understood the basics of shape, energy & teamwork & the other didn't.

comment by Devil (U6522)
posted 1 minute ago
The eye test is enough to determine Benitez's > Bruce's Newcastle ffs. Why is this even a thing?

Both incredibly dull, torrid teams to watch, but one understood the basics of shape, energy & teamwork & the other didn't.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
I think Newcastle were pretty much bottom of most metrics last two seasons when he was "matching Rafa" but Dubravka and Darlow kept defeating the XG metrics, what's happened this season is basically them reverting to the mean.

Re the Bruce loving apparently mid table clubs have to be grateful for whatever it serves up. Fans of elite clubs getting all outraged when teams down the league try and better themselves is one of the strangest things I have seen in football, above all else what the feck has it got to do with them?

There’s always a job for these guys due to their success. They may not have the same passion, or refuse/can’t adapt to modern football. There’s always someone younger and better who wants to beat these guys. Fergie managed to adapt as well as anyone and always stayed relevant. He was a unique case.