Good performances vs. Good results

[BlueLyon 9,359]

So what you want to see more, or better in what balance?

I personaly dont want us to go into tiki taka extreme or anything similar, but a decent performance with players showing determination, motive, spirit, team-work and overall IMPROVEMENT over the season.

While winning a title (PL) is definately priority for us right now, regardless of style, but what about next season?

We play extremely bad (speaking for performances, not results) since turn of the year and instead of improvement, we are regressing. Individualy and as a team.

I love certain level of stability between results and good performances. For example in 2010, we wont title and we put quite a few great performances over the season.

I dont want to go into Arsenal (all performance, no result), but balance, like Bayern from 2013, that should be our final goal. Good performances with good results.

However recent months have shown massive stepdown from key players like Cesc, Matic, Costa, but also what worries me is that our players generaly dont improve. Hazard didnt improve his shooting one bit, Azpi is still not involved in attack enough, defence isnt sorted out,...while Hazard and Azpi made improvements in areas they were already good, they didnt improve in areas where they lack. Players must be more complete to adopt different situations, but here we have very one sided players. Either they do great defense or attack, but rarely both.

[Myself 793]

We've spent more than enough money to expect both.

[BlueLyon 9,359]

Well we lost all the ''brilliance'' from autmn. And still leading PL (with such advantage) goes big thanks to shit performances from city and other teams.

[bluephoenix 1,125]

I would like to see a balance between good performances and results and believe good performance leads to good results.
And lets not talk about the performances from Costa and others. He might have scored the goal but it was nothing to what everyone expected from him. I feel Mourinho's results oriented mindset is not helping us.

I really think our best performances were under CA in terms of how we performed at least I felt it that way.

[mikeholiday 209]

Good attacking performance in the 2nd half vs Good defensive counter attacking / parking the bus / goal keeping by Soton.

I dont think we need to change manager just yet... just my opinion...

[Spike 12,049]

I think I've made my opinion on this topic very clear in the last few days.

[didierforever 7,349]

BOTH. balance. but if need to be choose one... good result. any time of any day of any week of any year. simple as that.

[Magic Lamps 11,446]

I would like to see a balance between good performances and results and believe good performance leads to good results.

And lets not talk about the performances from Costa and others. He might have scored the goal but it was nothing to what everyone expected from him. I feel Mourinho's results oriented mindset is not helping us.

I really think our best performances were under CA in terms of how we performed at least I felt it that way.

Also loved the way we played under Ancelotti in the double winning season. That team had no pace or natural talent like our current one but it still beat every opposition by sheer quality, power, determination and character. Drogba, Lampard well above 30 y.o. and still banging in goals for fun was a joy to watch. That team had three aspects we are direly missing these days: accuracy ,hunger and focus. We scored some team goals that season Barcelona in their pomp would have been proud of. That interplay esp between the Drog-Lamps axis was a joy to watch. It was no tiki-taka which is by the way not what I understand as "good performances".

Beautiful football does not come from "philosophy", it derives from quality that is channelled by complementary tactics and teamwork. Which is exactly what we should learn from the double season. We did not need a Hazard to dribble past 4 players. It came down to the approach. Get your determination and spirit high and play as good as you can, always give it your best effort, play to your strengths, never lose confidence or concentration. The way you play should be functional. When you play functionally and with the qualities listed it will look easy on the eye automatically without having to give it that artificial "tiki taka2 pimping.

What was also remarkable about the football played under Ancelotti was its honesty. We were not nice like arsenal but bravely standin gup for ourselves, never giving in, ruthlessly finishing off our chances to get the result the game deserved. We were clinical but at the same time fair. No gamesmanship. We won because our approach was pure. Teamwork, confidence, focus, accuracy, effort, determination - for me those attributes represent, define football.

We should go back to the roots and concentrate on that. Within all those "clear campaign" mini-battles, the constant reshuffling of the team, the fatigue, the siege-mentality, I sometimes feel the players have lost clear sight on what football really is about. Recover that and we should be fine, cos we got it in us what it takes to win titles.

[kellzfresh 7,226]

I think this is a better place to post this:

That first half was the reason why we stood no chance in the Champions League. We tried to defend after scoring one goal and they still got so many chances.

There are a lot of things we have to do to get better next season.

1. I think we shouldn't sign anymore Brazilians. Most of them have the worst decision making in any team. We're looking for energy from them but when they get fatigued, where's the little bit of quality?

2. We need to find a Spanish midfielder, people with good decision making/keypasses /assist record and can still press. (Koke)

We need to buy schneiderlin from Southampton to play besides Matic in the big games next season, Fabregas should stay away from the pivot or benched against any team that does pressing.

3. I think Mourinho is ruining everybody on the right wing with his tactics. The right wingers first job is to cover for ivanovic instead of attacking. Then the subs play 10 mins every 2-3 games.

What is annoying me is the amount of money and time we have spent on that wing (KDB, schurlle, Salah, Mata, Willian, cuadrado) and no one seems to get a grip, it means the fault is in the tactics. Either Mourinho gets a player who suits his tactics both offensively and defensively or he should do some rotation. In fact he shouldn't buy any player who doesn't have body strength for the right wing again, because from 2 years of watching the movement of the right winger I think the player Mourinho is looking for is James Milner. I'm confident if we buy reus for the right wing he'll look like salah was here.

4. And lastly wtf has happened to our pressing and intensity?? Since when can Southampton, Liverpool and tottenham press better than us??? If our players are weak under pressure, why don't we press the opponent back?? What is this sitting back, giving up and letting them create as much chances as they want and hope courtois has a great game?? Courtois has had too much motm performances and has made far too many saves with this our slow style of play.

We need to attack faster, press faster like the 2nd half and stop this firsthalf slow, sluggish and turgid play that is not an identity of a Mourinho team.

[CurlyHairLikeLuiz 1,625]

I don't mind us playing ugly football, but if we do, we need to play Zouma and Matic together in midfield because otherwise we are vulnerable to be pressed, which is how we used to beat Arsenal. If we want to play the style of football we want to play, however, our slow defence needs to be phased out Azpi - Zouma - Terry - Luis should be our first choice defence for attacking football. Oscar needs to step up big time, otherwise we might as well play a 4-3-3 with a b2b there. What I've noticed is that none of our players can shoot outside of the box anymore, like Lamps did. That's a problem for us.

[Jase 43,479]

I think this is a better place to post this:

That first half was the reason why we stood no chance in the Champions League. We tried to defend after scoring one goal and they still got so many chances.

Since when we tried to defend against Southampton after scoring first? If we had done so, we wouldn't have found ourselves getting caught on the counter so many times. We still saw plenty of the ball but because the passing was rubbish and the pressing was non-existent, Southampton kept on getting the chances!

[kellzfresh 7,226]

Since when we tried to defend against Southampton after scoring first? If we had done so, we wouldn't have found ourselves getting caught on the counter so many times. We still saw plenty of the ball but because the passing was rubbish and the pressing was non-existent, Southampton kept on getting the chances!

I know we went forward when we had the ball but we defend by not pressing and sitting back. That's a terrible tactics, against a good team, we give them all that space to do what they want.

I agree the passing was rubbish but it's because they showed us how pressing is done. You have to be Barcelona to escape proper pressing so we should have pressed them back instead of giving up a fight and conceding chances anyways.

It's frustrating me

[Jase 43,479]

I know we went forward when we had the ball but we defend by not pressing and sitting back. That's a terrible tactics, against a good team, we give them all that space to do what they want.

I agree the passing was rubbish but it's because they showed us how pressing is done. You have to be Barcelona to escape proper pressing so we should have pressed them back instead of giving up a fight and conceding chances anyways.

It's frustrating me

We didn't press as a unit yes but at no point during the game we sat back. We had players around the pitch and most of them were just jogging around. That's not sitting back. More of standing off the opposition!

[kellzfresh 7,226]

We didn't press as a unit yes but at no point during the game we sat back. We had players around the pitch and most of them were just jogging around. That's not sitting back. More of standing off the opposition!

When I say sitting back, I don't mean parking the bus, I mean not pressing.

But standing off is the right word like we did against Liverpool in the first leg of the carling cup.

[Jase 43,479]

When I say sitting back, I don't mean parking the bus, I mean not pressing.

But standing off is the right word like we did against Liverpool in the first leg of the carling cup.

:rant:

[stroey 2,525]

I don't mind how we play, as long as we become CHAMPIONS this season.

That's the main goal and only goal we should have, these young players need to taste what it is like to be champions, they need to get the feeling of being champions, they need that responsibility. It is so important to have this experience to develop the same mentality Mou's teams used to have. Ferguson's teams had that champions mentality too.

Then next season we can address the problems in our playing style, in the summer we can buy players to do that. And then I will join the club of members here who says "we need to play better football".

But right now we need the league title badly to develop these youngsters further and to keep Mourinho here. (I'm not sure Abramovic won't sack him if he messes this up)

[BlueLion. 21,491]

If anyone thinks our performance in the second half yesterday wasn't "good", they're mistaken. We were excellent and unfortunately their goalkeeper played a blinder. It happens.

People have to realise football is a results business. I'd happily take a cagey 1-0 every week if it means we win the title.

People remember what you win, not the football you play.

[Leif 6,006]

Nobody's right or wrong except me, so idk why there needs to be such vivacious defending of one's own opinion on this topic, but that said & sticking to the tune, my opinion is that I watch sport to be entertained - not to have satisfaction at the final numbers like "2-1" or whatever. Numbers don't mean shit, to me, I'm watching football and not a math lecture; and celebrating some math, which is what you're doing when you go "Yipeeeee!!!! 6 points ahead of City!!! Doesn't matter how we played!!!", seems bonkers to me.

It really just boils down to personality types which is why there's going to be no conclusion here & just endless opinions.

P.S. - If it's just the winning and the results that matter, what the fuck are you staring at a screen or sitting on a cold hard seat for 90 minutes for? Just check Yahoo results after the game if how a team plays isn't important to you, or check the highlights on MOTD if all that matters is the goals banged in at the end of the day.