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Poppa Out

patjennings said:
Again - that record is outstanding.

However, the big games for me is what I worry about. In both the semi and the final of the ACL there were some very dubious decisions favouring WSW - 2 red cards in the first leg of the semi and then at least six decent penalty claims knocked back in the final. Ante Covic, Anthony Golec and Brendan Santalab all should have had penalties against them appeared to handle the ball in the box in the second leg. This causes me to discount his effort here to some extent (still very impressive though - particularly when you look at the lineups in retrospect)

Yes decisions can always go two ways - but his big game record does not stack up. Is it 5 grand final losses now.

I disregard the record in his Socceroo tenure as being pressured. Firstly he always had at least one more round to make it and secondly there was no pressure on him at all. If he failed it was Arnold's failure.

The World Cup is a different beast and I'm afraid his tactical intransigence will be his (and our) downfall. I will be very happy to be proven wrong. I just fear I won't be.

To me he is the flip side to Ange's naive "I'm going to beat the best in the world playing aggressive football" and to a large extent ignoring defence. Popovic's answer seems to be I'm going to stop the best in the world scoring again us while hoping to scrape a goal.
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A bit of context to the acl win. He did that with a transition side that would go onto finish second last in the A League. The tie against sanfrecce was the final match for Hersi, Ono and that iteration. He beat Evergrande (with Diamanti, Gilardinho, and Lippi), FC Seoul and Al Hilal with the side that finished second last. Only against Al Hilal were we outplayed, and you're correct they should have had multiple penalties and won.

The achievement was remarkable, that side had no business doing what they did.
 
grazorblade said:
Will hold fire till after the friendlies, given the circumstances he took over, but he does have form with dads armies

Mooy of all people struggled to break in at wsw under poppa
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Not really true about mooy, fair about liking older guys.

Mooy played a lot, but didn't explode until he left. But he was behind Ono who was the sides best player.

I think he had actually been better with young guys for aus than at any of his clubs. Low bar of course.

I would like to see Segacic brought in, I think he will be great for Pompey, but he didn't even start for Sydney last year. Probably a Talay error, but still.

More than new players, I'd like to see the style progress in the friendlies. Despite the stereotype, he did do this with wsw.
 
Cunningstunt said:
Not really true about mooy, fair about liking older guys.

Mooy played a lot, but didn't explode until he left. But he was behind Ono who was the sides best player.

I think he had actually been better with young guys for aus than at any of his clubs. Low bar of course.

I would like to see Segacic brought in, I think he will be great for Pompey, but he didn't even start for Sydney last year. Probably a Talay error, but still.

More than new players, I'd like to see the style progress in the friendlies. Despite the stereotype, he did do this with wsw.
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Thought mooy was behind la rocca? Poppa liked playing mooy deep but city liked him as a 10

Wsw played so many games that season that mooy got a reasonable number of games but not many
 
Cunningstunt said:
A bit of context to the acl win. He did that with a transition side that would go onto finish second last in the A League. The tie against sanfrecce was the final match for Hersi, Ono and that iteration. He beat Evergrande (with Diamanti, Gilardinho, and Lippi), FC Seoul and Al Hilal with the side that finished second last. Only against Al Hilal were we outplayed, and you're correct they should have had multiple penalties and won.

The achievement was remarkable, that side had no business doing what they did.
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Hence my line - This causes me to discount his effort here to some extent (still very impressive though - particularly when you look at the lineups in retrospect)
 
As much as I hated to admit it, each campaign survived of the GG with the remaining players still having the experience to instill confidence. 2014 was very tight given late goals against Iraq away and home against Oman. In turn we should've won in Japan.

2018 was alright but for a silly game in Thailand and Saudi also hanging around forever.

2022 was where the GG had gone and the cohesion really started slipping. Covid aside we paid dearly with wasteful displays playing the wrong players and one or two late dodgy pens.
 
JS96 said:
As much as I hated to admit it, each campaign survived of the GG with the remaining players still having the experience to instill confidence. 2014 was very tight given late goals against Iraq away and home against Oman. In turn we should've won in Japan.

2018 was alright but for a silly game in Thailand and Saudi also hanging around forever.

2022 was where the GG had gone and the cohesion really started slipping. Covid aside we paid dearly with wasteful displays playing the wrong players and one or two late dodgy pens.
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Its been really hard with the lack of investment in youth. Thankfully we have academies down to u13s and reserve sides in the npl which is step one ....
 
grazorblade said:
Its been really hard with the lack of investment in youth. Thankfully we have academies down to u13s and reserve sides in the npl which is step one ....
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Wouldn't have worked under Ange but I wonder how we may have been in Brazil with Wilkshire, Neill and Kennedy. Rhys Williams was good at the time too but always injured.

Hard to pinpoint the lowest point as 2015 boosted us. Second half of 2013 was very concerning as was the 2019 Asian Cup style of play.
 
JS96 said:
Wouldn't have worked under Ange but I wonder how we may have been in Brazil with Wilkshire, Neill and Kennedy. Rhys Williams was good at the time too but always injured.

Hard to pinpoint the lowest point as 2015 boosted us. Second half of 2013 was very concerning as was the 2019 Asian Cup style of play.
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Neill's last few games for Socceroos, he was booed incessantly by the local crowd as definitely living off past glories, he was really poor for Socceroos. they had back to back 6 nil losses to Brazil & France.
 
I'm surprised that so many fans have a pessimistic opinion of experienced national team coaches for the Socceroos, to select the best players for a team to do the job?

I think the majority of fans on forums have been unhappy with every coach Aus has had since Guus - Arnie ( mark 1), Pim, Holger, Ange, Bert, Arnie (mark 2) and Popa.

I was probably only unhappy with Holger, but he provided ops for players like Brosque, Ogger and Matt McKay.

I think Arnie got it wrong not selecting Geria at RB, whilst selecting Geraint Jones, but not a lot else, despite him admitting he lost his mojo after the Asian Cup.

Popa hasn't lost in 8 WCQs - with a lot riding on each game. Fair play to him!
 
Decentric said:
I'm surprised that so many fans have a pessimistic opinion of experienced national team coaches for the Socceroos, to select the best players for a team to do the job?

I think the majority of fans on forums have been unhappy with every coach Aus has had since Guus - Arnie ( mark 1), Pim, Holger, Ange, Bert, Arnie (mark 2) and Popa.

I was probably only unhappy with Holger, but he provided ops for players like Brosque, Ogger and Matt McKay.

I think Arnie got it wrong not selecting Geria at RB, whilst selecting Geraint Jones, but not a lot else, despite him admitting he lost his mojo after the Asian Cup.

Popa hasn't lost in 8 WCQs - with a lot riding on each game. Fair play to him!
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Didn't know the former England Test cricketer played for the Socceroos. 🤣😂
 
Decentric said:
I'm surprised that so many fans have a pessimistic opinion of experienced national team coaches for the Socceroos, to select the best players for a team to do the job?

I think the majority of fans on forums have been unhappy with every coach Aus has had since Guus - Arnie ( mark 1), Pim, Holger, Ange, Bert, Arnie (mark 2) and Popa.

I was probably only unhappy with Holger, but he provided ops for players like Brosque, Ogger and Matt McKay.

I think Arnie got it wrong not selecting Geria at RB, whilst selecting Geraint Jones, but not a lot else, despite him admitting he lost his mojo after the Asian Cup.

Popa hasn't lost in 8 WCQs - with a lot riding on each game. Fair play to him!
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Popa hasn't lost in 8 WCQs - with a lot riding on each game. Fair play to him!

While I'm not the biggest fan of Poppa's management style. This record is hard to argue against.
 
Under Arnald for all his faults he had a very good assistant in Meulensteen who did most of the lifting with players and their clubs in Europe.
Meulensteen's reputation and communication style built credibility with clubs and staff and to my knowledge as I remember reading he would regularly call and visit players for a chat or coffee just to touch base with how they were going.
Even fringe players.
I'm wondering who does this now and is any of our staff based in Europe .
I know Okon was but does he have the required man management skills with both players and dealing with their clubs
 
SpongeBobFC said:
Under Arnald for all his faults he had a very good assistant in Meulensteen who did most of the lifting with players and their clubs in Europe.
Meulensteen's reputation and communication style built credibility with clubs and staff and to my knowledge as I remember reading he would regularly call and visit players for a chat or coffee just to touch base with how they were going.
Even fringe players.
I'm wondering who does this now and is any of our staff based in Europe .
I know Okon was but does he have the required man management skills with both players and dealing with their clubs
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In answer to Okon's man management skills there were a lot of unhappy players at the Mariners when he was manager. A good assistant can be a real asset. Apparently Harry was very good with the players under Ange at Celtic and Sergio Raimundo under Nick Montgomery was priceless.
 
Robbos said:
Popa hasn't lost in 8 WCQs - with a lot riding on each game. Fair play to him!

While I'm not the biggest fan of Poppa's management style. This record is hard to argue against.
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That's fair comment but the frustration is the conservative dross we're playing and lack of selections of young talent that'd get the pulses going. (I'm thinking Segacic, Ballard, Nisbet, Milanovic, Irankunda, Goodwin, Botic etc etc.)

The facts are we're probably going to get 1 draw, 1 win (maybe), and a loss at the WC. In which case boot Popa and get a coach in that'll have a crack.

Personally I'd rather go down swinging than play this dire stuff hoping to arse a goal from a set piece or an error.
 
patjennings said:
In answer to Okon's man management skills there were a lot of unhappy players at the Mariners when he was manager. A good assistant can be a real asset. Apparently Harry was very good with the players under Ange at Celtic and Sergio Raimundo under Nick Montgomery was priceless.
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Yeah, Harry seems to be a brilliant no. 2, but gets shown up when he tries the top spot. Being a great No. 2 is nothing to be sneezed at.
 
SpongeBobFC said:
Under Arnald for all his faults he had a very good assistant in Meulensteen who did most of the lifting with players and their clubs in Europe.
Meulensteen's reputation and communication style built credibility with clubs and staff and to my knowledge as I remember reading he would regularly call and visit players for a chat or coffee just to touch base with how they were going.
Even fringe players.
I'm wondering who does this now and is any of our staff based in Europe .
I know Okon was but does he have the required man management skills with both players and dealing with their clubs
Click to expand...
This is a brilliantly made point.

Easy to forget that Popa and co were thrown to together slap dash with whoever was available at the time. Hardly a process likely to equate to the best candidates for the roles.

How many inept Managers, business leaders, politicians etc you name it that exist at every level, it's very possible that Popovic's team is a bit of s shit show in certain areas and maybe that is what we've seen play out??
 
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