Re: The Steve Bruce thread

[DelboyVilla]

For the avoidance of doubt, I contend that we have won our first three competitive games this season despite Bruce and not because of him. His selections and set up are truly mystifying.

The sheer quality of the players in the squad continually rescue Bruce from his own inadequacies!

Exactly he had to use Jack and Kodj to get the result because before they came on there only looked like one winner and it wasn't Villa?

[FoxyAV]

How long before he blames the players for not doing what he wanted them to do? He did it at the end of last season and you have to wonder what exactly it is he wants them to do bearing in mind they're doing the same thing week in, week out.

I saw a story on Birmingham Live (hmm) quoting Ian Taylor as saying:

"You can tell that Brucie is absolutely fuming there. He’s holding a lot in there, I’m telling you! He must have given that team a roasting in there after the game because he was not happy. They’ve ridden their luck big time, but they’ve got through."

I don't understand the basic stuff going on here. Bruce has been here almost two full seasons, you'd have thought we as fans would be able to identify how we play but we seem to be as confused as the players. I know it's only Taylor's opinion but how can Bruce be fuming at the whole team when he selected them and sent them out? Does no one want to play for him, or don't they like the football, or don't they like us, what's the reason Bruce is seemingly constantly unhappy with the players and their performances?

[big ming]

We have just barely managed to register a couple of efforts on target despite playing the last two thirds of the game against 10 man Ipswich (favoured for the drop).
Selection and tactics both poor. We are still unbeaten but playing garbage bruceball. Stand by to be taught a footballing lesson (again) by Dean Smith's Brentford on Wednesday night. I will apologise, if wrong but I fear Bruce is unable to get a tune from these players.

[FoxyAV]

Sounds like we were lucky to scrape a draw.

[STO67]

Bruce is supposed to be a master motivator, although he says he doesn't do tactics. Where is the motivation, why are we so very poor? This is two points dropped, two vital points, we have to be more ruthless. Crap.

[Terry Derry]

A good post from Dave Hallwood’s group:

We may have made a better start points wise but the problem is we're playing the same as we did the last two seasons, if not worse. We had good runs in both the last two seasons, but we also had bad runs which cost us. It wasn't good enough to get us promoted then, and there's little to suggest it will be good enough this year. Play-offs, maybe, but I can't see much chance of automatic promotion playing like we are. It's not a consistently reliable approach, it depends too much on a flash of individual brilliance or invention, which sometimes doesn't happen for a few games at a time. It also depends on not making many mistakes, but playing players out of position and signing what appear to be two dodgy keepers is only increasing the errors. There's still very little in terms of tempo, movement, front foot approach or tactics. Given all that I can't help thinking it's only a matter of time before we hit one or more winless runs. It does seem odd when we have 7 out of 9 points to be feeling that way, but I do. And I don't think it matters too much who we sign, the bumbling muddling-through approach will be the same. Nothing to do with hysteria, it's an opinion based on watching Bruce fail for almost two full seasons.

[Dazzle]

As I’ve said previously, performances will be tolerated as long as results are positive. We’ve now had 3 average at best performances that has returned 2 wins and a draw, for me the Ipswich performance and result is strike 1 against Bruce. I’ve still got in and around the Blackburn game in my mind as a crucial period where if change was going to be made then that would be it. I think we could well lose at home to Brentford, there’s been no indication yet that we can put in the type of performance required to beat Brentford. If we do lose, or draw again, the pressure will ratchet up significantly for the next few games leading into mid September. It seems to me from the statements being made by Bruce that he is being forced to recruit younger loan players with options to possibly buy, we know from his history that doesn’t really suit him at all and so it would appear that the owners are building in a future beyond Bruce. For me it has seemed sensible to allow Bruce to continue and to try and evolve, and for the short term stability in retaining Grealish (I do believe Grealish has a lot of time for Bruce) and others whilst getting the transfer window out of the way and business done. The other side of the window who knows what the owners have in mind, but my guess is that Bruce won’t have many slips afforded to him going into September. It’s fair to say that we haven’t evolved a great deal at all in terms of our play.

[Terry Derry]

Totally agree. The owners will know all about Bruce’s failings from last season. They won’t want to leave it too late to pull the trapdoor.

[FoxyAV]

A good post from Dave Hallwood’s group.

What's Dave Hallwood's group please?

[FoxyAV]

Remember last season Bruce was supposed to be building the team around Grealish and Kodjia? Now he has them, what's changed? Doesn't look like anything.

[andrew24561]

It seems to me that Steve Bruce is dammed if he does and dammed if he dosent. Reading some posts it seems any win is despite his involvement and any defeat (in this case a draw)is all down to his team selection, set up and lack of tactics/style of play.
Now i'm no Bruce fan and think he will be gone sooner than later but until he has been sacked I will get behind our team and that includes Bruce for the good of our club
VTID

[big ming]

Just to add heresy to my list of crimes (as per the last post) I will say that I watched the Noses of Small Heath versus Swansea on Friday night and they played better football than Villa have at any stage this season so far. They made (and missed) a hat full of chances but the passing and moving were good and Monk has clearly got a system sorted. I wish I could say the same for Bruce but, as is an ex-defender, he has an over-arching defensive mentality and is serving up the same offensive tripe we have endured for the last 18 months with only a couple of performances as an exception. It hasn't even been good defensively either. I will support the team but I don't have to like what I am seeing.

[VTID85]

Just to add heresy to my list of crimes (as per the last post) I will say that I watched the Noses of Small Heath versus Swansea on Friday night and they played better football than Villa have at any stage this season so far. They made (and missed) a hat full of chances but the passing and moving were good and Monk has clearly got a system sorted. I wish I could say the same for Bruce but, as is an ex-defender, he has an over-arching defensive mentality and is serving up the same offensive tripe we have endured for the last 18 months with only a couple of performances as an exception. It hasn't even been good defensively either. I will support the team but I don't have to like what I am seeing.

I watched the same game and thought both teams looked absolutely fucking shite. That's not to say we're significantly better, but I didn't see anything in either team that we couldn't beat and I'm not just coming at this from an anti-Blues perspective.

[STO67]

The problem is, our wingers are miss-firing, the keeper and centre half are making mistakes and we are now already over-reliant on Grealish and McGinn, if they play poorly, Villa play poorly.   Some form and consistency is required, especially from the likes of Adomah, who we are unable to replace as yet.  Elmo is NOT the answer either.  We need someone better to play behind Grealish and McGinn in the centre of midfield too.  What I am saying is:  consistency is the key.  At the moment, we are struggling to find it.

[Dions_Bald_Head]

I'm just bitterly disappointed that we're still going thru the same motions as the last couple of seasons.

As I've said before, can Bruce get us promotion? Yes. But it feels like the monkeys on typewriters analogy. He's not bad enough to be blind to when things are going wrong, he has resources at his disposal & he's a personable guy who seems to get on with everyone so given enough chances he could pull it off. Maybe we're just slow to get going this season & we'll find a momentum to improve upon.

But is there anyone who believes that we have a future in the PL with him?
Because I don't, & that's the tragedy as far as I'm concerned because we're not using this opportunity to build a football club that will not only be able to gain promotion, but have the groundwork for making a decent PL campaign.

Can we have a broken record emoji?

[FoxyAV]

I share the same broken record, we need to hit the PL running, not scraping by and relying on luck. I don't see Bruce doing it, I've stuck to that for the last 18 months or so. His big tough aged heads didn't get us 'across the line'. Playing Elmo and Jedi (no matter how much effort they put in) won't either.

[jeffvilla]

Perhaps someone should tell Bruce that the Jedi is NOT a centre back. FFS we have seen it time and time again players out of there favoured positions. THE JEDI IS NOT A CENTRE BACK

[The Utterer]

Can't disagree with most of that posted above. Bruce football is basically a ""filling holes and scoring by individual brilliance / capitalizing on mistakes from the other team""

It does of course often work as this division is littered with mistakes but where i feel it falls down is this.

We are Aston Villa

Because of this teams are more "Up for it" against us and thus their concentration levels are a little higher maybe? This means they likely make a few less mistakes than they would in a more typical game against the lesser lights.

I do believe Fulham benefited from this a lot last season when i lost count of the number of games they won due to teams capitulating against them.. even when they didn't play particularly well actually from the bits i saw.

The teams Bruce has gotten promoted before have been of a similar ilk. We on the other hand are a bigger fish so part of Brucies tried & trusted method of winning because of the other teams lapses is less effective, hence us not getting promoted.

That's just how i see it.

It's almost like relying on winning by default rather than through quality football. This also is why it barely matters how good the players are in that system as they are rendered redundant in most cases. Only the moments of brilliance being applicable.

This is why we see the likes of Hogan, Hourihane, Lansbury, McCormack etc etc go from hot to pants. They are more the type of player to do well when the team play quality football.

[FoxyAV]

Good post. Plus when what look on paper like not so good teams like Hull come up against us but are well coached and organised by a good manager we make them look good, they get more confident and we're relying on the opposition having bad luck and not beating us! That's unfair on Hull btw, I thought they played well and were unlucky not to beat us.

[Army villain]

Bruce is out if his depth, he has been told to get younger players on loan, which is the complete opposite to Bruce, I am fed up with Bruce playing players out of position, and his so called tactics!! The players look like they are fed up with his tactics , we have some decent players who were very good before Bruce got hold of them, fingers crossed for our next game.rant over. UTV

[achilles]

@The Utterer, I think that is a good post.

Ipswich have been pants until they played us on Saturday, when they worked their socks off especially when down to 10 men, would they do that against 'lesser' teams, I very much doubt it!

[big ming]

Having watched the U23's a handful of times, they seem to have no problem in applying the style,formation and tactics that K.Mac requires and provide generally entertaing football. They also appear to line up in their natural positions.
Watching the first team,however, it is difficult to determine a playing style and we know that players are often shoehorned into playing in positions that do not best suit.
In short, the U21's play football and the first team play Hoof/Bruceball. Why is that,I wonder?

[STO67]

Whilst I am no supporter of Steve Bruce, I think they play out of position because they are plugging gaps where we are weak. Hutton runs his heart out and is a legend but, in truth, he isn't very good, so Tuanzebe plays right back. Tuanzebe is largely untested at centre back, so Jedinak plays there, Hutton plays left back because Taylor is absolute shite. Adomah plays on the left because we don't have a naturally left sided player. I hope by the end of the window, those gaps are plugged and we have a left sided player, a natural forward, a centre back. I don't like shoehorning players, but needs must.

[FoxyAV]

Bruce spent a long time last season (and possibly the one before, it's merged into one) sticking with the players he sent out every week. It surely brought stability to the team and allowed one or two good partnerships to develop but there were weak links that weren't addressed until the players were injured. IIRC both Grealish and Green were tried on the left wing before Adomah, who'd been replaced on the right wing by Snodgrass, was tried on the left wing. I'm pretty sure I remember my Boro mate telling me they'd played him there. It worked though, with left footed (I think?) Snodgrass cutting in from the right and right footed Adomah cutting in from the left while the full backs were there to provide crosses. I don't remember how Hutton ended up at LB though.

Isn't Tuanzebe a CB? And I think De Laet is our best RB by far.

If we're short a right winger then play Adomah there like we did in his first season, until we bring in someone who plays there as a natural. If Green works there (did he score his pre-season goals from the right?) then play him until we can bring in someone. I'd honestly prefer to see Green on the left and Adomah on the right, seeing as how Adomah was a right winger.

We did try to bring in a quality LB so at least we've seen the intent is there.

CB still worries me, I'm not sure Elphick is decent cover, and he plays on the right and we can't move Chester around to accommodate someone out of sheer desperation. It was either Hull or Wigan where Chester played on the left, it's too much fucking around with the established order.

Strikers also worry me and have been discussed before. We need someone big and strong because Audrey and Hogan don't work with Bruce's tactic. It's honestly going to be cheaper to change manager than to spunk millions at another McCormack (who doesn't work with Bruce, let alone his tactic)

[Dazzle]

Whilst I am no supporter of Steve Bruce, I think they play out of position because they are plugging gaps where we are weak. Hutton runs his heart out and is a legend but, in truth, he isn't very good, so Tuanzebe plays right back. Tuanzebe is largely untested at centre back, so Jedinak plays there, Hutton plays left back because Taylor is absolute shite. Adomah plays on the left because we don't have a naturally left sided player. I hope by the end of the window, those gaps are plugged and we have a left sided player, a natural forward, a centre back. I don't like shoehorning players, but needs must.

A fair enough observation, to a degree. And we also have to judge by players Bruce has bought. Of those positions and players you talk of we can say that you are correct about Hutton filling in at LB because Taylor is woeful (Taylor was bought by Bruce to be 1st choice LB), Jedinak is being played at CB when we do have Elphick sat on the sidelines as a natural CB, Adomah actually got his chance last season because of injury to Green (Green and Snodgrass were the preferred wide men, Green playing on the left), Tuanzebe is being played at RB when he wants to play CB, Elmohamady has been extensively used at Villa as a RB and is now being tasked with playing RW, we have DeLaet and Bree as natural RBs that can’t get a look in (Bree was bought by Bruce). So whilst we can say we’re short in one or two areas, much of that is directly attributable to Bruce. He bought Taylor, Bree, Lansbury (what ever happened to him), Hogan (came with a known injury record and is continuing that). It’s Bruce who is deciding to shoehorn Jedinak in at CB, Elmohamady at RW, and Tuanzebe at RB. To my mind we have around 4 players being asked to play in positions that they are not familiar with, nearly half the team! You might understand it if those players were producing markedly better performances than those sat on the sidelines, but I honestly don’t think we can say that. Jedinak has made clear mistakes, elmohamady has hardly delivered a cross. This is why I think Bruce cannot afford to fall more than 4-6pts off of the top inside the first 6-8 games, if Villa aren’t right at the sharp end then I do expect to see a change before the end of September.

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