Decent post on Oinkun from Bethnal…

765 Bethnal Yellow and Green

Posted yesterday at 11:04
Given the amount of change in the summer I’d say JHT is ahead of progress with the squad. Especially when you consider both the goalkeeper coach and first team coach both left unexpectedly after preseason.

Both in and out of possession structures are looking good (when injuries are not rampant) and the numbers look good. Further improvements around tempo needed in possession as well as the obvious work needed around holding leads.

JHT has got really good performance out of the best players and dramatically improved Fisher, Duffy, Sainz and Nunez. Good to see Mahovo be identified and fast tracked into the team and no fear shown in playing young players like him and Forsyth.

Struggled with the intensity of the league and schedule initially and didn’t rotate enough. Appears to be learning now how to manage workloads better now though.

Summer recruitment has shown good promise, Cordoba, Doyle, Mahovo, Schwartau, Crnac all look really good additions right now. Forson, Chrisene and Slimane have been more mixed, although decent value considering their prices. Too early to say on the Jan transfers but if Jurasek is as good as his early career suggested, then someone to get excited about after a bit of adaption. Wright has been great in moments, and awful in others. Maybe not a surprise as he has less than 10 senior appearances in his whole career so far.

While there are no huge stand out transfers like a Pukki or Emi. There are also no stinkers like Husband, Franke or Marley Watkins.

Struggled to replace the individual talents of Sara and Rowe, but that would always be very difficult to immediately replace, especially Sara who is showing that he is a Champions League level player.

From what I can see the club is heading in the right direction under Knapper, there is positive noise around the academy being closer to the first team, increased integration of data science team and a clearer overall structure around the club. He got excellent fees for Idah, Rowe and Kamara as well.

Solid 7 out of 10s for both. Good start, but need to continue to improve over the next couple of seasons.

Posted By: loz, Mar 15, 12:57:58