Absolutely.
Stop changing it every week pick 4 any 4 and stick with them so they get to know how each other play.
Against Coventry we did what some posters keep going on about we dropped the worst CH in the division Guthrie along with the worst FB always my fault Leahy and replaced them with even worse players ,worked out well did’nt it.
I don’t see how that sorts the defence between now and the end of the season I’ve got to be honest, I don’t see a manager coming in and getting these players to perform any better than what they are. Poor, over matched, League 2 at best players.
Keates does deserve the sack. But I don’t think it answers the question between now and the end of the season.
Out of the ‘defenders’ and I say that term loosely that we have in our squad and based on performances this season i’d go with either:
Johnson, Guthrie and Fitzwater, with Devlin and Leahy as wing-backs.
Or a straight back four of:
Devlin Johnson Fitzwater Leahy
I’ve saw nothing in Norman or Laird to suggest they’re an improvement on Devlin/Leahy.
This defence has two things on its collective CV. Firstly it survived relegation last season, and secondly it was part of a team that earlier in the season produced our best ever start to a third tier season in terms of unbeaten matches, so in my opinion its Keates losing the plot that has contributed to it being as bad as it is now.
A new manager wouldn’t turn them into world beaters, or even top end division three, but any manager that has a decent track record at this level should be able to give us a better chance than under Keates. Why do I think that would happen? Well firstly it would be a clean slate, players might actually start playing for a future that they clearly havn’t got under Keates. Second, we might get some basic tactical organisation of the type that gives you a chance in games, which conceding two and three goals every week doesn’t. Individual errors will still occur, how many times for example did Leahy fall on his back-side leading to goals earlier in the season? But if there is organisation and shape when we havn’t got the ball, and at set-pieces its got to be better than the current shambles. If we could do that, and at the same time get our wingers and midfielders, who do have decent ability to get the supply going to our excellent centre-forward then could see us picking up points, confidence, and maybe survive. Continue with the current regime and I don’t see how anyone can find an argument to support us turning it round. We’ve just lost five games in a row, the last three without scoring, we are literally getting worse by the game. If we lose on Saturday with Keates in charge (and I’m sure Bradford are licking their lips as we speak) I can honestly see this run of defeats rivaling that of 1988/89. This is already our worst run of consecutive league defeats since Hutchings in 2010 and Merson in 2004/5. If you want to find the last time we lost 6 in a row at this level, by my reckoning you would have to go back as far as 1964!!
This isn’t just run of the mill Walsall FC being a bit crap, this is pushing once in a lifetime bad.
Just roll that fact around for a second or two, no Walsall manager, not even Sibley, Merson, Mullen or Hutchings has presided over a run of 6 consecutive third tier defeats since 1964.
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Not even the devil himself, Whitney!!
On your first point, like this season, it was the first half of the season that maintained our league one status. That defence had a key difference, James Wilson. Head and shoulders a better defender than anyone in this years squad or last years squad. And Donnellan who whilst not great is, in my opinion better than Johnson, Scarr and Fitzwater’s form this season. The form of this defence was relegation level and we ended up sliding towards the bottom four. The slide has been even more dramatic this season.
On your second point, yes they were part of that team. But we still didn’t keep a clean sheet until the 8th game of the season, including conceding three to League 2 Macclesfield’s second team in the tin pot trophy. In fact we conceded 17 goals in the first 13 games of the season. We prospered despite that defence, not because of it.
Fair enough it might be a clean slate. Fair enough there might be a different tactical approach. But those players are sub standard. Jose Mourinho would struggle to get this shower to park the bus.
And that is no defence of Keates by the way, he signed half of them! I just don’t think sacking him, which may happen, will make any difference.
Are people still not over this? He deserved the sack too. Can we move on FFS.
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To be fair you’re really splitting hairs there. We took 22 points from 21 games after James Wilson left, so a very marginal decline, nothing like what we are seeing now. Also the clean-sheet debate, obviously keeping clean sheets is great, but if you cant do that then try and just let one in! As I explained, that gives you a chance of getting a result most games, conceding 2’s and 3s makes it almost impossible. Although we only kept one clean sheet, we only conceded one goal in each of the other 6 games, and hey presto managed a win or a draw in all of them! That’s the level we need to get back to, not better than that level, just the level that this defence has managed previously. Likewise if we took say 15 points from the last 14 games we might just get relegated, but we might also just survive. Carry on with this farce and I can see us finishing with maybe a point or two more than we have now and bottom of the league.
Edit there’s only 13 left now, but same argument applies.
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That’s relegation form though. That’s 48 points over the course of a season. I never said we were brilliant with him but there was a noticeable decline in the second half of the season, in league position and performance. Is that not fair? Is James Wilson not a noticeably better defender than what we have now? Hardly splitting hairs half a season of having a player we currently do not when comparing the two campaigns and making out it’s the same defence.
Well obviously, I’m just pointing out the defence wasn’t that great during that good spell.
What, consistently conceding over a stretch of games? Because our strikers/wingers aren’t in the rich vein of form they were in at the start of the season either. It’s unfair to say “well the defence was good enough because we were scoring 2 or 3 goals a game”. You can’t expect the forwards to just keep digging the defence out.
It’s the same old story and has been all season “change one element and everything will be fine”. First it was Leahy, then it was Devlin, then it was Guthrie now it’s Keates. Maybe these players just aren’t good enough 
One decent spell from the attackers at the start of this season doesn’t change that.
Yes of course Wilson is a better defender than we have now, we should have signed him last season as I said at the time, and I would have preferred it it we’d re-signed this Jan instead of who we signed. However, We didn’t collapse when he left as we are now, we produced marginal relegation form, not the hopeless bottom of the table form we are producing now. Just to illustrate that fact 48 points would have got us relegated 3 times out of the last 7 seasons, but it would have kept us up the other 4!! We also lost Edwards and Ozzy had his head turned which didn’t help our cause last season in the latter stages. Last season’s decline was marginal, and almost got us relegated, this season’s decline is monumental and has us heading for the bottom of the league and we have the same players to select if we so wish, plus all the other ones Keates has signed. As limited as these players are its patently obvious that the manager is the problem.
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I disagree. It’s patently obvious these players are also the problem. They were lucky not to be relegated last season and it looks like they will be this season. The fact that there form may or may not have been good enough to stay up last season isn’t a very good defence.
And what Keates has brought in is no better, to be fair.
Keates biggest issue/misfortune/mistake (delete as applicable) has been trying to keep us with virtually same back 5 as last year (less Kory) that almost took us down. Then failing to coach them into a cohesive unit or replacing them with anything better.
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From what I’ve seen Scarr is not good enough for league 1. He may well be a good player in league 2 as he seemed to show at Wycombe so would just have him warming the bench.
Devlin/Norman or Leahy/Laird. I liked Lairdy in his first spell but he really struggled against Cov’s pace on the right and they’ll be plenty more teams with quick wingers in the run in. No idea what you do with the fullbacks really.
Johnson was unlucky to be dropped, did well in the cup games and also played full 90 minutes in the last clean sheet at Gillingham.
I really don’t get the treatment of him. Did someone say he was out of contract at Wolves end of season? If he is surely you give him some starts, make him feel comfortable and then he could sign permanently in the summer and be a good player in league 2. Who knows he could be next Gerrard/Dann but not got the chance just to Keates seemingly not being able to count how many loan signings he’s made.
Can Norman actually play CB? I thought he was purely a full back?
I’m afraid that whatever formation we go with I think we are going to struggle. Unfortunately Whitney’s players are bad and Keates’ are somehow even worse.
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OK do it another way, Keates was brought in to do a better job than his predecessor. On any set of variables you care to bring to the table he has performed worse than his predecessor. So if the players are the problem 1) For some reason they are performing worse now than they were, and certainly worse than at any time since they’ve been at the club, AND they are getting worse by the week. 2) The players DK has brought in to compete with/replace the players who have deteriorated under his management are performing worse than the ones that were here before!
Now just so you know I hope we go on a run and DK turns things around and we get to look back on the last few months as a blip. If that doesn’t happen this Saturday DK’s record will be down to one point per game, and we will have the worst losing streak in 55 years at this level.
Unfortunately its a fact of life in football that the manager takes responsibility for results, its never been any different even for the likes of Graydon, Mourinho, Clough or anyone that’s ever failed to get the points on the board that the job requires.
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Did you argue with your nan at her own funeral? You strike me as the type…
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Nice post Geordie lad!
Long thread … but simple answer , sign a new one!