GeneralCartmanLee 313 Posted March 18, 2009 Share Posted March 18, 2009 It tells me that Wally has not won a trophy since returning - McCoist won both. Yep no credit for the good stuff, only criticisim for the bad....... What credit should be shown towards Wally in the 'finals' - forget the other games like Papa has said - he's lost two and his team selection, personnel, subs.....were a major part of that. Along with the players failure to turn up. Now we might have had a tough run up to the UEFA Cup Final but if your players can't get up for a once in a lifetime match then there is something far wrong. He and his players take the blame for Sunday but i don't accept he got it wrong/could have done more getting to the UEFA final... We had a chance near the end that would have equalised againsta far superiour team. I have no idea what personal changes you would make that would have won us the cup but it's all monday morning quaterback stuff anyway....... He managed to getb the players motivated to get these finals and has won plenty of finals in the past so his motivation techniques are not under question to me Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
ShootSpeedKillLight 0 Posted March 18, 2009 Share Posted March 18, 2009 For one, it should never have taken him until 72 minutes to make a substitution when it was clear things weren't working. Then with less than 5 minutes to go he plays the McCulloch trump card Tactical genius indeed. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
outlaw69uk 123 Posted March 18, 2009 Share Posted March 18, 2009 It tells me that Wally has not won a trophy since returning - McCoist won both. Yep no credit for the good stuff, only criticisim for the bad....... What credit should be shown towards Wally in the 'finals' - forget the other games like Papa has said - he's lost two and his team selection, personnel, subs.....were a major part of that. Along with the players failure to turn up. Now we might have had a tough run up to the UEFA Cup Final but if your players can't get up for a once in a lifetime match then there is something far wrong. He and his players take the blame for Sunday but i don't accept he got it wrong/could have done more getting to the UEFA final... We had a chance near the end that would have equalised againsta far superiour team. I have no idea what personal changes you would make that would have won us the cup but it's all monday morning quaterback stuff anyway....... He managed to getb the players motivated to get these finals and has won plenty of finals in the past so his motivation techniques are not under question to me I like how you worded that. Getting to the final, all credit. Actually AT the final, was poor. No HE shouldnt shoulder all the blame, the players were awful that day as well Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Muff 245 Posted March 18, 2009 Share Posted March 18, 2009 I blame both the management and players - Wally signs the players, picks the team - some of his decisions are awful. The players performance in some of those matches were a disgrace. If you can't get up for playing in a Cup Final then you don't deserve to be at Rangers. I wasn't interested in the UEFA Cup run but Wally got his tactics right through-out the competition - he just got it wrong in the final, some of his decisions were baffling. Anyway I'd rather not talk about the UEFA Cup Final anymore - the day was a disaster from when I heard the team news onwards. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
blueballss 2,972 Posted March 18, 2009 Share Posted March 18, 2009 For one, it should never have taken him until 72 minutes to make a substitution when it was clear things weren't working. Then with less than 5 minutes to go he plays the McCulloch trump card Tactical genius indeed. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
GeneralCartmanLee 313 Posted March 18, 2009 Share Posted March 18, 2009 I blame both the management and players - Wally signs the players, picks the team - some of his decisions are awful. The players performance in some of those matches were a disgrace. If you can't get up for playing in a Cup Final then you don't deserve to be at Rangers. I wasn't interested in the UEFA Cup run but Wally got his tactics right through-out the competition - he just got it wrong in the final, some of his decisions were baffling. Anyway I'd rather not talk about the UEFA Cup Final anymore - the day was a disaster from when I heard the team news onwards. Why not ? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Muff 245 Posted March 18, 2009 Share Posted March 18, 2009 I blame both the management and players - Wally signs the players, picks the team - some of his decisions are awful. The players performance in some of those matches were a disgrace. If you can't get up for playing in a Cup Final then you don't deserve to be at Rangers. I wasn't interested in the UEFA Cup run but Wally got his tactics right through-out the competition - he just got it wrong in the final, some of his decisions were baffling. Anyway I'd rather not talk about the UEFA Cup Final anymore - the day was a disaster from when I heard the team news onwards. Why not ? Can't really be bothered getting into this again. After getting humped from Lyon I just wanted to concentrate on the league and I knew from day one that any run in the UEFA Cup would affect our title run. I still payed for both home and away tickets for every UEFA Cup game including the final but I gave them away. Some for free, others at face value. I was in Manchester but I didn't use my ticket. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jardy 0 Posted March 18, 2009 Share Posted March 18, 2009 I blame both the management and players - Wally signs the players, picks the team - some of his decisions are awful. The players performance in some of those matches were a disgrace. If you can't get up for playing in a Cup Final then you don't deserve to be at Rangers. I wasn't interested in the UEFA Cup run but Wally got his tactics right through-out the competition - he just got it wrong in the final, some of his decisions were baffling. Anyway I'd rather not talk about the UEFA Cup Final anymore - the day was a disaster from when I heard the team news onwards. Why not ? Can't really be bothered getting into this again. After getting humped from Lyon I just wanted to concentrate on the league and I knew from day one that any run in the UEFA Cup would affect our title run. I still payed for both home and away tickets for every UEFA Cup game including the final but I gave them away. Some for free, others at face value. I was in Manchester but I didn't use my ticket. i didn't realise that muff, you would of had to stabbed me to get my ticket that day. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
GeneralCartmanLee 313 Posted March 18, 2009 Share Posted March 18, 2009 I blame both the management and players - Wally signs the players, picks the team - some of his decisions are awful. The players performance in some of those matches were a disgrace. If you can't get up for playing in a Cup Final then you don't deserve to be at Rangers. I wasn't interested in the UEFA Cup run but Wally got his tactics right through-out the competition - he just got it wrong in the final, some of his decisions were baffling. Anyway I'd rather not talk about the UEFA Cup Final anymore - the day was a disaster from when I heard the team news onwards. Why not ? Can't really be bothered getting into this again. After getting humped from Lyon I just wanted to concentrate on the league and I knew from day one that any run in the UEFA Cup would affect our title run. I still payed for both home and away tickets for every UEFA Cup game including the final but I gave them away. Some for free, others at face value. I was in Manchester but I didn't use my ticket. Bizzare, no point going into it because it sounds like i would never understand it Each to there own i guess mate...... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
outlaw69uk 123 Posted March 18, 2009 Share Posted March 18, 2009 I blame both the management and players - Wally signs the players, picks the team - some of his decisions are awful. The players performance in some of those matches were a disgrace. If you can't get up for playing in a Cup Final then you don't deserve to be at Rangers. I wasn't interested in the UEFA Cup run but Wally got his tactics right through-out the competition - he just got it wrong in the final, some of his decisions were baffling. Anyway I'd rather not talk about the UEFA Cup Final anymore - the day was a disaster from when I heard the team news onwards. I disagree, I think, in that scenario, you shouldnt be a footballer! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
AGM_72 3,650 Posted March 18, 2009 Share Posted March 18, 2009 I don't think we've had out and out wingers and full backs playing in any of these games, that can only be damaging when you rely so heavily, on wingers especially, in a 4-5-1 line up and thats the line up he's gone with in these cup finals. This makes the team disjointed and unbalanced and the strikers don't get provided with as many opportunities or with the support that they need. Though, in fairness, Davis makes a damn good fist of it when he's stuck out on the right. His assist tally does say that. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
simplythebest 11,453 Posted March 18, 2009 Share Posted March 18, 2009 For me Walter Smith's negative tactics have cost us three trophies so far. 2008 Scottish Premier League Title, 2008 UEFA Cup, 2009 Scottish League Cup and it could well be 2009 Scottish Premier League title as well. We may not have won the UEFA Cup anyway, personally i was only really interested in the league and the fact that an exam the next day prevented me from going to Manchester despite having a ticket didn't help my interest. But going into a European final playing for penalties was not the right way to go about things, it's not even the 4-5-1 i'm talking about here as you can find a very good balance between defence and attack with that formation but it was all about defence in the final. I think it was always inevitable that players like Arshavin would cut us open eventually and when that did happen he left changing things far too late. Wasn't it something like Novo on 77 minutes, McCulloch on 80 minutes and Boyd on 87 minutes? It was a great chance to win a European trophy but Smith bottled it. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Edward 0 Posted March 18, 2009 Share Posted March 18, 2009 What do we think of the above record? I was thinking about this last night during the adverts before Gran Torino and I couldn't help but think that in the four finals, we've only sort of turned up for one of them. Celtic and Zenit beat us with ease, we were very fortunate that Kris Boyd helped us to beat a plucky United side and we managed to squeeze past QOTS after losing a two-goal lead. Again, I think there's a motivation problem somewhere with our performances in cup finals, but can anyone else produce a good reason why we've been so 'poor' in the big games? Or if I'm being over-critical, then prove me otherwise Zenit - We were quite simply playing against a far better team, full of highly paid international class players. We stuck to our original game plan which took us to that stage of the tournament and we did as well as we could have done imo. Dundee Utd - Dundee Utd have proven on their day they are more than a match for both sides of the old firm. I think we showed real character to come from behind against them, and then showed great bottle to win on penalties. QOS - It was right at the end of the season and the boys were absolutely on their knees. QOS were obviously a decent side as they had previously knocked Aberdeen out the competition. We took a good 2 goal lead but then naturally appeared to tire and QOS came back into it. Once again though we showed terrific character to go on and get the winning goal. The heads could have went down after conceding a 2 goal goal lead so all credit to the lads. Celtic - During the 90 mins it was a very even game with chances at both ends. The 2 biggest saves during the 90 mins were from Boruc. Mcgregor wasn't really troubled once. The first goal was always going to be crucial and that proved to be the case. Once again i'd say your being over critical. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
rfc_no1fan 13 Posted March 18, 2009 Share Posted March 18, 2009 I'm not surprised with Zenit GCL, not in the slightest. I felt the system was right, the personnel not as good but still, on the whole, the technical aspects were right. I just didn't think the players were up for the fight and that irked me. I'm a big advocate of the 4-5-1, just maybe not in the style that Smith plays. I think that’s worse than saying they got it wrong tactically. Did you actually watch our run to the final ?…these guys didn’t want it you say….jesus, the only reason we were there is because of how much these guys wanted it...…..now that is a truly bizarre comment I'm saying they didn't turn up for the final. This thread isn't about the runs to the final, I'm looking at the finals themselves. We were lionhearted in our run to the UEFA Cup Final, but we just didn't seem to have that hunger or belief when we actually got there. Why do you think that was ? I'd love to know mate. Just in the same way that, mentally at least, the players didn't turn up for Dundee Utd (Boyd apart) or Celtic on Sunday. It's an answer that I'm looking for with this thread in all honesty. They froze, bottled it, shat it.... Put it whatever way you like. Zenit's team were full of winners, we only had 2-3 and that wasnt enough Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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