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Mauricio Pochettino - Sacked
- Thread starter DubaiSpur
- Start date
milo
Jack L. Jones
More apt Confucius quotes for the conversation seem to be:
"The will to win, the desire to succeed, the urge to reach your full potential… these are the keys that will unlock the door to personal excellence. "
"The expectations of life depend upon diligence; the mechanic that would perfect his work must first sharpen his tools."
"Success depends upon previous preparation, and without such preparation there is sure to be failure."
This one stood out too:
"Real knowledge is to know the extent of one's ignorance."
I don't know what his views were on the merits of a back three as opposed to a back four though.
Did he ever opine on practicing corners?
milo
Jack L. Jones
This is the closest that I can find
“Looking at small advantages prevents great affairs from being accomplished.”
Pirate55
The Last Man Standing 17/18
While I don't disagree with what Poch says here, he is still saying that winning consistently in the PL and Champions League HELPS to create a winning mentality, in and of itself alone, is not sufficient to ACHIEVE a winning mentality.
Question: Do we currently have a winning mentality? I would answer that we do not yet have that.
Let's look at the evidence. In three big games this season, we really froze. Arsenal, City and Leicester away, we were poor and deserved to lose. Even games where we performed well, United away (lost) , Liverpool away (drew), Chelsea home (lost) and Juve home (lost) - we didn't win. We still don't have the killer instinct to take us over the line in the biggest games.
Look at previous seasons in games we really needed a winning mentality to win clutch games - Chelsea in League Cup final (lost), Chelsea in FA Cup Semis (lost), Chelsea in battle of the Bridge (drew when we had to win) Wet Spam ( lost away ) Leicester in their Champions season when we lost at home in the very definition of a six pointer - even losses to Southampton at home and Saudi Sportswashing Machine away when we needed a single point from either of those games to finish second.
Yes we have a great team who play some absolutely breathtaking football at times. Yes, we are capable of some outstanding one-off results - like Pool at home and Real and Borrusia in the Champions League. Yes, we are improving year on year under Poch. Yes, going unbeaten at home last season was a great achievement. Poch has undoubtedly done a brilliant job.
However, do we yet have a truly winning mentality or are we more like flat track bullies like Graham Hick in cricket or Colin Montgomery, widely regarded as the best golfer of his generation not to win a Major. Bournemouth was the first time this season in the PL that we have come from a goal down to win - not exactly the best credentials to demonstrate a winning mentality.
We have two really massive games coming up - Chelsea away and Man U in the FA Cup semi finals. These games will go a long way to showing if we do indeed have a winning mentality. The ultimate step to demonstrate we have actually ACHIEVED a winning mentality ( rather than just wishfully talk about it ) will of course be to win a major trophy. After all, success breeds success. Let's all hope it isn't that far away.
Gazza Dazzla
Chris Perry
So basically unless we win every game we haven’t got a winning mentality?
Utd at home, followed by Pool away, followed by Arsenal at home, followed by Juve away, were all massive games, no? Or doesn’t it count for some reason?
Utd at home, followed by Pool away, followed by Arsenal at home, followed by Juve away, were all massive games, no? Or doesn’t it count for some reason?
Spur of the moment
Frederic Kanoute
In order to achieve that winning mentality it helps to have the very best players. No one doubts you need money to achieve that. Lorry loads of it.
If you cannot afford to 'buy' the top trophies you have no choice but to graft and build really hard over a long period of time.
That is what we are doing, no?
If you cannot afford to 'buy' the top trophies you have no choice but to graft and build really hard over a long period of time.
That is what we are doing, no?
All you've done is name games that whilst important dont decisively count for anything. Like Pirate says the FA Cup semi will show whether we are getting there, we've been to a lot of semis and we need that killer instinct to become true winners and get over the line of winning a trophy. Funny how you mention Juventus away, in which whilst playing ridiculously well we only got a draw - what 'winners' would see that as some sort of accomplishment? And yet when it really matters, when the heat was really on in the second leg Juventus won - they are a prime example of a team with a winning mentality. That isn't knocking our team, simply that we arent truly there yet....
Gazza Dazzla
Chris Perry
They’re only not important now because we didn’t lose them, had we lost them it would have been mentioned along with the random Leicester, Emirates Marketing Project, Arsenal away games that apparently prove we haven’t got the winning mentality.
By the way I’m not saying we do have a winning mentality now. I’m just responding to Pirate where he listed a random list of games (basically any we have lost so far) to prove a lack of Winning mentality. I picked a succession of games where leading up to it it was widely described as defining our season and we got great results in. Why is that not proof of a “good” or “improving” mentality, but Leicester away at some random point not even half way through the season some how more proof to you?
Direct question to you Harr, why does Leicester, Arsenal and City at random times in the first half of the season count for more than the more recent run of Utd, Pool, Arse and Juve?
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nayimfromthehalfwayline
Luka Modric
I think those games, if they went against us, would have effectively killed our top4 and CL hopes in the space of 10-12 days.
It was essential to get results in them, and we did - in some style as well.
We showed exactly the sort of mentality we apparently dont have.
And lets be honest, in years gone by we wouldnt have got the results either, which may show the development of some sort of mentality...
It was essential to get results in them, and we did - in some style as well.
We showed exactly the sort of mentality we apparently dont have.
And lets be honest, in years gone by we wouldnt have got the results either, which may show the development of some sort of mentality...
A point i tried to make a week or so back - unless you win the league there will always be a game that comes around that officially puts you out of the reckoning, 2-2 Chelsea battle of the bridge game as a case in point - what about the games leading up to that game which we won to keep us in the hunt until that point?
Mentality just seems to be a catch all reason to blame on any defeat that comes our way - something easy to pin it all on rather the multitude of reasons that cause a game to go one way or the other. Someone was trying to claim a league cup game v West Ham as an example that proved our weak mentality yet i dont think for a second all the games in knockout football we have won get counted as signs of a strong mentality - we have been in two semi finals and a final under Poch so far so there's a good few one off games there we have won.
What about our CL group games this season? Was in a bit of a group of death so any dropped points would be costly - needing to win away Dortmund to top the group and avoid the group winners in the next round and all the other permutations and pressures each game brings... all that is forgotten because we lost to Juventus - had we beaten them does thst mean they are the ones who don't have a winning mentality?
Seems to me a few posters are confusing the act of winning with the mentality required to do so
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Bedfordspurs
Martin Peters
I’d argue Bournemouth away (who hadn’t lost many games to that point this year) , losing and then losing your talisman striker as a big result .... a key result even as it out is up a place in the league and that’s where we have struggled before
Fair play mate, I think we are developing a winning mentality I just dont think we currently have it which I think is what Pirate is suggesting and sounds like you comply with. The games you mention dont count for more/less - those important games we have won show we are developing the winning mentality but in games that have REALLY mattered, real definitive games we have mostly come up just short - to date we have just lacked that SOMETHING. And this has been mostly against teams who have more experience and more of that desired mentality so its not a criticism, and we need these experiences to improve. We are close, but getting to an FA Cup Final and hopefully going one better from there will really begin to develop this mentality. I honestly think we need a trophy for our players to really believe, they must hear the narrative about no trophies as much as anyone and putting that to bed would really kick start the desired 'winning mentality'....
Robspur12
John Lacy
I do understand where those posters wanting a trophy to show the team has a "winning mentality" are coming from. The problem with using something like the cup to define this mentality is if we beat Utd in the semi, a pretty big feat in itself, but don't beat Chelsea in the final do we have a winning mentality or not?
Arsenal have won this Cup repeatedly but continue to struggle in both the league and Europe against any quality opposition. By no stretch of the imagination has the cup developed a winning mentality for them.
I have said it before winning the cup is for the fans. Progress in the league is the true measure of a winning mentality. Poch had it spot on.
Arsenal have won this Cup repeatedly but continue to struggle in both the league and Europe against any quality opposition. By no stretch of the imagination has the cup developed a winning mentality for them.
I have said it before winning the cup is for the fans. Progress in the league is the true measure of a winning mentality. Poch had it spot on.
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No one said a trophy alone equates to a winning mentality. But ultimately you need to actually win something to back it up surely otherwise why on earth would the word ‘win’ be in there? This team is developing far more of the mentioned mentality than the team that won the League cup ever did. We are doing it the right way by gradually getting there - but the end game is to win things otherwise you can’t have any serious claims to having a winning mentality, I would have thought that much is obvious....
milo
Jack L. Jones
I think that it's relative to your position. A newly promoted club who manage to stay up against the odds could display more winning mentality than richly resourced treble winners.
I think this debate is going to get bogged down in pendantry soon, if it hasn't already, however id like to question that logic above as to me what you're describing there is winning experience rather than mentality and i think there's a distinct difference between the two - i think there must be plenty of players out there that have the same mentality to win that the worlds best players also possess but are just held back because of a ceiling on their actual sporting ability - conversely on the other side you have players who are part of successful sides but perhaps coast by on ability alone and don't show the same mentality that the 'lesser' players do.