Antonio Conte (30 Viewers)
- Thread starter Dostoevsky
- Start date
- Tags goat coach
watch us bleed out a draw against portugal, and austria beating iceland.
Great job at the Euros so far, but his rotation is still cancerous. Word is no Insigne or SES today, two players who need to be judged now in the only meaningless game left to see whether or not they can come on and do something in the later stages. Instead it's Motta, Wing back Florenzi, Ogbonna and friends. God forbid he needs to turn to players like Insigne with zero practice in a big game that Italy happen to be trailing.
I am confused. Are the people blaming Conte doing so because (1) he set his team up to play for a win instead of a draw or (2) he set his team up for a draw but instead got a win?
If its (1) then you disagree with him about the objectives of the game (he wants 3 points you want 1) but you recognize that he succeeded at getting the result he wanted to get. In other words, his tactics worked given the objectives that he had set. He just happens to have had the wrong objective in your view.
If its (2) then you agree with him about the objective of the game, where both of you want a draw), but you are criticizing his tactics for ending up with a win instead of the planned draw.
To those who think (1) I would say
(a) that it is very unusual to expect a coach to tell his team to not win a match i.e. not try their best. That seems as a motivational disaster and the wrong attitude to plant in your players. Winning is the default objective for any big team for this reason
(b) Very often playing for a draw will end in a narrow defeat and then you are totally screwed and rightfully criticized for losing a game you are fully capable of winning.
(c) this scenario admits that Conte succeeded at winning which was his target. That match is another testament to his coaching skill. Must be uncomfortable to haters.
To those who think (2) I would say that this reasoning is clearly false.
Conte was not playing for a draw. If he was, then Eder and the team in general would not have tried to score till the very end and would have just wasted time. They obviously did not do that. If Eder went against Conte's instructions Italy could have always intentionally scored an own goal and made it a draw in the last second. They did not because they were obviously trying to win.
I know that the usual suspects have been switching between (1) and (2) trying to criticize Conte for even trying win AND saying that he was really trying to draw but was incompetent enough to accidentally win. You know who you are.
If its (1) then you disagree with him about the objectives of the game (he wants 3 points you want 1) but you recognize that he succeeded at getting the result he wanted to get. In other words, his tactics worked given the objectives that he had set. He just happens to have had the wrong objective in your view.
If its (2) then you agree with him about the objective of the game, where both of you want a draw), but you are criticizing his tactics for ending up with a win instead of the planned draw.
To those who think (1) I would say
(a) that it is very unusual to expect a coach to tell his team to not win a match i.e. not try their best. That seems as a motivational disaster and the wrong attitude to plant in your players. Winning is the default objective for any big team for this reason
(b) Very often playing for a draw will end in a narrow defeat and then you are totally screwed and rightfully criticized for losing a game you are fully capable of winning.
(c) this scenario admits that Conte succeeded at winning which was his target. That match is another testament to his coaching skill. Must be uncomfortable to haters.
To those who think (2) I would say that this reasoning is clearly false.
Conte was not playing for a draw. If he was, then Eder and the team in general would not have tried to score till the very end and would have just wasted time. They obviously did not do that. If Eder went against Conte's instructions Italy could have always intentionally scored an own goal and made it a draw in the last second. They did not because they were obviously trying to win.
I know that the usual suspects have been switching between (1) and (2) trying to criticize Conte for even trying win AND saying that he was really trying to draw but was incompetent enough to accidentally win. You know who you are.
I don't think I have seen anyone claim that Conte was trying to get a draw. Everyone agrees that Conte wanted to win and got the win (option 1).
I agree with the fact that playing for 0-0 from the first minute is bound to go wrong. But - as I wrote earlier - when you're in the second half against a toothless Swedish team with zero shots on goal, it would have been preferable to reevaluate and change to a more defensive approach. That would mean not substituting a hungry Zaza on, for example. Do I blame him for winning? No. But I do think changing to a more defensive approach would have been better.
I agree with the fact that playing for 0-0 from the first minute is bound to go wrong. But - as I wrote earlier - when you're in the second half against a toothless Swedish team with zero shots on goal, it would have been preferable to reevaluate and change to a more defensive approach. That would mean not substituting a hungry Zaza on, for example. Do I blame him for winning? No. But I do think changing to a more defensive approach would have been better.
