TOPIC: Keith's rotation system

A lot of negativity towards it. I think it's working really well, we have a squad of players that are being kept reasonably happy because they are playing matches and all no doubt feeling part of what's happening. It keeps them fresh when called upon especially when their is two matches a week and keeps them on their toes regarding putting in a good performance. A lot of these players are new and Keith will be learning more and more about them and he will be learning more about the players who are still here from before his time as his tactics and formation has changed from the rot we saw last season.
As time goes on he will know what is his best team and will use it more no doubt. As someone else pointed out who was at Brisbane road last night the team was set up perfectly last night to absorb and counter and it worked a treat. I hope Newport was just a blip as we were the better side with more chances and maybe a bit of a hangover from Anfield.

I don't mind the rotation to be honest. The 'tombola' crap is getting a bit boring to be honest.

The problem on Saturday wasn't so much the number of changes (and lack of consistency), it was the actual team selection he fielded that cost us that game. I couldn't care less if we made 11 changes each game if it was getting results.

cufcdeano wrote:
Totally agree, especially as he's gone into detail as to how and why he picks different players for different matches - saying how last night we needed quick players, so not a night for Brough, Rigg and Thompson. There's quite clearly a pretty structured thought process to the decisions and why they're made.

Let's face it, if Curle picked the same players every week, people would be complaining that he's isolating certain players and creating a divide in the squad.

No matter what he does, people will still have a pop at him.

Bang on there crunch. I'd guess it'd be some of the same people that are having a constant pop at him re rotation.

cufcdeano wrote:
I think you should add tombola to the swear filter.

Thought for the day - had we seen off York as we should have, and had we seen off Newport as we should have - 21 points, second on GD stuttering in the right direction.
(notice how I avoided the use of the word IF - big word)

It's certainly better to have a squad of 24 players or whatever it is that is rotated depending on the opposition, than to have what we've had in the last few years where we've had 12 Carlisle players and then a plethora of one month loanees filling gaps left, right and centre.

Agree that he seems to have a clear game plan going in to each match.

To be fair to him at York, we were cruising until Balanta had that complete mind poo, i know he brought him on but you cant account for individual errors.

Against York you could say he picked his weakest, definitely his most inexperienced line up, and were punished. Saying that Asamoah and Osei both should have scored to rescue at least a point.

Amazing as well as how Newport played on saturday, we have played twice now against liverpool/Orient in the past 3 games. Without Jabo, are we going to be a better side away from home than when teams look to defend against us?

I imagine much of the criticism about squad rotation is from people who know nowt about football, and/or don't go to the games. One of the frequent 'argument's I see is that "we're not a Premiership side so shouldn't be rotated as such" - well, it's for that reason that he needed to rotate after the Liverpool game. We are a league 2 team with league 2 fitness levels and some of those lads were dead on their feet after Wednesday, would have been madness to play them against Newport.

As far as the Newport result went, losing Ibehre completely jiggered KC's game plan of having a target man with a pacey player behind him - with Wyke being out there is no natural replacement and Degsy and Gilliead are too similar in style to each other. This meant we were trying to thread the ball through a mass of Newport players instead of being able to get down the wing with someone to aim at. Unfortunately, the dismal performances from Thompson and Brough meant that even if we had, those crosses would have been sadly lacking. The only time we looked like scoring was when Raynes went up front and started winning headers, unfortunately by then it was too little too late.

cufcdeano wrote: The selection may have seen us through had jabo not been injured so early in the match that we were looking comfortable. I'm sure he will have learned from Saturday and so too the players. I must say I didn't see a lot wrong with the team selection bearing in mind we had played 120 mins on the Wednesday and all the mental exhaustion that would have came from it.

I would prefer to see less rotation amongst the defenders, as I believe that they need to play together to develop an understanding of how to perform as a defensive unit. I also wouldn't rotate a striker who is banging goals in, as you need him to keep on a roll. I have no problem with other rotation though... providing the players coming in are of the required standard... I think that is part of the issue at the moment... the likes of Brough, Thompson,. Balanta and Osei just aren't up to the required standard.

I have sympathy for Curle on the Newport game... he absolutely had to make changes as a number of players were out on their feet at the Liverpool game and could not possibly have recovered in time. The team picked was strong enough to beat Newport but they simply did not perform... but that isn't unusual after a big cup game. Curle was between a rock and a hard place that game... I'm sure he would prefer to have better back up options to rotate in... but he hasn't.

chesterviabothel wrote:
And those that say 'so-and-so who went to another club and did better but wasn't given a chance at carlisle'

And if we'd lost at Hartlepool (which we could have done) or at home to Barnet (which we probably should have done), or the first half last night hadn't gone our way when they were on top then we'd be back near the relegation zone. Not being negative , but I'm a big believer in getting out of a season exactly what you deserve. We've been the 8th best team in the league so far this season - no better, no worse.

And even after last night , the defence is still the poorest in the division!

Champions95 wrote:
Nah we've just conceded more goals than anyone else

It's winning me over (wonder why I'm in a good mood at the moment....?).
Think having 17/18 players who are getting regular games has to be good for fitness, morale, continuity.
Inevitably 1 or 2 of these players will struggle and seem to be a weak link but if so they will eventually be sidelined.
Seems much more satisfactory than millions of loan signings coming and going.
There are a couple of players featured recently who don't look good enough but otherwise we are looking quite strong.

Talisman wrote:
All the players are full-time, so we'll train just as much as any other professional club, it's only really when you get into non-league and part time players that the fitness levels will be wildly different.

14 games played so far in 53 days - the most in our division (maybe the country, apart from WHUFC)
8 on the road
4 games have been against higher division opponents
2 have gone to extra time
1 to penalties
With all this, 2 of our strikers injured, and Troy's ongoing situation, rotating makes perfect sense.
I'm still concerned that we haven't kept a clean sheet, and frankly I think we'll be nearer the bottom than the top, but it beats being where we were this time last year.

I wasn't a great fan of Curle but I've been quite impressed recently.

He's assembled a half decent squad and given where we were when he took over I don't think he could have done much more.

Let's face it he can talk as much sh1te as he likes but if we're picking up points nobody cares!

DeckchairBlue wrote:
Theres a lot more to fitness levels than just training full time

i would be surprised to see a difference in fitness levels between premiershit and league 2. I don't see why someone lower down with the skill set can't run around as much either.

my only complaint these days about the rotation of the squad is we need to make sure that we have an effective wide player on at least one side. Brough and Thompson on at the same time doesn't offer anything. That for me is the reason why we did so bad against Newport. but as Deano said that was bad team selection. If Mcqueen is on the right we can use Brough on the left for balance to the team and let Mcqueen scare the defenders which may even free up space for Brough to contribute.

cyberslob wrote: things have moved on since the 1970's though cyber slob... The fitness facilities that. Premiership clubs have are amazing compared to Carlisle... A lot of the work is on recovery. We don't have oxygen tanks to speed recovery, for example. Sports science really matters at the top level now... And that is about facilities and know how... Both of which we struggle for as a L2 club.premier league clubs spend millions on conditioning, recovery, sports phsycology, dieticians etc. now. We can get players fit... But not necessarily in peak condition as often or as quickly after a game.

Your points about the wing backs are bang on though.