Season so far…

[johnstone]

Now that we have gone through one round of games it's probably a good barometer on the team's progress.

 

From my own point of view, I really think this is genuinely an exciting time for the club. The football we are playing is exceptional and like nothing I could ever have dreamed of seeing at Fir Park. 

 

I was chatting to a few mates, and I actually think the only game we have actually deserved to lose all season was the St Mirren semi final. If you look back at the league fixtures:

 

Motherwell v Rangers - 1-1 - draw probably a fair result but could have nicked it. 

St Mirren 0 v 0 Motherwell - fair result

Hearts 3 v 3 Motherwell -- should have won

Motherwell 2- 2 Killie - Should have won

Dundee 1 - 1 Motherwell - Should have won

Motherwell 2- 0 Aberdeen - Justified

Celtic 3 - 2 Motherwell - Draw probably would have been a fair result

Motherwell 1 - 2 Falkirk - Game of two halfs- draw might have been a fair result.

Livingston 1 - 2 - Fair result

Motherwell 2 - 0 Dundee Utd - Fair result

Aberdeen 1 - 1 Motherwell - Probably should have won it. 

Killie 1 - 3 Motherwell - Pumped them

Motherwell 2 - 0 Hibs - Total domination.

 

Every one of these games we have not been dominated by anyone and the really good thing about this is the trend we are moving towards - scoring goals and then controlling games, reducing the draws.

 

Exciting times.

[weeyin]

Given the radical overhaul of the way we were playing, I expected a lot more defeats early in the season, with the rewards not starting to come until after Christmas.

I have been pleasantly surprised how quickly we were able to pick up points. The fact we were disappointed not to win some of the first few matches speaks volumes about the progress.

It's been great to watch us develop, and the exciting thing is have barely started.

Who knew letting footballers play football could be so entertaining?

 

[Inflato]

I came across this analysis on X by @johnwalker_1986 and was going to share on the Hibs thread, but this seems a more appropriate place given it shows how much of a transformation has taken place in such a short period of time. Frankly, it's astonishing;

<

Motherwell: Dominating Without the Ball

A lot of praise has rightly went to Motherwell & Jens Berthel Askou for their work "With the Ball" but last night was a clinic on how to control a game "Without the Ball".

Hibs Analysis
> Wing-Backs High & Wide to Deliver
> Hanley "Limited" Distribution Quality
> Barlaser Key in Building Through Lines

Motherwell Press:
> Leave Hanley Spare
> Front 2 Pressing Outside CB's
> Just Blocking Barlaser
> Triggers to Jump on Hanley After Bushiri Pass inside
> Frustrates Wing-Backs to Drop Deeper & Deeper

Just Intelligence & Scanning
Elijah Just is one of the signings of the season, he has absolutely everything but last night his intelligence and technical ability without the ball was exceptional:
> Regularity of Scanning for Barlaser
> Blocks Barlaser & Creates Chances to Jump
> Wins Penalty & Scores off the Back of that work

Work-Rate When Broken
Albeit happened only once in the 30mins the game was 11v11, it helps when players work-rate is at such a high intensity when Hibs did break through, Motherwell got back behind the ball & forced an error.

Best Coached Side in the Country Currently 👌

>

[fizoxy]

It's hard not to get carried away with the start to the season, but one thing that makes this a bit different is that a lot of the optimism and general good feeling isn't just tied to results. As pissed off as most of us were about the semi final, we all moved on rather quickly - and that's just weird. 

JBA will definitely be on the radar of much bigger clubs with the way he's transformed this team in such a short time. 

We have seen managers like Shaun Maloney, who has the exact same ethos (and worked with our assistant) struggle to get that across, and you wonder if someone like him could drop in once JBA goes and continue the work - not advocating him in particular, just wondering if JBA has set the foundation.. Im also interested in whether other scottish clubs will try the same. 

I also wonder if more ambitious managers will be open to coming to Scotland, and the smaller clubs at that, to build theor stock. 

Wimmer should get dome credit for kicking this off as well, and bringing us Fadinger at the very least.

[fizoxy]

Oh, and Elijah Just is awesome. Hes another that I don't think will be with us long, but as per the post above, he's such an intelligent player, and his work rate is excellent. 

[texanwellfan]

One of our highlighted issues was lack of goals. I’d say at the moment that’s probably not the case. We’ve scored more than Celtic or Rangers. Only teams scoring more are hearts and hibs, 29,23 and us on 22 goals. One player leading goal scorer and another in the top 5. 
only failed to score in one league game V St Mirren 0-0 in Paisley. 

[weeyin]

It's defintely progressing in phases.

Against Clyde, in our opener (on plastic) you could see we were trying something new, but felt like the players only met 10 minutes before kickoff.

Early in the season, we were dominating without making too many chances.

Then we started scoring a few more, but lacked the ability to close out the game.

Now we are scoring a reasonable amount and not doing too badly in seeing out the match.

I imagine what is being worked on now is adding another goal or two in second half performances to kill off games sooner.

The main thing is we can see the progress, and that has kept most of the fans (and the players) on board with "The Project".

 

[wellfan]

4 hours ago, fizoxy said:

It's hard not to get carried away with the start to the season, but one thing that makes this a bit different is that a lot of the optimism and general good feeling isn't just tied to results. As pissed off as most of us were about the semi final, we all moved on rather quickly - and that's just weird. 

JBA will definitely be on the radar of much bigger clubs with the way he's transformed this team in such a short time. 

We have seen managers like Shaun Maloney, who has the exact same ethos (and worked with our assistant) struggle to get that across, and you wonder if someone like him could drop in once JBA goes and continue the work - not advocating him in particular, just wondering if JBA has set the foundation.. Im also interested in whether other scottish clubs will try the same. 

I also wonder if more ambitious managers will be open to coming to Scotland, and the smaller clubs at that, to build theor stock. 

Wimmer should get dome credit for kicking this off as well, and bringing us Fadinger at the very least.

Once JBA gets poached, Max Rogers is our next manager. Not Maloney. He was only there last night to learn from the master.

[wellfan]

1 hour ago, texanwellfan said:

One of our highlighted issues was lack of goals. I’d say at the moment that’s probably not the case. We’ve scored more than Celtic or Rangers. Only teams scoring more are hearts and hibs, 29,23 and us on 22 goals. One player leading goal scorer and another in the top 5. 
only failed to score in one league game V St Mirren 0-0 in Paisley. 

Just imagine what our current goal tally would be if we had a number 9 capable of scoring more than just penalties. 

[texanwellfan]

Indeed! More goals wouldn’t hurt us. 

[Ya Bezzer!]

I think one of the important things going forward now is how other teams adapt to our style of play when we start playing them for the second or third time in the season.

We've been a novelty up to now but usually it's harder to maintain a successful style over a full season when the opposition has experience against us and starts looking to negate our set up and tactics.  

I'd also say that we are heavily dependent on Maswanhise for goals and generally getting behind the defensive line.  

 

[weeyin]

We're the Pound Shop Man City and Maswanhise is our Erling Haaland.

[wellfan]

10 minutes ago, Ya Bezzer! said:

I think one of the important things going forward now is how other teams adapt to our style of play when we start playing them for the second or third time in the season.

We've been a novelty up to now but usually it's harder to maintain a successful style over a full season when the opposition has experience against us and starts looking to negate our set up and tactics.  

I'd also say that we are heavily dependent on Maswanhise for goals and generally getting behind the defensive line.  

 

Last night showed that JBA can adapt and keep other managers on their toes (knees).