Ronald Koeman Watch

I recently read, I think it was in Voetbal International, that van der Vaart, Wesley Sneijder and Ibrahimovitch said that when they were at Ajax under Koeman, they had conflicts with him, but now they know that with him they learned the most.
He is also very much respected by the Feyenoord players.
So given the choice between the opinion of posters in this forum and that of top players that played under his rule it is a no brainer.

 

If we are going to play the "according to" game then I can play along:

Wise decision by Koeman to leave Feyenoord. He has reached his ceiling. Now the players will be able to reach their ceiling with new coach.

— Raymond Verheijen (@raymondverheije) February 1, 2014

Na 2 succesvolle seizoenen gooit Koeman het ineens over andere boeg. Gevolg: slechtste competitiestart ooit, blessures & zwakke 2e helften.

— Raymond Verheijen (@raymondverheije) February 28, 2014

Today old-fashion Feyenoord coach Ronald Koeman was questioned about stats proving his team to be unfit & his pre-historic training methods.

— Raymond Verheijen (@raymondverheije) February 28, 2014

Na de publiekelijke schop onder zijn reet een paar weken geleden, krijgt een getergde Ronald Koeman Feyenoord ineens wel aan het voetballen.

— Raymond Verheijen (@raymondverheije) March 30, 2014

Als Koeman eerder uit zijn luie stoel was gekomen in plaats van naar spelers te wijzen, had Feyenoord misschien wel kampioen kunnen worden.

— Raymond Verheijen (@raymondverheije) March 30, 2014

(Would still like to read those Vaart, Sneijder and Ibra quotes in their right context though)

I rather value the opinion of somebody who has worked with Rijkaard and Hiddink than just some posters on this forum ....


Anyway if we are allowed to think ourselves again, then I would say that I am amazed how happy Feyenoord is with their second placing, their no European group games, their lack of domestic silverware like the KNVB Cup.

Koeman was not bothered with European football, unlike other teams in Eredivisie. Koeman made sure of that. Feyenoord conceded a lot of goals from standard situation not that long ago, not sure if that is still true since Kongolo being added to the first 11. Another interesting (late?) choice. Was that only due to injury, or did he not bother to make room the biggest Feyenoord talent when he was up to speed again? What about the long period of time that Feyenoord conceded excessive many goals from standard situations. Being able to defend those comes down to organisation and Koeman was not able to straighten that out. Feyenoord had a very bad start of the season, basically giving away the number 1 spot within the first 4 or 5 games of Eredivisie. His team also more or less stayed the same, others had to deal with many mutations. He played afraid against Ajax in the Arena for the Cup IIRC, while 2 seasons ago they had Ajax up the ropes with more daring football in that 1-1. Why being so scared? Why letting Feyenoord play afraid, if even FC Zwolle is able to show gusto and balls to play the game and bring it? How can a proud Feyenoord fan defend that?

Contrary to what some Dutch media say, Feyenoord could have won the Eredivisie. Should at least have won something of a KNVB Cup as they had no Europa as energy consumer and focus distracter. If Feyenoord rather celebrate no Europa, their second place in Eredivisie and no silverware, then I think there is a gap between what I saw as a possible this season and what people in Rotterdam settled for.

 

Who is Verheijen when it comes to coaching top players? I value him highly when it comes to the physical part of the game, but not where it comes to the coaching part (= technically and tactically). I get from your reaction that you take my post very personal and sensitive.
I am of the opinion we should have won the league hands down already at the winterstop, but the difference between you and me is , that I blame the players and you blame the coach.
Especially your analysis of the Ajax matches is somewhat off the road, when you accuse him of being a coward. The fact is that, and if you can look back the matches you can and if you are willing to, see that Koeman was trying to order the defense players to move up closer to the mid field, but they didnot. But you have to be willing to see it.
I donot hear you about FdBoer, who last and this season only found the winning combination of players when he was forced by injuries to change his (points wasting) first choice. In that respect I fully agree with JC14, that he is a fine field coach, but there should be another one to manage the team.
You have to distinguish between what the coach wants and the way the players execute it. Pepe's tactics were fine against Real, but it came down to the way it was done by the players and they simply didnot do their job fast enough. So in your way of reasoning Pepe sucks, where I put the blame on the pitch with the players. You really believe that Koeman, a world class defender in his time, didnot train the defense in the set pieces defending? Come on, it is the way the defenders executed it that is the fault, not Koeman.

 

Point noted, but if you rate him highly on the physical part of the job then it is interesting to read this Tweet again:

Na 2 succesvolle seizoenen gooit Koeman het ineens over andere boeg. Gevolg: slechtste competitiestart ooit, blessures & zwakke 2e helften.

— Raymond Verheijen (@raymondverheije) February 28, 2014

His general point is that Koeman changed the workload of pre season, intensified it and as a result of that ended up in a very bad start of the competition. Your general point is that not winning the league is the players fault, while this guy you rate on this part of the job explains a key mistake on Koeman's behalf. You state that you believe it is the players, but if the players are guided in a way that it messes with their condition then it may look like it is them to blame, but it was how they were prepared by a certain coach.

Yes. I see Koeman as a threat to Dutch football and how the media have led people to believe that he got the maximum out of this group, while he should have won at least something in his 3 years is beyond me. Besides that, I do not like pragmatists and opportunistic coaches. I like coaches that invest, think long term, try to play football over the ground, rather than long ball it to the tall guy up front and play a tool like Immers behind him. It's a crime against a little gem of a player like Clasie, who is about triangulation and capable of more complex football. There is much more football in Feyenoord than what Koeman got out of it. The away match against Ajax 2 years ago was a game that opened my eyes of what could be and Koeman has been nothing but a disappointment since then in this respect. That pissed be off.

That could be an excuse for somebody who lost the dressing room or is new to the club and has yet failed to ingrain his philosophy. That is not the case with Koeman. Plus he maintained many of the same players of the year before and was not occupied by Europa in mid week like Ajax was.

Also this is the problem with opportunistic coaches. They do one time this and another time that. Of course that results in imperfect execution. That is the longer term result of the choices of a coach as well.

I have been critical of Frank de Boer and more than on 1 occasion. For example after the Milan game in the bold part:

Koeman figured out Kongolo was a gem after Mathijsen got injured. What took him so long to acknowledge the big talent he had running around in his squad. Had Mathijsen not been injured, Kongolo could have ended up on a loan to Utrecht. What a joke. Talking about figuring things out and getting saved by an injury.

My most recent comments regarding Frank de Boer are after winning the Eredivisie. His fourth. 4 in a row and their fans are critical. How many has Koeman won with Feyenoord? If you really think Frank should settle for being a field trainer, as being poor in other aspects of the job, then imo that reflects really bad on Koeman. He lost 3 times this season from Frank who had a really poor squad at his disposal. Any proud Feyenoord fan would not say he has better material. Even looking at an almost undefeated episode of Feyenoord running from the end of Januari until now we see 1 loss and that is to this field trainer Frank. Looked like the players were fine, but Koeman was just out coaches by a field trainer. It's not about ordering players to run forward, it is about getting them to do so. The gap is incompetency when that team is 3 years under your control.

I am not sure Bayern has better players than Real Madrid. Why is it down to execution of the players, rather than the other team (players) just being better? Maybe Pep's tactic played right into the cards of the strengths of the players of Real Madrid who are quick and excellent on the counter. Maybe the Bayern players are less comfortable in the tight spaces as his Barca players of the past. One could question if some Bayern players like Robben do not like to have a bit more space to run into and benefit from a turnover themselves. Bayern also had some injuries.

Another thing is that Pep won the league. Maybe wins the Pokal. It begs the question if they were entitled to win the CL and not a Madrid. Koeman won jack sh*t 3 years in a row while you think they should have won the title by winter. I think Feyenoord should have won silverware as well, certainly in his 3 years. Even FC Zwolle got silverware and they do not deliver half a dozen of players to Oranje. However Koeman is not to blame for anything and leaves Rotterdam as a hero. I think I have a different view and demand a little more from a coach in given situation.

 

Couldn't agree more.

 

I'm also not a big fan of the trainer Koeman (not the player) He is overrated by the media, especially by the three guys at VI. While I applaud him for promoting young talents to the first team, but I have seen little to no progress in the youngsters under Koeman, I think they learned more in the few weeks they were at the NT with van Gaal than the whole year at Feynoord with Ronald. I also hate how he talked about his players in the media and I will never forgive him for the "alle ballen op Pelle" tactic.. That was traumatic.

 

you cannot be serious about the start of the season blaming it on the physical way Koeman started the season. It was giving away goals to the opponent in a stupid way and missing bucket loads of chances in the 2 of the opening games that did cost us dearly. Had nothing to do with condition at all. One of the 3 games wasnot a loss that was a blame to any one, but I forgot which one it was.

Now you are getting funny. When you inherit a team that ended 10th place the season before and manage them to the second place in his 1st season, then loose the backbone of the team's experienced players (the axis Vlaar, El Ahmadi, Bakkal and Guidetti) and still get the team in a shared second place in points, only to have PSV take the CL spot because of I think 1 or 2 goals less with replacement players that had no first team experience at all and an average age that was about the youngest of the Eredivisie. Only this year was a disappointment to me, but not with the blame with the coach as I already explained why.
You state that Immers is a tool, and I get from it that that is a negative remark, as I donot know the meaning in this respect. But if he is a tool, it is quite remarkable that he creates chances for the front line and for him self in abundance. He isnot technically gifted, but if that is your standard for putting away a player as useless, then I wish you luck in watching Eredivisie players, as they are all around you. But what matters is that he has the gift to be constantly in the place where he gets a scoring opportunity, even so much that he would be top scorer of the league dwarfing Finbogasson's total. You cannot have no clue about football and get that many chances. The total amount of chances makes it unlikely that it is pure luck that he gets there. But his lack of technical skills I think made him miss them.

Sorry, but you are ranting nonsense, he hasnot got the same team running 3 years. And about Mathijsen and Kongolo. Do you really believe the rubbish you are shitting here? That he didnot see that Kongolo has qualities? You must be like lady Neeskens, that also liked to make an own reality, as Koeman in public has voiced his high expectations of him long before Mathijssen was injured. In fact than he even said that he and the other youngster, I forgot his name Berg/Beek or so are going to be the top defender combo for Feyenoord. In this Forum Mathijssen often was ridiculed and Koeman scorced for fielding him. But reality is that in all three publications that rate players ( Voetbal International, AD Sportwereld and Telesport) he in about 95% of the ratings was in positive territory. So you expect a coach to even more unbalance a team in experience matters when the older player is just playing well?

Getting them to do so means that you have the means to swap players without jeaperdizing the total quality. That isnot the case with Feyenoord. Ajax has a deepre selection that makes it easier to swap players.

Sorry, but I donot look at criticizing one game. You place Frank de Boer above Koeman, while he as I already stated he only found the right combination of players that were going to win a long streak of matches after he was forced to do so by injuries and not by intelligence and insight about the right combination of players and the qualities of them in relation to each other for two seasons in a row. So when you blast Koeman for playing Kongolo only after an injury,which is ony one player I donot hear you about that glaring fact about FdB who had to replace a few players and then started to have an unbeaten streak that lead to the title twice.

Bayern just wasnot quick enough, like they were earlier in the season to block the counter by winning back the ball fast. Maybe they were too tired to do so, but this tactic of Masdrid wouldnot have worked against Bayern a few months ago.

 

Well, if you remember my posts about that, you would know. I was amazed by how many chances the Ajax opponents got ( I only talk about real goal opportunities) and how low their conversion rate was. Remeber Cambuur, Vitesse twice etc.
On the other hand Feyenoord gave a lot less opportunities, but then these dumbheads manage to get a conversion rate of 40% or higher.
So Ajax won/drew matches they should have lost, while Feyenoord lost matches we should have won.
But the fact remains we lost points against Ajax we shouldnot have, so in the face to face confrontation Ajax was smarter/more efficient. So all in all from that point of view Ajax is the deserved winner of the title.

 

A certain game was lost and nobody was to blame? Goals in other games only fell as a result of stupid (individual?) errors and players missed chances they should have scored. So it was not only something of defense, also attack is to blame. If players look like sheep, not being sharp in attack and defense you don't think there is something wrong in the way they were prepped? 3 lost games in a row and that NEC game was also a nice eyeopener in terms of players not being able to react properly to a turnover. I just read that differently. An expert you rate on the physical part of the coaching job disagrees with you also.

On another note, I still would like to see the Ibra, Vaart and Sneijder quotes in their right context .... not seen them yet.

It is funny to expect Feyenoord to win some silverware in 3 years time? Even Ron Jans in his first season at FC Zwolle did that. Besides football is a reaction sport. Not only to other teams, also to past seasons. Getting 10th in a previous season only creates more reason and momentum to respond the following season. It also made sure that Koeman was not side tracked by Europa. Other teams fighting in the top have been. Europe not dragging down the energy an focus levels for the weekend has helped Koeman a lot with his results in Eredivisie until this day. You have to factor this in.

Anyway if we are not allowed to expect from Koeman to do what Ron Jans with FC Zwolle (in the fashion he did vs Ajax) with lesser material (though Mokotjo is a ge , then there are always my other 2 points about this coach in the paragraph you quoted but did not touch on for some reason.

The fact that he is an opportunistic coach, who resided to hoof football. Especially after that Ajax match in the Arena 2 years ago and with Oranje players like Clasie at his disposal. That part is what really turned me off from Koeman. Not getting the promise of football out of Feyenoord that it held for me.

I also remember Koeman changing his approach again after that bad starting period this season. Maybe we have not zoomed into that one enough yet. If a coach plays type A kind of football at the start and goes back to type B kind of football after the bad results, then why is it not his mistake as well that his original chosen course did not work? Of course execution is poor when he had to switch again, but it is his job they can do it and he is responsible for the estimation if his team is able to pull it off in the first place. He knew his players and was not new to club and competition. Quite clearly he has failed in that estimation.

Tool is used here as technically handicapped. His presence is a further enrollment of anti football. What I have seen from him, especially mid season made my stomach turn. He is a player that takes the football out of a team.

That first sentence is basically a cop out for not having to address the fact that Koeman lost to de Boer a whooping 3 times in a row this season, a field trainer according to you, while FC Zwolle won 5-1 from Ajax in the KNVB beker with far more daring game play I might add. Even if you want to make the point that there were significant mutations from season 1 to 2, last season this was not the case and Koeman had more than enough time to stamp his authority on the team to get it playing in the way he wanted. Blaming everything on the players and absolving the coach from the way the team executed a plan is not credible.

My Kongolo example must have struck a nerve as in this paragraph you became a bit abusive in your wording towards me. It's rich to go after the Boer for getting things right after an injury while Koeman got a more stable Feyenoord after playing Kongolo after a Mathijsen injury. He is not only better currently than Mathijsen, but also than BMI, who is actually not that good on the left back position. So that was a possibility for Kongolo to play as well. He was almost off to Utrecht on a loan. I think that is funny.

The Kongolo example makes your remark towards de Boer a case of a pot calling the kettle black. However Frank de Boer is a field trainer according to you and Koeman is a coach who did nothing wrong somehow. It's amazing how Ajax fans are critical towards their coach after 4 championships and you have it not in you to place even a little bit of responsibility on Koeman's plate for not becoming champ. Feyenoord should have been champ by winter you say, but the coach played no role in that failure, it was all on the players. For me not a credible claim and just not true.

My quote containing critique on Frank de Boer was the bold part, me addressing a bad pattern with Frank concerning the DM position of Ajax. It was certainly not about a single game, though it triggered me to make the post. You probably did not click to expand the box scrolling to the bold part. If you do that you will actually see this:

So that is that.

I just say how I see things and I think your view of blameless Koeman is a bit rosy, while some Ajax fans think de Boer is just a field trainer after winning 4 championships in a row. Imagine Koeman winning 3 championships or even 1. We would not hear the end of the greatness of Koeman. Ajax does not have a Pelle scoring for fun. They could do with a good striker. They do not have a Clasie. Janmaat. Boëtius. Maybe Ajax has a bit more depth, but then again, had to play in Europa and FC Zwolle certainly has a less squad than Feyenoord and they trashed Ajax, while Feyenoord lost 3 times to Ajax this season. How a coach is then absolved from any blame and the opponent coach is a field trainer (compared to Koeman as well?), is all a bit rich to me.

 

DRB300, you are more and more copying miss Neeskens in the way you are arguing in creating your own reality like I think Koeman doesnot do anything wrong, or a coach must win something or he is a failure. You could apply that reasoning to Vitesse, PSV and FC Twente. Teams that have been on the number one spot this season. But for some reason you choose Koeman as your target and not one of the others.

So I stop here.

 

Neeskens used the straw man fallacy like here life depended on it. Summarizing somebody in a way that the poster did not intend to say and then running away with it.

Me having my own reality is actually the purpose of having a forum in the first place. Bringing together views and discussing them. You have yours and I have mine. No problem.

I did not choose Koeman as a target though, there was a post from you out of the blue in 2 threads how you rate the opinion of 3 top players over any poster here having a different view on Koeman. Obviously this is something you wanted to discuss or made known, not the other way.

You put all blame on the players for missing out on the title this season, I think Koeman had his fair share of responsibility in it. I also think he fell short in Europe and actually benefited from it for the eventual league position during his tenure at Feyenoord. My main point was his hoof football though. Not getting the football out of Feyenoord that would have been possible.

Koeman was celebrated in Rotterdam as a hero with his last game in de Kuip, so the fans must be pleased.

 

In my view as a person with a general dislike of both Ajax and Feyenoord. I rate Koeman over FDB for how they did this season. I don't think Feyenoord had much of an advantage in league play (if any)for not playing european football. Ajax played horribly in the CL then worse in the EL, but thats red bulls fault so it doesn't count...

Basically with how poor the Eredivisie is, I feel like this is argueing which member of the Jostiband has the most talent.

 

It seems that Luis Suarez has favourable quotes about Martin Jol and Adri Koster when he was at Ajax

 

Yeah well no wonder he loved his time in Amsterdam. Jol made him captain and built his entire gameplan around getting him the ball and letting him shoot as often as he wanted. Unfortunately that brought us a grand total of zero championships.

 

probably doesnt count because it was barça's fault...

 

He said Adri taught him a lot and that Jol gave him confidence.

You're starting to become a bit like "Neeskens"

 

Soooo, and what in my post is Neeskens like? Arenot those favourable quotes?

 

It's incompleteness and lack of relevance.

 

I predict it will end badly once more. He wants Tadic and Pelle.

According to Sky Sports Southampton and Twente have an agreement already.

VI claims that Southampton has made a €6 million bid for Pelle. Feyenoord wants double.