Danny Wilson - Learn from your success
Article by Chris HawdenFollow e-Barnsley on Twitter!
It is often said in life that we learn from our mistakes.
Football managers are no different, after suffering a poor result, they often elude to the phrase, we will learn from our mistakes and aim to put things right.
You have said you will learn from your mistakes, you don't appear to be.
Well I would like to ask Danny Wilson have you learned from your success.
Make no mistake about it, Danny is my hero, the journey he took Barnsley Football Club on in his first tenure as Manager was scintillating in reality a miracle, a small town club that had never before played the beautiful game in the top flight, was catapulted by Danny right into the thick of the premier league limelight.
This was all years ago now, the football world has moved on and with it, Barnsley FC.
Barnsley have fallen from grace into the Championship, which has been our home for many a season.
We now find ourselves in league 1.
Since Danny departed the reds, I had dreamed of his return, we have had no manager ever that has built a side capable of what his promotion side achieved.
Many managers have come and gone.
In 2013 my dream came true, Danny rejoined the reds and unlike a few eternal optimists I realised that the job this time round would be a rebuild job and that it would likely be in league 1.
So what of the job he has done so far.
I have to say, to press, I feel he has been disappointing, he appears to have ignored his first tenure in charge and has adopted a different footballing philosophy to the one that he applied the first time round.
In his first stint as manager, Barnsley had adopted a Total Football philosophy, It was initially put into practise by Viv Anderson and after Viv left to become assistant manager to Brian Robson at Middlesbrough Danny was placed in charge as manager and adopted the system that had been put in place.
He used a tried and tested 5-3-2 formula which switched to 4-3-3 in times of despair.
One touch football played at pace, with players making all sorts of effective runs that cut open many defences, it was a delight to watch.
I hoped that he would bring back the samba beat to Oakwell.
Well apparently not, over the years he seems to have changed his approach to a philosophy that appears to be picked up out of recent failures rather than past success.
Danny's team nowadays resemble a team set up by coco the clown rather than the old vibrant Danny Wilson.
I'm not sure, what his selection aims to achieve any longer, it seems a more standard mechanical formula and a formula that just isn't working.
Danny you must revisit your past in particular your successful times, look at what you did well, consider what you do now, don't be frightened to change, go back to your original values and let's have the samba style back.
The football we currently play lacks all the flair you used to adopt, off the ball running was a feature of your old teams, this seems to have fallen by the wayside.
You also had some tough wise old heads, in midfield and central defence , you appear to have discounted these type of players merely for young guns.
Where are we now?
Danny now appears to favour a 4-4-2 system.
The problem for me, we have signed many players in the summer without giving adequate thought to where each player will play and how they will fit together as a team.
It also seems that there has been a lack of consideration to the physical nature of league 1.
We have a few nice players, but is nice what's required at our level.
We have signed players based on youthfulness , without considering their physical attributes or the balance each player would add to the team.
I'll try and clarify my point, we have signed four decent strikers, I feel they are all capable of scoring goals, however play them along side each other and it doesn't quite work.
The team needs a big physical striker, to be an Ariel threat and to hold the ball up.
Such a striker would create panic and leave second balls that our chosen strikers can feed off.
Leroy Lita, is simply lost without such a player.
If the striker holds the ball up and brings the midfield into play, it will ease the pressure at the back and stop the wave after wave of opposition attacks.
I seem to mention this every week , we need a tenacious ,gritty, tough midfield general for the midfield holding role, we seem to be over run in midfield every week because we don't have this type of player.
Our defence concedes goals because they are not protected by such a man.
There are some decent defenders in the Barnsley side but the midfield does not do its job.
The game against Fleetwood once again highlighted the lack of a midfield general.
We were overrun in midfield and again we lacked a physical striker to hold up the ball.
We let the home team dominate play and in fairness, whilst we showed an attacking presence in the second half, only bad finishing by Fleetwood allowed us the luck required to get a point.
In respect of Port Vale, it was like a re run of the Fleetwood game, except the result was different.
Port Vale won 2 -1
The same failings were evident and I'm beginning to sound like a Brocken record.
We were over run in midfield and again had no striker to hold the ball up.
They scored from a superb free kick in the first half, we managed to get back into it with a penalty kick.
Port Vale missed many more chances including a second half penalty, but there relentless pressure paid off and they scored late in the game to claim the points.
I mentioned last week that Reece Brown was being tortured by the pace of the MK winger, sounds the same first half against Vale.
If a problem persists as it is, do something about it.
Listen Danny, add some strength and experience to the midfield and up top, or we are in for a relegation battle.
Do it now for the sake of our team and our town.
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