A merged topic.. new title - what needs to change @Sheffield Steelers

[Jayboy]

I will just leave these here with you to read and judge what the Steelers management have to say on the recent form, wrote before 2 more losses to Manchester and Coventry obviously..

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[Sttrinian84]

Be interesting to read next weeks programme….

[smbmetal]

Not really sure what to make of Tony’s article there. I do now understand that the club is run and I quote “first and foremost as a business to make money”.

I hope he understands that if we don’t win trophies his business model of making profit will diminish quite quickly as 6,000 + will not turn out every week and buy 50/50’s etc.

Whilst there will be many that enjoy the match night experience of which there is completely nothing wrong with, that alone cannot maintain financial success as the results and flat performances on the ice will eventually stop some of the on ice fans from going which they may have kids for example but stop going cause the on ice performances aren’t good enough, so could see it as a waste of money so won’t buy their usual 4 tickets etc.

Tony has set a precedent with the sacking of coaches who I say again, were more successful than Aaron has been in the same amount of time frame.

So, the long and short of it……we can finish bottom of the league as long as the Steelers are stable and making a profit? That’s my personal interpretation of his article there.

This then leads me to think that Tony Smith is one of the big reasons why the Steelers have lost their in your face extremely successful never say die identity of old.

[paul johnston]

Does Tony think you can't win trophies and be successful financially? Success always brings in more fans and more money.
Is he suggesting here that our budget for players is less than other teams?

[mark]

Oh the irony of Simms calling out people for making horrible social media posts, coming from the person who has driven more fans away from the club with his own posts than anyone else has. I'm calling BS from DS.

[greeny]

After watching the steelers for 25yrs now, all i can say is i miss the old days, good old physical hockey with big characters, i know times change but i really do find all this fast past, non contact, no character hockey dull, i say what needs to change is get a team of players who are not afraid to throw their body about and make others accountable if they just plod along. Even if they lose it will be entertaining

[Sully]

Whilst I appreciate that the game has changed somewhat. I feel the club as a whole has lost its identity. I feel that we have lost that arrogance, that grit. We are no longer feared. If you beat our team, you’d have to die doing it. I feel that’s gone. Even with illness or injuries we’d be in your face.

This lot should be shown the Matsos and Blaizer teams who played with 10 and 12 skaters and still f ound a way to win.

[smbmetal]

Whilst I appreciate that the game has changed somewhat. I feel the club as a whole has lost its identity. I feel that we have lost that arrogance, that grit. We are no longer feared. If you beat our team, you’d have to die doing it. I feel that’s gone. Even with illness or injuries we’d be in your face.

This lot should be shown the Matsos and Blaizer teams who played with 10 and 12 skaters and still f ound a way to win.

I agree, but I now understand why from reading Tony's article earlier in this thread why.......

The club is run "First and foremost as a business to make money". So we've changed our identity (IMO) to be non-controversial and plain vanilla.

Interestingly enough, the business I work at wouldn't tolerate certain individuals with their social media posts from official accounts......guess there must be different rules for the Steelers.

[Doom]

The big concern for me is how this season is following exactly the same pattern as last season.

We start the season well playing a high pace game with plenty of energy and skill and put ourselves in a very good position going into the new year.

Then for some reason which nobody seems to be able to explain, the quality of our game dips considerably and we fall away badly with little prospect of any silverware.

If it was down to injuries I could make a case for Fox, but it isn't, we've been very lucky with injuries this season and will have had far fewer games than Belfast playing an import down.

The issue is either in the coaching style or player recruitment (older players getting fatigued in the latter half of the season?), but whatever it is the coach should take full responsibility and worryingly he doesn't seem to understand the reason why it's happened again.

I'll only be buying a play-off weekend ticket after we've qualified, because based on previous experience with Fox I don't have any confidence we'll make it through. The midweek loss to Fife in the Challenge Cup felt very much like the loss to Dundee in last seasons playoffs. We initially found ourselves in a bit of a hole, dug ourselves out and got into a good position, then fell apart in the 3rd. I don't see it as a coincidence.

I don't buy the arguments that the club, coach or players aren't committed to success, I think they probably all want to be successful and I would suggest Tony has put the budget in place to be successful, it's just something isn't working and I can only think it's the coaching (recruitment and tactics).

Regards

Doom

[paul johnston]

The big concern for me is how this season is following exactly the same pattern as last season.

We start the season well playing a high pace game with plenty of energy and skill and put ourselves in a very good position going into the new year.

Then for some reason which nobody seems to be able to explain, the quality of our game dips considerably and we fall away badly with little prospect of any silverware.

If it was down to injuries I could make a case for Fox, but it isn't, we've been very lucky with injuries this season and will have had far fewer games than Belfast playing an import down.

The issue is either in the coaching style or player recruitment (older players getting fatigued in the latter half of the season?), but whatever it is the coach should take full responsibility and worryingly he doesn't seem to understand the reason why it's happened again.

I'll only be buying a play-off weekend ticket after we've qualified, because based on previous experience with Fox I don't have any confidence we'll make it through. The midweek loss to Fife in the Challenge Cup felt very much like the loss to Dundee in last seasons playoffs. We initially found ourselves in a bit of a hole, dug ourselves out and got into a good position, then fell apart in the 3rd. I don't see it as a coincidence.

I don't buy the arguments that the club, coach or players aren't committed to success, I think they probably all want to be successful and I would suggest Tony has put the budget in place to be successful, it's just something isn't working and I can only think it's the coaching (recruitment and tactics).

Regards

Doom

Absolutely.
Have we improved/learned from previous seasons over his tenure?
I'd say we've stood still/gone backwards.
As you say been lucky with injury-i think we've barely played any games short benched and have frequently come up against teams barely playing three line hockey. And we have the fitness coach that others don't have.
Struggled with filling our centres roles again.
Got slightly younger with addition of Neumann and Raska-then for me wrong choice to move Raska on.
Haven't again got a big goal scorer or two. Everyone here and there has chipped in with goals but not a real out and our scorer in sight. Is it right that none of our top 9 have scored in last five games-thats astonishing if so.
Systems, line selections, PP, lack of character, leadership, grit and physicality. Its all lacking from what I have seen.