Great to see you SOPs, I'd have to concur with Don, Wiz et al regarding airmanship etc, it's part of the wider issue that can be traced back in part to the explosive growth of European locos and their cadet programmes. Far different to the old legacy programmes where cadets were taught on the job by experienced and capable trainers. Nowadays cadet programmes are still able to produce a standard product but they are flawed in the sense that a large number of second and third generation of airline pilots have no real world experience beyond a set of SOPs and operating manuals, throw into the mix that many of the trainers are mere facsimiles themselves of those cadet programmes and you have more potential for significant gaps in knowledge and the ability to show resilience.
Recently I asked a chap I was flying with if he would consider landing with no autobrake selected, he told me it was "outside SOPs" so he wouldn't consider it unless it was an emergency, I asked him about disconnecting the AP above 10k if it wasn't doing what you wanted it to do, again "outside of SOPs" so only in an emergency, I asked him how did he plan his descent, "VNAV" does it for me.
At every turn his answer was that automation and SOPs would solve his problems for him as well as protect him from fleet etc.
For me that is ostensibly the result of the policies and blame mindset that currently exists, it's also why people don't move thrust levers, why they don't anticipate and identify small problems before they become bigger ones and it's why people make preventable mistakes as they have neither the capacity or skills to have a plan B..C..or even D sometimes stored away for when the proverbial hits the fan.
In the case of what's currently happening, based on the available information the Air Seychelles crew displayed far more resilience than the EK crew.