Every goal we have scored so far is worth more than 3.3 points - at this rate we could win the league, scoring less than 30 goals
The transformation in our defence - with players we had last season, up until last night - has been amazing. Credit to Vlad. But entertainment has been negligible. Vlad leaving out players not committed, which he's got away with so far do probably right, or Gino insisting on leaving them out in his role as super salesman? But one thing is clear, we either have the unluckiest or most inept medical staff since our last medical team.
Well I'm sure a lot of these 'injuries' we've suffered this season have been fake, but given it's a long standing thing since 2016, I'll go for ineptitude. God knows what happened there, because in our first season back in the Prem we hardly had any injuries whatsoever...
There’s a discussion to be had right about now on the old ‘results vs. entertainment’ debate. My own view is that fans of clubs like Spurs and West Ham have always fallen back on the ‘DNA’ of the way their teams like to play football as a comfort for them never winning anything. This was particularly acute in the old ‘1-0 to the Arsenal’ days which really irked them in a “I wouldn’t pay to watch that every week”. In the end fans want to see their team win above all else.
Not me. I always want to avoid relegation, but beyond that I'd rather see a good game that we lose than a bad one we win. The complicating factor is whether the **** we've been watching us building a platform for better stuff later.
Given the lack of attacking options currently available and having a 19 year old rookie as the leader of the attack you do have to wonder , exactly, what some people expected. Can anyone, with a straight face , say that any person at all would have done a better job as boss in the same circumstances?.
We wouldn’t have as many points, but would’ve scored more goals, maybe the games would’ve been more entertaining, but the moaning and complaining about the lack of investment in the defence would’ve been unbearable.
This discussion regularly comes up when comparisons are made between us and Burnley. They generally play awful football but can grind out wins, especially against us. It’s often seen as preference by many on here.
Maybe. But we can't say that for certain. With the players we have had available and the lack of firepower with the uncertainty with others we could easily have been on nil points no goals and sulky prima donnas deciding that they are too good for us . 7/10 for the start . Plenty of room for improvement tho. Which is a plus .
I’m agreeing with you, I don’t see how we could’ve done any better. Maybe we could’ve scored more goals, but that would’ve come at a cost, which the same people who are unhappy now would’ve also been unhappy about.
I think that as we have had NO actual strikers playing in most of our games so far, we've done remarkably well.
Yep, we have one of our creative players (Pedro) playing a a striker, and we’ve had Saar for part of one game. Playing Pedro as a striker means we lose his creativity for a forward to benefit from, but he’s not a forward himself to able to put chances away that aren’t actually being created because there is nobody to create them. Put him on the left Sarr on the right and then bring Hughes and Capoue (both players capable of creating chances) then put Gray or Perica upfront and I think we become a pretty formidable prospect. Worse case scenario none of those players make an impact (unlikely) and we carry on picking up 2 points per game.
The Burnley comparison is the fact that they are well run financially whereas we are the opposite. That said being frugal I imagine naturally leads to a more limited style of play I agree.
I think you need to separate the unhappiness with the owner with the unhappiness with the team. For me anyway, and I believe Moog and GD. I think the start is good, and with players to return I am hopeful if we can stay clear of injuries. I’ve found the games a hard watch (Luton apart) but given the upheaval the overall points haul is good and more importantly the standard of opposition seems pretty low. Team spirit also seems the best for a long time. However, I think think the owner has done a poor job, has severely damaged our finances and his model means we are a third priority behind player trading and Udinese. I really don’t like him and want him to leave. You will disagree completely of course which is fine. However I can still look objectively at the team and applaud how Ivic is doing while still agitating for the removal of the owner.
I don’t disagree with most of that. I would be happy for the owner to leave, if it was on the basis that they sold us to someone with a lot more money, or certainly a lot more money than them. Short of that, despite their shortcomings they still rank quite highly when compared to any of our previous owners, so no, I don’t want them to leave unconditionally.
The chances are we'd be much worse off without Gino than with, so I hope he stays. That's not to absolve him of mistakes, because he's made plenty. If we weren't bought by a billionaire (and frankly, why would we? Not like we're a sleeping giant with a massive stadium), I imagine we'd have similar fortunes to teams like Hull, Wigan, or Watford circa 2007-2012. Or worse, Bolton and Bury.
Remember back in about 2008/09 when Phil Gartside was lobbying hard with other EPL owners to transform the premier league into a competition without relegation - that ended well for them........
Its been so sterile with our cbs making regular surges into the oppo half. I thought Wilmots pass then run into the box was so negative on Friday night.
But with 30 points and only 3 goals conceded after 15 games we’d be on our way to promotion. Promoted with 92 points, ditch Vlad for an EPL oven ready coach and we can all happily moan about our football playing Burnley and Man City again.
I agree with most of this, but be careful what you wish for. Gino could be replaced by an asset-stripper, an agent of a foreign government, an oligarch or an American. The chances of the next owner being a genuine football fan are pretty small, as football fans rarely have the money needed to run a club nowadays.
An American? Oh my. When was the last time an English club won anything with them as owners? They can stay right out of our soccer-ball.
Was going to make a glib joke about us definitely not being about to lose out best winger and best striker midway through the season like 07-08, until I realised my maths was wrong and I couldn't read
I can't believe that after a year of defending calamity, a year of everyone moaning about recruiting centre backs and left backs, that people can't put up with a transition period where becoming hard to beat is the first priority.
I keep thinking about that season. It all began to fall apart with the 0-3 home defeat to WBA when Jay Demerit was badly injured. Actually we just scraped into the play-offs on GD from Wolves, but the less said about the semi-fianl with Hull City, the better.
You're forgetting that it was the owners who have seemingly made the excellent appointment in Vlad. Basically no one on here would have heard of him before, and other owners in a similar position might have gone for an uninspiring appointment such as Hughton. We all know they screwed up in their decision making last season, especially with skimping on signing a full-back, but this summer's dealings have not been close to as bad as many on here anticipated (not the declared "fire sale" at any rate).
You are most likely right; but we don't know for sure. Owning and running a football club is a chancy business at the best of times. Maybe things just went wrong - deals falling through at the last minute, people letting them down, etc. Maybe they had all sorts of good people lined up and it all just fell through. They are not like Everton; they have to work to a budget. But this doesn't fit the narrative on this forum.
I think you make a good point that gets lots in the anger and frustration of some forum members which is that some deals fall through or potential signings aren't interested in joining us. I have never once said get the Pozzos out or let's get rid of them because I have never run a football club or negotiated for players. The grass isn't necessarily greener on the other side. Yes, I have got frustrated at some positions on the pitch not being covered or some players being crap, but I used to do that with the previous owners as well and I am sure I weren't the only one back then. And 5 seasons in the top flight takes some doing with a club like ours. Let's hope for a swift return.
Running a football club with less money than everyone else requires the owners to make a constant serious of decisions that need to be more right than wrong, and for them to make better decisions than the opposition make. The collective minds of the forum with the added benefit of hindsight will always find it easier to point the bad decisions out, than it is to consistently make the right decisions every single time.
Yes. Right now given where we are they have given us a decent shot at promotion with this squad. I think they’ve done a decent job this summer give the constraints. Aside from the centre back lack of focus over several years my grumbles are more general. Large external debt, large expenses and long contracts given to ageing players which nobody else wants (see where we are now). Added to the poor communication and general klutz fashion they seem to run everything. My frustration is less what they are doing now, more what they have done in the past. Maybe they can turn round but in my perception they have a long road back.
The problem is they have bridged the financial gap by running up vast external debt. They have been running on the same budgets of 6 or 7 of our peers they are just using someone else’s money.
