I know you’re essentially acknowledging this fact so I’m just piggy backing on your post to air a thought, but when did we actually strengthen sufficiently in a January window? The only one that springs to mind is Sanchez in the last promotion season, but he was a holding midfielder who came on at 60 minutes to see games out, so was really just the icing on the cake. That sort of player would be useless to us now, which highlights just how severe the degradation of the squad has been since then. You might be able to argue Kamara was a positive last January, but what we really needed was a CB and we got an inter-company transfer instead, ignoring every other CB on the planet in favour of one we owned, then of course we signed Kalu and Kayemebe who were utterly pointless signings and didn’t help out situation in any way shape or form. In our previous relegation season we signed Pusseto in some sort of accounting dodge.
Sorry I should have clarified this a bit more. Gino has been the owner in name, but Pozzo Snr was very close to everything. He kind of released the shackles late 2018 when the whole Udinese fan base were really loosing their sh*t about where his loyalty lay and its feels no coincidence that things started to go haywire shortly after
Those were actually different seasons, sadly - Niang under Wally in 2017 alongside the ultimate 'what could have been' Zarate, Cucho (almost never to be seen again), Cleverley and, of course, Valber Huerta, and then Geri in 2018 on loan initially under Javi, along with Lukebakio, Dahlberg and Didier Ndong
I used to have a season ticket and go to 10+ away games a year. I stopped going when we rehired Quique, and I genuinely feel so much better for it. And so does my wallet.
It's been a problem with us for a while. Our closest was Sierralta, who's injured. It's a reason why this game was so obviously destined to be difficult for us.
The lowlight of the night for me amongst so many to choose from was some idiot 2 rows back from me hurling abuse at Louza for feigning injury . At his own player ?
Didn't post anything last night, no point. We're all as frustrated and fed up as each other I'd imagine. Feared the worst when I saw the starting lineup, 5th and 6th choice CB's, one making his league debut and a centre midfielder playing RB, for a team dodgy at the back at the best of times, we were always going to be up against it. The most annoying thing for me was the difference in aggression and energy in both teams play. When there's such a stark contrast in something so fundamental, it's embarrassing. We absolutely crumbled, no one even had the balls to make a tackle, or clatter someone. Make a statement. We just shrunk in confidence and cowered away from any responsibility or fight and got exactly what we deserved. The funniest thing about all this is, as sh1te and inconsistent as we have been so far this season, we're only 7 points off top spot. Any other year you'd reckon we'd be double that. Norwich lost at home. Burnley drew at Birmingham. Sheff Utd lost to bottom side Coventry. So as much of shambles as its been, its not entirely unrecoverable. Granted losing Louza is a massive blow, and we really need to get Hause/Cathcart/Sierrallta back fit to avoid fielding a back 4 like that again. Massive game on Sunday, and I understand why people would be nervous given that display, but what a game to change it all again. We've been a different team from week to week so fcuk knows what team will show up on Saturday, but you'd like to think Bilic will have torn into them after that and we'll see a reaction. If there's not, all bets are off for how nasty it could get.
I know we have a crap defence anyway, but let's face it when a team is missing as many defenders as we are atm they are going to be very unlikely to win, so let's give the guys a bit of a break
If they give 100% and don't look visibly scared and like they're trying to hide, then yes, we'll give the guys a bit of a break.
Yes, you'd like to think so, but the trouble is that for all his qualities Bilic (or any other Watford manager) ultimately has no authority over the players because they know that he is the one that will get sacked after a few defeats, not them. They have nothing to fear from him.
I have stopped going to away games, and thought long and hard about renewing this season, I eventually caved thinking that in the championship we would at least be competitive..... How f****g wrong I was, Unless they turn this around big style this could be my last season as a STH. (which really hurts me to say, but I can't put any more money, time and effort into a clueless owner and a crapawful squad)
I suspect that anything less than play offs and season tickets sales will drop dramatically next season.
Not even bothered about playoffs, I just want to see some heart, some passion, some self pride, some genuine effort and way less crab football, from weak players simply going through the motions. It's not really that much to ask. Is it? At the moment they look more empassioned about the woke, virtue signalling, hypocritical, knee crap than about the actual match.
I can take us being crap. I just can’t support a club that has disrespectfully awful and self-harming decision making and where the players don’t care enough to give 100%. To me rehiring Quique was a complete reveal that Gino/ Dux etc. had absolutely no clue, and are chancers trying to see what sticks. From that moment, I knew that without accidentally stumbling onto a miracle solution, that we'd be on a course of slow, systemic decline. I actually think there is still a chance we could get promoted this year, crazy as it seems. The league is awful, we have a decent manager, some good players and we can probably get some loanees this Christmas which fill the gaps in our squad. But even if we did, who cares? It doesn't stop what now a clear and obvious trajectory. The good loanees will go, our CBs will be another year older. We'll still buy players that are cheap for a reason, whether injury prone, old or have a bad attitude, and put them on long term contracts. Eventually the rot will be all consuming. You can't be a successful football club, or even a decent football club, if you refuse to fill obvious gaps in the side. You can't bring in an exciting 18 year old South American and assume that it will cover for having centre backs who can't compete in the division. Nor can you bring in a young manager for a long term project, refuse to sign quality players that fit their system and then sack them weeks later. It's like Waiting for Godot. Absurdist, repetitive and ultimately pointless.
Bang on, I always thought their end game was Wally and they wanted to trade up to him over time believing he would be the ultimate answer. Beyond that for me showed they didn’t really have a clue. Silva was a good appointment, but it was purely off the back of his short spell with Hull, then Javi was also a good appointment but was very reactionary, I seem to recall the logic was he was good at getting points off of big teams in Spain so was seen as the solution to the problem we were facing at the time. That’s the point it became about simply reacting to an immediate problem rather than any long term thinking, then as you say with QSF, that’s when it really showed they didn’t really have a clue.
More interesting stuff, thanks for the education. My outsiders concern for Millwall's future is that your reputation will see the middle-class types that are moving to the likes of Deptford and New Cross more likely to take their kids to Charlton than Millwall (it's not that much further away than the Den is it?). Maybe you think you don't want those types of fan anyway, but even Rotherhithe and South Bermondsey will be posh one day.
I'm afraid that none of that will happen whilst out transfer policy is to sign players to suit Pozzo and Bayat, not Watford. Players are brought in either as band aids (usually old and cheap), dodgy Mogi deals (overpriced, crap but allow money to be funnelled to Benelux) or as investments (possibly talented and with potential but not suited to Watford needs). It's no surprise our team is dysfunctional.
lol. I mean, this isn’t accurate at all. It’s almost like you really really wanted to have a good old moan about taking a visual stand against prejudice for 5 seconds before kick off and shoehorned it into a decent enough post about the effort levels of the team. #bringbackboris
