I can’t see us getting any more than 36 points now. 3 wins, 3 draws and 6 defeats. The next two will be defeats for sure, so the last 10 will be 3 wins, 3 draws and 4 defeats. That sounds about right to me. This totally self-inflicted run we’re now on, where we’re giving away points for fun, will turn out to be the final nail. I said it after Villa. I got a feel it would lead to these results. This how football is, bad form, good form and then bad form again. Trouble is the good form was only 6 matches and the bad form has been 20. 36 points is unlikely going to be enough to stay up, nor should it. We’ve had a good run of 5 years at the top table but it’s all but over. Of course hope must exist, until mathematically impossible, but we all know how this story will end.
After the last 3 games it's hard to see where the 3 wins you predict will come from. A squad full of ability, but with no resolve at all.
So if your life depended on the right prediction and someone asked you today whether we’d stay up or go down what would your answer be? Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Maybe we could swap? - they might have some players who can stay fit or last 90 minutes over a period of time! Be cheap too..
Dear god I hope we have a bit more ambition than a past-it’s-sell-by Gray and Deeney 442. We’ll never get out of the championship again.
I experienced a whole raft of motions when Mariappa unaccountably scored an own goal, under absolutely no pressure against a side that had hardly threatened us all game. Shock, anger, disappointment and surprise. Having finally calmed down, just, the emotion I should not of experienced was surprise. This event has its cause in p*ss poor recruitment over an extended period of time. It was just an accident waiting to happen. I don’t know if we’re short of cash, if we just don’t want to buy defenders, or if this is just down to having an appalling recruitment department. If it’s the latter I suggest we take the same view there as we do with failing managers. I.e. get rid soonest.
I think that’s 17 points we’ve given up from leading positions. I’m not going to do the research, but I bet the majority of the goals that ended up costing us points came after 75 minutes. In my opinion, that comes down to a couple of failings. Firstly, I’d argue that our fitness levels just aren’t good enough. That comes in part from pre-season, which obviously didn’t prepare the players physically, or possibly even more importantly, mentally for the coming season. Secondly, and again related to mentality, we just seem to lack the required confidence and fight to survive. The Villa game was a huge setback, and we’ve clearly not recovered confidence-wise from that late defeat. When things are going against us, we don’t seem to have the collective will to dig in, and overcome it. Whatever happens over the next couple of weeks, Pearson has to find something to help this group of players regain the confidence we saw flowing through the side only a couple of weeks ago.
God been Brighton away twice now what a shocking away day. Soulless experience. Very average pubs, you have to get a train there and back, queuing for England, airport style security, heavy handed police, power trip stewards. They didn’t let my mate in with an under 23s ticket. 5 sniffer dogs. 9 Watford fans refused entry for drug offences. Padded seats, 0 atmosphere. Tell you what today the championship felt quite appealing. Give me Vicarage Rd any day of the week.
We are done, by the time we get our next 3 points everyone will have pulled away from us. Getting us relegated was more difficult than keeping us up, but somehow the club and players have managed it
The second half of that game was up there with the poorest I've seen us play this season. The lack of intensity, desire and urgency was painful to watch. Its difficult to avoid the fact that this feels deserved. We've not invested in our weaker areas, we've not addressed the core issues at the heart of the side and we're probably going down to the Championship. At this point I don't even feel angry or bitter about it. Just grimly resigned. I don't actually blame Pearson. He's done a decent job with a side that looks like it's fundamentally rotten mentally. If we do go down I actually think he's the best person to keep and take us back up again.
I said that "Football isn't just about points attained." and you need that explained. I would have thought that is something simplistic that my mother-in-law would ask, as she knows nothing about football but. OK, I'll humour you, and try and explain - and waste 5 minutes of my time. If all you do, Burnsy, is look to the number of points a team gets from a match or matches, without consideration for anything else, when making your judgement on how good teams are, then you are not taking the following into consideration; Luck, referee decisions, the timing of events during the match, the managerial changes during a period of time, the managerial decisions like the players picked, dropped, the tactic, the substitutions, injured players out, injured players coming back, attitude, new players coming in, the weather, the state of the pitch, how the opposition played and anything else that may affect how matches result. The list goes on and on. But still, you just carry on merely looking at the number of points and the table.
I’ve been to the last three Watford games at Brighton and they’ve all been poor. I like the quirkiness of the stadium but the feeling that 30,000 fans have been ‘bussed in’ to watch the match is odd. I also think there’s something about the design, certainly of the away end, that doesn’t lend itself to generating an atmosphere. I was directly behind the goal yesterday and there was plenty of singing but it always quickly fragmented into different versions and didn’t present itself as ‘loud and proud’ which is normally achieved at other venues. As for the game, we clearly had the superior players and were comfortable for the 25 minutes between our goal and half time. However the mindset in the second half seemed to be to not try anything too risky because we were leading, including no subs. Whether this came from the management we’ll never know, but it was asking for a panicky last 15 minutes when the home team were bound to push for an equaliser. It was so inevitable when it came. A big chance of a crucial win missed.
Pearson said after the Tranmere game (which involved mostly reserves, but is probably still indicative) that he thought there had been inadequate pre-season conditioning of the players.
I think this team is very weak mentally to begin with, both as individuals and a collective, no matter how many 'time to work' instagram posts Troy sprinkles amongst his partying, and I just don't think they're capable of recovering from the psychological hammer blow of entering a second period of declining/comedic/disastrous form; particularly given the nature of some of the results, Everton chief among them. We've regressed almost to our pre-Pearson level as of last night, and players clearly aren't putting in the same amount of work throughout as they did when he came in. It's pie in the sky, really, but our only obvious hope is that Sarr comes back, bursts onto the scene once again and drags the whole team up with him/shocks them out of the malaise again.
At the end of the season, we will be relegated on the number of points attained. I guess you will comfort yourself in the moral victory that we deserved more or something. It will still mean the same thing in practical terms though.
No. Now we still have to sit through the slog and disappointment of that inevitability unfolding. This side have shown themselves over an extended period as being incapable of the level of form needed to stay up. You choose to believe that somehow, deeply ingrained failings will disappear and that abilities which have been missing for a twelve month will suddenly manifest in them. It's completely unrealistic. Mathematically possible but massively improbable to the point of certainty.
Don't worry, those that have lived in the world of denial all season will come back on here at the end of the season and try to claim 'they told us so' like they always do. It's one of the reasons we're such a **** club.
What they will do is blame those who saw it coming. "You gave up so no wonder the multi millionaire players who have coaches, motivations, bonuses for survival and professional pride at stake failed to survive, because your failure to chant Yellow Army and wave some flags made them lose hope."
You've given up half way through every season since we've we were promoted. I expect you would love us to be relegated so you get the opportunity to say "I told you so", at least once in your life.
The parallel wasn't lost on me, but I don't want to upset @GoingDown as he's crucial to my bully gang.
Really? So irrelevant, that you all find the time to come on here to spout relentlessly negative and miserable posts? It's what some people live for.
I'm just venting. I am upset when we fail. I can't materially change outcomes, so I come on here and vent. It's kind of how it works. That I'm spot on, time and time again, is beside the point.
