Reasons To Be Cheerful About The Championship

The Premier League is grim.

Last four years have been far the least connected i've ever felt to the club. I actually had already decided if we'd stayed up I probably wouldn't renew my season ticket. 8-10 wins a season if we're lucky, constant thrashings and non contests with the bigger teams, general hate from the idiotic pundits who don't give a **** outside the big six, it's awful. No matter who we sign or how well we recruit, the gap is insurmountable, whoever our 'star' player is, will still look ******* dross in nearly half our games. Constant 'banter' from City fans from Bushey, or Arsenal fans from Manchester about how much better there club is than yours. It's honestly just soul destroying.

The reason I loved football was pretty much the match day experience, mostly away days, the Premier League has sucked the life out of that. Watching young players come through and make an impact - you can't afford to do that in the Prem. I want to be able to look at who we are playing on the Saturday and actually think theres a point in me travelling up to watch it. The novelty of being on MOTD and being relevant war off very soon into the Mazzari season. Your best shot in the prem is if you use your time in the Championship to build the nucleus of the team as you aren't afforded that time in the prem, kind of like Wolves, Burnley and Sheffield United.

As for next season, I am generally one of the more pessimistic on here, but I think we will be in a far better position than most are fearing. The Pozzo's may look mugs at this level, but they've never had any issues building us an ultra competitive championship squad at a few weeks notice down there. It is going to be by far the weakest Championship of all time if Leeds, West Brom and Brentford come up. Half the teams will probably be starting the season on minus 12 and those that don't won't be spending much.

Our cloggers might look **** in the Prem but a bit of perspective is needed. Forest are 5th with Ben Watson as a key player, Scum have lost 1 in 11 with their awful squad. We'll get rid of those we can, but the likes of Hughes, Chalobah, Dawson, Pussetto, Femenia, Foster, maybe even Cleverley and Gray should be bloody solid players at that level.

There is then the off chance that just due to the situations we keep hold of the clear stars at that level. Cucho looks likely to be integrated, he oozes class and the physique needed down there, similar to Suarez although I expect he may go. Capoue (age), Sarr (Fee), are two we may just manage to keep hold of, Sarr is raw as hell, if Gino doesn't want to play ball I can't see anyone paying more than we paid for him unless he kicks up a fuss. Joao Pedro is another one it will be great to see get some game time. There's the off chance we could build another really exciting fun team if we get the coaching appointment and recruitment right. We might be good, we might be ****, but we can avoid financial ruin (With our player sales we really should) - it's got to at least be worth watching again.

Oh yeah, and Deeney is the first player we should be looking to get out, the club needs to enter a new era without him.

 

Possibility of winning the league for the first time in the second tier

 

I know there have been problems with the stream during the restart

 

Pretty sure theres a service to watch all games called Ifollow or something.

 

Sarr, Deulofeu, Doucoure, Hughes, Pedro and Chalobah will all leave. What we will be left with is a knackered Deeney leading the remainder. No way will that be enough to get anywhere near the play offs and more likely struggling against relegatkon as Huddersfield, Hull, Middlesbrough etc.

Pozzo needs to bite the bullet and accept that it will take at least 3 years to build a new much younger, hard working, ambitious and motivated squad. Brentford have shown how it can be done. The first thing that needs to be done is to get rid of the dead wood including Deeney and especially Gray, Pereira, Mariappa, Foster, Success and Janmaat. Give Gray and Deeney free transfers and then hopefully some mug team will pay their wages. I would make Cathcart captain with Capoue taking over in his absence.

One thing I am looking forward to, particularly if we retain all the current defence, is seeing them get outmuscled by Akinfenwa when we play Wycombe!

 

Totally agree it will be interesting, but should we get relegated (just saying should in a vain sense of hope!) the difference between this season and others is massive, the reduced window between one season ending and another starting is going to play a massive part - as its the real financial impact of lockdown.
I have no financial facts, and is based more on a hunch but - given the wider impact felt in many industries, and the airing of footballs dirty laundry that Lockdown brought - many clubs just won't have the money to spend on players and will instead be using the 2020/2021 TV revenues to mitigate losses made. Whilst players will no doubt want to leave, some of whom deserve a move, others who I couldn't care less about, I actually think the summer transfer window may be a quieter one than many expect - and the club will only sell if they get the right figure or if they feel keeping the player will be detrimental to the wider squad.

I agree that I can't see any of those on loan coming here (other than maybe Cucho) which, certainly in the case of Estupian, is very disappointing - I've watched a lot of Suarez and it's hard to say how good he will be given the quality of the Spanish second division.

Looking forward to potentially seeing Cathcart and Kabasele getting bench pressed by Akinfenwa

 

Fixed

 

Oh, and I will be winning four figures when relegation is confirmed Sunday. Most of which will be donated to good causes and the rest on next years season ticket!

 

Trouble is I could have written most of your first para in May 2015. We all knew that's what it's like before we came up, both because we'd experienced it before and seen how it affected other solid clubs of similar status to us. What you have to do is improve off-field infrastructure and take the club forward in other ways because gravity is always gone drag you down eventually. If Bournemouth go down they'll have almost nothing to show for it. We'll have plenty, but maybe not as much as 5 years could have delivered. The failure to put in place a working youth infrastructure is probably the biggest failing.

And I honestly can't see Sarr (or Deulofeu for that matter) playing for us much in the Championship. Because of the late closing transfer window we may actually get an appearance or two out of them but they'll be gone pronto. Can't see either of them relishing it anyway. Gonna have the **** kicked out of them and both have a habit of reacting to that at this level by hiding so surely will in the Championship too.

 

It really depends what we do with the squad. The Pozzos have shown they know how to put together a good Championship squad, but we may have to contend with an uncomfortable transition period.

The 14/15 promotion season was far more fun than any of the PL seasons, so I'm just crossing my fingers that we can get it right.

Look at this way: we have a lot more to work with now than when the Pozzos took over in 2013. No reason why we can't be competing for the top six.

 

Main one for me is going into each game knowing it will be competitive. There is literally no point in us playing games like yesterday, it's damage limitation from the start.

I'm not expecting us to return immediately but if we can get in and around the top 6 and do it with playing youth, i'd be happy with that. If we could keep Deulofeu until January due to his injury, I think he'd destroy the championship and it would be great to watch.

Getting the correct manager is absolutely crucial though, they cannot mess this one up.

 

I will be a bit annoyed if relegation means we never get to see the South American loanees (still think there's a chance we might see Cucho), a bit sad if it means the end of Sarr and Deulofeu (very sad if it means the end of Hughes) but hey, what's it all for in the end? For us to possibly finish 10th? Even if we'd done everything properly since the Cup final, it's not like we were ever likely to top last season in terms of excitement. I don't think we'll be that bad in the Championship (at least initially), but even if we are, and we end up back where we came from pre-Pozzo, it'll still be more unpredictable and we'll have more winnable games. There won't be any games that we'd be absolutely dreading (with the possible exception of L*ton!)

 

Can't say I'm sold on Sarr being of the level that a PL team will take a £40m punt on him. He's had one really good game but the rest of the time he's been pretty average and can't cross at all. I wouldn't be surprised at a season in the Championship, much like Traore had. Although Wolves might take a punt if Traore heads off to one of the big boys. They know how to develop players.

 

Far superior away days, (though to be fair the away days in the prem have been pretty good).

 

The excitement of battling it out with Millwall and Blackburn to see who will finish in 7th place after we've had 12 points deducted for going into administration will be amazing

 

I feel exactly the same. Take out the Liverpool game and from the outside in people would probably be calling him one of the flops of the season. Convinced if not for that game we'd have no issues keeping him. A year in the championship will do him wonders and he seems to have a level headed agent.

 

Agree here, as mentioned with the reduced transition period (albeit an extended Transfer Window) I think clubs will look at our players come Christmas rather than straight away. Sarr has huge potential, but he came from the French league which really is terrible outside the top two teams and is still to adjust in the Premier League (certainly since teams figured out to put two players on him at all times) - there is no doubt half a season in the Championship would serve him far better from a development perspective (2 games a week and without doubt more physical but not that less technical opposition), but it's whether he sees that or feels he should be in the Premier League/another top division elsewhere. If however a team came in with a big bid I don't think we'd turn it down - but other than Everton who have those brain farts when it comes to buying players, who else would pay the money we'd really want?

 

He was brilliant when he first became established in the team, him and Deulofeu linked up excellently. He's been up and down since, you can't expect him to do it all, of late we've had a) very little down on the other wing which leaves teams ganging up on him, b) absolutely nothing in the box for him to aim for, and c) all too often we just don't get him in the game at all. Traore himself wouldn't do that much better under those circumstances, and let's not forget that when he did drop into the Championship, he was very raw and wasn't anywhere near as good as Sarr has been for us. It's Ken Sema for us in the Championship I'm afraid to say

 

The Saudis at Newcastle?

 

If they get that across the line (highly likely given the Premier Leagues passion for money!) then yeah they'd certainly be in the mix, although you wonder if they'd aim for more "marquee" signings?

 

The Abu Dhabi lot at City couldn't really go for marquee signings initially (Robinho aside) as they were bang average at the time, Newcastle are even worse than City were then

 

Reason to be cheerful - Gray will get opportunities to play and score some goals. Something we needed in open play after this season's restart. Can't wait.

 

We had in our grasp being an established PL top 10 side and we ****ed it up through stupidity.

I don’t see that’s any cause to rejoice.

Heading to the championship is going to mean staff lose their jobs, dozens of them.

We deserve to go down. It’s probably the best thing so we can rebuild out of the spotlight, and that may take 3 years it may take far longer. It Gino doesn’t heed the lesson and get a grip of the morons working for him we might drop further. We will have unsellable players hanging around like unsinkable turds. There’s nothing positive about it.

 

I totally agree.

The next few weeks are huge. Some important decisions to be made over the next Head Coach and transfers etc. Like I said on another thread, we will know what Gino's intentions are in the next few weeks, they will decide the next few years imo.

 

Likewise.

 

We will never ever ever ever ever be an established PL top 10 side. The last 5 years is as good as it will get. Look at the established top 10 of the last 20 years. A club of our size doesn't feature other than the odd season of one of stoke, Bolton, Burnley, Sheff Utd, all of whom have since been relegated or soon will be. Our only realistic target is a few years of survival as we've just had. Our golden era of the last 30 years.

 

Had we bought a decent back 4 last summer we would be mid table right now!

 

It's nice to see someone with a level head and some perspective unlike some who basically want to get rid of our entire squad bar Sarr and Hughes and I agree with most of what you say, but you exaggerate somewhat the "misery" of our time in the top flight, making it sound more akin to our short stints under GT and Aidy. Only last season in the time frame you mention, we won 14 games and scored 52 goals and were top 10 until West Ham beat us in our final game, and 7th with four games to go. And although we lost most of our matches against the big teams, under Gracia we were competitive apart from a couple of games at Liverpool.

 

But we didn't. We always strengthen a little but our peers have deeper pockets and strengthen more. The gap between richest and poorest will only get bigger. We may get another run in the prem but we will always be one of the 8 or so who could, and eventually will, go down when it's our turn again.

 

Sorry, but that's a mirage you're seeing. We never had that in our grasp. In fact I'd say with every passing year our already tenuous grip being able to compete at the top table was slipping. I just hope Pozzo hasn't borrowed so much in the last couple of years in our efforts to compete that relegation completely knackers us. We really don't want to pass straight through the Championship to even murkier depths.

And while it is a shame people will be losing their jobs, especially in the current climate, that presumably happens everywhere across the professional game every year. I've heard this said a few times - I think even Deeney said it on BT straight after the Newcastle game - but it's basically irrelevant.

 

Looking forward to me asking “whose he again” after we get another influx of below average players from Italy shipped in

 

I hope you're correct YellowKicks, I really do.
I do think it is beholden of Gino to speak after Sunday,not Duxbury.
His lack of communication was at first enigmatic and allowable given our relative stability. That's gone for a burton now.
If the Huddersfield owner is to be believed there are many more Wigan cases to follow.
This will be a real test of Gino's leadership. I agree a new captain and broom is required. Perhaps the broom could be captain and save time?
Time will tell and hopefully by Monday some clarity will be provided.
Darkest hour before dawn ....cont'd page 94.

 

Petition to sack promotion off until we win the Championship