S-Clarke

I think KWP has to be knocking on the door now. England are blessed with Full Back options though so it's a difficult spot. James, TAA, Chilwell, Shaw etc are probably still ahead of him. (I'd like to think he's jumped ahead of Wan Biasaka though) The bonus KWP has added this season is his ability to play at LB as well, so that's given him more of a leg into any squad. JWP should be a shoe-in for a CM role though.

A really, really comfortable win. I don't particularly think we went above 2nd gear, but we still had too much for an absolutely inept Norwich team who look destined to drop without much of a fight. First half was better than the 2nd half, midfield dominated it throughout. Romeu was a class above. I think if we were a tiny bit quicker in our build up we could have scored a bucket load. Elyounoussi in particular struggled to find space and was ineffective most of the night I felt as he lacked the pace to really stretch it. Tonight is the sort of game where we needed a bit of pace in the number 10 roles in order to stretch the game a bit and pull Norwich around. Broja was really poor I thought. I go back to what I said a few days ago...if he puts in those sorts of performances for Chelsea he is dropped straight away and would struggle to get back in. We give him the opportunity to have these 'spells'. He's clearly got ability and talent but he's still young and he has a lot to learn and I still say we're the best place for that, hopefully he see's that and isn't blinded by the dollar or a 'promise' of Chelsea involvement. We're in a really good place, certainly back to 2020 kind of form. We can enjoy the battle at the bottom from afar and look up for a change. I don't think we'll get European or anything like that, but a top 10 finish and beating our points total from last year has to be our target now given our run.

Brave shout, their next 3 or 4 fixtures will determine their future imo. I will be watching with interest to see how they play out! It's nice to be able to 'enjoy' watching this from afar for the 2nd season in a row really.

I got confused when I saw that, as there is also a Xavi Simons at PSG who is a ridiculous talent, I thought it was him to start with! I don't know a great deal about Xavier though.

Anyone can buy him if they want to, it's just that Chelsea have a deal to sign him at that fee if they wish to exercise it. It doesn't mean all clubs can execute the same fee. For Man Utd, and 4 years left, £60m no less.

Yeah I think that's fair. He was clearly undecided about staying here and from a club point of view, given what our model was at that point, could not afford to lose our best player for free. That would have killed us. Luckily we used his fee to strengthen us in other areas such as the Broja loan fee, Armstrong, Perruad, Tino, Small etc. None of that would have been possible without Ings leaving. Ings has probably got himself some extra dosh and a tasty signing on fee, so we leave it there really. He probably does regret it at this point but by not signing the deal the club couldn't hang around and risk losing him for £0.

Not sure if this impacts our prep or not, but apparently there has been structural damage to the dome at Staplewood. (similar to what happened to the O2 I think)

They're either safe as houses by mid march or sunk right into the mire. I reckon they'll be ok. Same as Everton no matter how 'close' they look atm. I still can't see a way out for Burnley, Watford or Norwich to be honest. They'll win here and there but they've got too much to do.

They've kind of hit the wall we did a few years ago. They had a few seasons of being absolutely spot on scouting wise with the likes of Ndidi, Tilliemans, Perreria, Fofana etc. Then they got a bit crazy and spent silly money on Vestergaard, Somoure and Daka who have not impacted in any way really.

I think that's it really, his tactical inflexibility kept being brought up but I'd say that was generally down to a lack of options to choose from. We were pretty rigid. This is probably the first season that Ralph has had close too what I'd call 'his team' and the 'depth' he requires, and look at what he's doing with it. It would have always been absolutely mental to ditch him and I'm glad the club didn't flinch. That's why I've got so much trust in Martin and co, they have their heads screwed on.

His injury status may well have been a reason we didn't push too hard for him in January, I guess we want to see how he recovers as well (He's been injured since Nov apparently). He'll be going into a positive team though who look on the up, which can only be a good thing in order to showcase his talents.

And this is why Saints is the best place for him at the moment. We allow him an environment to be a bit niave and to learn that side of his game as we don't expect to win things or win every week. At Chelsea he'd be under a microscope, a couple of performances of the level he showed yesterday and he'd be getting hauled off and a 100m striker would take his place. He wouldn't have the time to develop there as many players have shown over the years, christ even Lukaku himself had to leave Chelsea to develop before they bought him back for stupid money. That is seemingly their model. THey were forced to throw James, Mount etc into the side when they had an embargo and that's the only reason they developed. In normal circumstances that wouldn't have happened in my opinion. As a current player, Callum Hudson-Odoi is a fine example of someone who needed to move to progress as he had a lot of natural talent. But he didn't and he's now stagnated and is at danger of never fulfilling his potential.

Listening to his interview, Lampard was equally critical about their long ball play and said he doesn't want them to play that way. I think they reverted to that because we didn't give them time on the ball, and when they did have the ball they were generally shit at finding a team mate.

I thought he had a terrific game to be honest, similar to the player we all saw at the start of the season. He carried the ball well, advanced a few times, wasn't troubled defensively really. He got an assist with a terrific cross from the right as well.

Bednarek had a great game I thought, really proactive in his game in terms of coming out to engage rather than 'waiting' to defend. He was quicker in mind to either of their forward players today which helped us a lot. It kept us on the front foot. Midfield not so much a surprise, expected us to dominate with the profile of player they had in their 2nd half. Gomes is just drifting as a player and cannot physically play at that intensity anymore after his injuries.

Gives us balance I think, looks a much better player. He's very intelligent in the sense of the gaps and space he picks up, much the same as Armstrong - so those two together create a bit of a formidable attacking unit for us, especially with the pace/power/strength of Broja and Adams through the middle.

Everything is looking up this year. Club is on much better footing.

I think we're getting a bit too ahead of ourselves here! We'd need title winning form as we've got a massive catch-up to get to the likes of Spurs, West Ham and Wolves who will be the teams in and around that. (there are lots of teams with tons of games in hand on us as well, so the league is a little lopsided atm) Top 10 is a fair target and a good building platform for us, mid-50's points wise would equate to quite a remarkable season in my eyes. I'd be delighted with that.

On form, the quality of squads and positions in the league...it should be a no-brainer really and an easy bet. But...football isn't like that. I think we've got grounds to be a bit cautious as by all accounts they haven't played badly in recent weeks and Smith has certainly made them a better side. But...if we play to the level we have been then we 'should' have way, way too much for them in the press and the attacking movement we have on offer. We've got ourselves an amazing full back dilemma, complete opposite of last season. It's certainly good to be debating Tino/KWP/Perraud compared to Valery, Stephens, JWP, Bertrand and Vokins. Tino had a really good game today I felt, so did KWP, but Perruad in recent weeks deserves to come back in.

That was very similar to the home win over Everton last year, fairly comfortable in the main. They came out quickest and tried to press early, but it was a bit hit and rush by them - no real purpose, just lots of running and pressure. Eventually they ran out of some steam and we got a foothold. I thought for the majority of the half we were the better side, certainly keeping the ball better and working it into better situations. Somewhat frustrating to be 0-0. 2nd half we had the game tied up on that 2nd half sub. That basically gifted the midfield to us as Gomes is that limited. From that moment on the midfield opened up and we had space to spread the play and dictate from the middle of the park, the early go from Armstrong was critical as I felt we'd start to get frustrated and start rushing had we not got that. Even after that point we still kept pushing and really should have been 2-0 way before it was, but long came on and had an impact which is all you can ask for. Overall a really enjoyable game and a pretty comfortable game all told. We don't get many of those! It was nice to sit back and relax for the last 5 or so mins. We do look a really good outfit at the moment, very sharp on the press, really good in possession and a general threat in an attacking sense. Having Armstrong back gives us such a different dimension in an attacking sense as he's such a clever player with his movement. Norwich next, you'd say they've got no chance given our form but you never know. How good is it though to not have to look over our shoulders, we've got ourselves a nice little cushion in the top 10 now and with our fixtures coming up I see no reason why we can't aim for the 50's points wise this year.

I've always found Sheldons features/articles a bit... ''well, yeah I knew that....why did I just read this for 5 mins? I've learned nothing new'' Carl Anka was on a different level with his content. On this specific one it's another non article with means nothing and tells us nothing new, as clubs have been doing this for all time. Why our own reporter has decided to specifically name and shame us is beyond me though.

I guess I'm just being a bit realistic, I'm not purposely being disingenuous. There's nothing wrong with dreaming, that's what makes football fun at the end of the day, but being realistic there is no way we can ever be a consistent Top 6 team without mega, mega investment which this takeover won't provide. That's not a criticism, it's just where we are as a club and the level we operate at. If we can make the most of the level we're at and win the battles such as scouting etc then we could have some good times. I just think it's wrong to 'expect' us to be competing in the Top 6 or pushing even higher, that's a bonus season if it ever happens. In the main we develop players, watch good teams, play good football and go-again. That's kinda been our model since year dot really, the new ownership allows us to do it with more flexibility and pace I'd say. Cortese was spending someone else's money, that's what became apparent in the end. In the end it felt like his whole regime was built on sand, albeit it was very fun. How we're doing it under Martin is sustainable for a club of our level. We did finish the season 5th, but Man Utd had a game in hand after the final day of the season (v Bournemouth I think) which then allowed them to finish sixth a few days later. I'll still say we finished 5th as it sounds better 😀

We're clearly not the only team who do things like this, you've got to use whatever competitive advantage you can get.

Fully agree with all you said there. It's the perfect way to run a club of our size and if people are a bit down heartened by that then they're probably supporting the wrong club. I've always seen us as a mini Dortmund in the way we try to develop and then sell on. They're in a league not as competitive so they can push higher, but with our model we should certainly be competitive in the top half for sure. That can sometimes lead to crazy seasons where everyone is shit and we can capitalise, like Newcastle did many years ago, West Ham and even ourselves in 2015 when we finished 5th on the final day. So I don't think anyone is downplaying or being unambitious, far from it. Play this way well and we'll end up punching above our weight at times.

Great post, thanks for that. Really loved Jos. I remember he was seen as a bit of a cheap option after we'd missed out on Amaar Jamal (remember him??) but he turned out to be a hero. Didn't quite cut it in the PL, but he was our best CB in the Championship imo. Jose just had that extra bit technique and physicality to make that extra step.