S-Clarke

Hopefully he's good, but I'd say he's somewhat fortunate that our GK bar is so, so, so low - so he doesn't need to be anything special, just make some saves and he's the best keeper we have at the football club.

Oh yeah 100%, I do get where you're coming from - I know exactly what you mean and I've walked into exactly the same company you talk of, eventually you're sucked into the culture if you don't move/or if it doesn't change soon enough. Apathy is the word I'd give it. But I think as a professional you have to have more about yourself, certainly in a profession like this, to challenge the standards and challenge the narrative - I don't think we have anyone who has that in their makeup in any way, they all wait to be led, wait to be told - but there's no one to lead them. What this often leads to are lots of little toxic cliques forming in different area's, where they 'lead' themselves and resent anyone else questioning them. If you don't have 'leaders' on the pitch, then you at least get leaders in the coaching and management setup to garner respect and set standards - but we don't do that either, we just appoint kids to coach misguided kids. It's a really toxic setup curated by a flawed organisation, who is allowed to continue unchecked to make the same 'decisions' over and over like it's groundhog day. In any other walk of life this organisation would have been abolished by now as a 'failed' start-up, of which there have been many.

Don't forget Orsic, signing of the century right there. He really dug a hole for himself when he openly said that, or it was fed to the media via the club anyway. I'm sure in himself he still believes that window was a success in some bizarre confused way.

I don't give the players any slack to be honest. If you go way back to the Selles/Jones era, who is still here? Gavin Bazunu, Jack Stephens, Joe Aribo, Edozie, Armstrong - that's it. The rest have arrived during Martin, during Still etc. And including Aribo and Edozie is even stretching it a bit as they don't play anymore, so we've got like 3 first team players who have been here from the Jones/Selles days, the rest aren't nearly as 'impacted' by all the managers. I can't let the players off lightly because the moment someone really challenged their professionalism and was strict (Juric) they absolutely spat their dummies out and went crying, seemingly similar happened with Still as I'm sure that article was about us. They want an easy life, they want a mate coaching them - or someone who isn't going to really challenge them. None of this lot are leaders, none of them have high standards, they're all happy to settle for mediocrity, take the pay cheque and ponce around for 90mins every week - so I'm sure they're more than happy with weak people like Selles/Eckert in the building as they can walk all over them. I think we have a really, really toxic group that needs removing - that's another pat of the problem. We didn't go far enough in the summer.

I think the difference at Brentford is that he had Giles and Benham, and their scouts, offering the stable-footballing experience around the table. Probably pushing back on his nonsense, but also taking some of it and refining around actual real life football facts. Here...it's him with that 'football experience'. Sloak hasn't got a clue about running a football club, Kraft didn't have a clue. Parsons came from Dyson. It's a vacuum of footballing leadership, which has allowed Rasmus to assume responsibility as the only 'footballing' adult in the room, with no one to truly push back on his ideas in a football context. The damage has been done long before Spors or Wilcox, it started as soon as they got hold of us in their first two transfer windows.

I think you're referring to the official EFL one. I'd never pay towards that, scam costs. There was an IPTV Service called SaintsPlayer a while back, which offered thousands of channels to be viewed via multiple platforms - including all football matches.

It's a bit of a tightrope though, it only takes 1 or 2 faltering transfer windows to throw that entire chain down the pan, and transform a relatively stable club into one struggling to keep afloat. It's not sustainable, in the PL at least, to solely rely on a model where your recruitment can only happen when you sell for big - as we found out, that strangled us for years. Bournemouth are hitting a funny period right now. They sold for huge money in the summer, lost their DoF and their big buys from the summer haven't really cut it - and they're down in 15th with their manager probably off in the summer. There's nothing wrong with signing low and selling big, but it can't be your entire strategy for long-term success as it's not sustainable. There needs to be other elements of income. Brentford are probably a good example to use - they don't sell stacks of players, but they do invest well when required.

They were missing Jack Stephens voice and organisational skills.

Not that there's much point, as we'll be back here in Feb looking for them to sack the manager again anyway. There's only one element which needs to be sacked, but you can't sack ownership sadly.

Luckily we gave Fellows and Leo a nice rest over Christmas for this game, this is the big one. In all seriousness, I'd expect to see the likes of Jelert, Quarshie, Bragg, Romeu, McCarthy, Wellington, Archer, Fraser, Matsuki, Stewart etc all start - we have a big squad, sadly full of absolute rubbish in the main. Will be good for Romeu to get a start though, he's struggled a bit coming onto the pitch in dysfunctional performances - so it would be good to see him from a start.

SaintsPlayer was the best one, but that's long gone sadly. My 'friend' has not found a truly reliable one since, so he just moves around every month. Reddit is a good source of providers apparently, some offering 24 hr trials and rolling 1 months, gives you flexibility. I don't think it's sensible to ever do anything more than 2-3 months 'deals' on IPTV providers as the market is so volatile, but if you find a good one you can just roll with it month to month.

You wonder who finds these people, as Ben Garner wouldn't have been top of any peoples 'list' - it's obviously someone thinking outside the box and looking at data rather than experience. Ben was part of that right to dream academy - it does feel very Rasmus. Rasmus drove the Kamaldeen deal if you remember, and Kamaldeen came from that right to dream academy setup himself.

I see Amorim has gone the same way as Maresca. They both clearly called out influences above them stopping them doing their job properly, or providing the right tools, and they are promptly ousted. Probably excuses in some way, but it also goes to show that the managers don't 'run' the team like the old days, they are just the front figure to the DoF/Scouts and board.

The OS will always do that, it's not worth listening to the club propaganda during times like this as it just winds you up even more.

I feel sorry for Fellows as it's not his role, he's wasted having to run back all the time. But Manning, well, you can't say any more than has already been said! He's bad in a 4, even worse as a wing back as part of a 3. He's not quick, not strong, he panics under pressure, he can't mark, he doesn't sense danger. But he can pass with his left foot. You could wrap that description up and apply it to quite a few of our players tbf.

Armstrong isn't a striker, he's a wide forward - or an inverted forward in certain setups. He has never been consistently any good in a central position. We needed a proven CF to start the season, with Archer and Downs providing cover or alternative options. Archer playing alongside someone proven could have also been fruitful, but we'll never know.

No, because it would have still left us with Cameron Archer and Ross Stewart - and the later couldn't be relied on, so we needed 2 strikers in the summer. That was pretty obvious to anyone with eyes.

I think a better manager would look at this squad and say, yeah, I fancy my chances - but we need to do x or y to get the best out of so and so etc. But the club won't allow that to happen, it has to be done the clubs way - and that's why we only end up with the likes of Tonda. We've got a strong squad for this level, but it's not being played correctly and nor is it balanced quite right. We're many levels below what we had under RM, but we're still decent for this league - better than we are right now. So I also can't buy the 'we have loads of rubbish' players argument. We have some, yes, but there are tools to work with here - if someone is allowed to.

Like every other club in the history of football, in all other leagues, the manager appoints the staff - usually people he trusts and knows from previous roles. But as Tonda has never been a manager, he doesn't have that - so we're in a situation where the club is trying to match a coach to the manager, or should I say match a coach to the club philosophy. It's even more bonkers when you look at it.

You can only be trolling at this point, and that takes some going as a mod - credit for that. You were one of the 'Bazunu is fine for the Championship' brigade by the way. Just saying.

No, I don't give him that slack. He was all over that summer recruitment because we felt it was a good idea to not replace Wilcox. It was Martin, Bitcon and Parsons around the table with the scouts. His hands were all over the deals we made that summer.

I respect you for sticking at it and still trying to believe, but come on Manji - it's over. There's nothing left for SR here, they need to lock up and go. We can continue to hope and believe, because all we'll do is hope and believe ourselves to L2. We spent £55m in the summer which was a record amount for a Championship club, granted a lot of that was generated from the sales of Dibling & Fernandes. £60mish between both of them. Who are we selling in the summer for 30m fee's, let alone 60m combined? No one. We might get a few mill for Shea Charles for 1 year left, we may get around £15-20m for Leo if someone gambles - we might get 5-6m for THB if we sell up? We might get £15m for Ramsdale at a push? Then when you combine that reduced transfer income with a smaller parachute pot, and 3 teams coming down with PL squads and parachute pots, then it's probably fair expect us to be well off it. You can't really compare us with a Coventry or a Sunderland coming from the edges to the promotion push the next season, because those two clubs were building over time. They had a plan, they had a squad, they just had to tweak here and there. We have nothing. We are in complete freefall and have been for the last 12 months. There is no magic formula or 'positivity' that's going to fix this, it's hope casting at this point. The only 'hope casting' we should be doing is wishing for new ownership and trying to get SR as far away from this club as we can, ASAP.

I don't think he did. Gao came in under Kruger when he was in charge. The issue we had is that Kruger went back to Canada with the 5 pledges, so we'll never know what Gao's plans were for us....!

Managers appointed by SR: Nathan Jones - A failure, promoted beyond his means. a 'try to be clever' appointment when it wasn't needed. PPG - 1.07 Ruben Selles - A failure, promoted beyond his means. a 'try to be clever' appointment when it wasn't needed. PPG - 0.44 Russell Martin - I can't say he was a failure, as we got promoted under him. It was a 'try to be clever' appointment from the outset though. In the PL he was an absolute failure and we were not setup to compete in any way. Ivan Juric - A failure. He was an experienced coach (one of the only experienced they've appointed) with a specific style, the polar opposite of what Russell Martin had implemented before - so the players didn't fit, a weird call timing wise. They probably use this as justification as to why 'experience' didn't work. PPG - 0.44 Simon Rusk - A complete waste of time this one. Promoted way beyond his means, I don't believe they ever saw him as the manager - just someone to see it till the end of the season. PPG 0.29 Will Still - A failure. promoted beyond his means, and another try to be clever appointment you have to say. PPG 1.13 Tonda Eckert - A failure. Promoted beyond his means, a try to be clever appointment when it wasn't needed. PPG - 1.13 (not including his caretaker stint). Overall there is a consistent theme here - they promote and appoint people beyond their skill level, hoping to turn rough scraps into diamonds to provide THEM with an opportunity to pat their ego because they were so revolutionary. Similar themes follow throughout the coaching staff, with the likes of Ben Reeves, Ben Garner, Adam Lallana. Obviously it doesn't work, so why do they keep doing it? Because it enables control. They are able to retain the control of the narrative across the entire group. Whether that's formations, style of play, tactical approaches, transfer targets etc - with people in these roles promoted beyond their means it allows SR to assume the decision making, and the rest just nod along. Juric was the only change from that, but he wouldn't have lasted long when he discovered they wouldn't have allowed him the autonomy.

We've spent £55m this season, and we're closer to 23rd. We are 15th. Why is next season going to mean that we are more competitive than this year? We're not going to have more money to spend next year, or better players. We're going to be up against teams stronger and better than us too. Doesn't add up I'm afraid.