S-Clarke

The shit against them has got to ramp up, we can't allow them to think that their propaganda nonsense has appeased us. They were out to chat to the press when we won 5 out of 6, but are silent at all other times. It shows you all you need to know about them.

A fair few called it, it's playing out exactly as we knew it would do. Appoint an inexperienced kid after a purple patch, and this is what happens. We have lost 3 or 4 on the bounce away from home, against some god-awful horrific football teams. It's not good enough. He has no idea what to do, although part of me doesn't believe he's allowed to truly put his own swing on things. Where are all the players now after all the sound bites prior appointment? ''He makes it so clear for us to play'' ''his instructions are so clear'' - are they so clear now you bunch of whining pussies? The club are the worst. Driven by propaganda that they hope the masses swallow up. I think they'll be in for a surprise, because we're still not accepting this. The only way out of this loop is new ownership, that is 100% the fact here. That can't happen though as it's so much easier said than done, there's no shareholding or way to force owners out apart from a constant barrage against them for years. That's all we can do. We will very likely slip further down the leagues, but it's the only way we can rid ourselves of this lot. They've destroyed an establish PL club to the point that a lot of us won't ever see us in the PL again in our lifetimes.

pre-season under Martin, prior to our PL season. A 2-0 or 3-0 defeat. But yeah, we have only played them a handful of times - if that - since 1975.

I would say we've had more hits in this window than we've had under SR before, I mentioned this a few weeks back. The scouting overhaul in the summer has had a benefit. Jander, Leo, Fellows, Azaz are really top picks for this level. Standout quality. The most important position was up front though, and whilst we identified the gap early on, we absolutely naffed it up with this guy. Let's forget this saga ever happened and hope they can pull out a Jander/Leo style ST signing, as our new scouts have shown they can see good players.

He's made it to the bottom of the list again then, that's some going.

I note the George Long argument has cropped up again, in that a third choice keeper isn't meant to be better than the 1st or 2nd etc etc. A bunch of you are absolutely missing the point, once again - as you did in the summer, whereby it was proclaimed that 'Bazunu is fine for the Championship'. The original point from the summer still stands. We didn't need a third choice goalkeeper, that's the whole point. We needed/still need a 1st choice keeper. Then McCarthy/Bazunu become 2nd and 3rd choice.

Don't get me wrong, he still had a decent game and is important to us - we do fall apart without him evne more, but....I just sense his wings are being clipped slightly by the more savvy managers in this league, the instruction is not to allow him to drive or be stood in space as the 'easy' out ball on a transition. If I can call our approach out after 3-4 games of the same, then I'm fairly sure every manager in the league now has this sussed and we'll be seeing a lot more sideways and backwards. It's similar to AA, who was coming deep to collect, spin and run - that's also been clipped by oppo managers now. And thus we have nothing else to our game.

Stewart is out of contract at the end of the season, so he'll be free to go at that point. I expect he'll retire, it would be for his benefit and those close to him need to be strongly advising him of that course of action. It's like flogging a dead horse. I'm not counting on him coming back, I wasn't counting on him at the start of this season either. We always needed a proper CF, as Stewart was never going to be an option for us. I was so surprised when people were calling on us to extend his contract after his Sheffield United brace. For once the club didn't make a stupid decision there.

Yeah, LB is a real issue for us IMO. Wellington just isn't up to it, and Manning is Manning. Backup at best is what he should be. Jelert was supposed to be someone who could operate at LB, but that's not gone to plan. Need to re-visit the full back positions in January on both sides IMO, it's a bit of a problem.

We've totally ruined this lad, he had a decent enough rep at Sheffield United and Boro before that - but he's now a shadow of that player, looks L1 at absolute best - maybe lower end L1. We'll do well to get rid, it will be loans until the end of his deal. Adds more criticality to the need for us to buy an actual striker though.

It was a bit square-pegs for no real benefit. We had no fluidity in those final stages due to those changes, as it ruined any shape. 5, 4 or 3 at the back is not the issue really, it was the lack of any real shape in those closing stages. You never saw us winning because we couldn't build up any momentum. More poor in-game management from him I have to say, especially with a 2nd half against 10 men.

That wasn't a great showing really. Coventry were makeshift in a number of places and they still looked better than us for most of that 1st half, much more organised and you could see an actual pattern in their approach and what they're trying to do. They play with a purpose. The red card totally changed their approach, as expected. That made the second half look more 'one sided' in terms of the context of the game as they sat back a bit more, but we didn't push them at all. We didn't have them on the ropes, we didn't pen them in, we didn't cause their CB's - who haven't played all season - any issues what so ever. It was really poor. There has been a gradual return to the pass backwards, pass sideways and around the back four in recent weeks. I don't think I'm the only one seeing that. I understand what doing it can give you, draw them on, move it quick and break the press...but you need to be very accurate and have very good players to do that regularly, of which we don't have. So it might work once every now and then, but doing it when the oppo is clearly onto it (Cov pressed heavy) seemed a bit daft. We played ourselves into 2 or 3 issues just from self inflicted pain. Their goal came from the insistence that Manning kept the ball in play rather than lofted it out of touch to settle the team down. Tonda needs more to his game, or should I say the club - as this feels more and more club directed whenever I see it. I also think teams have sussed Janders role in our side and are giving him special attention - I saw it against WBA (second half), and against Norwich. Stick players around him, don't leave him in space, don't let him burst. It often leaves Downes as the free CM available for the pass. It removes all of that fluidity in our side as it was Jander who broke the lines and enabled us to drive. Teams are safer leaving Downes free as all he will do is pass it backwards, teams know there is no danger if Downes gets the ball. A draw is a draw I guess, and in the context of all the other results, it doesn't cause us any real problems in the bigger picture. I'm still not entirely convinced by us though and I believe we just lived through a purple patch, a so-called manager bounce as they call it, and now we're settling back into our baseline. We'll be in the market for a new manager come May.

I know the game you're thinking of, Villa 4-0 winners against us at their place. Ings scored. That was the following season 21/22 In Feb time I think, and yeah our season collapsed from that point. This 1-1 mentioned here wasn't too far away from that 9-0 Man Utd away game in 20/21, our season kinda plateaued up to that and then collapsed afterwards. So we were still a basket case, even in 2020, 2021.

A new contract for Bazunu is a genuine possibility, apparently it's in the works. We'll wait and see, but I fully expect a new 4 year deal.

I think they'll get 15-20 points by the end. They're down, no doubts, they're not getting out of this - but I can't see them finishing below 12 points. They'll have a run of 3 or 4 where they pickup a couple of wins and some draws. We all felt the same last year, I didn't think we'd beat Derby's record but we did - and we were bad! They'll be fine in that sense, they put in a good shift yesterday and competed. Brentford at home next, and West Ham at home in a week or two - they could win both of those, and end up sitting on 8 points by January.

I'd never put him in the Bazunu league, Stephens has much more to his locker than Bazunu and has given us more in his time with us. He is very average though and is certainly a contributing factor as to why we concede as many goals as we do, although yesterday was on Wood's dumbness I'd say. Stephens is the sort of player you keep around, let his contract run down, and say 'thanks, good luck' and evolve the position. But we didn't and gave him a new deal, which summed everything up - happy to settle for mediocrity.

Cov aren't in their 'top' form at the moment, they were scoring goals for fun at the start, but they've been clipped back a bit in recent weeks. They're dining at the right end of the table and deserve it, I think they'll finish 2nd at minimum. They aren't dropping out of that race now. It's a surprise, when you look at the teams in the league (financial power) how they've managed to pull away is a great effort, fostered by a decent manager you have to say. But they've always had good players, their scouting has been top notch for years and years. Their RB Van Ewijk - awesome player, KWP-esque. Haji Wright is the American striker we should have signed a few years ago. Asante was a clever signing by them too, a proven Champ player who has added genuine explosiveness to their front line. CM wise they have Rudoni, who is a top tier Champ player, alongside Grimes who we were after a few years back. Sakamoto and Torp are also top players at this level to, whom they scouted for fairly minimal fees. Overall they're dining where they are because they've planned this over many years. They've got a tight setup which was built really well by Mark Robins, and Lampard has just taken them up a notch (with some more clever scouting). They are a good example for all Champ teams to look at and believe you've all got a chance, it doesn't need £50m spends. They've reinvested their Gyökeres and Hamer fees very sensibly.

It's a bit worrying really, the more I see and read from everyone around the club, the more it feels like the last 6 weeks have been a purple patch rather than anything particularly transformative - and we will dine on that purple patch for months. They seem to be using this 'purple patch' as justification for everything they did in the summer, rather than holding their hands up to say that they got multiple things wrong. For sure, Leo, Jander, Fellows etc - good picks, good additions. But they cannot ignore the catastrophic errors they made up front, at CB and in GK. They need to own those. I don't like how the club kept Spors back from the media when the going was tough, when Still was sacked etc, but he's then happy to front up after a 6 week uptick. Hide when the going gets tough, it's a trait which follows the players on the pitch too.

This is something I hope we don't expect to happen every week, the space THB got to play that role against Charlton in particular was an anomaly. The space Armstrong got to receive and turn in those games deep in CM was an anomaly, it's not the norm. The worry is that this is now all we will try, every week, and act surprised it doesn't work every week. It won't. 1 or two games a season you may get lucky with passive teams enabling that, but in the main in this league teams press, harry and remove space in the midfield areas. That's basic lower league 101. If we have nothing to our game bar THB getting in space, and being able to spray it to an unchallenged Armstrong, then we will tumble down this league quicker than we came up it.

He was always bad, Norwich fans said as much. Every other club he'd been at said as much. This is why some were so absolutely pissed that we got him in the Summer, people saying he's 'fine for third choice' were completely missing the point. We didn't need a third choice, we already had that third choice (McCarthy/Bazunu), we needed someone to push those. It was obvious to everyone bar a small subset of people, and the idiots who have brain farts at our club.

It's Lighthouse, that's how

I mean you're really stretching here. The reality is that when Stephens came into the team on a regular basis, we have regressed at an alarming rate. Good lad he might be, but he is a really sub-standard defender. It's not all on him, but he's one of the reasons in our decline over recent years.

Yep, agreed. On paper they are the profiles we needed, but the club gambled on them rather than go and buy proven of that profile. Very risky, but they have a knack of doing that sadly. To be fair to them, Leo, Jander, Azaz, Fellows - ticks in the box, more than usual for SR. But the flops have been pretty damaging to us as they're key spine positions.

This is true, I don't think it's a case of advocating for long ball either - but we have zero options to switch a game in that area. Armstrong > Archer > Robinson. All the same, quick, nippy forward players. Not physical at all. I discount Downs as I don't think he's up to it. He was probably meant to be that presence, but we need a more seasoned presence in that mould. Stewart could have been that, but he won't ever last more than a handful of games so he needs to be discounted too. So yes, a ST and a GK are two priorities for us - with specific attributes. I wouldn't be against signing a CB either, but we'd need to shift 1 or 2 first.

Yeah he has been quite underwhelming it has to be said, surprising really. I thought he was better than what we've seen.