S-Clarke

At this stage, who really cares anymore. The players clearly don't give a shit.

We had a much better team then though. Bednarek, Stu Armstrong, Che Adams, David Brooks, Kyle Walker Peters, Sulemana, Charly, and a Downes who cared because his boyfriend was with us. I said it in the summer and was put down so many times - but our squad this season cannot hold a torch to the lot from 23-24, and it wasn't full of world-beaters - but they're still leagues above what we have today. The damage Martin did to us in the PL was extraordinary and that won't ever be forgotten.

I've never rated Wellington myself, I think he's been another shite pickup by our esteemed scouts. I remember the fans at Sao Paulo pulling him apart before he left them. We love picking up everyone else's crap.

Goztepe are clearly the top club in their pyramid. We've been used to support Goztepe. Rasmus even came out and said they're the main club of the group when they assumed ownership. That wasn't a joke.

At this stage, I'd keep Jander, Leo, Fellows...I'm struggling?...Charles, Quarshie maybe ummm....Azaz and Robinson? I'm stretching a bit there though. But that's as far as I'd go. New GK, entirely new defence, new full backs, new midfield, new strikers. And new owners. All of that needs to happen, nothing will change otherwise. The rest can fuck off as far as I'm concerned. (I'm not including loan players, just our current perms)

Prick.

Ben Garner anyone? Or maybe a Lallana, Ben Reeves and Andrew Surman trio. The golden era is just around the corner.

Can't wait for him to leave so we can replace him with Ben Garner.

At this point it's not about managers, 4 at the back, 5 at the back, 3 at the back. It all boils down to the fact that they have absolutely no fucking idea of how to run a professional sports outfit. They have no idea. They won't learn, they double down on mistakes and refuse to take responsibility. They are hideous. Back in the summer, or slightly before, Dragan came out and said if he didn't feel as if he was helping the club he'd sell. Do it. You're not helping us, you're killing us. Put us up for sale and fuck off. Take your stupid little sports republic experiment and play down the local park.

People tried to get it going today, it did for a spell - at 0-2 down. But then morons around just clapped because we passed the ball or won a throw, I can't remember - but the momentum stopped. Our supporters are as zombified as the club, it's demoralising to see. There were a couple of women on social media a while back who were attacking anyone who was after Martin, I feel they are the absolute personification of the majority of our fanbase right now. Absolute wet fucking fannies. Just like the first team, match made in heaven you'd have to say. There are genuinely people who are still thinking SR are fine for the club. That's frightening to me.

What more can you say? It's groundhog day every week, doing the same things over and over again, hoping for a different outcome. The club are just completely zombified at the moment. At this stage there isn't really much point in going down to the details of per match, as the problems are consistent across multiple. We move the ball too slowly, we're too ponderous, we have no drive, no one willing to take ownership, no one leading, no one organising, no structure and absolutely no idea how to play football. The manager was always out of his depth, you saw it at QPR in his first game. Rabbit in headlights, but the club were always desperate to give it to him. He will leave here and will never manage again, of that I'm sure. We've been used for another clever bollocks experiment. Moving away from the manager - the first team environment is toxic, fully toxic. It's like Chinese knot weed - it consumes the entire setup. Good players come in (Jander, Leo etc) and get dragged down into it, it happens in any toxic environment - good people come in, get suppressed, don't fulfil their potential and then leave to another environment where they do - but the toxic 'group' remains and continues to drag it down. If I was in charge and it was 'simple', I'd be sacking Downes and Manning tonight - they shouldn't be anywhere near our club, they are horrendous in ability but most importantly attitude. Downes is absolutely stinking the place out, he hasn't wanted to be here since his boyfriend left and he doesn't even bother anymore. The bloke will go down as one of my least favourite players ever, I hate him. Manning is manning, just shit. I also hate him. I hate a lot of this team, and that's the crux of it really. We can roll the dice on another manager, but if this toxic characters remain around the first team and the boardroom (looking at you Rasmus) then nothing will ever change. We need people with footballing experience and knowledge at the club, it feels rudderless - we're lead by analysts, sports scientists and data driven morons. Cheers for nothing SR, now fuck off.

To be fair to him, he did get injured towards the end of his loan - so it was cut short so he could rehab here. But that loan was a bit naff all told. He only ended up there because they were managed by his former Man City youth coach.

Those sorts of tweets are so transparent, because it's building the narrative out there that he'd be 'Fine' as permanent and they don't need to go and get anyone better in the summer. We saw exactly this with Tonda. It's so obviously club planting seeds.

It's absolutely anti football, propaganda football you could call it. It's not just us who do it, all these low-calibre managers instruct it because it makes them look better than they are and incorrectly inflates statistics and 'data'. I think it was all borne out of the tika-taka Barca days, clubs trying to be the next Barca/Man City, managers trying to be the next pep (it's all about possession football). That's one part of it, and they ignored the fact that Pep had some of the best players in the world at his instruction to implement it. Try the same with fricking Downes and Manning and you get what we've got. I think you have to ensure any team trying to play 'catch up' with the big clubs is full of pace and power, lots of energy and use that to press hard and counter on the 'better sides'. That's what makes these teams uncomfortable, if you try to copy them (which is what too many teams are doing) then they will sit back, wait for you to get bored and just pounce - and football then becomes boring, predictable and full of false platitudes. (like Pep coming out and praising us, after thumping us 4-0)

I saw those stats, to those at the club they are sadly evidence that everything is fine. They're doing it right etc. But those sorts of stats are stats without context, because when you watch it with your own eyes the passing sequences, possession etc happens between the centre backs, GK and full backs. That's where the stats get the tick up, of course oppos are happy for us to do it there. I'd be interested to see our possession stats in the final third, rather than an overall. I'd predict it would be very low.

There was definitely a contract offer on the table for Bazunu, I trust who told me that. So I do somewhat believe he either stalled on it or turned it down outright. Why he'd stall or turn down a contract offer from us is beyond me, he's fortunate he's been at our level for as long as he has. Stealing a living comes to mind. Why we even thought it was sensible to offer him a contract is crazy though, and shows that even after being loaned out their judgement hasn't really improved - because they'd have happily kept him had he signed, ala Stephens. They're just protecting investment as much as they can at this point.

I read that he's actually appeared in all their squads this season, he's only played 10-11 games, but he's been available which is positive for him. Probably puts our fitness department into question as they could never get him fit, although I personally still don't believe he's conditioned for the rigours of high level English football and never will be. I think he was always technically competent and had a good character, but you can't coach your physical structure.

I think they're complacent, I don't think they're happy about the mess they've created - but I think they are complacent enough to think 'everything is ok really, we've got Ross back now, it will come good eventually'.

But but but, he put money into the club etc. Yeah, that's worn thin now. Any credit he had has been extinguished for me whilst he presides over the chaos that ensues.

Not sure if that's said in jest, but we've shown nothing - all season - to suggest we can 'win' most of our games. Where we are is pretty much where I predict we'll stay. Wobbling between 12th-15th.

That's the frustrating thing for me, in the 'modern times' we genuinely had a once in a generation 'purple patch' during 2010-2016 where we were in a bit of a successful bubble, good players, good managers, good team, European football - it all lined up. But we have nothing to show for it. Not even League Titles in L1 or the Championship FFS. Blackburn had the league, Leicester had the league and FA Cup wins, Skates had the FA Cup, Swansea had the league cup, so did Bolton, Palace got an FA Cup, Birmingham won a league cup, Newcastle won a league cup etc etc. It's just so infuriating why we couldn't. We had better teams during that period than a lot of the above as well, but this is how we role isn't it. The perennial also-ran, outsider, continuing to celebrate, and profit, off of a cup win from 50 years ago rather than striving or trying to do it again. 'Happy to just exist' sums us up so well. Martin Semmens somewhat hammered that into the fans when he started saying we should be grateful to be in the Premier League - and as soon as that chat starts, standards slip, ambition drains and mediocrity reigns.

He may go on and be a huge success at Chelsea, but logic dictates that he won't. He hasn't helped himself by talking nonsense though. Going into a Chelsea press conference and saying that 'I'm good at what I do' isn't confidence from his perspective, it's setting yourself up to fail. Speaking waffle like above isn't confidence, it's setting yourself up to fail. Of course Jose came in and proclaimed he was the special one, but he had league Trophies, Champions League Trophies behind him to somewhat give his confidence a bit of credibility. This guy failed at Hull - a squad including Delap, Carvalho, Giles, Twine, Philogene, Zaourey, Greaves, Seri should not have finished outside the playoffs. He then took Strasbourg to mid-table in France, nothing to shout about either. What he's achieved does not give him any edge to start shouting about like he is. There were genuine links to him in the summer, I think we'd have grabbed him if he was obtainable - but I never rated him. He's another modern philosophy-driven manager, who talks corporate guff to appease the people who actually make the decisions above him.

There won't be any panic, to them nothing is wrong or needs an urgent fix - and this is why we find ourselves where we are. We all know how it plays out - 'Ross Stewart is like a new signing' articles popping up everywhere during the closure of the window, then promptly gets injured during the start of Feb. The club don't feel the urgency we do as they genuinely don't see any problems. 'The club are relaxed and calm about the situation' will be in an article somewhere between now and Feb.

Definitely some parallels there, and it really does show that no matter how hopeful and positive you are...if the ownership is not aligned with the club and the fanbase, then at best you're treading water for many many years. The Venky's were bat-shit crazy from the start, making big publicity stunts trying to get Ronaldinho if I recall correctly. And as all these crazy owners like to do - be clever with managers. They sacked Allardyce and appointed Steve Kean as 'interim', only to make him permanent. The fans hated him, but he stuck to it for 2 years before relegating them in his second season. He's not been seen in England since. This is why myself and others feel that removing SR is simply the only way to reset the trajectory. Continuing with them in charge will only lead to us becoming a Blackburn, Stoke, Swansea - once a PL side, challenging in the PL, to now a middle of the road and occasional Championship struggler. Quite alarmingly you'd have to say that's not even our current trajectory, that's where we live today. Does it get worse?

The club missed the boat on that one, he's already signed as loan manager at Strasbourg. Maybe a glorious return for Nathan Redmond instead?