Hodgey

Can see what Juric is trying to do. He got his tactics and stating 11 spot on - Bree played well and covered for Sugas lack of defensive nous and he’s got Suli and Les firing. He’s also pragmatic enough to accept that our strikers are not good enough and has got Dibling and Fernandez in much more attacking areas where they can show their quality. Can see the frustration with the subs. He’s a bit unlucky as Smallbone and Downes aren’t match fit due to injury, but agree that Smallbone sub as a false 9 was never going to work. The players were definitely tiring (agree that Martin never got this squad fit enough) and I think we would have still lost without the subs, but the subs were all notably worse than the players they replaced (Utd opposite). Hopefully dibling is ok - be really good to play that same team again again Forest (you can argue Manning for Suga). If dibling isn’t fit we don’t have anyone else who can remotely play there which is a real worry (and slight on our recruitment).

Does feel like we are going to spend big on a striker with exit terms if we go down. Ferguson rumours still swirling. (Loan seems more realistic ?) That kind of makes sense for all parties - assuming we finally sell TP to Turkey and Cornet returns imagine salary is there. Gives Juric something and the fans, hopefully drives a bit of momentum for a better second half of the season and reduced scar tissue for next season. Ferguson I think works, the worry of course is that I have zero confidence in our scouting system to find anyone unproven at this level so chances are we have another dud we can’t get rid of.

ABK is a player who gets better the more he doesn’t play. Some people have short memories - he was pretty woeful in our last relegation scrap and did nothing after deciding he was too good for championship. Even his quotes there suggest he wants to play to get back into the international team, and will clearly be off as soon as we go down. I actually think Martin got this one right, but let’s see what Juric thinks - he strikes me as the sort of manager who won’t accept pay check players not giving their all so we’ll soon find out.

I watched them at Woking, they played the same way as 1st team (which makes sense). Woking soon worked out our tactics and then gave us a bit of a hammering until we made a couple of subs in the last 10m. He doesn’t really have time to implement any new tactics even if he wanted to. I would say it’s a chance for him to play some of the youngsters he has been working with, but from what I’ve seen they are miles away from this level so wouldn’t be doing them any favours.

Spurs are beset with injury, have played a tough game on Thursday, and are going nowhere in the league - these are the games you have to win when you are down there. i don’t think we will for one reason - it’s their defence which is weak due to injury - they still have high quality forwards. We simply don’t create enough - we’ve seen this at Villa / City etc who aside from us have all struggled to keep clean sheets. So they’ll score at least one (I predict 2) meaning we’ll need 3 - which we won’t get. Was chatting with a mate yesterday and we both agreed that we miss Adams, even though he wasnt good enough, due to his hold up play and bringing others into the game. That we didn’t bother to replace him is frankly idiotic (Archer replaced The French lad, BBD we obviously deliberately bought to play out wide - which is idiotic in itself)

I thought this after the first 5 games, considering the theory that possession based football tires the opposition out that is not what I’m seeing. Our thinking should be simple - we can’t make our players better footballers than other squads, but we can make them at least as fit - and to my eyes they aren’t. Also Tall Paul and Lallana can’t do much more than 60m at this level.

Depends on the strength of the other two coming down and who they have to sell. That’s an unknown.

Agree with this. Plus Wellington and two lads with a year of Turkish top league experience in Juan and Matsuki. Maybe one of the promising youngsters flies at that level too (ie Awe). Oh and don’t forget Larios (occasionally too). Half decent manager should hit the play offs with that lot easily without the loans (which is the one area our scouting got right in the champs)

So here’s a different view. Given how woeful our scouting set up currently is, the low availability and high price of players, the extremely high chance that whoever is manager at the time won’t be at season end, our dreadful efforts in previous Jan windows, and the fact we will basically be down by then. shouldn’t we use it only to try and finally get rid of the likes of tall Paul and Sulimana (and send back those useless loan players ?) and build a fund for next summer when hopefully we have a clear strategy / manager to try and actually win something of note and come back stronger ?

They’re actually worse than us for defending set pieces - hopefully THB or Bed can make them pay. Expecting a very nervy, error strewn draw which would be a decent result in building momentum. Cunha worries me - he is the class player on the pitch and we need to stop him dictating play. If we keep it tight first half their fans could turn - many want O’Neil out. Hopefully the players feel the same and phone it in to get rid of him (whilst great for us - would still be a pretty despicable way of behaving)

I actually went along to see this as local to the area. Entertaining enough but in truth we were outplayed by Woking, especially in the second half. Was pretty disappointed with what I saw, they certainly didn’t keep to the RM philosophy- really struggled to keep possession, and the back line was undone many times by Woking. Rory MacLeod was a bright spark when he came on, aside from that nobody really stood out as ‘one to watch’. Two of our pens hit the post and the 3rd was a good save. Hopefully a good learning experience, very low crowd turnout - c 100 - so not sure if this competition is really a good idea for the national sides…

Funnily enough I initially thought this, but actually having now watched for this, most Prem teams defend with everyone in the box and nobody just outside. Statistically there must be data on this that it’s the best way to defend. that said, other teams bust an absolute gut to push outside the box as soon as the ball is going that way - not a lackadaisical jog with hands behind back etc. also the goal yesterday wasn’t the same as Ipswich - Ayew was actually unmarked in the box from the off (on that I agree - I don’t see any teams deliberately leave an opposing centre forward completely free in the box)

I remember going there years ago, when we were terrible with pundits half jokingly saying we should forfeit for a 3-0 to save gd. As it happened astonishingly Rory Delap got a brace and we got a point (I recall we gave away a 90+ equaliser naturally). So stranger things have happened

I think we should keep him. I don’t trust our club not to fcuk the appt up further - whoever we get would be subsequently fired so what’s the point - see if we improve as the season goes on to see if he gets another go at the championship. There simply isn’t enough goals in this side to stay up. That said not impressed today - the line up was clearly ridiculous. Not sure if he was making a point about how bad our strikers are but at least play who you think is the best one.

There is probably a team within that massive squad, that if picked consistently and with the right tactical tweaks stays up. RM has found solutions before - but I’ll give him a few hints: Stephen’s and Bednerak as a cb partnership will not keep us up - we know this as we have seen it before. Could you reintegrate ABK and/or build THB back up. There is no way on gods green earth that BBD is a left winger, certainly not in the Premier League. Why not use one of the 5 senior left wingers at the club (all be it one is on loan) Armstrong can’t score goals in this league (I think RM has sussed this one) Archer isn’t suited to playing up front by himself, like Mara he cannot hold the ball up or link play, oh and like Armstrong he’s a player who struggles to score in this league. Maybe try BBD who could do that role or hope Stewart stays fit. Also now we have abjectly failed to ship Tall Paul out - why not have him on the bench for a plan B Keep playing Les, Fernandes, Downes and Dibling in midfield - that is the right mix of creativity and defensive cover Find a new set piece coach, properly drill the back four on keeping a line. This team is worryingly unfit - many blowing out of their arses by 60m. no excuses for that - double training drills to get them fitter Make Downes captain even with that lot chances are we will go down. That won’t bother me - I’m not opposed to a yo-yo, what will bother me is ignoring some of the clearly obvious to everyone issues (above) and not be competitive.

Quick thought on the Tall Paul saga - does Turkish window still close later ? If so they will inevitably use that to low ball the price knowing we don’t want him, only hope is that another Turkish club want him too

They got through which is s great achievement, honestly the youngsters and experienced pros have been equally inconsistent. Genuinely not sure best route from here - you would be think experience but I’d say they have performed worse than the nippers.

Not sure what has happened here. At this level - we know these players can bat and bowl, but as a unit they are collapsing, shame as it should be a very winnable competition. Gubbins / Middleton and Prest have been particularly poor.

We’re going to have to disagree on that one. To me we got incredibly lucky - that £10m could have gone on a capable understudy for Downes rather than us losing whenever he didn’t play. if we were a comfortable prem team maybe, but we needed every penny and essentially blew it all so I’d say not a good signing. Yes he made a fair few appearances but so did Mara and Sulimana and I’d say they were equally bad buys.

The Charles transfer was utter madness , you can’t say that’s an ok signing - a championship club spending over £10m on a complete novice who couldn’t get in the team. Thankfully it was a one off but at that time they still hadn’t learnt the very costly lesson of the season before. The Jan relegation window was a complete disaster where we totally lost our heads and due to FFP are still paying the price. Honestly I’m still extremely unconvinced by our recruiting team. To my mind it was Martin who got us HB and Downes (and Manning and Fraser) rather than our recruitment team. They seem incapable of spotting a player, particularly a gk or striker and I’m not sure we’d be any worse off if we just shut the entire team down and let Martin do it. Agree that whomever did the selling last year did well and got good prices, but for good players, we still can’t get rid of a lot of the dross. Edwards looks to be a solid piece of business and I think we are doing some sensible business at the moment with money we have, but Martin in right - all we’ve done so far is get back to the level we finished last season (4th in the championship)

Like what they are doing here - last year they just threw all the youngsters in with Gubbins. That paid dividends and this year they now have experience - so much so that line up looks very strong and they are clearly confident of winning the trophy and using the likes of Organ, Abbott, Abbas, Brown, Gubbins and Wheatley for extra experience and practice before the last few county games. It really is an exciting crop of young talent we have, and it’s great to see how they are being managed. And yes, Whiteley was a massive disappointment and doesn’t seem to have regained any confidence.

We’re going to have to gamble with a striker, it’s a position everyone wants and there isn’t an easy solve with our budget - whoever we get will have huge risk. The GK position however should be much easier to solve, plenty of good gks out there who would love to be no 1 in a Prem club. We probably need to get both right to stay up as they are critical positions. I can accept us getting the fwd position wrong, but if we don’t get a competent keeper at this level then there really is no excuse (and Dubrovnik is not the answer).

Cricket is like the EPL in India - stands to reason these massive clubs want to expand globally and the UK has a decent competitive set up. Short form cricket will continue to grow - not sure they’ll ever crack US though (despite Baseball being dreadfully dull) which is where the cash really is. Great time to be a limited over specialist - wages will soon be up there with football and it’s not seasonal anymore as there are tournaments everywhere. Whilst the 100 is an interesting concept aimed at kids, the opportunity in the UK is to throw proper money at the blast and attract the best players in the world. Not sure the ECB have quite understood that oppo yet. should mean we are cash rich and get high profile oversees, and potentially steal more local talent. weve got some very good young cricketers coming through so hope we continue to support. i was listening to commentary the other day and the Somerset ? Commentator commented that we have finally got local players - apparently he once listed all out players and not a single one was from anywhere near Hampshire !!

But made ridiculously hard work of it. Those 19yr olds started to make very short work of our attack. Good to see McD and Turner back to form. And Prest took the shackles off - not seen him do that before. Jack isn’t ready yet but good experience I guess in the dead rubbers. Lots to do next year if we want to compete. We’re not going to win anything if we are relying on the likes of Wheal and Weatherly. On the plus side I see further improvement from Albert and Prest.

Batting wasn’t too clever either….