Hodgey

Even Bruce knew about our rb issues - targeted from the start- you don’t get away with that at this level. Sometimes you need a plan B - pointless bringing on a big lump up front if you can’t cross the ball in. We should have put 3 times the amount of crosses in that we did in those conditions but every time it was laboured slow passing to the wings and hit first man crosses. We should have pushed Vestigaard up front, Jwp our wide to cross and bombarded them. Everyone is upset not by this game (annoying though that is) but that we seemingly can’t think of ways to score against 10 or 9 men - it really isn’t good enough

We’re in a very tricky place - next 5 years are crucial. squad size is right - make up isn’t - having 3 first team gks and 2 full backs is madness - that is a recruitment error. Scouting has also let us down - £55m wasted on Hoet /Gunn/Lemina/Elynoussi, if we had a competent cb/cm/am then we could be more tactical in bringing kids on / covering positions. this has been done - but the Burnley bloke had a point about our youth, the quality and aptitude of players we are producing isn’t good enough - especially if the aim is to have half the team from the youth set up. This for me is the biggest worry And then there is finance - Covid hasn’t helped, neither has awarding Forster and Long big new contracts. That loan means we need to make £10-15m a year from transfers - for that you need some quality youngsters or great scouts. Finally we have literally put all our eggs in the Ralph basket - if he goes we have to start again, giving him that much power has worked so far as he is such a talent, but I can’t see a succession plan if he leaves. The hope is that we finally clear the deadwood, use some of those wages on patching up the squad, and that the new youth set up starts producing results meaning we can stabilise as a mid table team who make a small transfer profit each year to eat into our debt. If we can do that for a few years I’d think we’d get investor interest and we can move on from there if we go down, we probably drop again and end up bankrupt and start again - at least it’ll be a bargain price then for someone !

Didn’t feel like a 9-0 oddly, in some ways the bizarre decisions have masked the score line. A big concern for me is what is going on with our youth - we have stated aim to have half the team made up from the youth and yet seemingly have neglected our youth set up in terms of both talent and aptitude- they all look utterly lost to me. Given we don’t have a pot to piss in so can’t buy talent this is of major major concern

Fair enough MLG if I misunderstood. Just out of interest - do you think our youngsters (ie trying to come through our youth system now) are better than l1 standard or not ?.

MLG - after your statement that our young players were significantly better than l1 standard - this perhaps another indicator that they are not ?. My take is that sadly this crop of youngsters are some way short of the mark, aside from Smallbone I don’t see any of them being Prem level and most will end up in l1. Using the loan system makes sense if that is the case until either they improve or new talent comes through - we can’t afford to buy. also assuming Vest or Salisu are fit shortly then Stephens could be used at full back as an option who we know can defend at this level.

No - also Italian clubs always do this, especially to us. They get players in on loan, with a ‘right to buy’ for xx, then at the end offer a fraction of that or nothing and look for another loan. I’m hoping we have learnt this from Cedric / Ramirez / Osvaldo and just accept getting an unwanted player away with subbed wages is a bonus. We do need a massive relook at our strategy for offloading unwanted players - it’s not just the money but the resources put into trying to offload could be used in acquiring better players.

That Valery and Walcott right side is going to give me nightmares tonight

It’s mental - and does suggest an educated gamble by our recruitment team. im also confused why some posters have been so adamant that he is going to be the next big thing / future of our club having never seen him play for us ! For those Stephens haters out there - can I point out that he is playing, injury free, keeping clean sheets, and if he wasn’t we’d have been without a cb (even if he hasn’t had one good season in la liga and once marked Messi etc)

Ah - MLG, excited to see if you are right about our youngsters being significantly above l1 level tonight. Be a good yardstick to see

Longs star has fallen dramatically, Ralph would rather play 2 players out of position than play him...

Agree to disagree on both those points MLG - obviously hope you are right but think you might have rose tinted ‘Saints’ specs on. My reasoning is u23 level is below l1 and none of those players have done anything of particular note there. As for Long - I think you are thinking of Long a year ago - looks totally shot to me (no better than our young strikers - possibly worse).

Sorry MLG but that imho is a pretty baseless assessment. If we play our ‘reserves’ and youth on top of small squad / injuries etc then we have every chance of going out in a competition we could win (first silverware for 44 years). Why are you so confident N’lundulu, Vokins, Smallbone and Valery are better than l1 level? aside from being at a Premier League club what evidence is there ?. Equally long is probably l1 level now. I hope Ralph rests a few key players (Jwp, KWP, Ings, Berty) but should still play rest of 1st team - and I think he will, he’ll want to win this and Arsenal after is winnable and post that the big boys will have Europe as well as COVID to deal with.

We’ve all wondered what the long term damage would be of that disaster of a transfer period where we spend on Hoet, Elynoussi, Carrillo, Lemina, Gunn and new Forster contract. £80m fees and another £15-£20m in wages - £100m gone there. At least recent windows have been much improved - equally costly has been the failure to get rid of any of them (even pre Covid)

Combination of changes in manager / style, poor coaching and poor strategy. I think the last lot genuinely believed their own hype in our academy when it was clear that standards had dropped. Think they are addressing now but yes, 5 years of underperformance where we have basically produced nothing for Ralph to work with (and he clearly wants to). Lowest point being when we were sending out 20-21 year olds to non-league (and renewing their contracts) a horrible but accurate indication of the quality on offer. Hopefully in 2-3 years time the production line will be up and running again but it’s not exactly helped our cause in terms of squad - lots of youth players now around the squad who are way short of the level required.

It’s fair comment - we haven’t produced anything in the last 5 years and talent looks sparse and not improving., Ralph obviously likes working with young players but his actions speak volumes on his opinions of our youth. Hopefully with new structure we’ll see talent coming through again in 2-3 years. We’ve had a look in the 1st team at the best we’ve produced ( Tella, N’dulu, Obafemi, Vokins, Smallbone, Valery, Ramsey) and none of them look prem quality (in fact I’d say they are more league 1 level) which has been a big reason (along with some poor transfers we are still working through) why our squad outside c 15 players is so poor. I remember Ross bigging himself up on his policy on buying in great young players like Valery - but in reality it’s been a really poor period, and clearly our competitors have noticed this too and will use it to try and pry top talent away from our set up.

Might just be me - but I recall many an awful performance v Hammers, hope tonight is different but I’m worried about defending corners with no Vest. We can’t play Long and Adams again - that partnership doesn’t look like it will ever work - assuming no Ings we need to play Walcott up front again and recall Djenepo. Rom back big plus as their midfield with Souchek and Rice are strong and mobile. Hopefully both teams try and play tonight

Well - precedent was set when they gave Long a 2 year contract on high wages until he was 35. Bertrand is much better than Long so he would rightly be asking for something similar...

Started well again and deserved lead at half time without creating much. They made tweaks and looked more dangerous - scoring and looking slightly more dangerous until the red. After that I think our automisns just don’t work against 10. We were pedestrian - but we actually often are - tempting players out of position then to play quick through the middle where there is space. Arsenal refused to move out of position leaving only space wide - that’s not really our game nor what they have been trained to do. In the end happy with a point - very hard to unlock a team who park the bus - look at City v West Brom.

Delighted with a point, Walcott missed a good opportunity but so did they - finishing isn’t his strongest point and we know that. Energy levels had dipped and Wolves gamble on taking a def out for a mid worked in killing our game plan of fwd passing down the middle - I thought we coped well with that and intelligently tried to go wide more given how good they are on the counter. I agree with some of the comments on Long - it’s been a while since I’ve seen him have any effect on a game as sub. For me we either need someone to hold the ball up and draw fouls (protecting a lead) or provide something a bit different (chasing a game) and what we generally get is him running around a lot with the game passing him by. My worry is that we are asking him to do a job he can’t do and it may be better to throw a youngster on instead with him being an influence in training / role model on professionalism.

Great win. Interesting that fans and club are in agreement over weak areas - full back (tried to remedy with Williams loan) centre back (Salisu) and centre mid (Diallo). This game proved the rule - and I’d probably add another cf to that list as well as Long now looks like a lower league player and the youngsters aren’t quite ready (maybe the Wellbeck rumours). In the end you had 2 players out of position (Walcott and JWP) two players way off the pace (Diallo and Stephens) and a centre forward who can’t perform at this level anymore (Long). That’s problems with half the team so that second half wasn’t a great surprise. They had so much joy down both flanks and McCarthy and Vestergaard did well to keep them out. As others pointed out our right side desperately needed fixing but Ralph didn’t really have an option. Also when we are under the cosh we need someone to hold the ball up and win fouls - Long can’t do that (neither can Walcott or Obafemi) so that’s a worry. Hope all the injuries are short term.

I’ve never got the Romeu bashing. He’s very good at what he does - and has been a mainstay in any decent period we have had since he joined. Great passer, strong, intelligent (never been sent off despite his style), big club and plenty of Prem League experience, and a real team player (if he gets dropped he tends to come back stronger) Yes he isn’t the quickest, but if he was he’d be top 6 material. I’d give him a 2 year contract now - if he signs for another club in Jan as he is entitled we’d have made a big mistake.

Valery is a massive concern - he’s way off the required level at the moment (really not sure what has happened to him), I’m less concerned about Vokins who has looked OK when required. I think you would struggle to find a worse reserve right back in the division. And we simply don’t know about dm - if Dallio is a quick starter then we should be ok.

I think we’ll be 14th, 11th if JWP / Ings or full backs don’t pick up a month out type injury. confident we’ll end up above Fulham, West Brom, Palace and Sheff Utd. Confident we’ll be below city, pool, Utd, everton, Chelsea, spurs, arsenal, Leicester, Wolves. Think we’ll also end up behind Leeds, West Ham, Newcastle and Brighton...

I don’t get the McCarthy bashing. We all know his limitations - that’s why he was bought as a no 2. But he’s better than the two keepers we bought as no 1 - that’s been proven given he’s displaced both. I can accept an argument about finding a better keeper - as clearly there are out there (but we don’t have any money so that’s out). But in reality we have much bigger issues to concentrate on than an average prem keeper who is a bit uncomfortable with his feet. Btw he played well yesterday - I can’t believe anyone watched that and thought ‘dodgy keeper’

I’m pretty sure I saw stats on save % for last year and McCarthy was something like 12th - he also faced a lot of shots, so he is (or was last year) an average prem gk. Gunn was bottom I think and I’m pretty sure last season he played properly Forster was bottom 3* Granted we are playing a different way this year that might change that - but if the new way means a gk who sweeps - I don’t think I’ve seen a gk less comfortable doing that than Fraser - then again I’ve also seen Gunn charge out of his box missing everything so not sure even he is much better. * prepared to be MLGd on these stats but I’ve got a pretty good memory