Hodgey

Best - Case, Adams, Flowers, Hall, Katchoul, Richards, Clyde, Beattie, Schneiderlin, Marsden, Lambert, Mane, VVD, Tadic, Svenssonsx2, Worst: Delap, McLaughlin, Osvaldo, Delgado and his mate, Van dam, Crainey, Moi, A Armstrong, Forren, Marshall, Dixon, Speedie, Quashie, Bernard

I still can’t work out if there is a Prem quality team in there or not. Whilst there are a lot of poor players in the squad, I can’t help but feel there is a decent 1st team in there given the right structure and support. Sadly I don’t think we’re going to find out as we have too much to catch up and rivals are picking up points. happy with the battling spirit yesterday, and overall we’ve been decent since Selles took over (yes the odd bad performance). It’s so important for next season that we keep improving and are competitive - if we go down we need to believe we will come straight back up and start next season quickly. I think even with some of our best players picked off there is a quality championship side there, what will hurt us much more is not having a winning habit or belief.

Not one of our 5 Jan signings, specifically bought to have an immediate 1st team impact, starts. I think that says all you need to know about our recruitment success.

For some reason I think we’ll get a draw. The only way we score goals is from free kicks or winning the ball high when teams play out - which Spurs will. So I think we’ll score, but we will almost certainly concede - probably from a corner as they have players good in the air and we can’t defend corners at all. it’s all a bit moot - we need wins and we don’t score enough to get them. I think it’ll be a good game though.

On Sulemana - there was one point where he was hugging the byline with acres in front of him, even Selles was gesturing frantically for a cross field ball but nobody looked up. He does need to get involved more but equally we need to look for that ball to use his pace and get the fullback worried. For whatever reason both sides favoured play on the same side - our right and their left, this was a particular issue for us when we had Adam Armstrong out there, something I don’t want to see repeated.

I saw this very differently. Whilst the pen was poor, I really liked JWP reaction - his head didn’t drop and he and the team used that miss to galvanise them on to our best period. I thought he and Lavia were excellent today defensively, they shielded the back line, broke up play, kept possession, competed and Leicester had no shots on target. This was even more evident in the second half when we had Elynoussi, Mara, Armstrong*2 offering zero threat upfront and unable to hold the ball up. the pair of them must be utterly knackered (so I understand the free kick you cite - which was caused by Elynoussi getting totally done by their player) but they did a great job for me

I thought Selles finally (as in terms of for the whole season) found the right balance today with his line up. Walcott starting was a surprise for some, but it actually just highlighted our unbalanced squad - we don’t have any right sided at mid and it was the right call. I really liked his decision of Che over Paul - picking the player who suits his style over the Newly expensive option. I also don’t rate Perraud so was happy on the full back pairing. I also noted him at the edge of the technical area constantly giving instructions and communicating, generally calmly although in the last 5m his emotions definately got the better of him. Now the negative - those subs were ridiculous, Elynoussi as the support striker for Alcaraz decreased that attacking momentum. Worse was the Mara and Armstrong subs. So I get that Che and Walcott may have been deemed unfit for 90m. But what we all know, confirmed on Wed, is that Mara and Armstrong cannot hold the ball up, and are nowhere near Prem standard. Sure enough those two not only killed any attacking threat, but also meant we had no out, neither could hold the ball up, increasing the pressure on out backline. he’s got a 66pc win rate in the Prem so you have to respect that. But I think he got lucky today and hope he learns quickly as those changes today were frankly terrible.

Going on Sat with very low expectations - was hoping they would at least throw everything at it as their cup final, but after seeing Leeds and that I just don’t think they have it in them. as for the team, it actually doesn’t seem to make much difference who they play in terms of any attacking threat. Adams has to play it fit - he’s not good enough but at least makes things happen. I’d go with macca kwp ABK Salisu Perraud lavia kwp Armstrong Alcaraz sulemana Adams Tall Pall to come on for last 30m for a bit of route 1 when we chase the game after making some defensive howler or two. If Adams and Salisu still injured then I guess Tall Pall and Bednerak (I mean you can’t play cc after that)

The summer signings in terms of quality/price were generally good. They were just not what we needed at that time. the last window was self confessed panic - strategy out of the window and supposedly the club aimed solely at staying up. But since then we’ve appointed a coach as manager, bought a striker who looks no better than Adams and can’t last more than 60m, another erratic winger to add to our other erratic wingers, a winger who can’t cope with this league, a mate of a manager we sacked, and a decent looking Midfielder that we’re not sure where he plays or if he fits our system. wouldn’t surprise me at all if we see a lot more of Bednerak, Walcott, Adams, McCarthy, Moi, Armstrong and Djenepo for the rest of the season. And if that happens you know how bad those windows have been !

I’m not sure I agree that Lavia is our only Prem quality player, JWP and KWP clearly are and I’ve seen enough from ABK, Salisu and DCC that with good coaching / set up they could shine at this level. I also think Alcarez and Sulemana have all the attributes to be Prem players. So we do have some talent. What’s really killing us is not having a Prem competent gk (self inflicted) or striker (much harder to solve) or manager (self inflicted). We also seem to have a load of not quite good enough wingers. we’ll see in the summer how many Prem level players we really have when the bids come in.

It’s pretty clear to me the issue - the team at the end of that game included - Bazuna, Bednerak, Maitland Niles, Diallo, Adam Armstrong, Mara, Walcott. Those players are mid championship at absolute best. Which incidentally is where we are heading. I guess it’s because we are trying so hard to stop conceding, but we simply don’t look like scoring from open play and we need to win games now. We’ve moved from missing easy chances and conceding regularly, to creating no chances and conceding slightly less regularly.

Southampton Against Chelsea, Romeo Lavia received his fifth yellow card for what can only be described as a naive entry into the dark arts. Being subbed, Lavia lumbered before stopping altogether to take off his shinpads. Too obvious, Romeo — what he needs is to look at midfield partner James Ward-Prowse, who, at 28, still carries choirboy looks that belie his nuisance behaviour. He is a proponent of “sharing a yellow” and endlessly has poor Wilfried Zaha in his sights. The smiling assassin concedes the most fouls of any regular starter in the team and yet, incredibly, has only had four yellow cards. Take note, Romeo. from the athletic on ‘dark arts’ - reminds us that he’s not just about free kicks, and certainly isn’t the son in law some on here think….

So we need 6 more wins (ideally 7). Outside Spurs City and Pool I’d say we need something out of all of those home games. 3 wins 2 draws and 3 losses minimum. Then we need to beat Forest and Brighton and at least draw with Leeds and West Ham. I think that may be enough. it’s a frightening task but is doable - the problem really is our home games as to date we are a million miles away from that kind of form. That home turnaround needs to start with Leicester. We can’t afford to lose any 6 pointers from now on though.

Agree with this - the key is to stop Leeds getting 3 points. Yes ideally we win, but I think we are better off drawing this and beating Leicester rather than the other way around. A point at Leeds is a decent result, losing would be very damaging. We also have to solve our dreadful home form if we’ll have any chance of staying up. That Leicester match for me is crucial and could be a season maker.

And yet he amazingly still has many of his own fans who will never rate him, despite him being pretty much the only reason we still have half a chance of staying up, on top of keeping us up last year, and utterly betraying real world stats like ground covered, interceptions and err goals actually scored. too much of a son in law who can’t captain, only good for a few set pieces (and even then gets criticised for them) and is one of the reasons we are shit apparently…..

no I haven’t, but do you think our board and fans will ultimately be happy with ‘OK’ ?. I think he will be better than Jones as he isn’t mad and seems considered and intelligent, but it’ll be a miracle if we’ve suddenly found a premier or even championship ready manager lurking within our club. I think he’ll be OK, as stated, in that he’ll take us down but with slight improvement in style / results. Point I was trying to make (badly probably) is that I see us losing Selles, a good coach, due to the situation we have found ourselves in. Saying he’ll be better than our last clown, whilst probably true, doesn’t really help his case when the board want an instant Prem return.

This is such a messy situation, very high chance Selles will fail at this level (much as I hope he doesn’t). Then what ? how will the new manager feel about a coach who has been part of two failed projects - wouldn’t they want a completely clean slate ?, if he’s still close to the players will he feel undermined, equally will Selles be happy being relegated back to a coach after this ? I can’t really see any other result here than Selles leaving the club. The only positive is that expectations, are extremely low - if Selles takes us down but we play ok I think most will not see that as failure.

As I said in an earlier post, this whole thing smelt like we didn’t really want him and had other targets for the summer. Think JM realised that too and rightly didn’t fancy it. After that fiasco assume it’s Selles until whomever it is becomes available. Just hoping he’s competent enough not to cause any more damage. But of a two fingered salute to the fans though - ‘we’ve given up on this season but still want your support’. Also puts even more pressure on securing this new target quickly in the summer for the championship. Feels like another unnecessary mess to me

Must have misheard length, still far too long for a novice. Still think this is a forced appointment and everyone knows it, I’m almost certain we’ll see a new manager in the summer. Hoping Marsch can prove everyone wrong as we could do with stability.

Problem is availability - I’ve no doubt that Ankerson has preferences who quite simply would not come now but may end of season. appointing Selles until end of season would be waving the white flag, and whilst Marsch chance of keeping us up is minimal, stranger things have happened. Unless this is Marsch decision (which I doubt), I don’t really like this - giving him a year and a half would show more commitment and low compensation. He’ll be under so much pressure as it is - we’re hardly endorsing his appointment, don’t forget we gave Jones 6 years l, this feels like we’re now going too far the other way. We need some stability - changing managers every 3 months won’t work for us and I think showing even if we go down we think you can lead us back up would install more confidence / long term planning. If I was Marsch I’d have no problem in freezing out players / ignoring young players / pissing off coaches if I think I’m only there for 3 months no matter what.

So I’m going to say what we’re probably all thinking. We’ve ended up with a slightly worse version of Hassenhutl, in a slightly worse position, after dragging our name through the mud and spunking probably the best part of £10m on compensation. it is what it is, and for what it’s worth I think is the best result given our position. He’s not keeping us up, BUT if SR continue to back us, he seemed to do a very good job with Saltzberg when they were the big dogs in a poorer league - which should be the situation we find ourselves in the champs. And of course he isn’t Nathan Jones. I’m hoping everyone gets behind him and gives him time (ie until Dec, not until April), lots to turn around.

Just looked at Marsch record, 37 games with a pretty average Leeds side with some key injuries - I’d say similar squad to what we currently have so record of 11 wins and 10 draws = 43 points. Not brilliant but we’ve seen worse..

Marsch is the obvious choice to stay up and beyond even if we don’t , for a manager available now. Plays a system the club get, has Prem experience, got Leeds out of trouble last year, also will probably stick around for a rebuilding job. Plus no compo and immediately available. Nunes being the other choice, but his system I don’t think will suit. Gerrard / Lampard / Rooney not for me, even in the league below. The rest I just don’t see wanting it - and Allardyce would be panic. I do get the reservations on Marsch but given our situation I think he’s the best we’re likely to get. Please no 6 year deal though (how insane was that decision on Jones) - big bonus for staying up and 1 1/2 yr deal with option to extend both sides. amused to see Ralf on that list, but it’s not the maddest idea I’ve seen in football. He can have a very fast start with zero bedding in period and given a ‘end of season deal to see if you can finish what you started with new players’. Let’s be honest he’s probably got as good a chance of keeping us up, and better CV, then anyone else realistically mentioned. it won’t happen given the quotes from Semmens saying the players fell out with him. But you know what - those players are largely shit and I’m tired of pandering to them, the squad is big enough with new players that Ralf can simply freeze out those he dislikes. Obviously he’d have to go in the summer but that would be understood - Ralf gets the chance to go out on a high, if we go down we have new available managers to chose from. And it’s so left field it’s something I’m sure would appeal to Rasmus’s ‘I’m smarter than everyone and have spotted something you haven’t’ nature. so in summary Marsch, but he’s got less chance of keeping us up then Ralf. So not ideal but I think he’ll Mount a decent promotion push.

We’ve now got a squad that is far too big. Still got Tella (assume if Burnley go up they’ll buy him), Stephens, Smallbone, Simeu and a couple of others to return. Agree with those mentioned and the £100m. The issue will be those on big wages nobody else wants - ie Stephens, McCarthy, Bednerak, Diallo, Aribo, Djenepo, Armstrong (A) etc. Can see the usual issue of finding them all a loan move each year until contracts run out. If we want to go up automatically ironically we’ll probably still have the same issues we did start of this year - defensive midfielder, commanding centre back, experienced goalkeeper, competent striker, manager. As I’ve said before though even with the cream sold there are a lot of good championship players here, and with money to spend we should have top quality managers at that level knocking on our door.

One thing I’m noting now from several sources. The players hated Ralf at the end and our results/performances were awful. Now the players love playing for Jones and our results/performances are awful. I’m spotting a theme……