cityfanlee23

Possibly, but I havent been able to stomach possession football for the best part of 6 years

Part of me wonders whether it would have been as bad as this under Ruud. Maybe we would be in a similar place in the league, but with the step down in class and with the generally okay performances toward the end of the season, I’d have preferred to keep RVN in hindsight over watching Martiball.

Come on Phil there’s no need for that, Paul sells great scalp products too.

Moving Rudkin on or to another department and publicly apologising to the fans are what i've wanted for a while, not to make fun of him or make a point of embarrassing him to put out a video or statement, but to show the fans he actually understands the issues, the next step is to work with supporters groups to actually put some sort of 5 year plan together to reconnect the club with the fans, and a seperate 5 year plan to financially stabilise us and get us back to the premier league in a position where we can stay up. I don't think we will get a full plan given to us, but the club needs to acknowledge that we've lost our way with the blueprint that Nigel left us and that Puel progressed (With the support of Vichai/Top etc) and make a commitment to return to it. Promoting youth using our world-class facilities, signing cheaper, hungry players who have potential and need a chance. Acknowledge that and I've said i'm more than happy to get back on their side, the proof will be in the pudding, this is the first step and i'm glad he's taken it.

Also if we fancy aiming for the impossible, we should be paying whatever Ralf Rangnick wants to join us as an advisor alongside his role as Austria manager. One of the biggest influences of modern football and helped build Red Bull into what it is today, and he’s clearly someone who doesn’t chase money but looks to build a project.

The first step, years too late but it’s been taken nonetheless. I’d imagine that in general, JR is probably quite a competent person who overall has contributed more to the club than he has taken out, but as a Director of Football his stock declined rapidly as we veered away from a winning blueprint into a chaotic mess during covid. It’s imperative we find the right person to come in now, right now even if he didn’t fancy that sort of role long term, I’d definitely be offering a role to Nigel Pearson I know his health hasn’t been the best over the last few years, but maybe he has an office role in him to stabilise the club and oversee a rebuild. The point is, the fans have been heard, either that or Top had his card declined in Waitrose and realised the club has been burning through a fortune with no return, either way it’s a win-possible-win-possible-destruction but we have to make our voices known.

Then we play Marti's signing Begovic with Vieites as backup.

My bad, I didn't even realise he played today, just seen he made the full 90' so yeah he's probably got fire in his belly now, my assumption was based on the 1' of football he was given before today

Looked at the potential loan market come January for players who need game time and could use a 6 month loan with us as a stepping stone. In defence, there are a few Premier League loans I'd enquire about: - Jorge Cuenca (centre back that can play LB), signed for Fulham from Villareal but struggling for minutes - Jaydee Canvot, 18 appearances in Ligue 1, moved to Palace and has made 1 appearance - Josh Acheampong, CB for Chelsea, unlikely considering he's made 300+ prem minutes this season and Enzo seems to rate him, but worth contacting in case Enzo feels he needs more gametime. Wingers: Rio Ngumoha (left wing), scored on debut for Liverpool, made 206 mins total in all comps (most in EFL cup) as the heat turns up on Liverpool I doubt he will be getting many more minutes. Could do with consistent mins in the championship. Midfielders: - Bence Dardai(CM/CAM), played 21 games last season for Wolfsberg but fell out of favour. Ambitious loan targets, but the benefit of a short term 6 month deal could be enticing for players to fight their way back into contention?

IF the goalkeeper rumours are true, and IF Marti is the one who has identified the need for one, we need to sack him yesterday. We've signed 2 goalkeepers this season, one of them a Marti choice clearly, the only reason we would even need to consider a new goalkeeper is because of Marti's reliance on them. Goalkeepers need to be better with their feet in 2025, but Stolarzcyk's lack of ability in distribution and passing is the least of our worries and it's only an issue because Marti's tactical system makes it one, we could easily offset Stols flaws without needing an immediate replacement using the very little money we have. IF it is MC that has asked for a keeper and we spend some or all of the pittance we have left on a loan deal to secure one, that really is the club rowing us up sh*t creek, and Marti throwing away the paddle. Good god I hope the rumours are wrong.

Not fussed who we have to sell. Players like JJ need to be snapped up, made captain, and the entire foundation built with him as the starting brick. This is the sort of Danny Drinkwater/Matty James/Vardy/Mahrez kind of signing we need. Great attitude, works hard, huge potential. Fans need to do their absolute best to make him fall in love with this place.

Another false dawn buying him time.

Oh ffs, Marti just got another 4 weeks.

I've turned us off, the last 8 years of this Pep inspired experiment has drained me, I have lost so much love for football over the last 8 or so years, just cba watching us anymore. Boring, Lethargic, Sideways. I'll just have BTG on in the background instead. This club feels soulless

We are a team with 5-6 top top class individuals at this level, Marti has developed a system that nulified every single one of them whilst managing to exploit our own weaknesses.

At this rate just give it to Mowbray..

The very first comment is something worth noting in the context of FT. The sheer number of people who reject xG and xGD because they clearly don't understand what it represents is astounding. It's one of the most evidenced stats in football when it comes to predicting the direction of the teams position in the league or across 90 minutes of a match. Multiple users on here have been talking about this since the early games when we were sat 3rd/4th, because it was obvious we were not going to hold that position. xG isn't gospel, but ignore it at your peril; football is a statistics game, and very rarely do teams circumvent these metrics across an entire season. A tactical system that produces low xG almost always finishes closer to the bottom than the top. I wanted Marti fully gone by about game 7 when we had just lost 4th place, because it was absolutely obvious he was wedded to this system, and the system doesn't work. The problem is, far too many fans (less so on FT admittedly) are willing to continue a failing experiment on a gut feeling rather than any metric or statistic, and it's the exact reason we went down because of BR. With that said though, we quickly dispatched of Cooper and ended up declining even further, no doubt the board are lining up Russell Martin as we speak.

I think he would improve Okoli massively too.

I think right now we need him, but I do sadly think you're more right than I am, he doesn't deserve this mess. If he came in as DOF that would probably please everyone. It would also be less stressful on his health.

I'd take Hassenhuttl right now or Bo Svensson, both have been part of the Red Bull network, both aim to play a relatively exciting brand of football. Adi Hutter/Marco Rose miles ahead of us now, but i'd be happy if we embarrassed ourselves enquiring anyway. Urs Fischer would be my #1 but never going to happen with the mess we are in.

My main concern is, ideally you want the club to have a blueprint on the type of players to recruit, the type of staff, the succession plan when a manager is removed and who replaces him, a full blueprint of every single department pulling in the same direction, so that even when a manager leaves the next can come in and tweak and continue to improve, Under Pearson and Puel we had that. BR dismantled it and we are now struggling with overpaid dross. Problem is you're right, the whole club needs a refresh and Top has proven he doesn't know how to do it. I don't particularly like the idea of a manager having total control over everything, but right now we need an experienced manager who can come in, identify the issues club wide and start to lay those foundations again. Pearson laid the foundations that gave us a decade of success, those foundations have crumbled because most of the people that came after wanted to go in their own direction and KP rightly or wrongly gave them the power to do so. I would welcome coaches like Carlos Corberan and I was a very staunch advocate of Danny Rohl who don't yet have a track record of being foundation builders, but what I think this club really needs right now is a Pearson/Dyche/Puel type that are not afraid to upset people in order to uproot this club and fix it from the bottom up. I really don't know what the immediate answer is, but I know we are in massive trouble under Marti.

Tell me we would be putting in performances as drab and lifeless as that if Pearson had this team as long as Marti has. Not suggesting he would have us up there, but I would put everything on players like Nelson/Aluko/Page playing good minutes, and players actually fighting for the badge. Christ, give this team to Neil Warnock and we put up better performances. This really hasn't worked for Marti and at this point it feels like it's just a "bad fit" regardless.

Give this squad to Nigel Pearson and tell me we put out a performance like that.

Arise Sir Neil of Warnock

If it gets us another step closer to rolling the dice, yes.