Jobyfox

Just got back from Christmas shopping. How’s our biggest match of the season going?

Probably the most important game of the season and we’re starting with Danny Ward in goal. FML!!!

Bloody hell. I’ve been watching LCFC for a long time, but had to google the top two on that list. I can’t remember Hodge being that bad. Ricardo was unpopular because he had a very strange style and was picked ahead of Chris Weale who was perfectly competent at the level we were at. It depends on the criteria. Some on that list only had a handful of appearances. Ward played long enough to make a significant contribution to us going down. Some of these probably are worse (eg Kalac), but were found out pretty quickly and kept well away from the starting eleven

186 pages of saying how crap someone is? Well it isn’t nice, but it is a reflection of the frustration of people. I was rather hoping we’d never see him in an LCFC squad again after our relegation season. That’s right for us, but also right for the player who would struggle to redeem himself in the minds of the fans of this club. Yet, there he was, on the pitch, at Newcastle, in a Premier League game. I realise there were a collection of circumstances that enabled him to be back in the squad (i.e. injuries to our best 2 goalkeepers) but, even so, it was still depressing to see him on the pitch again. He needs to go, as soon as possible, for his own sake and for ours!

Hopefully talking about “Jakub” is recognition that he is still our 2nd choice keeper and “other options” might just have been forced upon us through injury

It does seem like you could get dyno-rod in with an industrial plunger and they still wouldn’t flush!

They’re still significantly better than us!

Put them in the same sweater with their heads sticking out the same hole and insist that they are conjoined twins!!

Crumbs of comfort… Us, Ipswich and Southampton were always going to struggle. We needed an established PL club to get dragged into it. Wolves are now most emphatically in it!

After our relegation season Ward should never have made another squad. How have we contrived to get into a position where he’s playing in the PL again. Where is Iversen? How long until Jakub Stolarczyk is fit again? Who’s available on loan? Going back to Danny Ward is just criminal mismanagement of the highest order?

I see you’re feeling generous

Yes. It was always likely to be damage limitation today. Our squad is poor. Our squad decimated by injuries is highly unlikely to get anything at Newcastle.

Bet it was deflected

RvN and Cooper both have the misfortune of having to pick from the same squad. In this case one that is also decimated by injuries

Agreed. But the alternatives are ……

Used a Portkey - apparently

Yes … he’s on the bench

That’s quite a feat!

Who needs a midfield anyway?

No idea who’ll play in midfield. It will probably be Skipp and Hamza, which is reasonably dreadful at this level. There were plenty of reasons why we were relegated that were higher up the list than Ndidi, which I won’t list now as I don’t want to revisit the trauma

Fortunately you’re playing a poor Leicester City side with no fit midfielders. I think you’ll be fine

Yep. So did winning the Premier League title

I agree with this. In some ways I was disappointed that we moved away from our style after winning the league. I realise that we had players who had unique qualities (Vardy, Kante) for the system and that it probably wouldn’t have been as successful with future iterations of players. It’s just that if we all play the same style then the clubs with infinite resources will always do it more effectively. I think a low block, high intensity, game with quick transitions and fast moving forwards is an alternative that would take many teams by surprise. It can also be quite exciting to watch if done well and should be differentiated from long ball, kick and rush, to big forwards that is quite ugly and outdated. If we had this system and recruited into it we’d have our own identity. It’s similar to what Diego Simeone achieved at Atletico Madrid after realising he’d never compete with Real and Barcelona by adopting the same style as them

That’s kind of my point really. Whilst I’m not always as convinced as everyone else seems to be that Rudkin is the devil incarnate it’s a situation of the clubs own making. The absence of any structural change following our relegation means that the finger has been squarely pointed at JR. It’s difficult to comprehend that the consequence of that in house review was to decide that everything was fine off the pitch. The club’s attempt to just brush everything under the carpet, rather than make a visible change, has created a void of culpability. The absence of action means that the fans have stepped into that void and decided themselves who’s at fault