Ricey

Ndidi is just back from injury and has looked dead on his feet last couple of matches. Still starts. Faes has been a big ball of arrogance and incompetence. Still starts. You can’t moan about the welfare of the players yesterday and then just roll out the same old team. Lack of rotation is going to cost us.

Presumably this means that if we don’t go up, the EFL still can’t deduct points for the 22/23 PL breach? …and if we do go up, the PL can’t deduct points for a 23/24 EFL breach (if we do breach)?

Imperative we start strongly (won't happen). We had a chance to turn The Den toxic on Tuesday but instead we allowed Millwall to grow into the game and grow in confidence. We have to learn when to go for the jugular and when to be more cautious. Against teams near the bottom, we have to go for the jugular. Plymouth have scored 1 goal in their last 6 home matches. We should feel comfortable being quite attack minded from the start and attempt to get ahead. Take the initiative rather than playing slow, patient football that only results in the opposition fans and players taking hope from it. It won't happen though. Maresca has admitted that his belief that is against low blocks it is best to play slow, patient football.

89th minute own goal.

I struggled at times earlier in the season as despite the winning most matches the performances were often unconvincing. But I, like many others, put that down to the players still learning this new system. We all hoped that there were several more gears to move into. The reality is that Enzo was a much needed breath of fresh air for the players in the summer and that enabled us to hit the ground running. The players adapted fairly well to the new style, perhaps because it wasn't really that new compared to Rodgers' style. But as the season wore on, it was concerning that we weren't winning more games more comfortably. I think I can count on one hand the games we have won convincingly. Most, if not every, match had a period of time where we looked toothless or all over the place. Normally at end of matches, after going ahead or whenever the opposition decided to go at us a bit more. Even when we were 17 points clear, in terms of performances, it felt paper thin. Over the course of the season more and more teams have discovered the way to frustrate us. By this point, the blueprint is so clear we might as well have faxed it around to every other club ourselves. Enzo at the beginning of the season needed to be a coach, but as the season has progressed we've needed him to be a manager. That is where he's fallen short. In regards to tactical flexibility, in-game management, rotation of the squad or instilling a ruthlessness into players, he's gone totally missing. He has incredible stubbornness for such a young manager and it's costing us. Away from results, I've struggled all season with the style of play. It's too often painfully dull and when things don't go our way, it looks pretty pathetic. That's not just on Enzo, it was also the case with Rodgers. For the last few years our teams have been slow, soft, predictable and totally lacking in any sort of mental strength. I'm sick of it to be honest.

The thing is, we cross it quite a lot. Mostly floated balls to the back post. Why not bring on a player who is one of the best around at doing that.

We have to learn from last night, as Friday will be a similar match against a team fighting for their lives. Hermansen Justin Vestergaard Coady Ricardo Winks Dewsbury-Hall Praet Mavididi Fatawu Iheanacho I can't believe we've got to the stage where Iheanacho is the answer, but I think against a parked bus at least he brings physicality. Daka is in horrendous form and Vardy can't start two matches in a few days. Praet should offer more in tight spaces compared to Ndidi and Justin should help guard against getting hit on the counter. Coady for Faes is simply a no-brainer. I'd love to see us go at them early, but it's never going to happen. If we do and we go ahead, Enzo will bring out the calm down gestures and all of our momentum will disappear.

I did wonder/fear how much the last two results were down to the fans creating an atmosphere where the players were afraid to play slowly or negatively. There was a good intent about us in both matches. Last night was back to our worst. Slow, predictable, one dimensional, soft and unambitious.

He's the perfect player to come on when we are creating nothing against a parked bus. He can play cross field passes, he can cross the ball into the box and he can whip the ball behind the back line. I get why he doesn't start, but games like last night a perfect for him to come on in the final 20 minutes.

The worrying thing is that you just know the Plymouth and Preston games will be just like this. Possibly Blackburn as well, but the fact it's on the final day and at home might mean we show a bit more intent. There is simply no excuses for last night. We looked like a team comfortable in mid-table who have a big cup game in a couple of days.

This is it for me. He's seen the inner workings of Guardiola's Man City and has come away from that thinking that there is only one way to do things. He thinks that changing shape, mixing up our patterns of play or going more direct at times is sacrilege and will cause the players and fans to believe in "the idea" less. That works when you are Pep and you have the resources to back it all up, but we don't have that luxury. He has to be more flexible and realistic to where we are are, the squad we have and the situation we find ourselves in. He feels more like a salesman for The Idea™ than a football manager who's job it is to get results.

The problem is that the system hasn’t adapted and evolved over the course of the season. Teams have sussed us and we’ve lost our fear factor. There has been no tweaks or improvements and we’ve stopped using our squad. It’s like our game plans are devised by ChatGPT.

His ‘idea’ will never be liked by the fans. It doesn’t resonate with why we watch our team. I like it when it works. I detest it when it doesn’t.

Another one that’s on Enzo unfortunately. I know it’s easy to scapegoat the manager after a defeat, but he’s only got himself to blame. Faes has needed dropping for weeks, Ndidi looks horrifically unfit and Akgun has not once looked like a winger, but there they all are in the starting lineup. He said there would be changes and there wasn’t. Add to that the baffling decision to swap KDH and Ndidi, then not change it when it clearly wasn’t working, and you have a pretty abject managerial performance on your hands. It was an arrogant performance. Just like Sheff Wed away and Bristol City away, we rocked up looking like a team that expected to win with ease. All of the fight and intent that we’ve showed in the last week was nowhere to be seen. To go away to badly out of form Millwall in such an huge match and create literally nothing until the final few minutes is unacceptable. I don’t trust this team to get us over the line.

Wout ****ing Faes. Beyond that though, it’s so predictable and unambitious.

Really weird to swap KDH and Ndidi round. Change it.

I’m already worried about Ricardo and Ndidi. Yunus hasn’t impressed me as a winger so far, but he’s earned his chance.

Any change will be for next season onwards. It won’t mean that we escape points deductions for last season and this season.

A luxury tax would work in some instances as it would allow clubs to be ambitious as long as they have the backing to do so, but what happens if owners lump it all on loans that then strangle the club further down the line? Also, for the mega-rich like Newcastle and Man City, it basically gives them free-reign to spend what they like and sail off into the sunset. A luxury tax, but still with some kind of spending/wage bill cap might be the answer. Regardless, we can't carry on with a situation where half of the Premier League are desperately trying to avoid points deductions each season.

They weren't new rules though. They had been in place for 10 years. I don't think they did have the right to be ambitious if it meant gambling the future of the club on it being successful, especially when that gamble effectively meant going all in on Brendan Rodgers and Lee Congerton, who both have a terrible records in regards to longevity and sustained success. No fan would have wanted that. They effectively built a financial infrastructure that only stood a chance of avoiding breaches if we carried on finishing in the top 6 and carried on being able to sell players for £50M+. That was never ever going to be sustainable and hindsight is not required to see that. We could still have been ambitious, but within a business plan that allowed for a bump in the road. Instead we put our foot down and wrote the car off once it hit the first pothole.

My only hope with that is that he's on reduced terms, knowing that if he had left on a free then there was no way he'd get a contract anywhere near like the one he had previously.

What I find staggering is that we lost £90m despite PL TV money and selling our two most prized assets. That is terrifying and makes me think that we have at least 2 more breaches coming for this season and next. What I also find staggering, but at the same time predictable, is that the clubs defence is "Well, we earnt the right to spend that sort of money because of sporting merit". I've not read the PSR guidelines thoroughly, but I can assure you that there is no mitigation or consideration for sporting merit. The only way you can safely afford to ramp up your investment is to increase your revenue. It sounds like the club started to budget for finishing in Europe (or at the very least in the top half) AND selling a high value player, all the while not budgeting for the fact that we might at some point need to sack one of the highest paid managers in the world and letting the wage bill run wild. That is not a safe or sustainable business plan. It was also going to end in disaster the minute we had a bad season. Even if we had finished in the European places last season, we probably still would have breached. Our wage bill vs revenue has been alarming for years. This has been staring the club in the face and they've done little about it.

Either the club didn't care about PSR, did the maths wrong or, more likely, they expected to sell a few players. Tielemans, Soyuncu, Vestergaard, Praet, Soumare, Choudhury etc etc. I think the club were confident that they could shift a few of those out, oblivious to the fact that no one was ever going to give us a good offer and no one can afford their inflated wages.

But what if the billionaire’s business acumen is the problem? What if the people below him are so close to him that they are bullet proof? At that point it becomes irrelevant that he’s a billionaire. He can’t spend his money if we are haemorrhaging money through incompetence.

After looking at the numbers and the statement, then yes, they have to go. It’s no time to be sentimental. There is no defence for those losses and the clubs reasonings for them are even more alarming. Top, Rudkin and Whelan are joined at the hip, therefore the only way for genuine change is for the club to be sold.