JimmyC74

Bad take. Not many fans, if any, expected us to consistently challenge again for the title, but it was reasonable for us to challenge top 8-10 given our budget, playing squad and Vichai himself went on the record hoping we could reach Top 5. The likes of Brighton, Brentford, Bournemouth and Fulham are no bigger than us but show what can be achieved with a strategic plan, clever recruitment and strong management / leadership. Our decline, culminating in the relegation under Rodgers was ridiculous, with Board, recruitment team, DofF and players culpable. With Enzo we selected well but he left us up shite creek and the Club made some flawed appointments, followed by more poor player recruitment which again resulted in relegation. We have a long road back, and we may never get back to being a top 10 premier league club that challenges for Europe and may be a cup win , but that definitely should not be beyond us and be our aim.

Will do well to bring in one, maybe two.

Do the fans need to lift the players or the players lift the fans. ? It’s a bit of both, but the away fans have always been the team’s biggest backers and it’s clear to see we are a mess right now.

Harsh reality - how many of our playing squad so far have looked like Championship Top 6 standard (nevermind prem quality) as opposed to also rans.

Doom loop disinterested, unengaged playing squad - chaotic board - despairing fanbase

Walked straight down the tunnel at the end of the game.

Agree but the alternative options of Skipp and Soumare are honking also……. Marti has a massive job to reshape this squad and it appears little help from the Board.

As great a prospect as Monga is, it is a indictment of this group of players that we are already looking to him to get us results.

Reality check …….unless we sort ourselves out / can bring ina few - there is no chance of promotion. This was supposed to be a decent run of games. Too many players phoning it in. Winks apparently walked straight off - obvs wants out - and how many more?

A win is a win but typical citeh we made it difficult. Obviously early days and lots of work needed clearly…also one or two reinforcements to push on. Skipp continues to fail to impress. Winks lifted the performance second half but I see reports he may be off (Brentford, Valencia) and if true we will need to replace him.

Fee appears less than we hoped but, more important now is we reinvest well in a striker…..and maybe a new 6. Jakob will do fine. Time to reinvest. Onwards.

The forward line of Mavadidi, Bilal and Fatawu is definitely the best in the Championship. A new striker would be ideal but Ayew can do a job if money means we can't bring in someone in who is good enough. Not crazy about Vestergaard but, with Mads/Jakob, Hamza, Caleb the defence should be okay. I would switch out Thomas for Aluko for certain. Skipp did okay today but if we can bring in the likes of Brownhill I think the midfield is strengthened. Overall, optimistic we can achieve the play-offs, the size of points deduction I think determines if we can do better.

Yes please

Request approved

Monga, Page and Aluko have been really impressive during pre-season but, I would expect the new manager to be careful about introducing these lads / managing their minutes to prevent burnout.

Agreed. Weird logic there. Everything about our football decision making, then executing on that decision, seems to take for ever. For a complex one-off deal you can understand it, but when everything takes weeks / months you can only conclude that the people in charge lack the acumen and skillset to operate at this level.

I guess not really, given who is in charge, but I am considering the financial sh*t we are in.

Somewhat surprised - given the size of squad, PSR issues circling us and need to trade before we can buy - that we haven't sold anyone at this point. Given his release clause / low fee, I expect Wilf will go - even if it is late in the window - but I had hoped we would have already waved goodbye to Faes and or Coady. You could probably argue we would want / need to move on 5+ this Summer and Rudders has never really be great at moving on players we don't want / need Mads Coady Faes Daka Kristiansen Ndidi Soumare Vestergaard (one of) Skipp / Hamza Bilal I don't expect there will be many (perhaps any) incomings except for a striker which we are desperate for.

Would seem an obvious deal. Hopefully we can rinse them again.

wouldn't bank on us have much to spend this window. Loan markets and working with what we have is probably the best we can do.

Much more like it 🙌🙌

Just can’t understand why we have waited several weeks to interview Wilder and O’Neil to suss out the competition. Maybe this is all a smokescreen for the preferred candidate but pretty underwhelmed by everything at this stage. Are we really saying this is the best we can attract?

Wilder would show a lack of ambition. Would Ipswich, Southampton, etc consider him if the had a vacancy ......no

Re Wilder in no particular order - He has a dodgy record with transfers - see Rhian Brewster £23.5m - Outside of Sheff Utd his win rate in the Championship is weak. At Middlesborough he won 2/11 in 2022/23 season and fans were v.happy to see him gone. - failed in the Prem. - He is reportedly old school and doesn't believe in data science.