leicesterseddon

I will probably contrive myself to believe the opposite before Monday night - but yes, it's surely all over now. Only picking up 2 points from our home games against Everton, Leeds, Bournemouth, plus Southampton away. Gone with a whimper.

We lack experience at the back. Our most experienced player in the PL yesterday was Soyuncu, and he’s hardly played this year. Players like Faes, Kristiansen, etc might make decent players one day but in fairness to them it’s a tough league to crack in your first season. I thought the same when we signed Souttar - he might be decent one day, but was he really what we needed in January given the situation we were in?

In the context of the game that has to be one of our worst performances in years. In a relegation dogfight against a team with little to play for and we were walking around the pitch watching them pass it round us. Fact is half the team (and the manager, frankly) know they won’t be here past June and have completely checked out. Our only hope this year was to sack Rodgers either in the autumn or if not, in January after the World Cup. We didn’t.

Got an impossible job and obviously not his fault when we go down, but have to say I’ve not been impressed. Team selection has been very iffy and in-game substitutions have been dreadful. And making Tielemans captain? Really?

I remember after seven games or so seeing lots of stats about how likely we were to go down. Not that it got through to the board (or most of our fans). Some on here were even taking about having a crack at the Europa League places.

I have long thought that this is a huge problem for us. A squad full of players who won’t be here next year, led by a man who must surely know he won’t be either. It’s the result of terrible recruitment and really poor planning.

I have some sympathy - because it’s hard to turn on a bloke that was in charge when we won the FA Cup and finished 5th twice in a row. I’ve always argued that his achievements at Leicester (which are laudable and should not be downplayed) meant that he deserved time to turn it around when we started to struggle last year. Unfortunately though, he’s had enough time and shown he can’t improve the situation. It’s a real shame. But there are very few managers that can reinvent a team past four years in charge. Ideally the fans wouldn’t have to turn on him at all, because he’s been a great manager for us when you zoom out a bit. But the owners made a fateful mistake by giving him that mega contract and now seem unable to back out of it, even though the drop-off is obvious for all to see.

Probably ~60% of our fanbase is totally deluded/ willing to forgive anything. The current level of performance puts me in little doubt we are going down. The fact the fans haven’t turned n Rodgers basically proves (rightly or wrongly) that we have a Championship fanbase that is glad to be making up the numbers in the top tier.

I know not everyone is a fan, but our xG of 0.02 tells you everything you need to know. It was an utterly depressing vision of what next season would be like under Rodgers when Maddison leaves. Mind you I didn’t think much of Arsenal. Rolling around on the floor and time wasting against a crap team like us to run the clock down is not the hallmark of champions.

In my book Soumare should only be an option of last resort. He’s shown flashes of promise, but he just doesn’t have the speed of thought to be a success in the Premier League.

“City…Manchester City that is” They can’t help themselves can they!

I’d love that but can’t see it happening at this stage to be honest It will be interesting to see where he ends up though because his stock (like pretty much the rest of the team) has certainly fallen over the last year or so I think the best he can hope for (at least, initially) is to be a benchwarmer at Arsenal/Man Utd or something like that. He’d probably take it though, hoping to break into the team at some stage Can’t see Liverpool/Man City coming in for him because of their style Or maybe he goes abroad

Our post-goal celebrations are almost becoming themed Der-duh duh-duh-duh, der-duh duh-duh-duh to Kungs Short break to take breath, then… Der-duh duh, der-duh duh, der-duh duh der-duh duh der-duh duh to Carnaval de Paris

You are right to say if we go down both Rodgers and the ownership should share the blame. But for me it would be 70% Rodgers and 30% owners. The decision not to buy anyone in the summer is increasingly looking like a gamble too far. Having said that, Rodgers's recruitment has been shambolic, so I can see why they were reticent to give him more cash. Allowing so many players to run down their contracts has also been a massive failure. Perez, Tielemans and Soyuncu alone cost us around £90m so the idea they are all going to walk away for nothing this summer is bananas. Even with all that though, I think the squad he has is better than where we are - and for that I blame his tactics, selection and godawful style of play over the last year or so.

I feel much more optimistic after yesterday for sure. It was absolutely vital to win after our disastrous post-World Cup run. But looking at our fixtures, I still think we’ll be in the zone come the end of the month. I still think we’re absolutely in a relegation scrap, and won’t think otherwise until I see a sustained improvement, particularly in defence

We’re in a weird phase. Nobody is behind Rodgers, but the home crowd hasn’t yet turned on him and probably won’t until we’re in the zone.

There are effectively four factions within the fanbase now: 1. Top is a good owner, and should stick with Rodgers 2. Top is a good owner, but needs to sack Rodgers 3. Top is a bad owner, because he won’t sack Rodgers 4. Rodgers has been let down by a lack of investment I think the interaction between factions 1 and 3 is the most heated, but the tension between 2 and 3 is also there…

I think when he says we have a small squad, he means there’s only a small number he thinks are up to scratch. Unfortunately for him, many of those deemed surplus to requirements are those he himself has signed.

At the time, I regarded the West Ham and Everton wins as a turning point. But it’s now clear they are potential relegation candidates too, so I’m starting to reassess that theory. Our five wins this season have all been against sides lower than 14th. Unless that starts to change, there’s no reason not to assume we are in with a chance of relegation too.

True, but I don’t think it’s right to say our Kop is the same as other grounds in England. It’s all demographics (age/social being the most important) and for some reason our home crowd just doesn’t really have it really. Never really has, to be honest.

I don’t doubt that people within the club read this forum, but there is very little evidence they give it much thought. We’re in a terrible state off the pitch to be honest. No one is enthusiastically behind Rodgers, but those who want him out aren’t numerous enough for many to put their head over the parapet. The net effect is a strange sort of apathy, best expressed by the ‘Kop’ yesterday waiting patiently for Newcastle to dispatch their penalty in the first half. The only thing that will shake people out of this state of torpor is to be in the zone come February or March.

I was interested to see what Newcastle were like. I thought they were good, but if I’m honest not as good as I thought they would be. They didn’t scream quality. More that they were workmanlike and quite organised, and very fit. Their second goal was a quality move, but other than that I didn’t feel like we’d come up against a top side. As for us…we were appalling defensively again. Gave them the game really. We desperately need a centre half more reliable than Evans

He was never going to play much of a part though was he. Been nowhere near Southgate’s plans in the year leading up to the tournament, and was only picked as a wildcard to get the media off his back.

I think it’s why the top clubs in England might not want him. They all play with a very demanding system that requires midfielders to press high up (especially Man City and Liverpool) I think abroad the situation might be different, and I can see a club in Italy/Spain taking a punt on him I can’t really see him staying here to be honest, unfortunately

I generally don’t like the idea of sitting deep for 90mins. Plenty of teams try it against Man City and most fail The problem is they have so many quality players that they will get a goal from somewhere You could argue yesterday proved that, although the plan very nearly worked The pragmatist in me knows that it is probably a good idea to sit back against them at the Etihad. But I have never liked a tactical approach that is so defensive at home, and never will