reynard

Absolutely agree. I don't watch a lot of football on Tv but thought I'd try this as they are supposedly two of the top teams. I appreciate Man City win a lot but it is so boring to watch. They have had something like 70% possession but only 6 touches in the Arsenal penalty area. The atmosphere in the ground is rank and you can appreciate why. literally nothing to get excited about in the first half.

Didn't seem to work that way beating Bournemouth.

Absolutely correct. If we don't get promoted this season there will need to be a massive clear out of players not counting those out of contract and sales of our supposed better players. We could easily end being like Stoke and facing a decade or more out of the top flight. I understand people wanting us to give it a real go but this game is a distraction right now. Also though they have struggled a bit the gap between them and us if they play anything like a full team is far wider than some people realise. I hope we win but I think the chances are slim whatever team we put out.

Agree. There's just no options in midfield with this team. The one decent chance we had came from a mistake from them and we nearly scored but we're creating very little really.

Two poor sides battling out. We're still in it but it's hardly vintage.

Doyle is a bit like a bad Coatsworth without the effort.

Midfield is completely absent. Zero attacking threat. We do look going backwards and sideways though.

Thanks for pointing that out.

Thanks for all this. On paper I'd say we have the most difficult last 15 games of the top 4. We have to go away to Leeds, Sunderland and Hull all of which will be difficult games we could easily lose. One of the key points we're not really talking about is when you have to play who. By which I mean especially in the final 6/7 games of the season. Sides in danger of relegation often pick up surprising results at the tail end of the campaign as they fight for survival whilst those who can still make the play-offs strive that extra bit in matches. The team which has to play the most "on the beach" teams with not much to play for who may have the biggest advantage. Right now I'd say this will go down to the last couple of games and it really does look likely 103 point at least could be required for promotion. I'd not rule Ipswich out yet either. They really fight hard for a result and their form could turn yet especially with a relatively straightforward run of fixtures coming up.

This is really at the heart of the problem. English football in particular has become bloated with very average overseas players earning a wage that is not commensurate with their abilities and talent. Now I'm not having a go at the players who are only accepting what has been offered to them and why shouldn't they. This is a pretty big if but, if the premier League crack down properly on those clubs who step outside FFP then hopefully we can start to see an end to the frankly ridiculous wages that are offered. We have a system awash with more money than it ought to know what to do with yet spends far too much of it on player wages. Agents are another problem which only exacerbates the issue. I'd like to see a system where clubs can only spend 50% of their income on player wages and bonuses etc and then some of the money used to directly reduce the terribly expensive costs for the fans of match tickets and season tickets. Of course I know this won't happen but until the wages of average players are brought down all clubs will continue to find it hard to move unwanted players on.

Clearly then Rudkin and his team didn't understand this or why bother to bring this player over, agree terms and get him to do a medical which he supposedly passed. They clearly did all that in the expectation of signing him. If it was about selling first then we would have a pretty clear indication by lunchtime today that nothing was going to happen yet continued to proceed as if we could sign him. We'll probably never know the exact truth behind what happened here but it just looks so amateurish.

Of course it isn't worth breaching FFP for this. But, we're supposed to have agreed terms, we brought him over for a medical which he's supposed to have passed and yet the deal's supposedly fallen through because at the last minute we couldn't balance the books. I'm sorry but if that is the case we've known for days that we wouldn't be able to balance the books and known we were unlikely to sell anyone. In which case this has just been a complete waste of time and money all round. There a general whiff of incompetence surrounding our whole recruitment in the last few seasons, going back to the failure by 14 seconds to register a player. of course being a DOF isn't a straightforward job but I'm afraid I have little confidence in him.

He's the Director of Football. It is his job to understand FFP whether he works it out for himself or gets a legal team to advise him. He's highly paid to oversee the football side of the club. This is frankly embarrassing. if it was the first cock up then fine but it isn't is it? I understand it is difficult but if the financial side of things is this bad then he must have known that and frankly why did we waste money on this whole process if we knew it wasn't going to work?

Correct but he's the director of football with overall responsibility for the football side of the club. A remit which includes recruitment. He may not be a lawyer himself but he's paid to oversee things. I can't say I have a huge amount of confidence in him but let's see.

It has been pretty clear this player was/is our manager's number one target. There's been no serious mention of any other player. The fact that we've been negotiating for weeks and have left it until now when I can't really grasp why this wasn't sorted out days ago is indicative of either level of incompetence or non full disclosure. But you're right in what you say.

A new director of football would be a good starting point.

This is what bother me the most. There's either been some less than open discussion from one side with some facts not being revealed or frankly it is plain incompetence and lack of due diligence on our behalf. The fact that he has been the only potential signing seriously discussed also illustrates how parlous our financial position must be in relation to FFP. Exacerbated by some rank bad signings last January where we wasted several million pounds on players that either aren't good enough or won't try to adapt to a new playing style. In our position this was exactly the time to invest in a couple of decent new signings but we're clearly not able to do that.

What the hell is Praet recovering from, Christmas? Sad and bad news re Wilf.