Happy to go down

[Leicester_Numan]

Right..........so the next goal is to improve the squad so we arent relegation fodder, and we are an established Premiership team.

Then we become an established team, we improve the squad further, so we can rotate it more and give ourselves a chance of winning a cup and maintaining a good league position.

As we become an established team, we become richer, we can have a proper squad with 2 good players in each position.

Then, who knows? we can have our own Bony, our own Bojan, Sigurdsson......players like Swansea and Stoke have got since establishing themselves like we want to. Then we can make beating bigger sides a more regular occurence.

Then, who knows? maybe the stadium is developed and 8,000 more seats are added, or.........the youth set up is improved further, and we begin to produce more and more players of our own and watch them progress like Southampton have done? Southampton's youth team produced the worlds most expensive player.

.......or

We can just throw the towel in and live in championship obscurity forever.

I simply do not understand why the fact that, OK, we cant win the Premiership, WHY does that mean its the end of the progression of the club?

Everton arent going to win the Premier League either. I watched their fans at Man City jumping up and down for about 15 mins singing the school of science chant non stop. Theyre progressing as a club!!!! Look at West Ham, they build stability under Sam, then they sign Valencia, Sakho, Song, Cresswell......theyre FLYING, people coming on the radio saying the good times have returned to Upton Park.

Youre only limited by your own ambitions.

All of that is achievable with patience and sensible management, pretty much how we're doing it now. I want to be in this division, I don't just want to recreate the O'Neill days, I want to surpass them. This will take time and our fans really do have to learn that they can't have success instantly, we're not that big or rich yet but we also can't throw away the whole future of the club by throwing massive amounts of money at it in a possibly vain attempt to stay up this season. A bit of yo-yoing wouldn't hurt too much, it just means it'll take a little longer. The only thing that matters is where we are in 5 or 6 years not where we are now or next season.

The question is, do our fans have the patience for it? Judging by this season so far, some of them don't and their immediate demands and expectations are as unrealistic as ever

[DANGEROUS TIGER]

With patience and perseverance comes growth.

Surely if we should go down, we'd have a solid foundation to recommence a promotion campaign and would be in a better financial shape than ever.

People would rather see us waste tons of money on new signings, expecting to keep us up at all costs.

I just want to see us retain our status. Your points are valid, but it appears that some people are now unambitious, and don't appear to want us to return to this level. 

 

Fingers crossed we can stay up.

[DANGEROUS TIGER]

Right..........so the next goal is to improve the squad so we arent relegation fodder, and we are an established Premiership team.

 

Then we become an established team, we improve the squad further, so we can rotate it more and give ourselves a chance of winning a cup and maintaining a good league position.

 

As we become an established team, we become richer, we can have a proper squad with 2 good players in each position.

 

Then, who knows? we can have our own Bony, our own Bojan, Sigurdsson......players like Swansea and Stoke have got since establishing themselves like we want to. Then we can make beating bigger sides a more regular occurence.

 

Then, who knows? maybe the stadium is developed and 8,000 more seats are added, or.........the youth set up is improved further, and we begin to produce more and more players of our own and watch them progress like Southampton have done? Southampton's youth team produced the worlds most expensive player.

 

.......or

 

We can just throw the towel in and live in championship obscurity forever.

 

 

 

I simply do not understand why the fact that, OK, we cant win the Premiership, WHY does that mean its the end of the progression of the club?

 

Everton arent going to win the Premier League either. I watched their fans at Man City jumping up and down for about 15 mins singing the school of science chant non stop. Theyre progressing as a club!!!! Look at West Ham, they build stability under Sam, then they sign Valencia, Sakho, Song, Cresswell......theyre FLYING, people coming on the radio saying the good times have returned to Upton Park.

 

 

Youre only limited by your own ambitions.

EXACTLY. 

[DANGEROUS TIGER]

What a pile of contradictory nonsense. Want to be mediocre so we can be winners? How does that work?

 

I don't want to go down but I don't want this every year either, fans wanting players suspended or injured, verbally abusing the manager because we haven't won for a few games. I hope this is a one-off.

If you don't want us to go down, what's the problem? We all disagree, and have our rants, but we should all want to see our club at the top level, always, and no matter what.

[MC Prussian]

If you don't want us to go down, what's the problem? We all disagree, and have our rants, but we should all want to see our club at the top level, always, and no matter what.

We should always want to see our club succeed at the top level (to a certain degree).

 

Getting to the Premier League is one thing, staying there another.

[fleckneymike]

I just want to see City playing the best football they can with the best footballers they can attract. I'd rather we played good football in the Premier league but if the cost of being in the Premier league was that we have to play with little or no swagger or expanse then I'm not interested. Just being in the Prem isn't enough for me, I'm not content to just survive, I'd sooner go down with a swagger than stay up with ugly football.

[biggs]

I watched that Man U match a number of times and only look forward to improvement even if it means some immediate hardship. Better than going back to beating the likes Ipswich or Bournemouth in the championship. There is the possibility of going back and sitting mid table...wouldn't we all enjoy that!!!

[tickler28]

Pretty ridiculous statement IMO. What are you in football for if its not to improve, win trophies and move on as a club?

If this is right, season after season you'd have no interest in promotion but would be happy to sit in the middle of the Championship every season? What would be the point in that? In fact, yes lets just be happy to drift down the divisions so we can play 'real' football every year?

Not very well thought out OP.

I actually think he makes a good point. Struggling in the Premier year in...year out will suck. However it could go one of two ways....be a Swansea, Stoke, Wigan (for a long time) and adapt or be a yoyo team like Birmingham and Wolves were. What I don't want to be is shite like Bolton were...never get anywhere and then end up in the wilderness.

What I do think though is thinking wed get relegated and then win every week like last season is naive to say the least. You only have to look where previous prem teams are to realise that life back in the Championship ain't always a bed of roses. Teams like Birmingham, Wolves, Wigan, Leeds, Forest and Fulham would snap are hands off to swap places....who would snap off theirs?

[jamesmilner]

apart from beating your local rivals (Derby or Forest) on a cold Tuesday night in an electric atmosphere

 

 

Watching them romp the Championship with 100+ points?

absolute bollox !! prem is the prem end of , cop out from the both of you !!

[Donut]

I actually think he makes a good point. Struggling in the Premier year in...year out will suck. However it could go one of two ways....be a Swansea, Stoke, Wigan (for a long time) and adapt or be a yoyo team like Birmingham and Wolves were. What I don't want to be is shite like Bolton were...never get anywhere and then end up in the wilderness.

What I do think though is thinking wed get relegated and then win every week like last season is naive to say the least. You only have to look where previous prem teams are to realise that life back in the Championship ain't always a bed of roses. Teams like Birmingham, Wolves, Wigan, Leeds, Forest and Fulham would snap are hands off to swap places....who would snap off theirs?

 

Bolton, as in the same Bolton where our misfits now reside, had Europa League campaigns, appearances at Wembley, top 10 Premiership finishes and got to watch the likes of Okocha, Djorkaeff, Nakata, Stelios, Anelka, Jaskelaainen and Hierro amongst others in their squad.

 

Theyre now a shit also ran in the championship which is what the OP proposed.

 

What more do you want as a fan? seriously

[Guest Col city fan]

I actually think he makes a good point. Struggling in the Premier year in...year out will suck. However it could go one of two ways....be a Swansea, Stoke, Wigan (for a long time) and adapt or be a yoyo team like Birmingham and Wolves were. What I don't want to be is shite like Bolton were...never get anywhere and then end up in the wilderness.

What I do think though is thinking wed get relegated and then win every week like last season is naive to say the least. You only have to look where previous prem teams are to realise that life back in the Championship ain't always a bed of roses. Teams like Birmingham, Wolves, Wigan, Leeds, Forest and Fulham would snap are hands off to swap places....who would snap off theirs?

I think it's a shite point, a completely defeatist attitude and God knows, I don't want another ten years in the wilderness.

Dangerous Tiger's post above sums it up for me.

[Rob1742]

Cant beat abit of Birmingham/Charlton/Ipswich on a Tuesday night in Nov in front of 19,000!

Lets not get too excited about the Olde ChChip...there were some shite awful seasons we had!!

Would really look forward to playing any of those teams on a Tuesday night in November, if it was like we have been performing over the last few seasons. Bring it on

[Rob1742]

In fact, while were at it, why not go all the way down to the Unibond? there would be some lovely grounds in random places we could take over and win shitloads of games down there. Plenty of tuesday nights in the wind and rain too. PROPER FOOTBALL.

Of course, wed have to make sure we deliberately lost our fair share of those games to make sure we never got promoted, because as we would win less games in the division above that would seriously limit the enjoyment.

I blame the club too. It was silly of them not to write a letter to disgruntled fans to apologise for being promoted, because of course that meant leaving the championship. Hopefully as a good will gesture if the club does get relegated, fans like Rob might get VIP tickets to the relegation party instead.

**** SKY.

I never said I don't enjoy going up, I was pointing out the negatives when you get there. Much prefer to be at the top of the championship, performing well with all the benefits that brings, rather than struggle in the prem, with all the plastic fans and all the other points I raised.

[splinterdream]

Losing can be enjoyable part of the supporting a football team also, it creates talking points; what would you change? who would you drop? what went wrong and how can it be put right? should the manager be sacked? When a team wins every week, there really is less to discuss, also being the underdog really makes the game more exciting. I hate the Premiership for all that it takes away from the championship and England, but I also love it when we're in it

[Soar Fox]

So people moan and slag Holloway off for taking us down to the lowest league we've ever been in. And now we're on a bad run in the premier league, (you know the league that every team aspires to be in) people would rather us play the likes of Fleetwood at home on a Tuesday night than test ourselves against some of the worlds best players.

Some people on here are unbelievable

[Donut]

I never said I don't enjoy going up, I was pointing out the negatives when you get there. Much prefer to be at the top of the championship, performing well with all the benefits that brings, rather than struggle in the prem, with all the plastic fans and all the other points I raised.

 

No, what youre pointing out, is that youre an enormous plonker.

[Rob1742]

No, what youre pointing out, is that youre an enormous plonker.

Plonker, for saying last season was much more enjoyable than this? Saying the prices, the plastic fans, the difficulty in getting tickets are things I di t enjoy.

Well mister, in a couple of years look back at what season you enjoyed most and I would put money on it that last season will be deemed more enjoyable than this. If you enjoy travelling away and getting beaten week after week, then I would say you must have a screw loose.

I'll remember last season fondly, you remember this. Enjoy

Plonker, for saying last season was much more enjoyable than this? Saying the prices, the plastic fans, the difficulty in getting tickets are things I don't enjoy.

Well mister, in a couple of years look back at what season you enjoyed most and I would put money on it that last season will be deemed more enjoyable than this. If you enjoy travelling away and getting beaten week after week, then I would say you must have a screw loose.

I'll remember last season fondly, you remember this. Enjoy

[The Horse's Mouth]

This can't be serious surely

[Donut]

Plonker, for saying last season was much more enjoyable than this? Saying the prices, the plastic fans, the difficulty in getting tickets are things I di t enjoy.

Well mister, in a couple of years look back at what season you enjoyed most and I would put money on it that last season will be deemed more enjoyable than this. If you enjoy travelling away and getting beaten week after week, then I would say you must have a screw loose.

I'll remember last season fondly, you remember this. Enjoy

 

Perhaps youd be better following a team every other season then? or perhaps just following a team that wins? who knows, maybe you can support whoever is hot in the championship that season, that might float your boat perhaps.

 

Honestly, what kind of goon can possibly justify wanting to be in a lower division.

 

Youre deadly serious arent you? Its not even trolling, you genuinely would rather go down.

[theessexfox]

Donut's just said everything I want to say.

 

I'm loving watching us compete at the highest level for the first time in my full memory. 

[Dan]

I can't say I'd rather go down but I've got to admit I wouldn't be as gutted as I once would've been.

[Rob1742]

Perhaps youd be better following a team every other season then? or perhaps just following a team that wins? who knows, maybe you can support whoever is hot in the championship that season, that might float your boat perhaps.

Honestly, what kind of goon can possibly justify wanting to be in a lower division.

Youre deadly serious arent you? Its not even trolling, you genuinely would rather go down.

The Premier League is horrible. Two leagues in one, too much money at the top end. Yep, give me the Championship any day. The fans, the teams, the lot. It's much better.

[Rob1742]

Donut's just said everything I want to say.

I'm loving watching us compete at the highest level for the first time in my full memory.

For the first time? I can assure you, the novelty will soon wear off. It will wear you down in the end.

[Soar Fox]

The Premier League is horrible. Two leagues in one, too much money at the top end. Yep, give me the Championship any day. The fans, the teams, the lot. It's much better.

Did you say this when we had drawn at home to Arsenal or had just beaten Man United 5-3??

Now we're losing games people want us to go back to the championship and start winning again. Obviously we'll have to tell the players not to win to many games as we wouldn't want to go back up again would we.

[Fox92]

The Premier League is horrible. Two leagues in one, too much money at the top end. Yep, give me the Championship any day. The fans, the teams, the lot. It's much better.

 

The Championship is a better division, I agree. It's open. There's too much money in the Premier League and it's a two horse race between the clubs with the most money (Chelsea and Manchester City).

 

But of course I want us to compete at the highest level. I want us to be playing Manchester United and Liverpool. We're never going to win the league because we're not bankrolled, but as proved by Swansea and Hull in recent years there is always a chance of winning a domestic trophy and that's what we should be looking to do.