StrangelyBrown

Its worse than that - he gave away a penalty, was ball watching on the 2nd and 3rd goals and in both cases lost his man who scored. He's an absolute clown and shouldn't be anywhere near our team let alone the fucking captain.

Bednarek and Stephens have been at the heart of this shit show for far too long. They are a big part of the problem. Today Stephens didn't do anything much for the most of the first half, but got away with it. Bednarek continues to be at the heart of most of our shit defending alongside Harwood-Bellis. I'm hoping we ditch all three next season and try and establish some proper solidity for the first time in years.

Is there some mental instruction from the board to play 3 at the back no matter how shit it makes us? I'm really fed up with it. We don't have the ability to play that way and not get overrun in midfield.

Really??? Villa at least had the basics of a functional team. We had a piss poor team that had over performed with Hassenhutl...

The ref really doesn't want to give us anything. Same old.

Harwood Bellis' hair really does make him look a proper twat. Him and Bednarek absolutely shite for that goal.

Lallana was a known entity and clearly a pointless signing before we got him. All the rest were gambles that didn't pay off.

Let's be realistic.... We were absolutely dogshit when we got relegated. We sold our best players and replaced them with players who were good in the championship. We bought more championship quality players in the summer. Did we really think we'd be anything other than dogshit when we were promoted to the premier league?

Palace had a major clear out a few years ago (mostly by running down contracts) and have gone from perennial strugglers to a decent side. We need to do something similar - we have a squad of proven failures and weak minded players.

I'm not sure that's how multi club models work.... I always thought the club at the top of the pyramid benefits from the other clubs lower down... But maybe I'm wrong and Man City only exists to fuel the rest of the city group 🤯

No they didn't - it was £40m!

No one will be spending £50m+ on a championship player so if we want that sort of fee we'd be better selling now than at the end of next season. I don't know why anyone thinks his value is going to go up with a season in the championship - while logical in reality it just doesn't seem to work like that.

To be fair I the championship we sometimes swept teams away brilliantly, but we were inconsistent at best often riding our luck rather than putting inferior teams to bed.

I think you've missed the point.... Half the time Russ' football was anything but beautiful - it was often incredibly tedious. We so often lacked the courage in the final third. So often played the ball backwards in good positions. So often gave the ball away in the same old positions in the same old way. Give me Koeman, Poch, Ball or Nichol over Martin any day - those guys knew what good looked like and knew how to entertain.

There's something very iffy with the way the PL is officiated, but maybe Liverpool benefit from the same bias that persists in the media - even when they were bang average they got far more airtime and praise than they deserved.

Surely we can't only have one? Most of the squad deserve stick for being utter shite.

I agree it's difficult to be certain. Unfit teams normally suffer from losing late goals - we're so bad we ship goals for fun all the time. Having said that we don't seem capable of running as much and as hard as anyone else in the division and our players aren't very strong in the tackle, but that could just be that we have a team that aren't as good athletes as the rest. What is clear is that our squad is bloated with players who just aren't athletic enough for this division whether or not you call it fitness or call it physical capabilities and that is on the scouting and coaching teams (past and present).

It would be incredibly saintsy for our players to realise they are in the shop window and turn up for this one and play really well but still lose in the last minute. Everyone will ask why haven't we played like that until now and the we revert to losing 4-0 every week.

We need to break the cycle. We've got a whole bunch of players who are too good for the championship, but who have proven over and over how inept they are at PL level. I'd do something drastic and next year I'd only keep younger players who after a good season in the championship might make the step up with better players around them. This would be pretty limited though ... Wood Edwards Welington Shea Archer (at a push) I'd love us to keep ramsdale, dibling and Fernandes, but they'll be long gone. I'd drive everyone else to wherever they wanted to go.

Leicester really are utter dogshit. They've actually got a few decent players and yet look worse than us which is some achievement.

I couldn't agree less. 3 CBs is harder to play than 2 and isn't just a case of adding extra bodies. 3 at the back creates freedom for fullbacks to play higher and become wing backs, which in turn allows an overload midfield. Plus one of the three should step up into a more offensive position when we have the ball. Sadly our players just aren't good enough to play that system.

It seems simple. Go 4-2-3-1 with... Ramsdale KWP THB Bednarek Wellington Les Downes/Aribo Dibling Fernandes Sule Onuachu The only real choice for me is whether to bring Downes back in.

It's the last bit that really resonates with me. No matter how good our scouting is without a coherent strategy we'll still struggle. Unfortunately Spors seems to be a recruitment guy rather than a club strategy guy so I'm not sure we'll be much better off even if he is better than I expect him to be.

How many of our players would you want in our squad?

MLG schooled by his own methods.