what REALLY cost us promotion ..?

[S-Clarke]

 

A five year plan can only work if it is followed. If the manager decides to go in another direction, that 5 year plan starts becoming irrelevant. This is the problem Cortese has and what Pardew has to reassure him regarding the season ahead.

 

.

 

who's saying the plan has not be followed?

 

was it promotion or bust this year? i think not.

 

this year was always about spinning the club around and get it moving in the right direction, if that ended in promotion that would have been a bonus - but we gave it a damn good go anyway.

[Legod Third Coming]

It's all water under the bridge now, we can all have a pet theory as to why we never made the play off's. The one thing you can categorically state is that we never maximised our chances of making the play off's. There's no guarantee we would have made it what ever, but we definitely could have improved our chances.

 

A five year plan can only work if it is followed. If the manager decides to go in another direction, that 5 year plan starts becoming irrelevant. This is the problem Cortese has and what Pardew has to reassure him regarding the season ahead.

 

I am sure we will buy wisely in the transfer market and expect us to be a lot stronger next season. As long as we hold onto players there should no long term effects to not going up this season, apart from the financial aspect.

 

You only have to look at Leeds collapse in form this season and many will tie that into their FA cup run. They put out their best teams for those games and although impressively successful, they just seemed to hit the wall there after, with the volume and intensity of the games just catching up with them. They certainly made £M's from those ties which they maybe could not have over looked, or maybe the assumption they were untouchable in the league with so much of a cushion? Were Leeds to fail to go up this season, I really doubt you would find many fans that thought those FA cup games were worth another season in league 1.

 

There a lot of Leeds fans who wonder whether Bates wants promotion anyway. He makes a profit from a League One club and knows full well he will have to pay higher wages in the Championship...

 

The point is, none of us knows what objectives Pardew was set other than that he claims to have been told he will be judged after 18 months. It is, therefore, somewhat premature for people to judge him on promotion this season... He is, after all, only 8 and a bit months into his job!

[Turkish]

Beating Leeds and Norwich are not beating Tranmere Exeter Wycombe and Brentford is not conistent

 

Not getting enough points means getting less than Norwich Leeds Millwall Swindon Charlton and Huddersfield if had got more we would have go to the playoffs I would have thought.

 

no you are right, we should win every game, Man Utd do, so do Chelsea, Barcelona, Inter Millan, Real Madrid etc.....

 

This year, 2010, since Pardew has had the squad he wanted we have lost 4 times in 28 games, one of these to a premier league team and one in a game where we had nothing to play for and experimented with the first XI. What is inconsistant about that?

[GenevaSaint]

no you are right, we should win every game, Man Utd do, so do Chelsea, Barcelona, Inter Millan, Real Madrid etc.....

 

This year, 2010, since Pardew has had the squad he wanted we have lost 4 times in 28 games, one of these to a premier league team and one in a game where we had nothing to play for and experimented with the first XI. What is inconsistant about that?

 

We've got a great record in 2010, but we've drawn too many games on the road that we should have won. Next season we need to turn draws into wins.

[doddisalegend]

We've got a great record in 2010, but we've drawn too many games on the road that we should have won. Next season we need to turn draws into wins.

 

I've said this loads of times before but draws on the road are fine as long as you are winning at home if you do this you take 2pts a game over a season that should be more than enough for a top two place. It's not our away form we should worry about but making sure we win all our home games and draw are away games. We should play like Oldham when ever we go away;-)

[Alanh]

I've said this loads of times before but draws on the road are fine as long as you are winning at home if you do this you take 2pts a game over a season that should be more than enough for a top two place. It's not our away form we should worry about but making sure we win all our home games and draw are away games. We should play like Oldham when ever we go away;-)

 

That's great in theory, but how many teams ever have a 100% home record. Even Arsenal in their Incincible season didn't.

 

In practice we need to have a strategy to win every game next season. We won't do it and there will be upsets and unexpected results along the way, but our form since October suggests that more than 2 points per game is achievable.

 

I know you were joking but we should never attempt to play like Oldham away from home. If we replayed that match 10 times with each team having the same strategy we would win it 9 times. They got lucky in that we didn't get a break all game - just about the only home game all season that has happened.

[doddisalegend]

That's great in theory, but how many teams ever have a 100% home record. Even Arsenal in their Incincible season didn't.

 

In practice we need to have a strategy to win every game next season. We won't do it and there will be upsets and unexpected results along the way, but our form since October suggests that more than 2 points per game is achievable.

 

I know you were joking but we should never attempt to play like Oldham away from home. If we replayed that match 10 times with each team having the same strategy we would win it 9 times. They got lucky in that we didn't get a break all game - just about the only home game all season that has happened.

 

You're right we won't win every game at home but by the same token we will win games on the road too. My point is considering our home form of late draws on the road aren't bad results. Wins are better but if we draw it's not time for people to slit their wrists. We dropped points at home early in the season that cost us not draws away.

[benjii]

You're right we won't win every game at home but by the same token we will win games on the road too. My point is considering our home form of late draws on the road aren't bad results. Wins are better but if we draw it's not time for people to slit their wrists. We dropped points at home early in the season that cost us not draws away.

 

Exactly.

[Window Cleaner]

Although seeing how HMRC always give clubs more time to pay their debt you have to wonder if the Old Regime didn't get their payment priorities wrong.

 

If we'd have given more money to Barclay's and fobbed off the revenue with excuses maybe we wouldn't even have been on -10 points. Although the old regime might still be in place.

[hughieslastminutegoal]

October and November I think up to the away game at Leeds, 26 points from

11 games.If we had carried on in that vein we would now be on 81 points having obtained 82 from 35. Probably just because we played poor sides in the main but the side hasn't got any better results since.

Since then we have obtained 45 points from 24 games

 

Stop it. LG3C will think he's missed a second lobotomy.

[John B]

no you are right, we should win every game, Man Utd do, so do Chelsea, Barcelona, Inter Millan, Real Madrid etc.....

 

This year, 2010, since Pardew has had the squad he wanted we have lost 4 times in 28 games, one of these to a premier league team and one in a game where we had nothing to play for and experimented with the first XI. What is inconsistant about that?

 

I totally agree with you I was just pointing out why I thought we did not get promoted

 

 

I thought we did really well this season and never expected promotion but hope we maybe in the CHAMPIONSHIP in the near future

[hughieslastminutegoal]

that would make sense if 'the team' had played a full season, but they didnt

 

What makes a really good side? Those that are doing well but make sure they win games at the critical times. We found ourselves (or got ourselves) into a challenging position, but we failed at critical times to get the result required, when we were in position to really put the sh*ts up a those in the top 6. OK so there were some crappy pitches. But I doubt that will be taken as a sufficient excuse by NC.

 

AP has, overall, done a good job. It isn't a case of whether I or any other Saints fan want AP replaced or not. It's how confident is NC that the side will deliver when they are in sight of the winning post. I think there are question marks there. And if unexpected opportunities present themselves along the way, an ambitious Chariman may well feel it appropriate to move the goal posts because he will want those new opportunities to be taken advantage of. Recognise and act on new circumstances will be the mantra.

 

That is what life is like in the business world. A sales director, for example, can't say "Well, how was I to know that opportunity was going to arise? It wasn't on my list of targets at the beginning of the year. But overall I did a good job."

 

My natural reaction is to continue with AP, but then I'm not tough enough (or maybe not ruthless enough) to have made it into NC's position. That's why NC is likely to look at things rather differently to most fans.

 

I'm just not completely convinced that, after a "so near" season he is going to want to "suck it and see" until Christmas. I think AP better have a very good closed season plan, and a very convincing but realistic transfer target list...

[St Hando]

Just about to post pretty much the same thing....

 

That -10 was like a dark cloud hanging over us. As soon as they were chipped away, we looked a different team.

 

At Salisbury Tommy Widdrington ensured that the club went into admin the day that they got to 10 points, thus when the deduction was made they went back to 0. He thought tht not seeing the team on minus points was good for the players psychologically. Would this have made a difference at Saints? Thoughts?

[Window Cleaner]

xcuse by NC.

 

AP has, overall, done a good job. It isn't a case of whether I or any other Saints fan want AP replaced or not. It's how confident is NC that the side will deliver when they are in sight of the winning post. I think there are question marks there. And if unexpected opportunities present themselves along the way, an ambitious Chariman may well feel it appropriate to move the goal posts because he will want those new opportunities to be taken advantage of. Recognise and act on new circumstances will be the mantra.

 

"

 

My natural reaction is to continue with AP, but then I'm not tough enough (or maybe not ruthless enough) to have made it into NC's position. That's why NC is likely to look at things rather differently to most fans.

 

I'm just not completely convinced that, after a "so near" season he is going to want to "suck it and see" until Christmas. I think AP better have a very good closed season plan, and a very convincing but realistic transfer target list...

 

 

Anyway it will all depend on what part (if any ) of his 18 months AP mortgaged to obtain the 2 million or so transfer funds in January. That is the real factor, not how close we came or how well we nearly did.

 

If it was "if I give you 2 million funding you will guarantee a place in the play-offs or else" then it's case closed, any shades of grey will depend on what was agreed.