League Preference (Split)

[revolution saint]

3 hours ago, Turkish said:

I'd quite happily compete to win the championship every season and when we do refuse promotion.

I know many fans are sold on the Sky, Premier league best league in the world horseshit, but it's only best league in the world if you're one of the best teams in it, for those outside the top 6 or so without billionaire or country owners it's pretty shit. Starting every season with the main aim being to scramble together enough wins to stay up to do it again next season, having the media and pundit fawn over how brilliant all the big clubs are when they beat a team where their bench cost more than the entire squad of the opposition, it's shite if you support a smaller club. The championship is far more competitive, lots of clubs of similar size with most having something to play for and none of the wig, facepaint, tourist helmets or I want to be entertained, match day experience bellends.

 

Completely agree.  If you're not one of the top six then the premier league is boring.  I was far more engaged in the championship and league one campaigns than I am now.  Aspirations of mid table mediocrity isn't that much of a dream.

[Winnersaint]

2 hours ago, John Boy Saint said:

Living in north Ampshoire a great example of that scenario was nipping into Tesco on a Saturday morning and it being very notable how many people in Reading shirts were doing a shop before making the easy 10 mile trip up the A33 (they were plentiful in other parts of town too). When they got relegated from the PL it was equally notable that Reading shirts seemed to vanish from view. 
 

 

Having lived in Berkshire for the last forty odd years I've always thought of Reading as a 3rd Division club.

[Turkish]

2 minutes ago, Winnersaint said:

Having lived in Berkshire for the last forty odd years I've always thought of Reading as a 3rd Division club.

I used to work in reading. Definition of a noddy club. Most people there support them and someone else like Chelsea, spurs or Liverpool 

Edited 9 December, 2022 by Turkish

[Kenilworthy]

While we remain in the Premier League there is an outside chance of winning a cup. We were in a final just five years ago, followed by pissing away two semi-finals. With relegation the chance of a cup win disappears. Yes I was at Wembley in 76, but that was at a time when a second division club was still allowed to have world class players like Channon and Osgood. 1980 was the last time a lower division club won the FA cup and it isn't going to happen any time soon.

[Nordic Saint]

16 hours ago, CB Fry said:

I think one of my favourite things about this forum is how many people are unable to contemplate relegation to the Championship without deciding that means immediate and definite relegation to League One as well.

They probably remember where  Nathan Jones left Stoke:

11v11 league table generator

[John Boy Saint]

3 minutes ago, Nordic Saint said:

They probably remember where  Nathan Jones left Stoke:

11v11 league table generator

Hey - the majority of Stoke fans would freely admit that a Jesus of Nazareth miracle would have failed to get a tune out of that squad.  

[Whitey Grandad]

28 minutes ago, Kenilworthy said:

While we remain in the Premier League there is an outside chance of winning a cup. We were in a final just five years ago, followed by pissing away two semi-finals. With relegation the chance of a cup win disappears. Yes I was at Wembley in 76, but that was at a time when a second division club was still allowed to have world class players like Channon and Osgood. 1980 was the last time a lower division club won the FA cup and it isn't going to happen any time soon.

In terms of cup chances there is very little difference between the bottom of the Premier League and the leagus below.

[Nordic Saint]

33 minutes ago, John Boy Saint said:

Hey - the majority of Stoke fans would freely admit that a Jesus of Nazareth miracle would have failed to get a tune out of that squad.  

Well, Michael O'Neill did. With exactly the same squad he achieved much better results and saved them from relegation. Mick Harford also got better results at Luton with the same players when Jones went to Stoke, and got them promoted to the Championship.

 

Stoke 2019/20 season:

Jones W 2 D 2 L 10  points per game 0.5

O'Neill W 14 D 6 L 12 points per game 1.5

So, basically, O'Neill was able to get three times the tune out of that squad that Jones did.

Edited 9 December, 2022 by Nordic Saint

[Marsdinho]

Some of you sound like you are more than happy to pay circa £50 a week just to watch 22 men run around kicking a ball. There has to be a point to it all; otherwise, what's the point?

[AlexLaw76]

34 minutes ago, John Boy Saint said:

Hey - the majority of Stoke fans would freely admit that a Jesus of Nazareth miracle would have failed to get a tune out of that squad.  

most fans are clueless

[SotonianWill]

28 minutes ago, Whitey Grandad said:

In terms of cup chances there is very little difference between the bottom of the Premier League and the leagus below.

Dosent help this season due to the world cup, but I would say fixture lists are more on a premier league teams side normally.

[John Boy Saint]

1 hour ago, Turkish said:

I used to work in reading. Definition of a noddy club. Most people there support them and someone else like Chelsea, spurs or Liverpool 

I use to work for the Reading Evening Post in the mid 80's when our most favoritest manager of all time was in charge of them. While I was there they got promoted from League 3 to 2 helped by a season opening run of 13 straight wins. Working in circulation sales the uplift when the paper ran a feature piece on the club was very noticeable, and it had the sports department working flat out to produce something else about the club to keep the sales up in slow news weeks. 

Weirdest thing was when Reading got to the playoff finals against Bolton, my neighbour a keen Reading fan asked if I could get some bits from the club shop for him for the big game at Wembley - stood outside a bike shed with a shutter on one end that was the "mega Store" I was peering over the fence into Elm Park and thought "jeez Man U could be playing on that pitch next year!". Just before that playoff John Madejski happened to mention that it would be a financial disaster if they got promoted to the Premier League as so many players were out of contract. I went to the playoff game - to this day I swear Reading threw the game, from being thoroughly ruthless in the first half to being a bunch of stumblebums in the second - something that was not in their DNA all season.

[John Boy Saint]

53 minutes ago, Nordic Saint said:

Well, Michael O'Neill did. With exactly the same squad he achieved much better results and saved them from relegation. Mick Harford also got better results at Luton with the same players when Jones went to Stoke, and got them promoted to the Championship.

 

Stoke 2019/20 season:

Jones W 2 D 2 L 10  points per game 0.5

O'Neill W 14 D 6 L 12 points per game 1.5

So, basically, O'Neill was able to get three times the tune out of that squad that Jones did.

So basically we are buggered!?

Hmmmmmm just looked at the Championship table - can't see anywhere that I haven't been or offers a touristy long weekend - ho hum

[Whitey Grandad]

52 minutes ago, Marsdinho said:

Some of you sound like you are more than happy to pay circa £50 a week just to watch 22 men run around kicking a ball. There has to be a point to it all; otherwise, what's the point?

No, I'm not happy with that.

£25 a fortnight though is quite acceptable.

[trousers]

1 hour ago, AlexLaw76 said:

most fans are clueless

It's very rare to see such good examples of self-awareness these days...

#banter #no_offence

[AlexLaw76]

1 minute ago, trousers said:

It's very rare to see such good examples of self-awareness these days...

#banter #no_offence

I absolutely include myself in that statement 🤣

[trousers]

14 minutes ago, AlexLaw76 said:

I absolutely include myself in that statement 🤣

Me too

[Holmes_and_Watson]

8 hours ago, Turkish said:

I used to work in reading.

In a library, or in publishing?

I did try not to post it. Really, I did. I moved onto other posts, but I just couldn't let it go.🙂

I'd rather be in the Premier League, even as things are. There's always the hope, and sometimes the reality, of being better in it. While the promotion years were great, it was with the goal of getting where we are. Our next attempt might not go so well, so I'd be happy hanging on in this league for a while yet.

Even as some clubs play with a different level of resources, others as big as Man U and Liverpool are looking for owners/investors. Hopefully as some prosper, others will be forced down a level, meeting us as we improve.

[Bad Wolf]

On 09/12/2022 at 09:58, Dellman said:

Seven dreadful years, never again please. Let Pompey suffer that

They already have. More so.

The second Championship year, the 2 League One years and the Championship promotion year were all very enjoyable. I even really loved watching us under Jan Portevlet or whatever his name was. Tactically utterly clueless but with the resources he had, we had some really 'easy on the eye' football.

[Saint Fan CaM]

Other than the prospect of losing the club completely, I really enjoyed the post relegation years - started with me being able to afford a decent nicely located ST seat, losing Lowe from the helm, rubbing shoulders with some influential people, then the piecing together of a new, passionate squad including SRL etc. and the incredible feeling of scoring loads of goals and winning lots of games with a rocking SMS.

Let's face it, if you're a true fan can you ever really say you WISH for the club you love to be relegated - i.e. you WANT to see it fail?  And the trouble now is that the consequences of relegation might not be so appealing - under the current economic situation (Worldwide), would we see another Marcus come to save us?  I doubt it.  No, despite previous experience, I really don't want to see us being relegated - we belong at the top table of English football.

[SotonianWill]

On 09/12/2022 at 13:23, Micky said:

Absolutely this.  For what it's worth I was absolutely gutted that the proposed European Super League (or whatever they called it) was dropped so quickly - I would've loved it had the big clubs pissed off to their own league, which would've leveled the playing field somewhat.  Most teams in the Premier League are simply making up the numbers - playing for nothing (other than Sky money of course).  The Championship is a decent standard across the board - I  have no problems if that's where we end up. 

 

 

only thing i’d like to keep is the one uppence on other teams of being in the prem. other than that it’s shit for a fan. 

[BERMUDASAINT]

On 09/12/2022 at 03:16, egg said:

On your last bit, yes, there are massive financial impacts of relegation to include for staff etc. However, the discussion (I assumed) was from a football perspective only. For me, on that front, relegation ain't an issue. 

Personally I want my team to compete. I also want to see them achieve something positive at the season end, or at least have a chance to. Playing for mid table nothingness does nothing for me, and fighting to stay up is shit.

Look at the championship table now, and the premier league, and ask yourself whether you'd rather be in the shoes of a Millwall fan sitting 7th with a real chance of the play offs or promotion, or a saints fan with a real chance of relegation. I suspect many people will be reluctant to give the honest answer.

But you can't ignore the financial implications, it directly affects what team we have to support. So let's say we go down to enjoy more competitive games, but we will loose the pl monies after a few years, ticket prices are cheaper, so the whole package starts to deteriorate,  including the pl stadium that we can no longer afford. I see no  one wishing to be pompey and their footballing position is nothing to be envious about. This is the reality, we can go down, but you will loose your ability to buy good players, stadium will deteriorate and we will have a much poorer club overall. Not a good gamble just to see us be in a weaker league to assume we will be competitive. We dropped like a  stone down the leagues and luckily we had SRL to save us. Every team not in the pl will have ambitions to get to the pl. You have lost your ambitions, I have not.

Edited 11 December, 2022 by BERMUDASAINT

[Saint86]

http://european-football-statistics.co.uk/attnclub/league/soto.htm

Think those attendance numbers hide how much our return to good form impacted things.

2007/08 - 21.25k average - Hit by start of financial crash.

2008/09 - Championship relegation season with 17.8k average - Also feels the full impacts of the global recession i would guess.

2009/10 - league 1 -10points we had 21k (matching 2007/08 in the champ)

2010/11 - Promotion season on the back of the EFL Trophy win we average 22.1k (a 2k jump related to form and fan enjoyment) - Comparable to lower championship attendances.

2011/12 - Champ Promotion season - 26.4k - A further 4.3k jump due to improved form AND competing at a higher level. This was circa 3k higher than any previous championship attendance - including the playoff season (23.6k)

2012/13 - Our return to the prem - 30.8K - A further jump of 4.4k due to improved form AND competing at a higher level.

Lighthouse's comment about larger away attendances holds true to a degree for the prem, although not as significant as first suggested i think. But if people are going to attribute a 4.4k jump as being just down to premier league consumers magically turning up, are we also saying that the championship is equally as popular with its 4.3k jump in attendance in 2011/12? - fans that weren't there for the previous championship playoff season? Hmm.... I don't think its as simple as that surely.

As a regular and season ticket holder throughout pretty much all of that journey, i'd personally say that trends in attendance (certainly post administration) have a lot to do with the phoenix atmosphere, general momentum, and feel good factors around the club, as well as good quality attacking football, some fun cup runs, the exciting young players coming through, and in us generally being competitive (and on form as a result). That carried through to the prem with a strong fan bond and people keen to see what the side could achieve in the top division. 🤷‍♂️ Equally our prem attendances up to 2017/18 were at 30.7-31k, and since 2018/19 they've dropped down to circa 30k or lower quite consistently. So not just premier league consumers, but fans not happy watching a struggling saints team following the heights of European qualification and the EFL cup final.

Edited 12 December, 2022 by Saint86

[Weston Super Saint]

On 09/12/2022 at 10:18, egg said:

Genuine question - What's the appeal of never having a chance of success compared to having a chance of promotion, and competing well at the top end of the table? Other than the better league and watching us getting beaten by really good players, the appeal isn't obvious. 

If it was all about watching games where there is a genuine chance of winning, pushing for promotion and the 'feel good' sensations around a team doing well, surely more people would be watching Saints?

[SotonianWill]

On 09/12/2022 at 10:18, egg said:

Genuine question - What's the appeal of never having a chance of success compared to having a chance of promotion, and competing well at the top end of the table? Other than the better league and watching us getting beaten by really good players, the appeal isn't obvious. 

promotion isn’t exactly success if you have to be relegated to achieve it

[SW5 SAINT]

On 09/12/2022 at 13:55, Turkish said:

I used to work in reading. Definition of a noddy club. Most people there support them and someone else like Chelsea, spurs or Liverpool 

I would say Reading were a genuine football club, with genuine supporters. Not just the glory hunters who attach themselves to the usual suspects….

[Turkish]

10 minutes ago, SW5 SAINT said:

I would say Reading were a genuine football club, with genuine supporters. Not just the glory hunters who attach themselves to the usual suspects….

That promotion season summed it up for me. I’d worked in Reading for about 18 months at the time at the company and could barely name more than 5 Reading fans in a company of about 500, they were all spurs, Chelsea or Liverpool fans. Come March suddenly there were dozens of them giving it all “I support Reading as well” when they played at St Mary’s pretty much anyone could get a ticket, I colleague rang me on the morning of the game who has minimal interest in football to tell me he was going tonight did I want to meet him for a pint- no frigging chance! I have a few former colleagues who I keep I touch with on social media who support other teams but go to the “Madstad” for big games and take their kids to give them a chance to go to a game. Soon as they started struggling in the premier league and it was obvious they were going down they all went back to talking about their other teams.
 

They might be a genuine club but I see them as a larger scale version of the place I live now which has a league 2 club, it’s Leeds catchment area and whilst there is a small section of proper fans most people support Leeds and go along to watch them because it local, cheap and a chance to see some competitive football and take the kids. You can always get a ticket and stand or sit wherever you want. Of course you want them to win but most aren’t really that bothered, much like the crowd at the Madjeski. 

Edited 13 December, 2022 by Turkish

[once_bitterne]

Can there be a team in all of professional football in England who has won fewer games of football than us over the past 5 years?

[Lighthouse]

5 minutes ago, once_bitterne said:

Can there be a team in all of professional football in England who has won fewer games of football than us over the past 5 years?

Without checking, Huddersfield Derby and Reading must be well down there. Probably a few others too.

[Turkish]

18 minutes ago, Lighthouse said:

Without checking, Huddersfield Derby and Reading must be well down there. Probably a few others too.

i doubt it hun, Huddersfield made the play offs last season and won 23 games, Derby and Reading have been pretty much middling championship clubs over the last five years which is typically about 6-65 points mark, so say 15 wins, apart from last season where they were both crap, even then Derby actually won 14 games. It'd be interesting to check actually but i cant be arsed and dont have time. I bet we are well near the bottom of the list. 

[once_bitterne]

1 minute ago, Turkish said:

i doubt it hun, Huddersfield made the play offs last season and won 23 games, Derby and Reading have been pretty much middling championship clubs over the last five years which is typically about 6-65 points mark, so say 15 wins, apart from last season where they were both crap, even then Derby actually won 14 games. It'd be interesting to check actually but i cant be arsed and dont have time. I bet we are well near the bottom of the list. 

We must be rock bottom by a mile.  Teams may get a few less PL wins than us and get relegated but 15th place in the Championship last season got 16 wins so given we are the only PL team which always survives but has never been decent the past 5 years we must have had less wins to cheer than any other set of fans. I guess the only one who could be close is Palace.

[Turkish]

9 minutes ago, once_bitterne said:

We must be rock bottom by a mile.  Teams may get a few less PL wins than us and get relegated but 15th place in the Championship last season got 16 wins so given we are the only PL team which always survives but has never been decent the past 5 years we must have had less wins to cheer than any other set of fans. I guess the only one who could be close is Palace.

You bugger you got me looking, So since start of 2018/19 season inc this season we've won 48 matches, Palace have won 53 playing one game less. Wonder if anyone can do worse than 48? 

[egg]

3 hours ago, SotonianWill said:

promotion isn’t exactly success if you have to be relegated to achieve it

That's one perspective, but if we go down, I suspect that's a success most of us would like to see?!

[SW5 SAINT]

2 hours ago, Turkish said:

i doubt it hun, Huddersfield made the play offs last season and won 23 games, Derby and Reading have been pretty much middling championship clubs over the last five years which is typically about 6-65 points mark, so say 15 wins, apart from last season where they were both crap, even then Derby actually won 14 games. It'd be interesting to check actually but i cant be arsed and dont have time. I bet we are well near the bottom of the list. 

You could almost make out a case for the least matches won in the last 30 years….!

[once_bitterne]

2 hours ago, Turkish said:

You bugger you got me looking, So since start of 2018/19 season inc this season we've won 48 matches, Palace have won 53 playing one game less. Wonder if anyone can do worse than 48? 

It would have to be a PL team as any team which has been relegated or spent a season or more in a league other than the PL will have more wins than us.

So you would be looking at a team that has never had a good season in the past 5, so that discounts. Newcastle, West Ham and Brighton.  Palace would have to be the only team with only slightly more wins than us in all of the 92 league clubs.

[Piran]

I think this topic has seen some good debate, especialy early on, and it's good to see different viewpoints being acknowledged without the nasty rancour that often takes over other discussions. It's okay to have an opinion other than one matching your own!

For me, I hope we never get relegated. I know it's not much fun losing more than winning, but there is interest in seeing MY team pitched against some of the best football teams in the world, and make no mistake, the Premier League has many of the world's best players and managers in it at the moment. I have also enjoyed thw World Cup, and marvelled at the organisation of many of the teams, so perhaps it's just me and a love of football, rather than a blind desire to just see Saints winning.

For what it's worth, I believe that Saints will survive this season. I have no opinion on Nathan Jones, either way; I know very ittle about him, but my prediction is based on seeing some very good young players coming to terms with a new league, and a couple returning from injury, plus (I hope) a bit of a shake-up up front.

[Turkish]

2 hours ago, once_bitterne said:

It would have to be a PL team as any team which has been relegated or spent a season or more in a league other than the PL will have more wins than us.

So you would be looking at a team that has never had a good season in the past 5, so that discounts. Newcastle, West Ham and Brighton.  Palace would have to be the only team with only slightly more wins than us in all of the 92 league clubs.

No wonder there is such a loser mentality around the club, we’re used to losing. Even if you go down and come up at least you win quite a few games rather than bumbling to less than a quarter of the games you play most seasons.