“Mid season” thoughts and assessment

We have completed our 19th league match and have reached the end of 2014, which is a good time to review, peruse, summarise and assess the first half of the season.

THE FACTS

• We have played 19 matches, won 5, drawn 3 and lost 11, giving us 18 points.
• We are in 15th place and two points above the third relation spot,
• However we are two points adrift from 14th placed Sunderland
• We have played 10 home games and 9 away games, however this is much more interesting when you view the current mid-season table:

1. Chelsea AWAY Lost
2. Man City HOME DRAW
3. Man Utd AWAY Lost
4. Southampton AWAY Lost
5. Arsenal AWAY Lost
6. West Ham AWAY Lost
7. Tottenham AWAY Lost
8. Swansea AWAY Lost
9. Newcastle AWAY Lost
10. Liverpool HOME Lost
11. Stoke HOME DRAW
12. Everton AWAY Lost
13. Aston Villa HOME WIN
14. Sunderland HOME WIN
15. QPR
16. West Brom HOME WIN
17. Hull HOME Lost
18. Crystal Palace HOME DRAW
19. Burnley HOME WIN
20. Leicester HOME WIN

Our points tally to date is:
• 1 point from teams in the top half of the table (Man City at home)
• 17 points from the lower half of the table
• 10 points (from 15) against the bottom 5 teams
• 16 points (from 21) against the bottom 7 teams (from Villa in 13th place)
• 18 points (i.e. 100%) from home matches
=> Note that we have played all the bottom 7 team from 13th place
• 0 points (i.e. 0%) from away matches!
=> Note that we have played 10 from the current top 12

ASSESSMENT

The assessment of the first half of the season all depends on the expectations. I personally was expecting us to lose around half our matches, and here unfortunately to date there are no surprises with a 58%loss rate, plus I hoped that we may have around 40+ points Thus I was hoping for full season results of something like:
Option #1: win 12, draw 4, lose 22, => points 40
Option #2: win 11, draw 7, lose 20, => points 40
Option #3: win 10, draw 10, lose 18, => points 40
Anyway, the key driver for points are the “wins”.

To date have 5 wins and are 2 points short of a 20 points mid-season target, so we can say we are either:
• 2 draws short of option #3
• 1 win short, but one draw up of option #1

Generally I cannot complain but I admit that I do not feel comfortable. I would love to have a few points more… if only we got a couple of away draws!!!

If I have to assess the season I would give:
• Home form: B+
• Away form: E
• OVERALL ASSESSMENT: C-

Subjectively, this season feels far less traumatic than our previous two seasons in the Premiership. However, this is most definitely down to the entertainment and results achieved at home at Loftus Road!

THE 2nd HALF OF THE SEASON

I personally will be content with "safety" (i.e. no relegation) and hope that less than 40 points will be sufficient. However, we need to target another 20 points which means 5-6 wins and a couple of draws. It would be great to add an FA Cup run, but we all know that will “focus” upon Premiership survival.

I think that this target is realistic and hope that we may notch some "away victories" against the current bottom 7 teams, and at home we should pick up some more points. We will know more after the next games of Swansea (home) and Burnley (away)

I would be interested in your views and opinions.

I wish everybody a great 2015!

 

Obviously we are under achieving away and doing well at home. Our next seven away games are Burnley, Stoke, Sunderland, Hull, Palace, WBA and Villa. These games will go a long way to decide our fate.

 

This is very true!!! Need to get a couple of wins and draws out of these fixtures.
It will be interesting and probably very nerve wracking.

 

I've been thinking the same thing, this clutch of games will balance out the away games, (we've only had hard away games so far) balance that with tougher home games and in the next few weeks we will have a much better understanding of how well/badly we're doing. If we can take 9 points from those away game (all denying points to our relegation rivals) and scrape some home draws against tougher opponents and maybe the odd surprise win, we could be not too badly placed. Of course if we capitulate away and don't scrape the home games, we're gone.

 

It's clear that our home form alone won't keep us up. The afore mentioned away trips are crucial as already mentioned, and whether we gain any points fom those depends on two things in my opinion.
1. Harry needs to change his approach to games away from LR. We can't just sit back and wait for the the inevitable opposition goal to go in.
2. Who we sign in the window, we can't continue to rely on Charlie to get us out of a hole, and we need to stop leaking so many goals.

 

Burnley showed against City what is possible if you give it a go. We are not solid enough defensively to be playing for nil all draws or trying to sneak games 1 nil.

 

We are in the ****....But it could be worse..

 

We have been here before...
I feel "happier" than either of the two previous seasons...I think we all must feel that surely.

But am I confident, we will stay up...110% DEFINITELY NO
Am I quietly confident......NO
Am I worried...YES
I am extremely worried.....IFFY

We are in a great position to stay up...at Christmas we are 15th...and there are a LOT of teams in the mix.
Any sort of consistently good results and we stay up

Do I believe we can get the results.... NOT SURE... on paper we can and with a few nice buys/loans to strength a squad we can consolidate our position.
I suppose this is why we support the RRRs...with Citeh and Scum, all you can feel is deflated when you lose....you cannot feel the excitement we feel when we actually win

 

My heart says we'll stay up but my head says that we won't

I really struggle to see how we're going to turn our away form around (and it needs to be a significant improvement, particularly those 6 pointers against fellow teams in the bottom half) given our tactics to date. Mentally the team seems to struggle to cope once we ship the first goal. In some games we'll simply have to go for it rather than setting ourselves up to try to nick a point. The first test of this will be at Burnley on January 10 - if our tactics remain as they have been so far away my fears will be compounded

Our home games simply IMHO won't yield sufficient points on their own to keep us up

 

Hello Beth, It is good to hear from you. I hope you are well.

I agree with your feelings and I am sure that we all share them. That is why I tried look at the hard facts and figures. The definite good news is that there are a lot of teams in the mix - certainly six (including us) and possibly even eight. Let's hope that is stays that way and that we can keep our head above the bottom three.

As you mention, key will be our January strengthenings (as well as a lack of injury to key players). But I don't want to read that the team will need time to gell.

Beth, I am sure you will have fun and as well as more anxious moments from your great seat at LR.

 

Merry Christmas Jan
My view from my fantastic seat was not very good yesterday...but perhaps better on Thursday

I hope you are not to cold in Poland
Best wishes for 2015...

 

The reality is we need 4-5 points each month till the end of the season. Looking at our games and being fairly negative on my predictions of the results, it is easily doable, although I wouldn't like to go in to May requiring any points!

There are 5 teams below us who must gain more points than us, I doubt more than 1 of them will achieve that. But if our away form doesn't improve and very quickly, we will be neck deep in the doo doo. It would be lovely if our home form could continue along the same lines, but just as we've had to play all the best teams away, we now have to play them at home. Hopefully it will all even itself out over the season, but I do fear that teams around us will look at our away record and feel we are for the taking, but then it could cause some to be over confident and we put them to the sword.

Oh I don't know, it's never boring at our club so lets just enjoy the ride.

 

I think we will be easily mid-table with a couple of games to spare, we're going to get almost as many wins at home and a couple more away to do it.

 

It's going to be a tough 2nd half of the season, of the eight teams in the relegation mix we have to play ALL our rivals away, and our home games include eight of the top nine, so home victories are gonna be a lot harder to come by. Unless harry can produce a winning or not losing formula for the away games we are heading for trouble. We seriously need some creativity and unless we get some I fear the worse...

 

I think if Harry goes, we have a chance.

 

Good stuff Ski, it's quite sobering when you look at the outcomes in black & white and makes the 2nd half of the season a tad worrying as we have to play 8 out of the top 9 at home. If we pick up 9 or 10 points from those games we will have done well, but that still leaves another 10 - 12 points needed away from home so something has to change......
It is not going to make pleasant viewing!!!!!

 

Nothing to worry about. Just like last season I've every confidence in our squad and management.

 

"She'll be right"

 

We need YSY and Sandro stronger and fitter than ever when they come back and playing well.
We need the strikers to get more goals, we need to not lose Vargas and Isla back off their loans.
And we need Joey to play a minor role in the midfield or not to keep mucking it up with loose passes

 

The Times has called it correctly. We need to play with the same attitude away from home that we have at LR. We can't do any worse. That is their New Year resolution for us. Even if we get walloped by the big boys we will more than make that up by getting the odd 'surprise' result against the teams we need to. I hope I am not wrong about that. I'm pleasantly surprised we are not in the bottom three at Christmas and no, I did not expect any wins away from home at this stage of the season. We need some good fortune in terms of injuries, suspensions and desperately need to bring in another couple of forwards - not gambles that Harry's scout has found who he has never even watched and who will only keep the bench warm. No more Delatorres or the Italian who played about 20 minutes last season.