I am not saying that I want to be relegated, trust me. But can you imagine if Hurst got walloped 9-0?
I hate seeing that score written down and avoid it where possible!! I remember listening to the commentary with my wife urging me to turn it off but it was mesmerising in a car crash sort of way. Difficult to believe the great Johnny Wark had a part in such a debacle.
That was before Burley took over. So you could say he took us from being a side that could beat Man United to a side that got walloped 9-0. But it doesn't paint the whole picture, any more than results this season paint the whole picture.
It's a comparison, I'll give you that much. It's a different era now than 1995 though. Now you have parachute ££££ many clubs with wealthy backers, new non fashionable clubs who've had a go at the top table. Back then, no parachute £££, football not ran the same, pre your Reading / Hull / Swansea etc with new stadium. We were by far a bigger team on the pyramid back then, than we are now. Relegation right now doesn't bare thinking about.
The fact is that Burley had 22 league games to form a winning team and even lost eight on the bounce and failed to score in seven on the bounce. He failed, but he still later took us into Europe. The playing staff was far stronger and more balanced than Hurst inherited, relative to the step in divisions. Some other things that Hurst has been bashed for and other parallels with that time include: - We sold our top striker. - We signed a forward at the end of his career. - We signed a young unproven striker who didn't exactly set the world alight to begin with. In fact he scored once in his first 12 appearances. - We were competing with teams with far more resources. And if dwindling gates are a concern. Average home attendance that season in the top flight? 16,818
What happened 23 years ago is an irrelevance, the game has changed out of all recognition and not for the better in my opinion.
Stadium held about 19000 back then, so it was quite full as a %%%% that season. Perhaps some parallels from back then, sure. See what tomorrow brings.
Agreed completely regarding relegation to League One. I don’t think we’d bounce straight back up, not with this unimaginative, austere owner, not with this squad where almost all the saleable assets have been sold off, and not with the gradually declining attendances that would continue to fall if we went down.
In what way did you “mock” Fieldmarshall’s argument? His post says that he thinks relegation would be bad for the club and that the lower income would bad for the club. He goes on to say that Marcus Evans wouldn’t show ambition and that attendances would dwindle. Not much to argue with there. Your response was, effectively, “Burley got relegated from the Premier League and had a good career with us. Hurst has got worse players, but there is no reason why he can’t stay here for years, regardless of league position”.
fieldmarshall's position nuggets, is that the management is a shambles. Furthermore, I didn't say that league position doesn't matter. I said on its own it's not the only factor to consider. The argument about relegation is very easy to counter and we have done to death on this forum already. No club of our size and circumstances has ever failed to bounce back in the modern era. The only side to ever get 'stuck' are Coventry City with a very different set of circumstances.
Burley also just had a few years' management experience and at a lower level (that's another stick Hurst is often beaten with on this forum). Where Burley has the edge on Hurst (and we are talking about that poor start), for me, is his footballing pedigree. People who have shown the top level of professionalism and footballing ability in their playing career, for me, have a better chance of building on that in their managerial careers and commanding the respect of their playing staff. I don't like the situation we are in, but we do need to look at it objectively. Hurst has not proven he is up to the job, but in twice as many games, neither had George Burley and far from it.
His position in his previous two comments on this thread is that relegation would be a negative event. He hasn’t mentioned or criticised the management in those most recent posts. The likelihood is that if we are relegated, more than one manager would have an attempt at preventing it. I would not hold Hurst ultimately responsible for relegation to League One, I would say Marcus Evans would be the most responsible. And I don’t think he’d hang around. We also owe him at least £90m, do you think he’d waive that debt based on how we’ve seen him run this club over the past half a decade? If you honestly do not see or appreciate the danger and repercussions of spending a season or more in the third division, then we’d just have to wait and see. At best, we go up first time of asking, agree it’s been a great experience, and just have to put up with the gloating Norwich fans for a few years. But if we don’t do that, and as FM points out with an owner that doesn’t like spending, a squad devoid of enticing players, and a dwindling fanbase, there is no guarentee of an instant return. Fail to do that, and it will only get harder to get out. I don’t want to see us play third division football for years. I can’t imagine many Ipswich fans wanting to see that. And you, with your expectation of us being a Premier League club, would surely not tolerate it for long?
We are where we are now and we have to accept that unless we start winning in October then relegation will be the most likely scenario. This is just not borne out by what has been the experience of other clubs to drop down into League One. Perhaps we will be the first to slide into oblivion, but objectively the chances of that happening are close to zero.
He would have to write part of that debt off if he sold the club because if we went into Administration he would get a small percentage of the debt. The only two options open to him are to keep his hand in until we get into the Premier League or write the debt off.
I accept we are in the bottom three and I am resigned to the possibility of relegation. I don’t like. I don’t think Paul Hurst is the main reason we’re doing so badly. I think the owner is to blame. Sheffield United spent six years in that division. Leeds United and Nottingham Forest spent three years each. These are clubs bigger than us and I don’t think many fans like talking about their fairly recent third divisions days. Or option three, and not a conscious choice perhaps, but say he fails to find a buyer and gives up on the club. It has happened (and is happening) to many clubs that ended up in League One and Two and causes all sorts of problems.
Of course we don’t know what will happen, Hampy, and there is no guarentee we are going down this season. I’m not seeking to argue for the sake of it, but my personal opinion is that I don’t see the benefit or allure of playing League One football and I think we’re equally likely to struggle in that division than make an instant return, based on what we’ve seen from this club over the past decade. The smell of decline is horrible.
