It's worth pointing out that, as this is the day before we play Juve as we begin our defence of the International Champions Cup, there's a good chance you'll see the likes of Troy Parrott, Paris Maghoma and NEW SIGNING Kion Etete play this one
I'm looking forward to it already. A few pre-match pints at The Royal Albert, a spot of football in the sun and dinner at Lorenzo's. What could be nicer?
I hope the club realise that we're expecting all player unveilings to look like this... please log in to view this image
It could be construed as failings on the part of the senior/academy mgmt coordinating to develop the older players as necessary. Before the reign of Pochettino there were always several players out on loan, some of whom were at PL clubs. If Ser Davos and NDombele are a bit above the standard to be expected for academy talent entering the senior squad, then how are kids of the same age going to play the number of real competitive games needed beforehand, when they are not out on loan ??
I think a small part of it has to do with injuries and/or illness ruling players out for an extended period of time not just at a crucial point in their development, but also at the point in a season where the players might stand a chance of getting a run-out of two with the first team. For example, almost immediately after Edwards made his debut he needed ankle surgery so missed a large chunk of 2016/17 and I seem to recall tonsillitis costing him a chunk of 2017/18, while last season Georgiou and Oakley-Boothe both had injury problems in the first half of the season, while Onomah's various injuries last season made his loan at Wednesday a borderline farce On the other hand, it was telling that WindyCOYS explicitly said the reason for Sterling, Edwards, Shashoua and Georgiou going out on loan last season was their agents forcing the issue to get their clients playing time, which once again paints the picture that Poch still sees loans as a way not of developing youngsters but getting them out the door as they don't fit into his plans (i.e. Harrison, Glover, Ogilvie etc etc)
Noted that some of the kids have had bad luck on the timing of injuries, but the latter also seems to be true. IMHO we need a return to the loan regime that began this decade, but now with a degree of Spartan honesty. Tell each kid that goes on loan to the PL or the league below that they are playing for the privilege of being in the senior squad, and if they don't perform *** they have no future at the club. All loanees that pass "go" in a season, should IMHO then be in the pre-season roster for the next season, playing as much as possible. *** allowing for injury misfortune, loan club managers being prats etc.
There seems to be twice as many cat B games as cat C. Anyone ITK on the difference between cat B and C games (opposition, day of week etc) ??
Cat A - 5 Cat B - 9 Cat C - 5 To break it down various other ways Cat A - Chavs, Saltypool, The Sheikh Mansour Team, Man Utd, Woolwich Cat B - Newcastle, Palace, Southampton, Watford, Brighton, Wolves, West Scam, Everton, Leicester Cat C - Villa, Sheff Utd, Bournemouth, Burnley, Norwich As for days of the week/kickoff times, it's not really worth asking as Sky & BT have yet to feed the fixture list into the shredder
My point is that on opposition alone, there are some in the cat B list that IMHO are not as attendance-inducing wrt some in the cat C list.
Newcastle have always been oddly high in the ratings, as they were Cat A a decade ago even though they were meandering around midtable as much as we were As for the others, I'm assuming that's an additional tax for Everton fans to boo our players for stringing three passes together and West Scam fans for being West Scam fans
Whenever I see the words "new and improved" added to anything, I automatically assume it means "stupid and worse". It's accurate far too often, unfortunately.
1. Dates have not changed, KO times being amenable is another story. 2. Spurs match day 2-4 are on Sky Sports Does RDBD Sports News "understand" this means Spurs are nowadays a big viewing draw ??
It's harder for their pundits to slag us off constantly if they're supposed to be covering Bournemouth's matches
