so here we are at 10 league games in and what i think is a good time to take a look at how things are shaping up. firstly, if we had been told top 5 after 10 games we would have snapped some hands off so to have been top and still thereabouts we have to be happy. lots of questions needed to be answered regarding LJ and his style, from the pre-season games we noticed a team that was more inclined to pass it around and get the ball forward faster, although recruitment came late every single player has slotted into the side and barring one or two nervy starts have all improved the squad, LJ talks of the squad not being 'fully up to speed' yet and i think we can all see there is still time for players to gel fully and develop better partnerships, also, we have seen the team can be changed with no drop in performance so (in theory at least) suspensions and injuries should not present any serious drop in form. we are not going to 'walk' the league in my opinion but we should be up there fighting for one of the top two as long as the players do not get complacent or we do not have many games like portsmouth where the players seemed more concerned at getting the game called off than trying to adapt and play. i was going to go through the squad and take a look at who had settled, who was showing promise and who might need more time but to be honest, as already said, every player is slotting into the squad with ease and really there have been no bad individual performances, here's to the next ten. any thoughts, notes, differing opinions lads?
If anyone offered me that the club would bed in the top 2 after 10 games, I would've snapped their hands off. Yes, we're still a "work in progress" and can only get better as the players get used to each other's games and strengths. What's been even better for me is that they've played really good football whilst getting used to each other. There's real confidence in the team and imo, that led to yesterday's defeat - maybe overconfident. In 9 of those 10 games, they've deserved something out of each game and basically deserved to win them all - even Burton. So maybe they thought all they had to do is turn up thinking the football will do the talking and if that is the case then they would've learnt that it doesn't work that way. They have to put the effort in and match the opposition before they can play the good stuff. We'll see how good they are as a team in the next game and hopefully they bounce back and chalk another W in the form guide
Chuffed to bits. I think yesterday was his first selection **** up picking players not suited to that pitch against that opposition. Lessons learned and move on.
Great start no doubt a huge setback yesterday though but he needs to get a settled team and that defence is still dodgy, need to win at Gills and Crewe now, signings in Jan as well maybe Grabban ? 36 matches left win 18 draw 12 lose 6 that is 88 points, that should be promotion.
not sure of wright/flan combo in defence, they both seem to work better if just one of them is in there...a bit like the power/dobson midfield tried last season, it just did not work, lads still finding their feet but i had a bad feeling about yesterdays game anyway.
It's got to be Doyle and Flanno for me. If either is unavailable, then Wright comes in for Flanno and Alves for Doyle. It was a big wake up call yesterday, and like others have said, I'm pleased that LJ did not carry a coat of whitewash by blaming the conditions. We didn't play well abd got what we deserved. The conditions were atrocious and were typified when a simple 5 yard pass got stuck after 2 yards, but they adapted better to the conditions, while too many of our players had an off day. Overall, it's been a great start to the season and I fully expect us to bounce back with more determination than ever.
10 games, 8 good performances, 22 points and joint top of the table. Happy enough with that. Yesterday was disappointing but I'd rather we lost 2 out of 10 if we win 6 or 7 of the rest. Last season we probably would have drawn against Bolton and Portsmouth and come away feeling "happy enough" (with 1 point less) I hate losing, especially in this league but last season was proof you can lose 1 in 4 and still go up
Delighted with our start to the season ( until yesterday) but I'm hoping it was our 'blip' and we move on. We'll soon find out, next time we play on a heavy pitch in the pissing rain, I expect to see him tweak the play to suit the conditions, not necessarily a massive change, just enough to show we've learned from yesterday. With winter coming we'll face different challenges so we need to show how we handle it, this is the mark of a good manager, let's see him in action.
Agreed, there will be blips along the way but we've got a great squad which will only get better as the youngsters settle in. Won't take long because they've hit the ground running. We nearly went up last year and player for player we're way better now.
next ten look interesting, plenty of games we can win in there plus a couple of good tests, alby and hume should be back fully by then, broadhead should be back up to speed...could be heading into xmas in good shape, the squad can handle a couple of injuries/suspensions with ease now (hopefully no more square pegs) and i think we will really see the benefit of that in the later stages. the draws seem to be a thing of the past thank feck, one game we lost we completely dominated so the only bad performance to date was portsmouth...1 out of 10 will do me.
2 points per game gets you promoted on 92 points. We are currently 2 points above the 2 points per game average with nearly a quarter of the season gone. The squad is settling well and any complacency will have been rinsed out of us on Saturday. Hopefully, the Portsmouth game will hit home to LJ that Flanno and Wright is a no-no. Doyle has to come back in. Looking at how we've started the season, there is plenty of reason for optimism. Defensively, we look to have plenty of good options. Winny has been a revelation and Cirkin and Huggins look too good for this league. Doyle is remarkably good for his age and a Premier League player in the not too distant future and the turn around in form of Flanagan has been astounding. At last we have a bit of pace and guile in the midfield. Neil and Embleton have both come to the party, O'Nien has performed solidly and Evans provides the leadership and composure that we have been lacking. Stewart has led the line superbly and Broadhead has proven himself to be a very able deputy/partner. If we can get Gooch and McGeady playing anywhere near what they are capable of, we will piss this league with the team they have around them. Here's to another 20 points from the next 10 games!
LJ had a habit of going on poor runs through tinkering iirc. Hopefully he's learned from that and as you say, Doyle back. Although you never know what goes on behind the scenes. Ie a knock or something. That was one of those bad days where everything went wrong. Hopefully the players put it down to experience and it's business as usual next game . At least we can expect that of the team now compared to the past.
So far so good. We deserved to be on at least 3 more points as the Burton game we should have scored about 3 and won comfortably. Before Pompey one or two bits of luck and we would have been on 100% and no real arguments that it wasn't deserved. The weather on Saturday did what no team has managed to do really and stopped us playing football. It's great to watch the way we are playing, league 1 could be won with a bit of a dirty game with long balls (Stoke under Pulis) but we are playing good football that is good to watch. Stewart is leading the line and looking every bit a striker too good for this league. Which is why I'm again confused by another mention of Grabban by Monty, its seems he doesn't rate our forward line not sure what more he wants 7 in 10 goals wise, never gives the opposition a second, good control, fights for every ball and seems to be loving every minute. Grabban scored, not much else and couldn't wait to **** off.
