Burnley have a much stronger squad than us even after losing their three best centre-halves, their best striker and one of their best wingers. Don’t be daft.
Nah Burnley have signed some very good talent. Bastien is a solid midfielder as is Josh Cullen and signing Aro Muric from Man City gives them a top goalkeeping option. Remains to be seen if Twine can do the business, but Burnley have a decent record of singing lower league English players and turning them into very good ones.
They have. They've got a more seasoned squad also. They'll be competitive, and I'd predict they finish above us as things stand. We've had a mixed bag from pundits. But then our window has been a mixed bag also. There are a lot of unknowns and we could finish anywhere. But some of them pundits are just lazy and tar us with the 'little old Hull' brush no matter what we do.
I'm not saying they haven't signed good players, I just don't see how they can be tipped for promotion when their squad overhaul appears like it's going to be bigger than ours and I think only 1 of them has played in the Championship before. I'm not saying we'll finish above them, we shouldn't. I just don't see the logic of the punditry.
It's bigger than ours but they're replacing their players with a better quality of player, and a lot of whom have played in England before, and so will not need to spend so much time adapting. They also had a bigger squad to start with so even though they're losing so many, they're keeping plenty too.
They have the strongest midfield in the division and have invested well in players like Twine and Cullen. I’d be surprised if they finished below the top two.
Maybe, it's definitely wide open. There's got to be big question marks over the gaffer though. I just feel it's all too much for an inexperienced gaffer to have to build a new side and then be expected to instantly go up. If they get O'Hare, that's a huge signing though. When I spoke to a few Burnley fans I think the expectation was that McNeil and Collins wouldn't leave and they'd build around them
Out of all the teams to get relegated, Burnley is the one I’d bank on going back up at the first attempt. I think Burnley have a better chance of going back up more than Everton or Leeds if they went down instead.
Yeah, it doesn't quite fit they're using our player churn as a reason to write us off as relegation fodder and not apply the same logic. But quite honestly, we've traditionally done quite well when we've been written off and dark horses, so let them say what they want. Only people that really have any say is the lads on the park anyway.
I don't think we're being written off for player churn, it's because none of the players are known quantities. I think both Not the Top 20 (who I posted a link to in the predictions thread) and Second Tier had us 10-11th because they didn't know if we would do brilliantly or terribly so hedged their bets, which sounds about right.
Enjoyed that not the top 20 run down. Also agree Burnley are more of a known quantity. **** me, we actually agreee
My favourite one was Alan Nixon describing the Muric signing as a massive coup after having a strong season in Turkey.
Best ones are when they write an article about one of our players and use the wrong player's photo. That happened quite a lot around our first promotion.
"“I’m not going to lie, the team is not ready yet but who is in the Championship?” Kesler admits" Ah. Hope nobody put a bet on for Saturday...
It's positive that it is recognised though. I'd be interested to know if it is primarily due to availability of targets, injuries, perceived performance or just some combination of all of the above.
What's he basing that on?! Is he pre-judging things?? But it's good that the club is reasonable about expectations for the first few games, after his comments the other day about wanting Top 6.
Probably all of the above. Bristol City is a nice opener to test the water and see how we get on. It's going to be a tough opening few weeks, but a few points here and there will give us a decent platform. Not expecting seven wins from these games, but there's two "winnable" ones.
Clearly reverse phycology to lull Brizzel into a state of over confidence. We'll be 5 nil up by half time.
