In all seriousness it does show you the gap between the Premier League and the rest, that clubs like West Ham can't even find a way for the likes of this lad and Alese to get into their team. There's such little room for error at clubs like that, that managers just constantly want "ready made" first team players. Its a symptom of the manager sacking culture. And its great to see clubs like Brentford and Brighton, who have largely followed the route we are trying, doing so well.
Bob was telling us that we won't spend a penny this window. So it's really good of West Ham to give us this lad for free.
The West ham lad sounds exactly what we need, big and strong central midfielder. If we can bring another striker in and lose our injury jinx I don't see any reason at all why we cant make the playoffs and even win it. Theres not many squads as strong as ours in this league when everyone is fit.
Aye. Getting in the playoffs will be harder than winning them. once we are in them we have the "big players" that can create moments to win any game.
I really don’t want to go up this season but I can see the excitement if we did, especially if they were told to play with total freedom and enjoy it, but the management would need to mean it and not just try for shut outs and try to get a draw here and there.
Your not alone in saying that mate and it really confuses me why some fans think going up is a bad thing. Maybes I'm getting something wrong in my thinking but surely over 100m in revenue aswell as parachute payments is not a bad thing, even if we did come straight back down. You only have to see the teams around us like Sheff Utd, Burnley, WBA, Watford and Norwich to see how strong they have become since getting promoted and then relegated. Fulham have been doing it for years and they now have a team in the top 8.
Thing is, if we do make the playoffs, I think there's a lot less pressure on the players, as fans were never expecting us to go up this year. They could go into the playoff games (assuming we were to make them) almost risk free. We'd obviously want the lads to win, but it's not like last year where it felt like desperation to get out of the league. Another season or two in this league wouldn't be as damaging to the fanbase as it was in League One.
FWIW I think its unlikely we make the playoffs. We are still too prone to mistakes and off days. Which is absolutely fine. We will be less prone to them next year, and the players will all be even better. So we should absolutely be aiming for playoffs next season. Aiming for automatics is always going to be a tricky one in this division, as almost by default at least 2 of the 3 teams coming down will be expected to challenge and have a huge advantage. Doesn't mean its impossible, obviously. But its a dangerous game to expect / demand to get into the automatics.
As Mowbray alluded, could be stronger next year but stay still or even drop a couple places in league position. See how patient fanbase is if that happens.
Wonder how much of a role Agent Aji played. Got to think quite a bit. I reckon all of that West Ham U21 team look at him playing in front of 40,000 each week in the championship and think "I fancy some of that"
Start of the season I would be happy with 15th. Expected this division to be a LOT better than it is. Having said that, the leap to the PL is massive and we are not ready for it Top 10 finish will be a superb return given where we finished last year, the injuries and the little baldy scotch twat chasing the money Next year would (with the right recruitment) be a promotion push
Whilst I don’t disagree, in fact that’s exactly what they should be thinking, I think most of them will be thinking they get multiple times more money and have the delights of London to spend it in.
