Match Day Thread Stoke City v Sunderland AFC – Saturday 21st October 2023 - KO 15:00

Hayden Hackney gets the nod for England u21s over Neil which I find a bit strange like. I do like Neil but I don’t see him as a Rodri type, he’s more of a Gundogan I’d say. Really busy in the middle doing the dirty work but there’s just something missing when he’s on the ball I don’t see the composure or class that you generally see from the better 6s, I personally think Jobe looks better on the ball than Neil. Maybe that’ll come in time who knows.

 

Folk suggesting the gaffer goes after 2 games? ****ing hell.

I hope none of you ever have a bad day at work like, actually ridiculous.

Boro 11 v 11 we didn’t look like losing, so it’s 1 **** performance after a decent start to season and the gaffer is questioned again?

All managers choose sides we won’t agree with at times, and while the setup today was ****ing ridiculous it’s certainly not ‘change the gaffer’ that isn’t even a thought process.

We are only off the pace of automatic because the top 2 have had absolute flyers. We should have beaten Ipswich then there’d be no gap with a 6 point swing.

I’d love to know who all the football ****ing geniuses would get to replace him..

 

Graham Potter. May fancy a 5 year project.

FWIW I don't want nor expect TM to go.

 

Haha, I mean you’ve ****ed me there cos I’d sack Mogga for Potter in a blink.

Not happening though cos he get the England job after the Euros.

 

Jesus, the over reaction after todays game is up there with the worst I’ve seen, absolutely moronic.

 

As long as he does not pick Clarke and Roberts as wing backs that would be fine, although I have seen little to back this up , maybe using our U21 team more would tide us over, we have some promising center backs at that level and Seelt has yet to appear in the starting eleven , to-day might have been an opportunity to give him a start in a back three . freeing O/9 to move forward between Ekwah and Jobe in a 3/4/3 or a 3/5/2 even, this would have made us more resilient imo. Lack of hieght at set pieces has been a problem both ends of the pitch since Stewart left, and its asking far too much of Ballard to .compensate, at this rate he is going to burn out and thsn we will be in trouble.

 

I don’t think he should be sacked instantly but the warning signs are starting to show imo.

twice now he’s been battered with no clue how to change things against a ****ing awful side.

and the constant playing with no strikers is baffling and people saying we need to learn how to play with strikers? Really?
He weakened the team massively today by not playing one or two of the 3 fit strikers we had today by playing players out of position. You could see from the start he’d got it wrong and he never changed it.

a good manager knows he’s made a mistake and fixes it asap not just look at the floor and kick water bottles.

 

Maybe cos he's only 16? He's good but you can't throw a kid that age into Championship football

 

I mean the bloke they spoke to in the summer is currently third in Ligue 1.

 

That really wasn't us today, I can't put my finger on it but we didn't have our usual team spirit and togetherness, weird.

Ballard tried to motivate everyone and kept bringing the ball forward but we just never clicked.

 

I think, if we’d finished 10th-15th last season, that would’ve probably been a sensible aim. But we have become victims of our own success in that and I agree, I don’t think he’d get another season. But I see a manager who, fir majority of his time here, has had us playing the best football in my lifetime. Got today wrong, definitely. But I still think we deserved more out of the game than we got

 

Glad someone else sees it as I do.

Just not happening for what ever reason, in patches we look brilliant and play around the opposition with ease.

 

Mentioned to my dad the other week that my biggest concern is not rotating the squad enough. Think weve made the least changes to our starting line up in the league, eventually that will catch up with us

Id like to see Adil get a run of games as think theres a really gem of a player there

Reckon burstow starts on Tues n i wouldnt be surprised if Dack starts. Still feel pritchard is most effective as a sub when the game opens up.

From what i saw today it shows how important Neil is to us. As i mentioned at start of 2nd half, i didnt mind the starting line up today but i think he waited too long to make subs in the 2nd half

Dont expect us to get anything on tuesday, leicester look on a different level to all teams in the league

We are still 6th tho and we still have lots of levels to go up

 

There was none against Boro either. No fight or dig in at all when down to 10 men.

 

Not getting the CM in the window will cost us. No doubt. I am not sure we are better than last year. At the moment I think we are not.

 

So the template has been set for this board.
Win and it's a great team....lose and why the f*ck has the manager picked that team....sack him now even though he can see everyday what's going on with the players.
This from a club that people have said need stability....more so with a very young team.
The posts on here from so called supports is beyond comprehension.
Stoke is always a tough place to go and always will be...Leicester this week will be a tough one....Norwich will be a tough one.
However the season is over 46 games and it's a marathon.
Where we will stand at that point in time determines everything....not again against Boro....or Stoke away......ffs.
No strikers on field.....ffs....how many times do we have to hear that one....we ripped the division up last season without one.
What let us down last season to me was losing Ballard and Baath to injury...and we were so close to being in the Premier League.
That manager was Tony Mowbray....great manager and still is.
In my opinion will we will the league.....yep.
This season we will win some games and lose some....just take each one as it comes and when we get into the business end of the season we are in a position to get the opportunity we need.
If you want to bitch and moan through everything game then bless you......not my idea of enjoyment or being a supporter but hey ho.
Things may not turn out at Leicester but we keep going....long, long way to go this season yet.

 

The points were there for the taking though Markus , we wont play a worse team all season than Stoke, yet we never really tested them until the last few minutes. Its a thin line between success and failure in football and we saw today how poor we can be without one of our three key players, lose two and we could really struggle without some fresh thinking on starting formations from Tony, its down to him to show us he can think outside the box, not just in press conferences but on the pitch.

 

Far too soon to say whether we are or not. Think we have more depth now n a few have taken a good step forward

It might cost us but itll depend on neil n ekwah staying fit n how jobe continues to develop

Most teams in our league will have a position where they lack quality depth. We cant sign another player of Neils quality at the minute so hes always going to be a huge loss, look at how poor city look whenever rodri is out their team

 

That yardstick of quality that’s so high a kid off championship manager has a job there and not a single broadcaster bid for their TV rights?

And we spoke to him doesn’t mean he had any interest in coming.

 

Yeah. Have to good that Mayenda is decent. Need some dynamic player to come in and make a difference I feel. The striker position is an annoying one. November next week and none of them look to be up to it IMO.