That has been the whole point! How many of the teams in today's PL have got a 'great team' - how do you define that. What was significantly different in our team when compared pre and post 20/12/2008? It seemed to me that the teams selected pre 20/12 were attacking and almost cavalier in their approach - they harboured no fears and took the game to the opposition. We were a difficult team to play against, as we always presented a threat and our results enforced that. We picked the oppositions pocket on more than one occasion and we looked okay - not great maybe, but certainly decent; that was certainly the opinion of football followers, at all levels, all over the country. Certainly Brown deservews credit for this period, although, I believe he had some strong support from Sam.
But then the wheels came off and we watched them overtake us when Browns arse-end dropped - exit Sam. We were all stunned by his selections, his strange tactics, his public admonishment of decent larkers. He would spout on about a players cracking performance and then that same player would be lucky to make the bench. Of course there can be some element of other teams working us out, but this was drastic, cliff-edge, dramatic failure. The manager was making not just odd, but crazy calls. He was more intersted in his telly image than working out his best eleven. He became a monster with a naughty step that stopped us playing our best eleven, nevermind a 'Great Team'. We stayed in the PL by the skin of our teeth and that should never have been the case with the start we had. That's my opinion - you don't have to agree