if if , yous go down , do you think redknapp will still be there.. anyway yous will have your players that dont give a **** , jump ship . theres no friends in football but the ones who want to play for yous ,will be the ones that can bring yous back up . when we went down .. thought it was the end of the world .. losing all your best players ,,but im sure yous can bounce straight back if yous go down. your owners are wealthy people so why not ..
Good summary. If you really want to speculate I can see SD stepping in as manager if HR gets another offer. Personally I have nightmares about Barton coming back (and no, I don't care how good he would be in the Championship).
The successful QPR teams that I have witnessed and supported have had a strong spine. Think: Camp/Carlisle/Bircham/Rowlands/Ainsworth/Furlong/Gallen (03/04) and Kenny/Hill/Gorrks/Derry/Mackie/Smith/Routledge/Taarabt (10/11) Both teams had one or two individuals who could score regularly, in Taarabt/Routledge and Furlong/Gallen, and other players who would work very very hard for the team. Clearly we need to keep players who are going to work hard for the team, Derry, Hill, Green, Faurlin, Mackie, Onuoha, Ephraim (yes!), Zamora, Bothroyd, Jenas. Let anyone who wants to go leave. We can't afford to have anyone in the squad that's not 100% behind the mission to get us back up. If Taarabt, Remy, Granero and Mbia want to go, then let them go. If we can keep one or two 'better' flair players, especially Taarabt, then they will give us that something extra needed to win us games. In terms of signings; we need to be careful. Clearly, signing 10 players every window does not work. We need to develop what we have, the Ephraim's of our squad, who with the right coaching can be a success at Championship level. We need to sign two or three good quality players and no more. Boothroyd, Zamora & Mackie should be three of our four strikers, with one more singing, who's a proven Championship goalscorer along the lines of Jordan Rhodes. My starting XI would be as follows: Green Onuoha, Hill, Ferdinand, Trarore Mbia(or Derry)/Diakete Ephraim/Taarabt/SWP (or Hoilett/Mackie) And then Zamora (or Bothroyd) up top. I think that's good enough or a playoff push without any new signings. Let me say, by way of concussion, that I in no way underestimate how tough the CCC is. It's difficult. Look at Blackburn and Wolves. With the right manager we can do it though. Edit - Not sure what I'd do with DJ.
Sorry to hear about your bump on the head, this might also explain your inclusion of Ferdinand - please god no.
Anything other than respect for the Championship is going to leave some people embarrassed. I included Ferdinand as back-up, in case Samba doesn't stay. Think he could do a job in the CCC; that said, I would make a decent CB a priority, with a goal-scoring striker.
When we went down into the Championship we shipped out most of the guys who helped us, by not trying hard enough, to get us relegated - Ie the likes of £104k a week Michael Owen. If you lot tried that tactic, how many players would you actually want to keep? For instance that Trabaat lad obviously has talent, but is he a team player with spirit and a hard work ethos? He bottled a header which cost you such valuable points. Or Zamora, who was guilty of wreckless stupidity in your hour of need? And you've got to understand why relegation happened. It's very likely to happen - but why? You've had two managers - both have achieved similar results - relegation form. Are they both over-rated or just unlucky for the season? In our case we had about 5 managers in one season, and our billionaire owner negatively invested in playing talent - he sold players to balance books, leaving us too short on the field. The opposite has happened with you - you've bought-bought-bought, way above your actual income - except these 'talented' mercenaries who have been acquired just haven't performed above relegation quality outcome levels it would seem. Remy has performed well, the money-grabbing t*at. But going back to our relegation season - we found that jettisoning some high-earning players and restoring team spirit, was the way to go. We couldn't sell most of them, thanks to their massive salaries and sub-standard ability. Ironically, Joey Barton became a key player for us who helped us get straight back into the Premiership. He did have that tenacity to fight for the team. You're almost certainly going down - we're not safe yet, I'm not gloating - and thanks to your Man City style attempt to buy success, you won't be missed. And I doubt Arry will hang about, unless he's on mega-wages like most of the players.
Know you are not gloating Consett, you speak sound sense. It is exactly the way to go. My disagreement with you is many about the managers. Sparky was clueless in in it for no 1, Harry does seem to care. Up until the last 3 games, which for various reasons we feel a bit aggrieved/unlucky/ misfortunate about....Harry had produced mid-table results. I think if he stays (I hope he does and has something to prove) he could do what you suggest...already he has "lost" Cisse, Ferdinand, and Granero. He has played triers like Hill, MBia and Jenas ...not always worked, but he seems to be forming a team spirit where none existed. I hope we can come back like you do....but I do not think Joey will be our catalyst
Good thread, and it is indeed time to plan for relegation now. For me we need to get rid of the likes of Ferdinand, Bosingwa, Park, Granero, SWP Obviously Cesar will go unfortunately, as it looks like will Remy - but I bloody hope we can somehow keep hold of him.
