Right Lads, here's my thoughts on our situation. I know we had some poor players or at least players who weren't performing and we got rid of them. The likes of Bramble and Mohammed Ali. I also know we brought in 14 players, about half of them for the first team squad. I also know we sold our two best players and lost our on loan player of the season. In fact, our players of the season (in my opinion) for the last four of five years have all been loan players, Evans, Rose and Welbeck. It's looking (early days) like our two best players so far are also loan players, Celustka and Ki. After a decent run in the premiership we should be buying say two top players, 15 million each and not a whole load of free or cheap players but we are doing exactly the opposite by selling our best players and getting in lots of players no better than we already have. This last transfer window has seen a net spend of less than one million. A couple of seasons ago we made a profit of 18 million. I know we've also had a couple of spending windows but I really can't see how we are not improving the squad. We must be taking in well over 100 million with all the tv money, gate receipts, merchandising, concerts and sponsorships so where is it all going? Teams who have came up well after us (Swansea for instance) have made big signings but we always seem to want to do things on the cheap. We have had good players but it never seems to last ( Gyan, Bent) Not since Kev and ( my personal favourite Niall) have we had a settled top pair up front. Now with Fletcher out for seemingly a long time we have a piss poor choice of strikers. It seems to me we are continuously going backwards. Given good boardroom backing I wonder where we would be if Reid had been given the wherewithal to build on the two seventh place finishes. In our current situation I want PDC to stay. This is where I probably will get criticised. I think Ellis should do more by backing PDC in january and let him get a couple of top players in for about 30 million. We cannot keep doing things on the cheap. On PDC's going to the crowd yesterday. I admire him for that. He is showing that he feels the hurt as well.
I wouldn't give PDC enough money to buy a Chicken Balti pie at the club. He is one of the poorest examples of a top flight manager I have seen since Sbragia (who was a far nicer bloke altogether). His team selections and tactics make Steve Bruce look like Sir Alex Ferguson and his pre/after-match interviews are cringeworthy on a scale not seen since Cloughie but sadly without any of the benefits Cloughie brought to the game. He is trying to emulate the greats without having the ability to back the verbals up. Without having walked the walk he is talking the talk but his words are falling on deaf ears in his own dressing room. Players have been trotted out on a daily basis, akin to the Brezhnev days in the Soviet Union, to tell us everything is fine and everyone is behind the manager but it didnt take an astute political animal to work out this was all bullshit and all is not well at all. This can be evidence from the last 2 woeful displays and the thumping defeats we are now seeing against very, very average teams. I expect to see chemical Ali trotted out this week to assure us all everything is okay. I didn't buy it from the start and I am now absolutely convinced he has to go if we are to stay up this season. We could well still make top 10 under a better manager (our squad is not a bad one at all) but bottom 3 is all we are going to make under Paolo.
But who can we bring in ?, Neil Warnock ?, I would take 17th in the premier league now if you gave me it. This is worrying not having teams like Palace, and Stoke coming here till next year and with tough home games until mid December. Di canio should have been stopped after he signed 5 players, he has changed the squad far too much.
Roberto Di Matteo stepped in to the Chelsea job when things were going tits up and took another persons squad to the glory of the Champions League Trophy. He did it without any fuss or ego and indeed showed he could manipulate players egos to get the best out of them. He would offer a simple and proven alternative to the situation we have now and could work with the new set up and regime. Given he is an Italian he will have an instant rapport with Di Fanti and Angeloni and be able to work towards January's window and maybe 1 or 2 of his choices in there. What I am absolutely convinced on is that to just stick with PDC say till Christmas, is going to see us plummet further out of contention at the bottom and make it virtually impossible (aka Redknapp at QPR) to rescue the disaster unfolding by the week. Players will be so demoralized (and they looked totally shell shocked yesterday) that they will not be able to pick up. Its thoroughly depressing to keep reaching this point time after time but its got to happen imo if we are to survive.
