Following all the excitement and optimism this week we got a taste of reality at Norwich. Less talk of Europe and more of survival me thinks.
I don't recall ever seeing ANY City fan seriously talking about Europe... We knew it was always about survival.
Huddlestone's red sees him out how many games? he's been a bit off recently, Koren can do playmaker perhaps Quinn should come in?
Only the Southend game, which I think he wouldn't have been a part of anyway. I expect Koren, Meyler and Quinn to be the midfield 3.
totally with you there, after Chessie went off, we needed a Meyler to do the dirty work and stop Fer & Snodgrass overrunning us didn't deserve owt today
There were a few saying "Can see us winning at Norwich and Palace and then......." We have all the laggards to play away. We need to squeeze the pips out of them. This is how we will stay up. Cardiff, Fulham, WHU, SAFC, Palace and Stoke Need to avoid defeat in all of these, ideally win one or two( ideally at SAFC, WHU and Stoke ).
We all know it's about Survival, today was a minor setback. As Thudd said on twitter, need to improve ASAP!
A late 1-0 defeat is less worrying that a comprehensive dicking. We've played **** and still only just lost.
How did the new gazillion million dollar Jelavic perform? - all I have heard so far is his Grahamesque effort after two minutes.
He played well, didn't get the service that he needed really. Missed a sitter in the first few minutes. He'll get there though. Will be interesting to see how he pairs up with Long.
Jelavic tried hard, had the occasional flash of quality, put his head in on occasions in dangerous areas and generally looked up for it, but he looked far from the relaxed, clinical finisher we're hoping for. Time should settle him. Defensively we looked as solid as usual, although losing Chester obviously cost us. It was in midfield that we looked poorest. Huddleston looked quiet ineffective apart from the occasional crossfield ball. Korean looked past it. Boyd struggled to get in the game. Livermore was OK but wasted the ball in good situations. Not worried yet. But closer to being worried than at any time this season.
This season is a season long relegation battle. Maybe today reminded a few people of that fact. If we can stay out of the bottom 3 come the end of the season then it is mission accomplished.
Comparing Jelavic's miss to Graham is laughable and stinks of someone who didn't watch the match. Jelavic was brilliant, made all the right runs, looked calm and collected with the ball at his feet, but misfired a couple of late crosses when he adopted the attitude of "If you want something done right do it yourself." The team just hasn't gelled completely with him yet but when they do and the passes come off, Jelavic will bang them in. His miss in the second was completely excusable and was just brilliant to have a striker in the right position for once. Awful game today, we just got progressively worse as the game went on. Chessy I assume has done his hammy again, but if he hadn't Fig wouldn't have played, which would have been good as he was dreadful again today, so much so we reverted to 3-5-2 just to play Rosenior on his wing. Reffing was also dreadful, though Sagbo needs to keep his ****ing feet as he goes down far too easily. Could tell Jela, Hudd and Livermore were getting pissed at the ref about all the poor calls as they started to lash out, which ended with Hudd getting sent off. Must admit I freaked until I realised he'll only miss the Sarfend game. All in all a pretty terrible game but a wake up call, and now we need something from Palace. Hopefully Long and Jela up front and they can start banging them in. Jela already showed me enough today to convince me he was worth it. I put him not scoring down more to the feeders of the ball than his lack of finishing or positioning - because he was brilliant with both.
4 wins and a couple of draws will definitely be enough. Trouble is, where are they going to come from if our away form continues even against the worse teams.
Precisely, and people can't quite grasp why I'm not happy at having paid over the odds for a pair of players with silly money we can't afford. People talk and act as if survival is a given, its not, the whole season is a relegation battle, as will next if we avoid it this time, and its still a huge, huge task to survive this time round. I think a great start and mid table has given people a false sense of security. 6 points to the foot of the table isn't a very big cushion at all to be comfy, 2 games is all I takes to make that up. Pretty much all our winnable home games have been and gone and all but maybe 2 or 3 we really can't be hoping to get anything from. We are also dog ****e away from home. That's a massive worry. Relegation is still very possible, and Jelavic and Long or not, we'll have done very well to finish 17th. As such we HAVE to budget as if we are going to get relegated at the end of the season. If we go down now we are in very serious trouble, not only will we not be able to afford to pay off transfer fees and wages we're committed to, we'll also fail drastically with FFP and be fined a **** heap more on top. And that's without even thinking about Allam and his petulant little threat...
Sydney, to be fair, Howard Webb got everything absolutely spot on today. Maybe Thudds second yellow was a tad soft and Koren should have been booked for his foul on dirty exTWS scum, but he called every foul perfectly.
