12.22, less than 3 hours before a game, no matchday thread

This will sound bad but I cannot recall, for the first time in my life the last time I did watch our highlights. Usually watch every goal every season. Just seriously fed up with all things ITFC and very scared things could get a bucket load worse before they get better.

Mick not having yet the club sums up how the club is run to me - ONLY at ITFC you can be told ' thanks but that's it yet STILL with 7 / 8 games left run the club until the end of the season.

It's an absolute bloody shambles.

 

I think we've finally discovered why you're the most pro Mick person on here you don't watch it haha. To be fair the average highlights reel thus season has been all of 30 seconds!!

I challenge anyone who says be careful what you wish for to actually sit and watch one of our matches and then say that!!

 

Oh I normally watch them and have been live to many a game under Mick haha but I guess given the budget I can understand why he does the game that way.

I think in terms of results / what we can do we very much need to be careful what we wish for.

In regards of style of play / aesthetics it's clearly going to be 100 times better to watch - I'll enjoy the 90 minute games more too of course.

It's not impossible to do both decent footy decent results just perhaps more difficult on a little pot of gold.

Anyway, see who we get, what Evans wants to put in, IF say Huws + Dozzell can stay fit all season. So many a variable - I just cannot wait for this season to end.

 

As many have said including in this article http://www.greenun24.co.uk/ipswich-...d-go-and-get-mowbray-from-blackburn-1-5461441

It's not just about style, it's about performance and how Mick plays will only progress our team so far, he limits out players and team by how he plays so I don't understand the argument. Particular as he has more recently recruited players who don't play how he wants.

As Burley says in that article, he didn't have much money to spend, nor did Robson, nor did Royle but they all had a philosohy to promote from within and believed that performance would mean results would follow. Mick just takes the hope out of football

 

After seeing at least 80% of our games this season I can't wait for a new direction.

 

What I will say against Burley - and this isn't in anyway connected with Mick - lets wind back the clock to Burley's time with us.

We had good players, in a division when direct football was generally what English football was associated with.

Lets look at other sides in division 1 in our promotion year 99/2000 -

You had the likes of -
* Swindon * Tranmere * Port Vale * Walsall * Crewe * Grimsby * Stockport all with absolutely zero chance of doing anything.

You had a lot of clubs up without a paddle at that point like WBA / Pompey / various others too.

It was a different time. We were in a good financial position. Take the Dyer sale, looked mad at the time however the cash generated helped us massively in 99/2000 with say Stewart arriving etc.

We had no pressure to sell - bar the odd far too good player like Dyer etc. We had squad continuity etc.

I think it's a little rich of Burley to say what the fans want to hear, people lap it up without even delving a little deeper into it.

On the basis nearly half the division wasn't in a position to do anything, and we had good ball players vs a good 19/24 sides who didn't - clear as day we were going to play the game the way we all want to see it played.

That's my pragmatic / logic hat off.

Taking that piece of s*** off - I HATE my thought process at times - however I'm a logical person in all senses. Ie - if I want to buy a car, would I get one on finance or something within my means? Sure - that sexy little ( insert car ) here MAY be what I'd love - it just isn't realistic with earnings!?

Taking that off though, next season I would LOVE the following -
* Higher attendances home / away / better more positive atmospheres.
* A manager who will play the game the way we'd like to see it played. A manager who will set up to WIN a game not COMBAT the opposition.
* A manager who will attract plenty of quality of player to Portman Road - use the lower leagues / loan system well and succeed despite budget.
* A manager who will act much quicker in games when it's obvious who is having a bad game / who SHOULD come on.
* Evans to release the purstrings further.
* WIN THE LEAGUE! Okay - now that's unrealistic, however maybe ----- IF I had to COPY one season from the past 20 years of our history - and given our situation etc - sod it - 03/04 entertainers.

Give me another 03/04 season with a play off campaign playing champagne footy/ zero defensive ability / we'll score one more than you approach with an average gate of around 25,000.

That's what I would LOVE.

 

It's all about opinions IMO

What you think is pragmatic, others may think is illogical.

Is it logical to play 'pragmatic' football at home against a team who are bottom of the league and hadn't scored in so many away games?

Is it logical to spend money developing academy players who clearly have more talent than many of those in the first team squad but not to play them and instead play (and recruit) journey men players or other clubs loan players who might not even be here next season?

Is it pragmatic to promote our academy players to play a passing game in the youth teams to then chuck them into first team where passing and movement is an alien concept?

Is it pragmatic or logical for Mick to buy players over the past few seasons who are more talented than those previously at the club but keep the playing philosophy the same?

Is it logical to stop the opposition all the time and therefore spend most of the time chasing the ball rather than letting the ball do the work? There could be a link here with our long injury list this season

Is it logical to go into every game with a 'pragmatic' mindset meaning the fans and the players think they're not good enough to play good football?

For me it's not about being pragmatic or logical, it's about mindset and belief/hope. They say in football it's the hope that kills you unfortunately Mick takes all the hope out of football because you know what's going to happen.

Yes things are different now back to the Burley days but there is also more pressure on this bigger clubs and actually due to the differences in funds when the parachute payments dry up you can see clubs have to overhaul their squads and it doesn't necessarily work (look a Norwich). Plus there seems to be more teams now who drop out of the PL and keep going down than there used to be.

Whilst Mick hasn't been blessed with finance I would say neither has he really been under any pressure to sell. What was it 3 years ago we rejected £10 million for McGoldrick, the only difference is when we have sold those funds haven't been re-invested in the playing squad.

 

Brilliantly put!

 

Okidoke - well lets see what the next gafa comes up with !