****!!!!!

I agree flanders and my post isn't necessarily the wa I think but I am pretty sure had we drawn with Liveprool, Beaten the mags then drawn with Swansea and lost to Chelsea that fans would be thinking "this isn't too bad, we've started OK and got more out of Liverpool than expected"

Not great when you're judged on results this game - 1 home win in 2011 says it all really - Short and Quinn must be wondering what's happening - buit also they run a business and sacking Bruce will cost the business a fair few million.

One thing I hated when I heard Bruce (not for the first time) was when he said "We knew we had a hard start to the season, now the first 4 are beihind us let's look at the next 3" (words to that effect) - I saw him at the Rainton meadows arena in January (when we were 6th in the league) - and he said "We have 6 difficult games coming up, if we're still sitting 6th or 7th after that we'll look at a push for Europe as the games following that are winnable" (and we all know what happened here don't we!!)

This, to me, is a defeatist attitude, and if he says the same to the players then why would they push themselves for a game against Chelsea when the manager thinks we'll get beat anyhow? Ji and Wickham pushed really hard when they came on (good attitude) but some of the players didn't give a **** - possibly the players to blame but with a manager saying stuff like this what would you expect?

 

I have been to nearly every home game in 2011 and paid good money to watch dross and an unbalanced team with no left hand side. We all could see it last year that the left needed sorted but another window passed and absolutely no sniff of a left sided player. This is my biggest gripe with bruce.

Added to that paying good money to watch your team beaten off Wolves/West Brom/Newcastle to name a few and being left miserable for the whole weekend then I am close to my teather, with the investment that has went on we as fans SHOULD be seeing our team win games.

Its not upto the fans to change things, we will always support our team but when the players & manager are failing then its bloody hard to take as we love the club so much and defeats hurt us so much but the players and sometimes Bruce I think do not feel our pain.

You can expect falling attendances etc because its up to the players to get the fans back at the SOL!

 

The vote of confidance? Yeah like that's never led to a manager being sacked a week later. If we lose to Stoke he has to go no two ways about it, last chance saloon, nobody could defend 9 defeats out of 10 home games. That said ill be going to the match on Sunday fully behind the players and fully wanting us to win the game, beat Stoke and we can look ahead to Norwich and West Brom

 

I can remember us stuffing West Ham and West Brom and the fans were still moaning about the team. That was in 76 and in a 3 game period we hit 16 goals with only 1 against

 

How many games will it take this team to hit 16 goals this season? That's the question that is worrying us all

 

I think they will give him the next 3 games, Stoke, Norwich and WBA. 2 at home and 1 away and a remit of a minimum (that’s an absolute minimum as well) of 6 points from 9. Maybe they should be even harder on him and say its 7 out of 9 to compensate for the shocking start we have made.

Also, I'd love to take Bruce to task on this 'hard start' we are supposed to have had? The Mags are a very poor team; Swansea relegation certainties; Brighton a 3rd division team last season. There are 3 games we played and still didn’t win. The fact we are playing Liverpool and Chelsea the others is the EPL. EVERY team has a couple of winnable games and a couple of probable losing ones every month. We are no different. The fact is we have looked pretty ****e apart form 1 half at Anfield (when we should have been dead and buried by the way) and 20 mins at home to the craas where we looked good but couldn’t score.

We are simply masking over problems that have been here since January to suggest 3 or 4 games is too soon to make judgments on Bruce. My argument is any more than the three I have suggested is almost too long, especially if we fail to win at least 2. Imagine how poor the team will be if we have played 7 games and don’t have a win to our name. I think Stoke will beat us as they are physically and mentally much stronger than we are at the moment and then Norwich away on a Monday night will be awkward to say the least and by the time Roy Hodgson brings his well disciplined WBA team up to the SOL, the pressure will be at boiling point for fans, players and manager alike.

The signs are there for all to see. WE have seen them many times before. This team and the manger have failure written all over it. Avoiding relegation is all we have left to fight for but how quickly the board act to rectify the problem will determine how easy or hard that task becomes. What we don’t want is a last 10 game rescue mission by some 2nd rate caretaker. We could still salvage this season if the right man is brought in now and given 2/3rds of the season AND a transfer window, to turn things round and get the best out of this squad of players.

I live in hope.

 

Yep. And I can remember what had been happening in the weeks leading up to it, and I can remember being relegated that season!

 

Take That or any other band come to the SoL on entertainment industry money and they accept that they have a responsibility to give value for money. And they know fine well if they screw up, fans won't turn up next time they're here.

Footballers today want entertainment industry money - but not entertainment industry responsibility. They want us to shout and sing no matter how many bum notes they hit.

I pay at the gate, and they have a responsibility to entertain me. That's the deal. Don't blame the fan if you're sh*t.

 

I can remember too many relegations kidda and I smell another one at the minute. All the signs are there to see. Bruce is limping along and is holed benneath his waterline (or is that waistline Lol). We are sinking and taking on water at an alarmig rate. If we dont act we will sink.

I cant see Bruce turning this around at all. It has all the hallmarks of a horrible, hard and ultimately devastating outcome. Championship football.

 

That a great point Cest...its not as if Sunderland fans don't know what a relegation team looks like..I have seen enough for two lifetimes. I am aware this is early in the season, but this is a decent squad that has no leader. we need someone in asap to get this season on track, otherwise I see us down by March...I have seen it all before.

 

True, but we were already relegated by then and had nothing to lose, If we`d played like that all season, your point would have been valid.