Don't really know. 15 points is very good, but the players are very good too. Different way of playing now than previously, boring to watch! 7/10
Of course, Monk has been terrible. 15 points from 10 games would see us with only 57 points at the end of the season. It's a scandal that he was even appointed! He can't even call himself a rookie any more. He had a few games at the end of last season for christ's sake!!! Plus he bought terribly in the summer. That Montero only beats 98% of the players he runs past. #Monk out
Gifted away points because he hasn't the experience to know what to do. Bring in experienced mentor IMO. The suggestion he's doing OK for a 'rookie' doesn't wash, either he's good enough or he's not. He is good enough for some but as you point out given the quality of the players we should be good. Is our play boring? Too damn true it is.
New to the thread and can't be bothered to read it back, so will just put my opinion and be gone! Can't argue with league placement. We're sitting pretty in the top half of the league, and while the league is closer this year, we're still accumulating more points than teams like Hull and Stoke who, from the outside, appear to have performed better than us at times this season, but are still behind us in the league. As usual, we're going to be overly critical of our own team because we see every second of every game, not the highlights/extended highlights of other teams. We're still ahead of some big teams and are still in touching distance with the teams above us (bar Saints and Chelsea) - a great position after 10 games. Monk gets a 7/10 from me. He's obviously doing better than a lot of his counterparts in this league right now, so that must be applauded. I personally feel that we've left some points in games as a result of his substitutions and team selections, but then refereeing decisions have also cost us just as badly, if not more. So he, and we, are coming along nicely this season. At the half way stage - once we've played everybody - we'll have a better idea how the league will shape up. If we lose to teams like Hull, Villa and West Ham before the turn of the season, we could find ourselves struggling in the second half of the season. Monk's doing a good job - could be more proactive with substitutions and will be faced with more rotation issues in the coming months than he's faced so far this season, so squad management will be interesting (I'm thinking Amat, Leon and any other January additions). A season full of promise and possibility at this stage.
Saying 'we should be good because of players we've got' is very unfair imo Bob. Through the summer Swansea City lost more players than Southampton, yet every one focuses on how great Southampton are doing despite their decimation, putting their success down largely to the brilliant Ronald Koeman. After the dust settled on our own decimation we began to rebuild ourselves, firstly by appointing Monk as manager, then by recruiting an influx of players some believed wouldn't come play for us because Monk is 'such a backstabber' but come they did, in droves. Fabianski, Fernandez Carroll, Montero, Siggy, Emnes, Gomis joined us. Taylor re-joined the starting 11 more or less as a new player with only Emnes and Siggy from the list having played with him before, Ki came back. Shelvey and Bony played together but neither had with any of those mentioned, a few minutes here and there excepted. Add to this the loss of Leon, the heart and sole of the club, and it must be said that we started the season with a scratch side of players each completely unfamiliar with playing together. Irrespective of talent it takes time to gel a team together and even more before they can build performances. So, imo, we began the season, as badly off as Southampton and irrespective of agendas it simply can not be ignored that Monk, a complete rooky, is doing as fantastic job and, imo opinion, as good a job as Ronald Koeman who gets great plaudits from everyone, its about time our boy started getting some too, especially from some of the posters on this board. Thanks Gary really not bad for a Rooky.
Did we lose more players than Southampton? Not really sure about that. But they lost really good ones.
Just think we could still have brendan or man utd manager van the man as manager....I wonder what report they would get of some of you
But they also acquired some really good ones. The took in a ton of money and they spent an good amount of it very wisely; perhaps even upgraded. Do they miss Lambert - NO. Do they miss Shaw - NO. Do they miss their coach - NO. It seems to me that whoever is Director of Football there has an excellent scouting and player evaluation team. As a result, they were not raped in the summer as some might think (I certainly did), but just quietly put out the "trash" to clubs that should have known better and brought in players that they had determined were much better value and better performers.
they were desperate to keep lambert and shaw but they wanted to move on. they have bought well but at a high cost that we cannot afford so its a gamble that has paid off...so far not that they have bought better...
As far as I can see we are two points better off than in the corresponding fixtures last season: Man Utd 1-2 Swansea (+3) Swansea 1-0 Burnley (Same) * Swansea 3-0 West Brom (+3) Chelsea 4-2 Swansea (Same) Swansea 0-1 Southampton (Same) Sunderland 0-0 Swansea (-2) Swansea 2-2 Newcastle (-2) Stoke 2-1 Swansea (-1) Swansea 2-0 Leicester (Same)** Everton 0-0 Swansea (+1) *Replaced Fulham ** Replaced Norwich
We have 3/4 of the premiership teams below us and some of those are huge clubs....So we are doing fantastic so far.... how anyone can complain about that is beyond comprehension especially when some on here said we will be in the bottom 3 all season and relegated before xmas...
"....some on here said we will be in the bottom 3 all season and relegated before xmas." Who? Don't exaggerate.