Quite frankly the offside reference amazed me.Berra was sat on his arse just inside the goal line.The daft beggar should have got off the pitch.
I have seen a still from the footage on sky that does show Grabban In an offside position when the ball is played back in, even with Berra on his arse on and around the six yard box..not the goal line as you say....but that does not excuse our poor performance in defending the corner or our general display on the day, I have said on this forum that the budgies deserved to win as they were better than us on the day!
I thought Mings at times looked like an utter donkey on saturday but then at times he looked okay. Not sure I'd be comfortable with him being our first choice LB this season Mick sometimes does every once in a while try something different that gives us a bit of hope that he might play a bit more progressive attacking football but then after a couple of games reverts back to type!!
I think given the cash Mick would spend fairly wisely and improve our fortunes but it's not all about cash. Whilst Mick has had a shoestring budget this is now his team, he has let the likes of Taylor, JET, Drury, Wordsworth, Martin etc etc go, whilst none of them were world beaters they all offered something abit different to what we have now. And just because he's had a shoestring budget doesnt mean we have to play football like we do, we've played far better football on shoestring budgets before
Just FYI, the only players who were on more than £25k last season (AFAIK) were: Bassong Turner Fer Snodders Hooper RvW Becchio Obviously three have now gone and none of the newbies will be on more than £25k (unless we are desperate to get Odjidja on board, he might be). Of those left, I believe Turner's was previously on around £25k and all players had relegation clauses, so he will probably be on c.£20k now. The real problems in that lot, obviously, are Becchio and Bassong, who are likely to be well over the £25k mark still. Otherwise we have been relatively well-managed in terms of not putting players on massive wages. But your point obviously still stands (as does Mick McCarthy's, though I think the way he phrased it is misleading), that as a result of being promoted to the PL, and also staying there 3 years, there is a massive gulf in financial strength of the two teams. In the cold light of day, half a week later, I have to say I thought Ipswich's players put in a decent performance for what they could expect. It was close fought, they worked seriously hard particularly in the first half, and could easily have stolen a draw due to poor Norwich finishing.