..lets face it, things can't get much worse now. It has been a pretty disastrous start to the season - 3 games, 3 defeats, 0 goals. And you would imagine confidence in the squad would be pretty low right now. Having started well (performance wise) against Hull, we have now seen two absolutely dreadful performances and results in a row. Whether this is down to the players, Harry Redknapp, or both, it leaves us in a situation where the Sunderland game is almost a must win for confidence reasons. I know some will say its far too early for a must win situation, but remember our winless run of what was it, 12 games? It is crucial to get points on the board quickly otherwise confidence will gradually decline. I keep reading comments from Redknapp saying our pre-season was bad, we are short on fitness, we are short on quality - why has this been allowed to happen? So far, I am also seeing little of the new players being the 'right sort'. Certainly having seen the Spurs game we lacked fight, passion and determination - 3 basic things in football that fitness and quality should not impact on. And having read several reviews of last nights game from fans it seems the Burton game was exactly the same. Serious questions need answering about our team - I just hope the team spirit that was evident in the play-offs last season hasn't eroded away. We all saw how quickly that disappeared in our last Premier League season. Whilst I will wait to reserve full judgement on our new signings/team formation, it hasn't been a good start. We certainly need to score against Sunderland, and also its important to get a win to claw some confidence back.
Spot on post. A performance and a draw would be my minimum from the Sunderland game. We can't afford to be cut adrift and have the ruinous media calling us winless QPR for another two months.
I think the characters of players we have this year means the spirit is much better - and will become much better once we get started. Whether they are good enough at this level is another matter - but I dont think team spirit is something we need to worry about compared to the last few years.
I see that after all the gloom and doom, and "Harry out" threads, there is at last a positive thread. Hopefully, after losing our first three competitive matches without scoring a goal there is a very high probability of improvement. The OP reminded me of a very memorable line by Michal Caine in one of the Batman films: Alfred Pennyworth: Took quite a fall, didn't we, Master Bruce? Thomas Wayne: And why do we fall, Bruce? So we can learn to pick ourselves up. ...I just hope that we learn quickly. After all, we have had many opportunities to practice in recent times.
The Sunderland game is must not lose in my eyes. After Sunderland we've got Man utd away which could make it 4 games no points and i think we would be pretty much into a repeat of last premier league experience
