The College Dropout

I'd be delighted if we could finish above Brentford.

I can't shake that video of what Rice did to him.

Much better than I expected tbf.

Left exposed. Did ok.

Burnley a bigger risk than Watford. their previous 2 managers aren’t bad. The team is just not good enough. Maybe Sarr is a game changer. But Claudio can coach a defence and they were hopeless. Couple clean sheets with Roy but not scored a single goal. They needed reinforcements not a new manager. burnley can win 6 of 18 games. They’ve drawn half their games anyway, like us they don’t need a drastic uptick to turn the tide in performances. But they don’t have the points on the board. Norwich don’t score enough goals to win another 6.

Aye but that’s for 16/17th. if we could get close to a point per game I would be happy. 36 points surely keeps you up. Burnley intrigue me. They could be gone by the last game.

I think he’s a weak link personally.

Teams at the bottom don't get a lot of points so games in hand in less important. Points on the board is important. Any team with more points than games after 23 games is highly unlikely to go down unless their form becomes terminal. Palace realistically need to win 3 games and get 3 draws from their next 15 to stay up. That allows them to lose 9 games (when they've only lost 8 all season). Palace vs Brentford on the weekend is huge. Brentford are in free fall losing 5 in a row and losing 8 of the last 10. But the other 2 are wins. Lose here and they are right in it. Norwich - don't score goals. They can nick a few wins but don't score enough goals to stay up imo. They need a lot of their goals to be decisive which won't happen. Burnley - they really need to start winning. 1 in 20 is horrendous. ARe they good enough to do that consistently? Watford - Can Roy get the attack/defence balance right? They couldn't defend for toffee under Claudio, yet to score a goal with Roy. I think it's these 3 plus us and Brentford (if they lose to Palace). Everton could still go full Kinnear era Newcastle but I don't see it. They're in the less points than games played boat as the rest of the relegation battlers tbh.

He's ropey. Not good in the air, slow, not the strongest. Gave away a foul in a bad area that to me, was avoidable.

I like him. Dynamic. Needs to keep being strong.

Electrifying tonight.

22 points from 21 games. New manager, players coming back to fitness. They’ll have to be v. bad to not get the 37 points needed to survive.

But we didn’t and we are currently in the relegation zone. lose to Everton they are practically safe and we are right in it. The margins are v. thin. We need to hit a run of good form for me to keep comfortable.

As I understand. We were £5m or so away from landing Lingard. It was never worth the risk to walk away imo. I have some blame for Howe on this. He should've pushed hard for another attacker.

Thanks - this is exactly what I mean.

I haven't said they can't. I just have no evidence that they can. So i'm not that excited. It's a different level entirely but City brought in Mancini for Hughes and you go - "ok this guy can take us to another level. We've seen it." Or when they got Txiki & co. or Mourinho to Chelsea. They've been to a level that we aspire to get too. Cooke I think, had no experience in football or at least a proven top level track record. And he did a good job for City tbf. That's the appeal of Trippier & Bruno - they've played and looked good for better teams. They can raise our level. SO i'm excited. I thought we needed an attacker of that level too.

Sidebar: The depth of this generation is far greater than that one. You had Vassell and Crouch off the bench for those lot. I also think they get a bad rap. They lost to genuinely good teams each time. An all-time great forward line Brazil and Portugal's Golden Gen. That gen was a better manager and fortuitous draws away from SF's and Finals. Thems the lines.

Not from the summer. We'll be trying to go from relegation battle level squad to midtable. Happy with Ashworth & Howe for that. Both have experience of that. But what about the following year, midtable to top 8. Neither have experience of that. Point is.. we need to get some experience of that level soon. If that's our aim.

Fair, although I think it's 4 starters (Sterling, Trippier, Rice & Mount) and 3 off the bench (Saka, Sancho, Rashford). Genuinely, what impact did Ashworth era Football Association have to do with developing that England squad? Hire Southgate?

Ashworth hasn't been a TD at a club long enough for me to know the long-term benefits of what he's doing behind the scenes. He's been there for 3 years and from what I understand, Brighton were already a well-run club. Having gained promotion and stayed up for 2 seasons. Not been there long enough to see youth players coming through. I take the England stuff with a pinch of salt. The clubs develop the players. We are a decade plus into significant investment from City and Chelsea. They've started producing a conveyer-belt of class players with the likes of Arsenal, Manchester United & Liverpool still developing talent at a great rate. That's the driving force behind England's uptick in performance. Yes and there's no evidence of him getting scouts of that level. Brighton have been signing the likes of Lamptey, Cucurella, Moder.

Yeh it’s possible. But I would like evidence to know it’s possible Something to emulate. I want Ashwoeth to do things better than they’ve he’s done before over the next 24 Month. I don’t know who signed those Leicester players or Monaco, Benfica etc. I would say yeh do what you’ve been doing just do it more. Here’s the extra funds. Leicester winning the league was an anomaly. But they have signed multiple players for cheap that have gone on to play at the highest level. Southampton back in the day too. Whoever brought in those players m, would get me excited. this isn’t to say Ashworth will flop. He’s just not done anything In his career to excite me.

Why not bring someone in with experience of challenging for Europe then? a Technical Director I want for 3-5 years. In 5 years we should be challenging for CL. Id like a TD with experience of that level.

Brighton aren’t aspirational to me. They’ve done well and are midtable. Nice team. Nice manager. Low expectations. as I said, the signings have been good not great. They invested more but it’s not like Brighton have done A1 business like signed Mahrez and Kante for 10m.

The fact Brighton are not a big club is part of the problem. If we are looking to break into the top 8 in the next couple of seasons, why are we signing a TD with zero experience of the top 8? it looks to me like we are setting up to become a solid mid table side. Which is an improvement and perhaps a necessary step. But I would like someone at the club with some experience of the level above If that’s our end goal.

Still a bit meh for me. Brighton signings and such has been good but not great. He hired Potter. He’s been good, not great. A lot of solid signings. Again, good not great.