J7

It’s going on for far too long with little sign of anything to suggest it’s going to get better. I love the guy, but it feels end of days stuff. Absolutely huge second half for him.

Very good goal.

The lack of DoF was huge, but surely it wasn’t a complete blank piece of paper they had to work from. It’s rehashing the debates of the summer, but we concentrated on long shot targets we’d lose out on if any of the ‘big 6’ went after them, and over priced players with PL experience. Other PL clubs did well shopping abroad, one not very far away. I don’t think the manager gets a free pass given he wanted more control, regardless of the mess upstairs.

There’s seems to be little consideration to the qualities of the players available. It’s like he decided he wants us to play a certain way, and it doesn’t matter if the defenders are carthorses or that Tripper is a slow 35 year old at wing back. It’s similar to persisting with Woltemade at 9 for long periods of the season. Stubborn.

Utterly baffling bringing Barnes on if Gordon is actually injured. Neave could have had a run out in a nothing atmosphere with no pressure after about 40 appearances on the bench.

I’m not comparing us to City tbf. More at the moans we didn’t spend on cover in January.

They maybe could have got a loan in, but I wouldn’t be wasting much money on ‘cover’. We need quality after a summer of buying cover.

We’ve spent half a billion.

How much energy do you want them to expend ahead of an important PL game on Saturday to keep it at 1 instead of 4?

We hadn’t been playing twice a week for three months and we weren’t blowing out our arse after 35 minutes like we were on Saturday though. We also didn’t have the injuries we have now.

I’d rather be fresh for Brentford tbh. The chances of getting through City from 2-0 then Arsenal are almost zero. Might as well give up on the league this season if we don’t beat Brentford looking at the table.

Given the amount of teams likely to be looking for managers at the end of the season, it probably wouldn’t be the best of times to be replacing the manager. Probably end up like last summers search for a number 9.

We drew there in covid and should have won. Yesterday was a mess. Penning them in for 25-30 minutes then collapsing isn’t a good performance. A game lasts 90 minutes. We were blowing out our arse after the initial phase.

Sunderland and Leeds drew there with a low block off the ball and hitting in the counter attack. Something we nearly beat PSG with on Wednesday and had the players to do yesterday. I’d have given it a fairly decent chance tbh. Certainly not a capitulation and the shagging we got.

It’s not a near on miracle atall. Villa are just about to do CL 2 seasons out of the 3 and had Europe then other two of the last 4. Forest weren’t that far away. Don’t get me wrong, it’s been a good achievement, but we’re the biggest spenders after the ‘big 6’, with 2 or 3 of them collapsing in recent times. It’s not a miracle.

Have to disagree. There were many occasions they were just lining up on the edge of the box outnumbering us. It’s not just the goals, it was like a basketball match in parts. It gave Liverpool confidence and the crowd were hyped up.

Our system. 😂 How about we look at what players we have and pick the best ‘system’ for those players? Pinning it on the scouts is pretty poor too. It’s fairly obvious Eddie wanted Elanga, Wissa and Thiaw seeing as we were after them for so long. Doubt Ramsey took much scouting.

A total mess. They’re struggled against teams sitting in and hitting them on the counter all season at home. I’m not usually one for sitting back after going ahead, especially against poorer teams, but it was embarrassing how open we were. They were flooding forward and our midfield was nowhere to be seen just leaving the defence exposed. After such an impressive showing in Paris, that really was awful to watch.

I don’t doubt it’s a period that has been disrupted by the Isak sale, however he was always going, last summer or this. Transitional to me means we’re trying to transition into something different. I barely see any evidence of that and teams who want to go more possession bases don’t buy Elanga. ‘Transitional mode’ because we’re not playing well is just nonsense. We can spend all season transitioning, then if we don’t qualify for Europe we’ll be losing other good player/s in the summer that we’ll need to ‘transition’ from next season. To be fair, it all just shows how important the lack of a DoF was. I’ve no idea what we’re trying to be beyond ploughing on trying nothing new.

I’m struggling to see what transition we’re trying to make. We just plough on with the same shit every game. It’s almost like pretending we still have Isak when we don’t. The subs are like for like and the only time they work is when giving us more energy, not because we’ve changed the way we’re playing. We have more quality that most teams, especially on the bench, which is why we can still win games. I see no sign of any transitioning period.

What do you want people to say on this thread after a run of the mill home win against Palace, for example? “Well done Eddie, the 433 (really 451) slow build up play worked this week against a team with lesser resources than us” People are always going to have more to say when it’s bad, or exceptionally good.

He wanted Wissa early on and loads of clubs would have been happy with Woltemade. He’s far from shit and has been out of position in nearly every game he’s played. We just plough on with the system that suited Isak, a totally different player.

We got Germanys starting ‘striker’, Italys best player, two Brazilian internationals (one who starts), Englands starting left winger and two of the countries brightest young full backs. We’ve spent half a billion in the past few years and sit 7th in it. We’ve got a better squad than both those teams. Don’t talk nonsense. I find it hard to blame the players at the moment tbh. They’re being hung out to dry in that system. I love Eddie, but he will have to go if he continues with this ‘system’. Not even changing things from the bench is almost unforgivable. I’m baffled as to how he can’t see what everyone else seems to see.

Suited to us? What’s ‘us’? And who is? An isolated striker (out of position if it’s Woltemade), deep and wide wingers, no creativity in midfield and allow any team that would like to attack in between the lines.

It’s gonna take Bruno hauling us through another game if we’re to win this. Best part of £200m and we still need a RW and striker.