Dean Smith

[MaVilla]

24 minutes ago, useless said:

People are talking as if we've been rubbish all season, if that was the case we'd be well adrift of safety by now. I've just gone through the last twelve years of the premier league and on only two occasions in that time has twenty-five points not been enough to keep a team out of the bottom three after twenty-eight games, in other words most seasons we wouldn't even be in the bottom three at the moment, and we haven't even played twenty-eight games ourselves yet.

this is the thing, we havent been terrible all season, we have been hit and miss, but unfortunately more miss than hit.

At PL level it is fine margins, i think we are just sub par by say.....5%?, but that 5% is the difference between staying up and relegation probably.

i think 1-2 really good players would have been the difference between staying up and relegation, its fine margins, it doesnt feel like the previous relegation season where were were constantly woeful, we are just missing out 5% in the critical areas. (1 excellent DM & 1 excellent forward from day 1 would possibly have been the difference - (and i dont mean Wesley necessarily, i mean a player either in the center OR a player on the right who was closer to Jacks level, rather than Ghazi/trez who overall, have been poor)

I suppose the major issue though, is who would leave in the summer if we did get relegated, could NSWE actually persuade or tell most of the team they are staying for one season to get us back up?, if so i think we would be much stronger when we did come back up as we could build again, the real risk is if we lost Mings, Grealish, McGinn et al, whether that money would be re-invested wisely enough to guarantee an instant return.

Going to be interesting.

[Adam2003]

2 hours ago, Eastie said:

let’s enjoy Wembley as it could be a long time before we get another visit there . 

...said plenty of people each time we have been there four times in the last few years...

[JAMAICAN-VILLAN]

The most frustrating thing is that was it not for some farcical individual error, in reality we should probably be at least 10 points better off than we actually are.

[Tomaszk]

19 minutes ago, JAMAICAN-VILLAN said:

The most frustrating thing is that was it not for some farcical individual error, in reality we should probably be at least 10 points better off than we actually are.

And 20 if we'd had a striker 

[PussEKatt]

@Jamaican Villan and Tomaszk....Look at my post a couple of pages back

[PussEKatt]

On 29/02/2020 at 04:35, TRO said:

or if we had of conceded 1 goal less a situation where we would have accumulated more points, would have existed.

The spectacle is important....but Its easier to stop a goal than score one, for survival.

No,you are wrong there.If we had conceeded 1 goal less instead of scoring 1 goal more we would have lost Vs Burnley and drawn Vs Manure.There is 4 points right there.

So you think that playing Wesley as our ONLY striker for over 20 games was the right thing to do.You dont think that Wesley and Kodja or Kodja on his owne would have made any difference to our results.FFS, name me one other manager in any division that would start a striker in every game when he has a scoring record of 1 goal every month.

[Stevo985]

3 hours ago, PussEKatt said:

No,you are wrong there.If we had conceeded 1 goal less instead of scoring 1 goal more we would have lost Vs Burnley and drawn Vs Manure.There is 4 points right there.

So you think that playing Wesley as our ONLY striker for over 20 games was the right thing to do.You dont think that Wesley and Kodja or Kodja on his owne would have made any difference to our results.FFS, name me one other manager in any division that would start a striker in every game when he has a scoring record of 1 goal every month.

Steve Bruce

[JAMAICAN-VILLAN]

21 hours ago, Villarocker said:

I think the "surprise", if any, will be to play Keinan Davis up front with Ally Samatta. Then, have a central midfield three of Grealish, Luiz and Nakamba. A proper 5-3-2 formation. 

Wouldn't be a bad shout IMO.

[TRO]

6 hours ago, PussEKatt said:

No,you are wrong there.If we had conceeded 1 goal less instead of scoring 1 goal more we would have lost Vs Burnley and drawn Vs Manure.There is 4 points right there.

So you think that playing Wesley as our ONLY striker for over 20 games was the right thing to do.You dont think that Wesley and Kodja or Kodja on his owne would have made any difference to our results.FFS, name me one other manager in any division that would start a striker in every game when he has a scoring record of 1 goal every month.

6 hours ago, PussEKatt said:

No,you are wrong there.If we had conceeded 1 goal less instead of scoring 1 goal more we would have lost Vs Burnley and drawn Vs Manure.There is 4 points right there.

So you think that playing Wesley as our ONLY striker for over 20 games was the right thing to do.You dont think that Wesley and Kodja or Kodja on his owne would have made any difference to our results.FFS, name me one other manager in any division that would start a striker in every game when he has a scoring record of 1 goal every month.

My point is , you can't keep expecting to score your way out......containment and the odd goal is sometimes important too.....as Crystal Palace showed over Brighton yesterday.

 

[TRO]

11 hours ago, JAMAICAN-VILLAN said:

The most frustrating thing is that was it not for some farcical individual error, in reality we should probably be at least 10 points better off than we actually are.

but those same errors are sometimes borne out of the way we play, when we are so open, pressure is applied and that's when errors occur.

[JAMAICAN-VILLAN]

7 hours ago, PussEKatt said:

No,you are wrong there.If we had conceeded 1 goal less instead of scoring 1 goal more we would have lost Vs Burnley and drawn Vs Manure.There is 4 points right there.

So you think that playing Wesley as our ONLY striker for over 20 games was the right thing to do.You dont think that Wesley and Kodja or Kodja on his owne would have made any difference to our results.FFS, name me one other manager in any division that would start a striker in every game when he has a scoring record of 1 goal every month.

You see the Midfield and Defense leaking goals, allowing people to carve through us and score? Guess what, it was the same ones playing when Wesley was.... You think they might have anything to do with our results or?

Again, I've seen many a time that literally any player who could control the ball, pass, and shoot would have been better so why are we doing worse?

Samatta is pretty good.

[villalad21]

1 minute ago, JAMAICAN-VILLAN said:

You see the Midfield and Defense leaking goals, allowing people to carve through us and score? Guess what, it was the same ones playing when Wesley was.... You think they might have anything to do with our results or?

Again, I've seen many a time that literally any player who could control the ball, pass, and shoot would have been better so why are we doing worse?

Samatta is pretty good.

But removing a midfielder for a defender surely didn't help us getting overrun in midfield?

[foreveryoung]

This game is gonna show what Smith has achieved all season, an prove all you doubters yet again he was just not ready.

Prove me wrong please!

[briny_ear]

57 minutes ago, TRO said:

but those same errors are sometimes borne out of the way we play, when we are so open, pressure is applied and that's when errors occur.

I would say pretty much always. We allow opposing teams to come at us so much and have so many shots. It’s inevitable that errors occur.

[DCJonah]

Dean has been given a squad physically weak in midfield, little pace and skill out wide, toothless upfront and error prone at the back. 

I find it hard to really get on him too much. The squad is a disgrace really.

[villalad21]

12 minutes ago, DCJonah said:

Dean has been given a squad physically weak in midfield, little pace and skill out wide, toothless upfront and error prone at the back. 

I find it hard to really get on him too much. The squad is a disgrace really.

So he has no say in transfers?

Konsa and Hause are a disaster class. That was not his signings?

[Graham t]

16 hours ago, Zatman said:

Eh you said last time

No I didn't. Do not mis-quote please....

VLD.

[Zatman]

On 29/02/2020 at 11:17, Graham t said:

Let's be honest, when was the last time Dean surprised the fans with some tactical brilliance ? Where he surprises me is his faith in certain players who are obviously not Premiership standard. Still, as ever, I hope he can inspire the lads on Sunday and I will be delighted if he proves me wrong and gets everything right on the day.

ATB

VLD.

You did say last time. Dont misquote yourself 

Regards 

[DCJonah]

25 minutes ago, villalad21 said:

So he has no say in transfers?

Konsa and Hause are a disaster class. That was not his signings?

I think he is part of the panel that signs them. I don't think he plays the main part. 

The summer business was disastrous and it what will ultimately cost us. 

We had our chance and we blew it.

[Lerner's Driver]

19 minutes ago, DCJonah said:

I think he is part of the panel that signs them. I don't think he plays the main part. 

The summer business was disastrous and it what will ultimately cost us. 

We had our chance and we blew it.

I mean, if we do go down, a lot of 'why' will be down to the players we bought, but when making as many signings as we did, the chances of that working were always going to be against us. Not only did those players need to find form individually, most of them needed to do it for the first time in the Premier League and some in a new country. And even if they had been able to maintain decent personal form, there was always going to be the issue of how they all gelled together. With one or two exceptions, It hasn't really happened consistently on either front. This season is basically a punt that has never looked like coming off. But then you think, what other option was there? You don't buy a quality new team for £140m or whatever it was.