Tomaszk Posted February 1 Share Posted February 1 4 hours ago, Vive_La_Villa said: 5th has to be the aim. Anything better than that will be amazing, Anything less will be very disappointing. That's quite strict. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GlobalVillan Posted February 1 Share Posted February 1 10 minutes ago, DJBOB said: Should rename the thread, “The race to said I told you so!” Oh here we go... When people take the piss out of others for being realistic and then it turns out they were right to be, it's going to get mentioned. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tomaszk Posted February 1 Share Posted February 1 It's not over. Spurs have got very lucky in some recent games. Beaten sides that should have scored 4 against them. It is over if we don't start playing well. It's been really shit for 6 weeks or so. I didn't see us falling off to this extent, we will drop like a stone if this form doesn't change. No chance of top 8. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DJBOB Posted February 1 Share Posted February 1 19 minutes ago, GlobalVillan said: Oh here we go... When people take the piss out of others for being realistic and then it turns out they were right to be, it's going to get mentioned. Theres being realistic and there’s standing on a soapbox saying, “I told you so! Look at me!” Plenty of us are realistic. Few of us are begging to be recognized for our prophetic placement predictions. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tomaszk Posted February 1 Share Posted February 1 1 minute ago, DJBOB said: Theres being realistic and there’s standing on a soapbox saying, “I told you so! Look at me!” Plenty of us are realistic. Few of us are begging to be recognized for our prophetic placement predictions. It did get a bit tiring seeing the constant "this is the best season ever, calm down" when we'd played total shit again, and it was being pointed out. Reminded me of wallies defending Gerrard because he was 7th on the 38 game table when we'd been trash for 4 months. We need to sort performances out or we're in trouble. 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GlobalVillan Posted February 1 Share Posted February 1 (edited) 19 minutes ago, DJBOB said: Theres being realistic and there’s standing on a soapbox saying, “I told you so! Look at me!” Plenty of us are realistic. Few of us are begging to be recognized for our prophetic placement predictions. And yet there you are having a go at me. Seemingly just trying to get attention. Basically you are saying, "look at me, I'll tell him he has no right to point out he was right." All I said, all along is that I thought we would finish 5th. I got all sorts of shit for that and so pointed it out. That's it. Edited February 1 by GlobalVillan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DJBOB Posted February 1 Share Posted February 1 18 minutes ago, Tomaszk said: It did get a bit tiring seeing the constant "this is the best season ever, calm down" when we'd played total shit again, and it was being pointed out. Reminded me of wallies defending Gerrard because he was 7th on the 38 game table when we'd been trash for 4 months. We need to sort performances out or we're in trouble. Unai has a history of sorting it out so I think it will be alright. The pendulum has swung the other way now, with the naysayers braying to the rooftops. Wouldn’t surprise me to see the boo boys at VP puff out with their chests too. The team is missing pieces. No Pau, no JJ with full fitness, Bailey can’t be fit for more than 30 minutes, Moreno being forced into form. Whether we can turn it around is based on any sort of fitness returning to us. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GlobalVillan Posted February 1 Share Posted February 1 8 minutes ago, DJBOB said: Unai has a history of sorting it out so I think it will be alright. The pendulum has swung the other way now, with the naysayers braying to the rooftops. Wouldn’t surprise me to see the boo boys at VP puff out with their chests too. The team is missing pieces. No Pau, no JJ with full fitness, Bailey can’t be fit for more than 30 minutes, Moreno being forced into form. Whether we can turn it around is based on any sort of fitness returning to us. The only people booing will be those with unrealistic expectations. That is exactly why it is important to keep a sense of perspective and reality. That for some, is never gonna happen. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tomaszk Posted February 1 Share Posted February 1 (edited) 2 hours ago, DJBOB said: Unai has a history of sorting it out so I think it will be alright. The pendulum has swung the other way now, with the naysayers braying to the rooftops. Wouldn’t surprise me to see the boo boys at VP puff out with their chests too. The team is missing pieces. No Pau, no JJ with full fitness, Bailey can’t be fit for more than 30 minutes, Moreno being forced into form. I think I would be surprised. And obviously distraught. Small caveat: IMO HT boos at a bad score are different to general boos at player/manager/incident whatever. Unai could very well bear the brunt of the off-field BS that he's shielded Heck from. Edited February 1 by Tomaszk Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tomaszk Posted February 1 Share Posted February 1 2 hours ago, DJBOB said: Whether we can turn it around is based on any sort of fitness returning to us. Not for me. We just need to improve with or without Torres, JJ, Mings etc. If they appear and we play in this lackluster way, we still won't be winning many games. We're playing sooo slowly. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leeroy Posted February 1 Share Posted February 1 8 hours ago, jackbauer24 said: Man City, Liverpool, Arsenal and Spurs will be the top 4 this season. We made hay while the sun was shining and made the most of our home form but issues with injuries, squad depth and, frankly, quality have caught up with us. We were never really going to challenge those teams. We've had far more good results than we've had good performances. The real challenge is to make the most of our great start, and Utd and Chelsea stumbling, to see if we can hold on to 5th or 6th. My gut says both West Ham and Newcastle will leapfrog us over the remainder of the season and Man Utd could too. It's disappointing, but the party line will be that we use it for experience and improve further next year... It just goes to show how hard it is to break that ceiling. We'll likely lose some big names/wages due to FFP and no Champions League, but that's why teams like West Ham (Rice) and Brighton (loads!) have been knocking at that door for a few seasons but unable to break it down. But, ultimately, this is why as a fan I am far more interested in a Cup win than scraping fifth and a potential CL place due to coefficients or whatever it is. I'll remember lifting the trophy far more than sporadic forays in to the CL before top players move on. I'd take an FA Cup win and ending 9th over CL qualification. Unfortunately, based on recent form, that dream will be over by this time next week too! If we went from joint 2nd at Christmas and 1 point off top to finishing 8th and lower than last season when we had Slippy for a third of the season that would be an almighty collapse and capitulation even worse than the ones under Gregory ad O'Neill and totally unacceptable for a manager of Emery's experience and success to allow that to happen. Really, none of the teams below us should be leapfrogging us. Even if West Ham win today we should not be allowing a team effectively 6 points behind us if you include GD to overtake us. They have Man Utd away and Arsenal home next two games, so we can open up a gap once more if we actually learn how to play effective football again. Man Utd are away at Wolves, I really don't think they are guaranteed to win that. Newcastle have some decent fixtures coming up but we should not be allowing a team 11 points behind us to overtake us. It's over to Unai now. He has at least a 50% win rate at all the clubs he's managed over the years. We have a 20% win rate in the last 5 league games, so he has to get back to the norm. Sheffield United is a must win and there'll be no excuses if we f*ck up again. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tomaszk Posted February 1 Share Posted February 1 4 minutes ago, Leeroy said: Sheffield United is a must win and there'll be no excuses if we f*ck up again. You'll be able to tell by the 10th minute if anything has changed and we're up for it. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CVByrne Posted February 1 Share Posted February 1 DDWDDDLL - That was Newcastles form from 31st Dec to 4th March in the PL last season. 1 win in 8 games. 1ppg run Do people need to check where Newcastle finished last season? DLWDL we are 1 win from 5 games and 1ppg run. 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leeroy Posted February 1 Share Posted February 1 2 hours ago, DJBOB said: Unai has a history of sorting it out so I think it will be alright. The pendulum has swung the other way now, with the naysayers braying to the rooftops. Wouldn’t surprise me to see the boo boys at VP puff out with their chests too. The team is missing pieces. No Pau, no JJ with full fitness, Bailey can’t be fit for more than 30 minutes, Moreno being forced into form. Whether we can turn it around is based on any sort of fitness returning to us. The only one from those players that is a loss is Pau. We haven't had Ramsey all season and were in the top 2 anyway. Anyway he was in the squad this week and came on, he is jus playing really pants, whether that's injury related who knows but it was the same last season anyway. Bailey's fitness, he hasn't really been injured, he's made all the matchday squads recently even if Unai chose not to start him. Moreno has had plenty of time now to get up to speed, he was back over a month ago, and Digne will be back soon anyway (maybe this weekend). Other teams have still got injuries or players out, Spurs have Son, Sarr and Bissouma still away, we're missing a few players but everyone making out like it's some huge injury crisis really lack self awareness of the injuries at other clubs. We could really do with Pau Torres back though, and maybe Digne, our defence hasn't been the same with them missing, although we need to rediscover our goalscoring form too but I think that's more on team selection by Emery. He probably needs to be more attacking and find a way to play both Diaby and Bailey. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
calcifer Posted February 1 Share Posted February 1 Well the winners here are the media, they can now spank themselves off as the top 4 is full of their teams. They just hope we drop down to 7th so they can show the top 6 without Villa in it.... Waiting for the jizz filled special over Spurz and their brave high line, how they do it correct etc... Unai went on that winless streak with Arsenal and they pulled the trigger (Special bunch of fans and sadly some of our fanbase is starting to act that way!) We are going through a slump - but come on hand on heart at the start of the season was you really thinking we would be challenging for the champions league? i wasn't, we are at least a couple of years away with squad quality/depth! Our slump is a combination of teams now combatting our style of play and the lack of quality. Manager needs to earn his corn and find a way, but the signings point to the future not this season, so maybe champions League is out of our grasp. This is what will happen this season - we finish 5th. Then watch someone like West Ham win the Europa 5th wont get Champions league then - winners of the Europa will get that. Far fetched i know but that's our luck! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tomaszk Posted February 1 Share Posted February 1 Very feasible scenario Spurs lose at Everton and we win in Sheffield. Back three points ahead. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Leeroy Posted February 1 Share Posted February 1 (edited) 5 hours ago, GlobalVillan said: I pointed this out a while ago and got told I was wrong because of Spurs XG or some bollocks. Spurs are a better side with a better squad and will finish above us. We scraped past them when they had 7 players out and that took was met with hostility when I mentioned it. The only question is, will we get 5th, which I've been aiming for all season. If Torres is back before March then I believe we will. Any longer than that and I doubt it. We are bloody awful without him and even 6th may be a stretch on current form. I think the first 11 of both teams when everyone is fit is actually similar, they have better full backs, I think we have a better goalkeeper, centre backs are even, I think our central midfield is better but they have slightly better attacking options. Maybe I'm biased but I think we do have a quality team when we are playing well, it's just at this moment in time pretty much every player is off it (including the usually reliable Dougie and Kamara and our expensive summer signing Diaby). Agree they have more strength in depth. We finished above them last season and they had Harry Kane. They've since lost Kane, added Maddison who has been brilliant, Johnson who hasn't been brilliant, and Werner where jury is still out, and they spent some money on their defence but still concede loads of goals, more than us. Ange has done well there as I thought after losing Kane it would be another up and down season for them. Edited February 1 by Leeroy Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GlobalVillan Posted February 1 Share Posted February 1 34 minutes ago, Tomaszk said: Very feasible scenario Spurs lose at Everton and we win in Sheffield. Back three points ahead. I'm looking at where we will be after game 38 and the current trajectories of the respective clubs point to them making top 4. They were always going to miss Maddison and they had several others out too yet we still only ever got 3 points in front of them.. Now we have Torres out who is so vital to us, I think they will finish at least 6 points ahead of us. But even they will be a good 10 points behind the eventual winners. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sulberto21 Posted February 1 Share Posted February 1 I’d say Spurs have more pace than us from back to front save one or two positions. That causes more problems for other teams. They also play quicker. We’ve slowed down the press beating pass and changed it to a gerrard esque lump forward for Ollie to compete for. If Pau isn’t available then someone has to recreate his press breaking pass types or we find a different way to get around it. Our current style of play is going to have us drop down the league. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
S-Platt Posted February 1 VT Supporter Share Posted February 1 Or we are just playing within ourselves it's a marathon not a sprint and we will start to pick up again soon!? I trust The Don knows what he is doing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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