A good percentage of our Squad are fizzy but so are Burnleys,hard work can make a difference but our bench is not good enough if we get players injured or out of form which happened before Xmas.
Now i know i bang on about rafas negative tactics
and have said many times our players are not fizzy and are a top 10-12 team
does anyone else think with a little more posativity from the start that we could be looking at a place in europe
we aint that far from it at the moment
A good percentage of our Squad are fizzy but so are Burnleys,hard work can make a difference but our bench is not good enough if we get players injured or out of form which happened before Xmas.
No they aren't mate.
Take a look at 70% of the teams in that premier league and it's clear they aren't championship. If they are then most of all those teams are as well.
That's just been excuses made for why were were struggling earlier. We aren't struggling now so there's no real need to use that card.
I honestly think that if we had pushed forward more earlier in the season we would be heading for relegation, not Europe. We would´ve been ripped a new one in some of the games, the players´confidence would´ve fallen and we´d be in trouble now.
Let´s not forget how tight the table is, never mind the position we were in 3 games a ago.
We struggle when our first 11 are not available because half the squad ARE fizzy,Kenedy plus new keeper joining and a return to form of Shelvey,Diame,and Ritchie and Lejuene and Dummets return from injury have made the difference,most of our replacements are not good enough.
Exactly (yeah, I know all clubs do to an extent but the quality of our cover-as well as some of the first team-is particularly poor)
Neither of our 'keepers-who were 1st choice before Dubravka-are up to the task.
Full backs? When Dummett is out (and boy has he upped his game because he definitely used to be in the 'Chimpo standard' category...must have been coached well, eh? ) Manquillo is just about the worst full back I can remember and who else do we have at either LB or RB. Even yedlin is shaky defensively and he's first choice.
Hayden-I'm afraid he's not up to it either. One of the big frustrations with Diame was that we knew what he could do when he put his mind to it but Hayden? What are his strengths? Has he ever dominated a Premier League midfield like Diame can?
Joselu? ffs, man.
Atsu? We look at Diame and say 'well, what can you expect for only £5 mil?'. Atsu cost one million more and whilst I know there's not a direct correlation he's not great either, is he.
The teams who thrive are those who have some genuine quality on the bench or, failing that, have players who aren't hugely below the standard of the players they're replacing. For me, the quality of a few of our first team isn't very high to start with and the players who replace them are way below even that standard.
That's why we struggled, because of who we had to bring in-not because Rafa read this forum and said 'By God, I had better start attacking'.
Well put Zip
you can take 10-12 tems in the prem an say their bench isnt good enough
im sure even manure and chelsea and arsenal would say their benches arent good enough
the truth is most team only have a strong 12-15 players
because of the wages etc you cant have quality in every department unless you can guarantee european footy
people can keep using the statement that we have fizzy players to attack ash or defend rafa
the truth is a real fan can see they arent
im all for the way rafa has played in these last few games
pople can say we would have had our arses spanked ?really
nothing has changed from a few weeks ago other than rafa has stopped picking his ****e buys
and has picked a stable side that has got games under their belts ,are playing attacking footy ,and are fighting for each other because they are getting game time as long as they perform
prior you could have a good game and get dropped\
gayle scores
he gets dropped for josewho
i said we needed players to have arun of games ,stability
that is what bournemouth and burnley do
when teams come up they need to gel they need to get used to the prem they need to learn what players at this level do
and they cant keep doing that playing different formations and with different players week in and week out
rafa seems to have got it right eventually
to late and to stubborn for what should have been a really good season