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A slight reappraisal? Was some of the early negativity justified?


Mr Popodopolous

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After the first 2 home games vs Barnsley and Millwall there was a fair bit of negativity.

"Barnsley are the new Rotherham" or words to that effect, I remember hearing a lot on here. Millwall we should be beating at home.

It's a long season I know but Barnsley since then 7 pts 5 games, lower midtable to relegation scrappers I reckon for them. Maybe our opening day win should have been seen in a slightly better light. They are not the new Rotherham, always thought it erroneous comparison and they seem to be steadying themselves out. Maybe was more a case of us making them look very poor, especially first half.

Millwall...again I remember negativty. Still they beat Norwich 4-0 and only lost 1-0 at Wolves, a team who have started very well. Not many teams will have comfortable games vs them, so a draw at home in some ways vs a physical team, combined with some flaws in our system wasn't the worst. Still should have won would agree on this.

In short, and especially with recent games- was the early quite high negativity on here justified? Millwall will make it difficult for anyone as I say with their style of play. The League as a whole...just bloody hard isn't it.

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I remain downbeat on our prospects for the season and have told the betting guy at work not to put his money on us.

I don't think it's sewn on relegation by any means but I don't see why we can expect to finish any higher than we did last season. 

A few good (or bad results) this early on aren't going to change my view on this.

As you say the league is bloody hard and there are some very strong teams in it; of which we are not one.

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Can't see us going down personally.

Midtable to lower midtable I expect. Burton, Millwall, Bolton will really struggle. Birmingham surely won't go down but definitely could struggle. Barnsley could go down, could well struggle. Ipswich had an excellent start but with freakishly good shots/goals ratio. Can't, won't last. Sunderland and Hull hard to say.

OTOH, Norwich,  Fulham, Villa will all rise. Brentford should rise but seem stuck in a rut- put in same category as Sunderland, and maybe Hull.

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We seem more solid and hard to beat than we were so I don't think we'll be in a relegation scrap.  

I predicted 18th and would amend that to 16th after the start we've had, only one defeat is encouraging.

A lack of quality between midfield and attack is our main issue.  Hopefully Leko can aid that.  Diedhiou hasn't been what I hoped he would be.

I shall make a bold (and probably quite ridiculous) prediction in that we won't score three again in a single game all season.  Que a 3-3 draw tonight!

 

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5 minutes ago, WTFiGO!?! said:

We seem more solid and hard to beat than we were so I don't think we'll be in a relegation scrap.  

I predicted 18th and would amend that to 16th after the start we've had, only one defeat is encouraging.

A lack of quality between midfield and attack is our main issue.  Hopefully Leko can aid that.  Diedhiou hasn't been what I hoped he would be.

I shall make a bold (and probably quite ridiculous) prediction in that we won't score three again in a single game all season.  Que a 3-3 draw tonight!

 

With the way we play, I'd be very surprised if we went the rest of the season without banging in 3 goeals against someone. 

Don't we have the Championships top "chance creator" in Paterson and the divisions joint top scorer in Bobby..?

Only 6 teams have scored more league goals than us. 

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Make no mistake. The football played after the first half against Birmingham was wholly shit. Brentford was an embarrassment and Millwall was about the same level. 

Reading was fairly decent. 

My biggest qualm has always been that we turn up for a little while then go into hiding for twice as long. 

The green shoots have shown on many occasions only to be later ripped out by something twice as bad as they were good. 

Im hoping for a little consistency. Wolves away tonight will be extremely tough. But so long as we give it a decent effort, I'm sure most would forgive us coming away with no points. 

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No reference then to the second half against a poor Brum City when we should have got at least a point.

The Brentford game when we were totally outplayed for most of the game? Admittedly we got a point but that game could easily have been a repeat of PNE away last season.

Millwall at home in which we did not look like a team who had ever met before kick off. Bullied by a physical side, we lacked any creativity to keep the ball and turn the pressure on them.

So were we incorrect in raising some of the same doubts that we had last season during that awful run?

A good away win at Reading has tempered us somewhat in our reservations for this season. It's a reasonable points gathering from six games and I, along with many others, am very pleased. But don't get carried away as we are having the same start to the season as 2016-2017.

I certainly do not expect much tonight and the two following are just as tough, so we could have by next Tuesday at 10.00pm, nine points from nine games and be much nearer the bottom than the top. That is not me being negative, more realistic. I actually think we may have 13 pts from 9 games but that could be wildly optimistic.

We are still consistently inconsistent aren't we?

 

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9 minutes ago, cidered abroad said:

 

I certainly do not expect much tonight and the two following are just as tough, so we could have by next Tuesday at 10.00pm, nine points from nine games and be much nearer the bottom than the top. That is not me being negative, more realistic. I actually think we may have 13 pts from 9 games but that could be wildly optimistic.

 

I can guarantee we won't get any points next Tuesday :shifty::whistle:

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15 minutes ago, Bar BS3 said:

With the way we play, I'd be very surprised if we went the rest of the season without banging in 3 goeals against someone. 

Don't we have the Championships top "chance creator" in Paterson and the divisions joint top scorer in Bobby..?

Only 6 teams have scored more league goals than us. 

Well I stand to be corrected but we didn't create much verses Villa and Millwall at home.  I still can't quite fathom the Barnsley game, I suspect it was a cross between a very bad game for them and a very good one for us.  At Brentford we were piss poor and extremely fortunate not to take a hiding, let alone score two goals.  

Fair play, Bobby's done well but I'm not a huge fan of taking statistics in isolation and using them as evidence, as I've explained in the Q&A thread.  How good were these chances?  How have the other players measured up in terms of created chances? etc etc.

We'll see, I'm basing my assessment largely on intuition. 

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Top of the bottom 6? Thin k we can do a bit better, maybe 15th something like that.

@WTFiGO!?! Villa at home we basically played decent, got a point which was roughly what we deserved IMO. Agree on Barnsley too.

@Rossi the Robin Agreed, more 1-0s and something else that maybe important in moving up a bit turning losses into draws. The defence as a unit is best it's been for a good while IMO.

@cidered abroad Millwall yes, agreed. We were bullied in mdifield. Think tactics played a part there, we kept losing the ball and it kept coming back. Birmingham...yes but we were unlucky, thought we were worth a point there. Brentford on the flipside, very lucky- could and perhaps should have got a pasting. In Millwall and Brentford, LJ's both starting tactics and slowness to react played a part for the worse I feel.

@Fordy62 Was Millwall an embarrassment...or merely a poor game? Given sides don't exactly thrash Millwall I am leaning towards the latter a bit but time will tell.

FWIW, and it'[s only 6 games in but I think we won't trouble the top 6 but shouldn't be in too much danger. 15th something like that.

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11 minutes ago, WTFiGO!?! said:

Well I stand to be corrected but we didn't create much verses Villa and Millwall at home.  I still can't quite fathom the Barnsley game, I suspect it was a cross between a very bad game for them and a very good one for us.  At Brentford we were piss poor and extremely fortunate not to take a hiding, let alone score two goals.  

Fair play, Bobby's done well but I'm not a huge fan of taking statistics in isolation and using them as evidence, as I've explained in the Q&A thread.  How good were these chances?  How have the other players measured up in terms of created chances? etc etc.

We'll see, I'm basing my assessment largely on intuition. 

They dont do it for every game, particularly not at the start of the season, but Experimental 361 does a graph of the quality of chances.

IIRC our chances against Reading over the whole match would have given an expected 0.8 goals.

Reading (again IIRC) should have expected 2+ goals.

 

However last season there were numerous games where we would have been expected to score more than the opponent based on the quality of chances in the game, but lost.

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1 hour ago, Mr Popodopolous said:

After the first 2 home games vs Barnsley and Millwall there was a fair bit of negativity.

"Barnsley are the new Rotherham" or words to that effect, I remember hearing a lot on here. Millwall we should be beating at home.

It's a long season I know but Barnsley since then 7 pts 5 games, lower midtable to relegation scrappers I reckon for them. Maybe our opening day win should have been seen in a slightly better light. They are not the new Rotherham, always thought it erroneous comparison and they seem to be steadying themselves out. Maybe was more a case of us making them look very poor, especially first half.

Millwall...again I remember negativty. Still they beat Norwich 4-0 and only lost 1-0 at Wolves, a team who have started very well. Not many teams will have comfortable games vs them, so a draw at home in some ways vs a physical team, combined with some flaws in our system wasn't the worst. Still should have won would agree on this.

In short, and especially with recent games- was the early quite high negativity on here justified? Millwall will make it difficult for anyone as I say with their style of play. The League as a whole...just bloody hard isn't it.

Was there bollocks!

As I said at the time. And got shot down then. And some referred to me as another "poster's mate".

Still ages to go but having been diagnosed in the recent past as dwelling on the past and a glass half empty chap I'm looking forward ;)

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53 minutes ago, Fordy62 said:

Make no mistake. The football played after the first half against Birmingham was wholly shit. Brentford was an embarrassment and Millwall was about the same level. 

Reading was fairly decent. 

My biggest qualm has always been that we turn up for a little while then go into hiding for twice as long. 

The green shoots have shown on many occasions only to be later ripped out by something twice as bad as they were good. 

Im hoping for a little consistency. Wolves away tonight will be extremely tough. But so long as we give it a decent effort, I'm sure most would forgive us coming away with no points. 

Shut up Fordy. I told you if you didn't back Little Lee and stop this nonsense you can forget they shirts ;)

I've not forgotten by the way. Just need to get my kids' birth certificates off my ex-wife to prove their age.....

Be in touch!

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6 minutes ago, EnderMB said:

We're still only six games into the season.

Wait for the tenth, and we'll see where we are at that point.

Exactly - next 4 are pretty tough (including Stoke) let's see where we are after Bolton and then we'll have a real feel for where we might stand this season. 

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2 hours ago, shelts said:

Ronan said "life is a rollercoaster just got to ride it "

I think he was City fan 

Forrest Gump said "life is like a box of chocolates - you don't know what you're goin' to get".

Think he was a City fans as well.

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Think we will be tougher to beat this season, with a defence that seems much more secure.

Think one of the key factors key is going to be taking our chances when our pressing game gets us on top and  the opposition on the back foot. We got the early goal against both Birmingham and Brentford and against Brum in particular, could have strengthened our lead before they got back in the game. Probably not so much so against Brentford, as they battered us .

Last season not being clinical enough in front of goal cost us dearly - almost as much as our porous defence.

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8 hours ago, WTFiGO!?! said:

We seem more solid and hard to beat than we were so I don't think we'll be in a relegation scrap.  

I predicted 18th and would amend that to 16th after the start we've had, only one defeat is encouraging.

A lack of quality between midfield and attack is our main issue.  Hopefully Leko can aid that.  Diedhiou hasn't been what I hoped he would be.

I shall make a bold (and probably quite ridiculous) prediction in that we won't score three again in a single game all season.  Que a 3-3 draw tonight!

 

Hahaha.

Wow...3-3 you called it- possibly in jest at least partly??

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By the sounds of it we're starting to see the benefit of a team used to playing with each other in a formation that suits us. The majority of this side have now played together for a year and we've then just added quality where required (albeit losing Tammy). Definitely feel we won't have to worry about relegation this season (despite starting well last season) think 10th-16th is where we should be finishing. 

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1 hour ago, Mr Popodopolous said:

Hahaha.

Wow...3-3 you called it- possibly in jest at least partly??

I was actually expecting a little bit of stick for getting it so wrong!!

Sometimes, all there is left to do is laugh :D

But well done LJ, the lads and the travelling support.  This pre-season sceptic is slowly turning.

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