samo II

Birmingham have woken up a bit now.

Martin is just cooked - the guy literally just ran round him and took the ball away. He needs pulling; it’s embarrassing.

Totally true, but makes it almost worst tbh.

We look so pedestrian. Birmingham are no great shakes and we’re not being massively out played, but we just look… meh.

We are pretty bad.

Several of our senior pros have shown themselves to be chancers stealing a wage for many games this year so I’m not going to give a lad on his debut too hard a time tbh. I’m 100% for giving kids a chance just now as I simply don’t want to see plenty of the well paid professionals who are performing like donkeys anywhere near the pitch.

Nice to break the streak but long way to go for this team.

For me, he’s trying to get fired. Saying weird stuff is part of it; get himself slung in way that means he gets paid off before he maybe gets the boot for a conviction, that might save the club from having to folk out. Either way; no chance he’s there till the end of the season, more’s the pity.

I don’t disagree we should be, I just don’t expect us to be. And that’s really been one of the problems; were we seeing an overmatched squad going for it but coming up short, that would show the bones of future better results. But we aren’t seeing that often just now, and that’s probably my biggest concern.

We’re a bad football team. Not a bad club, but currently; our squad is not playing good football. I’ll admit to disappointment in how I don’t feel the performances are showing what is being done to progress, and that is harder than bad results, but we absolutely shouldn’t be expecting rapid improvement or any kind of explosion of points soon. Because we are a bad football team, at the moment at least. NP needs to have time and resources, and we’ll see ups and downs, but we’re not in a position to expect to be even competitive in many games this year. My concern is how extensive the repairs required are, and where we might end up before we see a sustained upswing - had last season gone on much longer, we’d be in league one just now, so seeing such a sharp downturn in performance since the international break (and NP’s second bout of covid, let’s not forget) is concerning because I don’t want us to get into a prolonged tail spin which may be too hard to get out of.

Unbelievable. Tanner will rightly be fuming in the stands.

This is something worrying me. Tuesday was gutting, but expected them to show up and fight today, even if we got outgunned. Instead the team seem rudderless. No expectations on results this year, but did at least expect something resembling performances, but so far we seem somewhat directionless.

I don’t disagree. As I say; weren’t players I’d have brought on, mainly as I’d not have subbed them at all. Might be they were knackered, but one thing I would say is; a lot harder playing out of possession than with it, and when we sit back like we do, it certainly doesn’t help us keep the best players in the game.

Looking at the subs made and subs available, it is pretty clear the pickings were slim; Simpson and Bakinson haven’t ‘shone’ their last few appearances, and Pring is still very raw. While the subs made are not choices I like, I do think it’s a bit of a barrel scraping exercise just now: we don’t have many outside the starters who offer quality or experience.

I’ve not lost faith (speaking about NP here) and I know we play away games. But the fact we have a tendency to try and sit on leads (however slim) at home, and have repeatedly capitulated in those games isn’t a great sign of improvement. Make that mistake once; I’ll accept it is nerves/unfortunate. Twice; it is something to work and focus on in training. Three times; it’s a trend and it’s concerning we’ve not resolved it. I’m not panicking; I never expected this season to be painless/easy. But I did hope we’d at least be learning and progressive in our performances; very little evidence of that last night.

How that isn’t a handball is between god and that lineman because it clearly is a handball. As you say; doesn’t matter now, but that’s as bad a decision as we’ll see all season at a terrible time.

We’ve conceded in the final minutes of three from seven home games (Blackpool, Luton and tonight) so basically ever second home game. Might not be Groundhog Day but feels pretty close. Admittedly our away from is much better and is keeping us competitive, but we also don’t sit back half as much, even on leads or when drawing there. As I mentioned; I’d prefer we try and play more expansive at home, even if we end up losing by more, as at this point ‘holding on’ isn’t working.

It’s sad but it’s true. We clearly have some good young players, but we also have some absolutely average-to-bad senior pros stinking up the place; need shot of the dead wood asap to be able to get a real sense of things. But honestly; it’s ******* Groundhog Day with these last min goals - and that isn’t just individual mistakes, it’s the coaching; we defend too deep and for too long. I’d rather lose 3-1 trying to go for the jugular than 2-1 to these shitty last minute shockers.

Ludicrous. Literally no words.

Losing 6-0 away to Ipswich in the playoff season. I was attending with a friend who is an Ipswich fan; I was in the away end, he was in the home end with his pals and family. We were absolutely destroyed and 90% of the away end had left well before the end; I didn’t have that option as was staying with him, so was pretty much the last one out, and had to take dog’s abuse the rest of the weekend. Ended up in the playoff final that season so wasn’t too bad in hindsight, but a miserable trip otherwise.

“Everybody wants to play for us” ”they look at our pitch and look at our fans” ”we get the best version of everyone” He’s 100% trying to curry favour with the fan base/get copy out there shifting the blame so that when inevitably given the boot, he can claim to future employers it wasn’t his fault and he was in an impossible situation. His ‘blame everyone but himself’ style is gross; whether it was at the sags or anywhere else, I’d say the same. Possibly for the first time, I pity their fans; lunatic in charge of the asylum.

I’m sure he did. Man is clearly a fantasist.

Great reaction after midweek. Like I said then; we’ll have ups and downs, which Fulham>Millwall>today is pretty much how I imagined it. Nice to be top half while we still have a lot to figure out and room for improvement. Now; if only we could get next week’s game against Bournemouth moved to their ground, we might stand a chance… COYR

Unless there is either huge changes in ownership/financial circumstances (something SL seems keen to plan to avoid, while the blue few’s change of fortunes ended up a false dawn) for either or both clubs or football in general (like a collapse in the TV money), or we break some rules so badly we get fired down the leagues, I’m not convinced we will. That said; while it is only a league difference, the ‘stars’ could always align one year - I had a suspicion that might have been this year… only for us to scrape by, and them to step through the trapdoor. Again. Felt it might happen under the dog botherer as he seemed to make them much better than the sum of their parts, but where they are and what they have right now, I think they’ll need something big to change to make them look like a promotion side in their league, and even a completely apocalyptic relegation season from us I don’t think would make us a bottom half league one side. If we ever get promoted; they can forget about it - the money and exposure from that; would hurt them almost more than it would help us, I think.

Bakinson was very poor tonight, unfortunately. And agree with the upsides; also thought Pring was at least solid. Still a lot of padding in this squad; need a few decent additions and a thinning out of the unnecessary depth.