ExiledAjax

If we win tomorrow then in my opinion it will eclipse the Man Utd win in 2017. As a team Man City are better, Pep is better, their players are better individually. They are much better than that 2017 Man Utd team. Equally, I think we're comparatively a little less dynamic, a little less dangerous, our squad is a little shallower. We're not quite the final team that we can be. In 2017/18 we were just about at the peak of our powers with that squad. We were flying then whereas right now we're climbing. So we're a little weaker and they're a little stronger. I think if we win it's huge, the best result in years.

Play our best game - something like we did against Norwich - and who knows. Maybe we get to 70 mins and it's 0-0 and we can do something. But realistically it's going to be bloody hard. Bloody, bloody hard. Viva City.

Very good news. Home grown academy product. Key position in the spine of the team. Locked down until he turns 28 - getting his early prime years. Still improving, and still able to improve. Nice guy. Presumably quite reasonable wages that fit our structure.

I'm colourblind and every time I see these masks I think "why is this guy constantly dressing up as a canary?"

After 33 games they were already top with 23 wins, 5 draws and 5 losses. They're squad was excellent as well. Totally different situation. Not doable.

Shot numbers and xG have largely held up to our season averages over the last ten games. Shots and shots on target are a little down but not worryingly so. The last 2 games have been poor from that perspective but 2 games is a very small sample size from which conclusions shouldn't really be drawn. We'll get it going again and should get back to scoring 1-2 goals per game.

57 is getting you 15th or 16th in the vast majority of seasons. It's way more than you 'need' for safety.

Agreed, agreed. I just think it's so unlikely as to be beyond optimistic to even consider it. Fivethirtyeight are predicting 6th place will be Norwich with 71 points and +14 GD. If that comes true (and they're pretty good at this stuff) then we need another 27 points and improve our GD by +13 in 13 games, 5 of which are games against a current top 6 side. Even carrying on at 1.88 PPG over 13 games is only 24 points - not enough. Then on the goal difference, well over these last ten league games we've improved our GD by +3, over the last 9 it's +5. So generously taking the better of those two sets of games it's an improvement of +0.55 per game. Suggests we might, if we can continue in great form, we might improve it by +7. Given we've been scoring 1 goal a game, including 2 penalties in the last 4 matches I don't see us doing the above. So, if we continue on our current exceptional 9 game form (1.88 PPG and +0.55 GD per game) then we project us to finish on 68 points with +9 GD. That won't be enough. Also, all of the above assumes that none of the teams above us goes on a good run of form. At least one of them probably will, and that will make out job even harder.

Even after winning the next 3 games we'd still need 17 points from 10 games just to get to 70 and have a slim chance of 6th spot. It's just so unlikely. We basically can't afford to lose or even draw more than 4 games in our last 13 league matches. Take a look at our last 6 games and tell me how you think this is going to go. Because it turns out that the top 6 are quite good at picking up points!

True. Still a big ask/assumption/hope that anyone can replace the spine of a team in a single transfer window. If we assume the LB is Currie and the CB is O'Brien then you can see we're not buying Championship ready players. We're still shopping in lower leagues and buying players to develop. I don't see us transferring in a ready made top 6 set of players. Obviously I'll be delighted to be proven wrong, but I'm not expecting a promotion push next season. 24/25 is my target year.

I think Cardiff are still right to be a little nervous. It's unlikely they go down, but it's possible if they get a run of bad luck. Generally I don't see a lot of movement in the division between now and the end. The top 2 are done. Play off teams will be Boro, Millwall, Luton plus one other - probably one of Norwich or West Brom. Blackburn and Watford have a chance though. 6th place is the most contested of the meaningful positions. Relegated will be Blackpool, Huddersfield and then one other, most likely Wigan but maybe Rotherham or Cardiff.

But performances in the autumn were better than they were when Pearson took over. Likewise performances now are better than they were in the autumn. That is almost a definition of continuous improvement. That's all I am "arguing" - that we have improved through Pearson's tenure, and that such improvement was evident before we went on a 12 match unbeaten run. By the way I share your apprehension regarding next season. We will lose Scott, we will likely lose Kalas, Wells and James will be older, O'Leary is out of contract as well. That's the spine of the team either gone or under question. I personally doubt we will finish top 6 next season. I don't think Pearson will get us promoted. Right now if I had to predict next season then I think we'll be in that pack between 7th and 12th. Pearson won't renew his contract and we will go into 24/25 under new management. But there will always be a bit of "what if" won't there? Even if we finish 5th...what if we'd done better maybe we'd be 2nd. If we finish 2nd...what if we'd finished 1st. There's always an opportunity to say "we could have done a little better". The important thing is that over the past two years we have constantly done a little better.

Exactly. People have 50 points in their heads, but normally 45 is plenty.

I don't think we're arguing about everything. Yes our fortunes (assume you mean results) could have improved earlier - because the signs and numbers were there to show that we had improved performances. We just needed the last bit of fine tuning, a bit of fortune, a good wind. We've had those things in 2023, and results have followed this time. I don't think it's fair to compare the starting XI now to two years ago. Two years ago Vyner, O'Leary and Pring were 23, raw, error-prone, far less experienced. Two years ago Scott was 17. That's 4 of the starting XI who were nowhere near their current level. As they have improved, so has our team, and so have performances. The healthier organisation you talk of - that's another one of the signs I refer to as showing that improvement was happening and was coming. I just don't think it should take a run of 12 unbeaten games to convince people of improvement. It was there long before the run of results.

It should do. The team in 22nd are currently going at less than 1 point per game. If they continue at that rate then 22nd will finish on fewer than 46 points, and so 47 would mathematically see us safe. Realistically we've been safe for months, but 3 more points should shut everyone up.

But the signs of improvement were there long before this run in 2023. Results were coming, improvements were measurable and clearly happening. We just needed a few fine tweaks, a couple of personnel changes, some patience, and as we've seen in these last two games, our luck regarding penalties to turn.

Yep. Said similar after the last game. He's exciting, he draws defenders towards him, he makes positive runs. All good, all things that are rare in players. But he needs to learn to use his teammates. I'm sure he will do that, but it will take a little time.

Tuesday. The league's done - we'll finish mid table and above Cardiff whatever the result next weekend. If we want any excitement this spring then it's all about the Cup now.

It's a good idea, and I agree it would likely help to prevent the issue of more money simply strengthening the negative feedback loop of inflating wages and fees, and so more money is needed. However, my preferred solution is to change how clubs earn their money rather than how they spend it. I believe that incentivising positive management will work better than dictating how these businesses spend their money. If we can link league handouts to desirable things then that will yield better results than forcing directors to spend in a certain way. Invest in your disability team - get a payment. Increase fan engagement - get a payment. Improve your governance and transparency - get a payment. If we diversify the metrics by which clubs are measured and financially rewarded then we incentivise broader investment. It no longer becomes all about league position, and so no longer becomes all about paying the higher wages in order to secure the best players. In doing this we link rather than separate competition and sustainable business practice. This is the philosophy behind Fair Game's Sustainability Index. https://www.fairgameuk.org/sustainability-index And @chinapig is correct - change is coming and hopefully it will have an impact.

From the perspective of a colourblind fan a yellow/bright green away kit would be excellent. Block red home, fluoro yellow/green away, and then do whatever you want with the 3rd kit. Should mean we can have a good kit clash with almost anyone else.

It is written.

Quite like the keeper kits. Home is really nice and even the pink away one's alright.

Cheers. I'd wondered what other Hummel customers were doing. Interesting what Coventry are doing as well. Jon Lansdown's interview suggests to me that these are brand new designs done very quickly with O'Neill's. That removes any issue with Hummel, it's what I hoped to hear. As to the EFL. I guess it's pretty clear that we've sorted whatever we needed to sort with them and they've been reasonable given the situation we, Hummel, and Elite are in.

Appears to be a delivery of Chinese made Alpine back packs.