10 games in

[Jeez]

Much more competitive this season & enjoying watching us develop, so much so I’d forgotten how we almost always play badly against Millwall.

Last night felt like 2 steps backwards toward the dark days of last season.

We really missed HNM energy & disruption in the centre and Wells pace at the front. We played some good through balls that another finisher will have met.

[RedRock]

To avoid being in the relegation mix, a team need 8-9 ‘dependable’ players. Those who’ll consistently achieve 7/10 performances.

For a large chunk of last season we had only 2-3 who could be placed in that category. This season an improvement, I’d say we’ve 5-6 ‘dependables’. 
 

The bad news is that ain’t enough.

Unless Big Nige can develop some of our youngsters, as he has with Pring, or motivate/ up-skill some of the dross - who have been given chance after chance to prove themselves - we are in for a long old season. 

 

[Negan]

Much better than I expected. I'll be honest, I thought we'd be in a dog fight all season. At the beginning after 10 id of probably said we'd be in the bottom 5 so being 10th is great. So long as we don't drop like a stone like at the end of last season we should be alright. It's clear we need some quality up front though, the defence has been pretty sound and had we had someone more clinical up front we'd probably be in the play offs now. 

[Red-Robbo]

It became clear in the last third of 20/21 season that something radical had to be done. 

Nige carried out that root-and-branch surgery - a quite astounding number of releases - and it's clear that this leaner, fitter squad is better than the bloated Mark Ashton selection that we had back then.

Pearson did talk about wanting a new striker, but because of money and availability,  one did not manifest. That has prevented us being the team he really wants. Just that one player. 

At City, we've had some really good strikers in the past in what have been mediocre teams. Now it is a case of a decent team missing a quality, in-form striker. 

Pearson will know this. He's talked of it being a three- year project here.

I have faith that watching the teams he selects will only improve as time goes by. 

[Lanterne Rouge]

1.3 points per game gives us a shade under 60 come May. About what most of us expected?

[Northern Red]

1 hour ago, Lanterne Rouge said:

1.3 points per game gives us a shade under 60 come May. About what most of us expected?

Probably a bit better than expected for a lot of people.

[mozo]

13 hours ago, Red-Robbo said:

It became clear in the last third of 20/21 season that something radical had to be done. 

Nige carried out that root-and-branch surgery - a quite astounding number of releases - and it's clear that this leaner, fitter squad is better than the bloated Mark Ashton selection that we had back then.

Pearson did talk about wanting a new striker, but because of money and availability,  one did not manifest. That has prevented us being the team he really wants. Just that one player. 

At City, we've had some really good strikers in the past in what have been mediocre teams. Now it is a case of a decent team missing a quality, in-form striker. 

Pearson will know this. He's talked of it being a three- year project here.

I have faith that watching the teams he selects will only improve as time goes by. 

Totes agree and I would add to that, we have a fair few players that need a season under their belt, such as Pring, Atkinson and Tanner to acclimatise and Willliams, Weimann  O'Dowda and DaSilva to come back from injury layoffs. Massengo has developed now, but Scott still has a lot to learn still.

Beyond that, we have a succession issue up front and I worry about whether we'll either develop the young uns or have the budget for a quality recruit.

[GBF]

Glad to say like most people that both the performances and results have been better than expected   Unfortunately I still think we struggle this season because unless we catch teams on the break we don’t have any threat going forward and will struggle to score against most teams.

In terms of us using this year as a year for building a team for the future I am struggling to see the plan. Jury out on a lot of the players at present.  Most have showed potential in short bursts but not been able to put in consistently high performances over a sustained period.  We still have too many players in our squad who are either not good enough eg Kasey Palmer or have seen better years and are declining in effectiveness. Eg Chris Martin. On the positive side HNM has the potential to play at the highest level.  If NP can turn this squad into a premiership team within 3 years he will have done a remarkable job. I think of our current squad of around 25 that you would say 4 or 5 are good enough, at least 5 shouldn’t be in the squad and the rest are unproven but with potential to get better with a couple of years experience.