Ipswich are in second. You said, and I quote, "We're as close to the bottom 4 as we are to the top 3". Sheffield Wednesday are in 3rd on 29 points. We are 6th on 21 points, 8 points behind them. Forest Green are 4th bottom on 12 points, 9 points behind us. Maybe you shouldn't be offering to give Maths lessons when you can't even read a league table or add up. Just a thought.
I certainly expected us a team coming from the division above and having many players with championship experience to be top 6 yes. Not an unrealistic expectation really. I said way earlier in the thread, my biggest gripe is that we can't seem to get the basics right, match after match. How easy we get turned over in possession is extremely worrying, along with the quality of service to our front line. As for Duff, I want him to succeed obviously and I'll be there cheering them on in the stands at Morecambe but I just don't seen this golden boy persona that many on here view him as. Literally no experience of managing a team at this level so he has to prove he is up to the job.
I meant being in the top two, stop being pedantic. Incidentally mathematically same number of points away from the bottom of the league as we are from being top. Gonna be a very close league so we need to be far more consistent if we are to have abchance of getting out of this league. How many millions will this board keep putting in to keep us afloat at this level is my biggest worry.
I jokingly meant that you’ve took a dislike to Duff because your Mrs told you she fancies him….granted it was a crap joke
Agreed. I think as time has gone on though people seem to be forgetting that we didn't lose a match at home all season. This time we have Mads and Collins who've been in the championship 3 seasons, its not a completely inexperienced side Duff has.
And that we were level on points with Luton going into the last game which we were already on the beach for and lost whilst Luton had a derby game at home that they were honour bound to commit to. This after Luton had gone all out for a 0-0 draw at home to us on NYD despite us being without Kieffer Moore and Dani Pinillos and with a 'fragile' Kenny Dougall just returning from a major injury and a weak bench (Greatorex, Bahre, Vic etc). Our resources weren't deep that season (especially compared to others) and Stendel did a fantastic job in getting us up comfortably playing cracking stuff and getting great tunes out of a group demoralised from the previous season, and resurrecting players like Lindsay, Mowatt, Cavare etc.
The most worrying things for me at the moment are the general lack of pace (exacerbated by Thomas being out) and that in two games where we have scored zero goals we have been able to bring on zero strikers! After Norwood and Cole we have literally nothing that Duff feels he can trust (thanks Khaled) in the white heat of a L1 game. Indeed, there's nothing in the club until we get to Jalo at al who, whilst seemingly precociously talented, is probably not quite ready yet. Norwood is racking up the cards that his WUM style of play attracts and so will probably be suspended periodically and heaven help us if Devante picks up an injury. No problem for me with Duff setting up for a 0-0 and playing 5-4-1 as he did yesterday, given the wretchedly thin hand of striker options he's been dealt.
After 12 games in 2018/19 we had 25 points. This season, we're at 21 points. In 18/19 we would lose games 13 and 14. So if we get 6 points from Morecambe and Lincoln City, we'll be ahead of that season's tally. Weirdly, we also had a home game postponed mid-September for a completely unique reason. We had five clean sheets from 12, compared to six from 12 this time. We had 26 goals compared to 17 this season. It's up for debate, but I feel like the 12 teams we've faced already were a more difficult dozen than the first 12 from Stendel's first season. We had Bradford, Scunny, Rochdale, Wimbledon, Walsall and Gillingham for example. We've already - this season - faced Derby, Ipswich, Plymouth, Bolton and Sheff Wednesday away from home. I really don't think there's any value in people trying to re-write history when it comes to the 18/19 season. Daniel did a remarkable job with a relegated squad that was mainly kept together, with a further addition of Woodrow eventually. Duff has had to build a completely new squad after quite possibly the worst season we've ever experienced. He's already lost a defender to a season-ending ACL injury and has just seen a key attacking player (the area we are most thin in) ruled out until February. It's been an extraordinary start to his tenure, based on all available evidence.
I think the 2018-19 first team was far better although it wasn’t a great squad. We were down to the bare bones at times & ended up with Ben Williams in midfield & a young raw Vic coming on up top. Woodrow & Moore only had a couple of months playing together, Dougall broke his leg, Potts flogged in January & Hedges could never stay fit. I think the general consensus was that we would’ve stayed up the previous season if pretty much any half decent manager was in charge but we ended up with Jose Morais. So it was a pretty decent first 11. Matt Mills said this on under the cosh. Was 100% confident we would’ve stayed up without the manager change. Baffling that we got McBurnie & Moore & didn’t stay up considering some of the great escapes we’ve managed. Of the current crop there’s only Anderson & Collins that I think are clearly championship quality. There’s a few others that have potential but I wouldn’t class as reliable yet, Benson & Kane fit this category.
