We're on a 4 game unbeaten run

We've only lost one match since September and that was away to 3rd in the table QPR. And yet all the talk on here is of sacking the manager. I genuinely don't get it.

At the end of September many people were saying that if Flicker couldn't turn it around then he'd have to go. Fair enough, we couldn't go on getting hammered every weekend like we were doing. Well we're not. Not only are we not getting hammered, we're not getting beaten. We don't even look like we're going to lose, being much the better side in every game since then (QPR away apart). After shipping goals for fun, we've concede just 2 goals in the last 3 games. And let's be reight, Butland has probably only made 2 saves in those 3 games. If you can't see a massive improvement in our defensive unit then you must be blind. I don't mean to be abusive, but it's so obvious I don't know how else to express it. M'Voto has come on in leaps and bounds and together with Cranie they're forming a proper Championship standard centre half pairing.

Is there enough quality in central midfield? No. But we're still creating more than enough chances to win these games comfortably, even when we're not at the top of our game, like against Donny on Saturday. Are we scoring enough goals? No. So are we now saying that O'Grady isn't good enough? He's the best centre forward we've had since Shipperley, lauded by every man jack of us on here, he's scored 13 goals in his 28 starts, but he has a couple of quiet games and suddenly he's crap. It's bizarre. He'll get back on it, he'll start putting the chances away again and these games we're drawing we'll turn in to victories. As for those threads on Pedersen, they're just bonkers and not worthy of a response.

Flitcroft hasn't changed. He talked just as much ballacks last season, when he was the messiah, as he is doing this. He's a complex character is Flicker, he speaks in a unique way, he's definitely an individual, I would imagine it's a piece of piss to get on the wrong side of him, but he was exactly the same last season when he could do no wrong. Some people, like Madmark for instance, didn't like him from the start and I can understand that even if I don't agree with it, he's not to everyone's taste, but what I can't understand is those who use aspects of his personality to beat him this season when they were highlighting exactly the same character traits last season to say what a breath of fresh air he was.

The Reading home game and the second half performance against Ipswich were as good as I've seen a Barnsley team play in years. The two recent home derbies weren't that great (are they ever?), but we should have won and unlike many previous season that have followed a similar pattern, we didn't lose. I'm genuinely interested in how you expected a turnaround to present itself. Did you think we'd go from being hammered every week to stuffing teams 4 and 5 nil over night? When has that ever happened?

We're not the best team in the league, far from it, but we're making steady progress. To me that's obvious. It's obvious in the performances, it's obvious by the way we've become hard to beat, it's obvious by the fact we've stopped conceding goals and stopped the opposition creating many chances and it's obvious by the results.

If you want to see us blowing the opposition away every week then you're following the wrong club. It might happen for us in the future, but it'll happen by sticking with a manager and allowing him to gradually evolve the playing squad, just like it did with Danny Wilson. Danny had a great first season in management, an average second one, and by the third we were destroying all before us. I'd love our club to give a manager time to repeat that. Flicker may or may not be the one to do it, but I know one thing for certain, it's miles too early to judge either way.

 

If you are tacticaly inept you will always struggle

 

Get in there

If only I had a 'like' button.

 

Utter, utter...

...sense.

If I could be arsed to spend as much time as you thinking about it and writing, that's probably what I would put. Spot on in my opinion.

 

Re: Utter, utter...

did you read my post????

 

If Flicker was tactically inept we would have gone down last season.

There's a chasm wider than the grand canyon between a manager not doing what you'd like to see him do and being tactically inept.

 

Agree entirely.

 

"They want it all, they want it NOW."

Like here too.

 

Kick it to Chris's head, or pass it to Paddy.

Them's yer apples.

 

We are in the bottom three where we have been all season. We have the worst defence in the football league. We have failed to beat two of the worst teams I've seen since we returned to the Championship at home. We feel the need to select two defensive midfielders at home to Donny. Tactics are one dimensional and naive. Football is poor to watch. We play without tempo. There is little evidence of the manager furthering the development of our younger players. In fact he seems to have handled them badly destroying confidence and form. I have seen little evidence of any improvement. We have just been through a period of playing less adept teams and only managed to best one of them.

I'm not reallly for sacking the manager. I think however a sideways step for Flitcroft with an older experienced head coming into oversee would be a decent mover as we are sleepwalking towards relegation.

To be fair I think the goodwill that Flitcroft has protected him. 6 wins in 30 games isn't. Good enough or is it?

 

Sorry but the current evidence is there for all to see
Impetus got us through last season
We have none this season and tacticaly we are dire
Free kicks corners
do we ever look like scoring ? Nope
Subs changed a game ? Nope
Innovation
Young players coming through ? Nope

 

Re: Utter, utter...

Jay, I am in agreement with your post. Absolute agreement.

The problem you get, is that there will always be some fan(s) who will throw the points tally at you......and at the moment, it ain't good enough.

I always try to look at BFC in a wider context and not react to a short-term set-back (which Doncaster was, to be fair, as we expected to win and should have) and I think we are improving on and off the field.

 

I agree. Poor win record, not bringing through academy players, heavily reliant on loans, too negative at home and 2 wins in 15.

 

mrx, you are inaccurate with at least two of your statements:-

Subs changed a game - Jim O'Brien last week versus Ipswich?

Do we ever look like scoring - yes, on Saturday versus Doncaster we looked like scoring quite a few, but didn't convert. Another day we could have had 3 goals, and it would have been a stroll in the park.

 

They were definitely the two options on Saturday. However, I've seen us go through entire seasons with no options! And to be honest, if giving the ball to Paddy was our only option I could live with that. But the Donny match was just one game. They certainly weren't our only options in the second half at Ipswich, away from home at a ground where we often struggle, and we were destroying them from every area of the pitch.

 

One defeat since September. One win since August.

 

Jim O'Brien completely changed the game when coming on as sub last week at Ipswich while on Saturday against Donny M'Voto, who had an excellent game, really should have scored from one of the corners.

It's there, you're just not seeing it.

 

Did jim obrien come on for an injured player ?
Not a tactical decision
Inaccurate ? 0-0 v donny
If that is what we get when it all goes right god help us
Or was it just 'one of them days' again

I hope he does a good job and flourishes at the club but I have major doubts now

 

This thread

And John Peachy's, show the BBS at it's best. A variety of opinions, some polar opposite, eloquently argued from all sides without the need for sneering condescension or name calling.

 

**** off big nose , tha knows nowt

hello matey hows things