Indy

Top man! I’m not into current form guides, all teams go through poor patches and good it’s the best teams who are the most consistent over the 46 games. I just enjoy a good game of football, my best memories are the games v Southampton in the late 80’s with Le Tiss and his 4-3 win!

There’s going to be ups and downs, we’ll no doubt win more than we lose and finish 8th! There how’s that? For every position we finish above 8th at 46 game in May I’ll donate £5.

Isn’t a true reflection the current table? Not some random ten games four months back or most recent 18 games! Surely the current table is the only way to really judge our true form!

Good luck PUPS…. This week I’m sticking with Sparta Prague… Slovacko v Sparta Prague - Away Win. For City, a rare McLean goal. OTBC

I can guarantee had the form from the last games been swapped around with the bad run those currently pointing to form would be pointing back! It’s just how people perceive the club, for me it’s about 46 games from start to finish of the season! We will probably finish top 10 might make top 6 but I doubt it, but who knows! Wagner is here till the end of the season and we could well carry on gaining enough points.

Isn’t the important form over 46 games in a season? The rest is just stats to argue about? What is success this season? Top ten? Where do we go from there? Keep Wagner? Sell our most valuable players and build again? Is success the amount of season tickets sold? Profit made or loss made having a go! Argh football who really needs it? 😉

Let’s be honest, we are where we are because this squad isn’t great, the old pros are coming to the end of their days, the best playing days way behind them! We’re reliant on the prospects coming through and they have Sargent, Sainz, Sara, Numez, Rowe all excellent this season. McLean exceptional this year and coming from me one of his biggest critics (his consistency has always been questionable, not this season). The problems start again end of this season! Are we likely to go up? No not really Leeds or Southampton are very much my two alongside Leicester, but nothings certain in this world bar Death! So come May Sara, Sargent, Rowe all will want to play top flight and no doubt push for a move, the club will need to recoup some coffers and will happily move these players on at profit! So we go again, who’s next up? Fisher, Warner, Thompkinson, Kamara, Sprigette or someone else? Lots of prospects. Is that the best we can hope for, can we actually build on our better players and keep them? We shall see! But the circle keeps going round, we just need the right coach and owner to break it!

Indeed.

It might be that we have a core of good players and the rest are not that good! So injury to key players highlights it more…so again is it that he’s actually getting more out of the squad than the quality it really has, take away Sargent, Sara & Rowe we wouldn’t be anywhere near the top 6!

will we miss Rowe, Sargent & Sara after next summer? Who will replace them?

I don’t think he has! He’s the Pink Un influencer! I think there’s 20 odd threads started by Cambo! In a week!

Sorry but that entire back line would need replacing! We would need depth of squad for injuries too! You need a lot of luck on the injury front too, consistency in the team and I agree we have the same chance as we had when we went up under Lambert. The reality is I would hope we make a better fist of it, but like Sheffield have sold their best player, when we went up last time we sold our gem! Buendia and paid for it. I hope that we make a good go of the championship this season, but I’m not overly bothered of getting up this year! I’d much rather focus on building without selling the best players! And there is the big conundrum, our better players want to be playing top flight football! So we need promotion to keep them!

Sad isn’t it! Tow the party line or else you’re a Binner by some!

He’s certainly not alone in making those daft mistakes! But even I would start him in the CB position ahead of all four we have! Not that I’m having a go at them but they’re all devoid of being able to play forwards and it’s noticeable we all say how slow we play out the back! This changes with McLean at the back, he’s a decent defender too! For me at his age and ability now his best position in this starting 11 with Numez & Sara in midfield. If we want to shore up midfield during a game we have Sorensen or Gibbs.

We play our best football when McLean is in the back four and Nunez & Sara are in midfield, the reason is that McLean moves the ball forwards quicker and we have the players on the pitch to benefit from this. Watching the highlights from yesterday McCallum has to stay and start, he’s crossing and attacking ability is far better than Giannoulis. We look a genuine threat and push the opposition back from attacking! Yes we do concede from having McCallum up the pitch occasionally but him in the team limits the attack in our end.

So can we answer the question! Is it that Wagner is actually a good coach, him & his team have got the most out of Sarah, Sargent, Rowe, and the rest of a very ordinary squad? Or is it that Those old aging signings made by Webber are better than we thought? I’ve been saying for months I like Wagner and he’s getting the best out of a poor set of signings and development of some quality younger players! It’s now showing that he’s a decent coach punching above the position he should be with this squad IMO

Irony!

Nice report as always Ricardo…enjoyable read as always very honest.

Kingo your OP is bang on and this for the time being is true to, but the reality, we shouldn’t need McLean as a CB! Sad that we’re in tgat position. I’ve been very vocal of Numez & Sarah to start, McLean has been very consistent and solid this season so dropping him in the starting line up would mean Nunez or Barnes! For me a no brainier and Numez. But by dropping McLean to CB we can accommodate all the options! Today it worked really well!

FTW my point from the end of the summer transfer window, I’ve been saying that all season! It’s a part of what was required to add some experience and battle, but what we ended up with was over the top knee jerk signings in Hwang, Foreshaw & Batth. I’m happy to see Sorensen given the nod ahead of Batth, as I think he’ll be gone this summer, Sorensen will probably be given another year. As for your comment about Barnes, yes he did score but even that was a poor header from two yards out nearly saved and that assist was from the first pass mi**** deflected back to him! He did OK but let’s not get carried away, he passed a five yard pass straight to the Watford player in our own box just after it went to 2-1! It might sound like I have a chip on my shoulder I don’t, I just see Barnes as a player who’s carried during a game. For me if you do a straight swap Sargent for VH and start Barnes as normal then great, you push Barnes forwards and start Nunez then it’s going to be a struggle to score goals in my opinion.

I hope we rest Sargent, why risk him with such an important end of season coming up, better to sit this one out and get fit. For me we must play VH as a direct replacement, Barnes on his own doesn’t work, I’d still consider dropping Barnes for Nunez with VH up too. Keeping him in the bench to come on later in the game. But I’m not the manager with the pressure on his shoulders, as I’ve been saying Wagners being doing a decent job given this squad!

E recent Desert Island Disk interview Delia was hinting to this, not wanting to give up what she loves, you can’t blame her, after all this time. No one knows why there’s a three year transition but as LYB said the complexity of change as we appear to be doing probably needs a lot of questions answering to meet the FFP & EFL regulations. It is a messy way of doing things but if it benefits the club long term than great, but I still maintain we need a leader at the top to drive us forwards.

Good luck to all PUPS….. Sparta Prague v Liberec - Home Win please. For City, Sainz to score. OTBC.

Jan Moleby

Big Dave Strihavka.