The best thing about the last 2 games

[Bluefloyd 58]

We finally have other players contributing a threat. No longer do we have to rely on Teemu for every goal. 

Idah was OK last night, but that was fine as Sarge was great. Our over reliance on Teemu has been a massive concern. If those three can keep in some semblance of form we don't need to panic if any one of them has a slightly 'off' game. 

We had no chance if we couldn't score. Now we look like there are goals in the team, what a turnaround. 

[Yellow Wal 314]

The best thing about the last two games? 

We won!

[Worthy Nigelton 1,062]

6 minutes ago, Bluefloyd said:

We finally have other players contributing a threat. No longer do we have to rely on Teemu for every goal. 

Idah was OK last night, but that was fine as Sarge was great. Our over reliance on Teemu has been a massive concern. If those three can keep in some semblance of form we don't need to panic if any one of them has a slightly 'off' game. 

We had no chance if we couldn't score. Now we look like there are goals in the team, what a turnaround. 

Very good point although two of the five goals were o.g's! 

[LaUnionCanary 86]

Yes, because we pressed and delivered balls into the danger zone. And on both occasions we had a player directly behind the og scored ready to score for us.

Edited January 22, 2022 by LaUnionCanary

[cambridgeshire canary 6,781]

To be fair Pukki has got two asissts in the last two.

 

Just because he hasn't scored doesn't mean he's been working hard and helping.

[Beetley Yellow 57]

For me, it’s a more generic thing- that some fight and spirit is being shown compared to some of the abject performances earlier in the season. I could live with being relegated as long as we did so having been seen to give it a real go. Hopefully there’s a bit of confidence returning in some of the players, and with others returning / getting up to speed (especially Normann, hopefully) we can at last see some of the potential in the squad.

[percy varco 200]

We did not build a formation based around Gilmour. 

[TheGunnShow 5,987]

It's beginning to vindicate Webber now, isn't it?

[Wacky Waving Inflatable Arm Flailing Tube Man 3,849]

Let's not forget Rashica. He may not have scored in these two games, but he offers a completely different skill set to Idah and Sargent which gives the opposition more to think about, as well as being dangerous in his own right.

[cornish sam 960]

2 hours ago, Worthy Nigelton said:

Very good point although two of the five goals were o.g's! 

That it they hadn't been ogd would have gone to a Norwich player to bury into a gaping goal...

[damn that Ralph Coates! 47]

.....is that fans are even more behind the team

[TheGunnShow 5,987]

5 minutes ago, Wacky Waving Inflatable Arm Flailing Tube Man said:

Let's not forget Rashica. He may not have scored in these two games, but he offers a completely different skill set to Idah and Sargent which gives the opposition more to think about, as well as being dangerous in his own right.

Not to mention that cross he sent over was just absolutely begging for someone to climb over. Enter his former Bremen teammate. Who incidentally completely overpowered one of their new signings in the air to bury the header. And when Pukki set up Sargent for the first goal, he outmuscled another of their new signings.

[Robert N. LiM 4,466]

1 hour ago, Beetley Yellow said:

For me, it’s a more generic thing- that some fight and spirit is being shown compared to some of the abject performances earlier in the season. I could live with being relegated as long as we did so having been seen to give it a real go. Hopefully there’s a bit of confidence returning in some of the players, and with others returning / getting up to speed (especially Normann, hopefully) we can at last see some of the potential in the squad.

This. We just look more difficult to play against. I didn't mind losing under Farke, but I did mind what a soft touch we often looked. We seem a lot nastier and more streetwise now. Obviously Watford and Everton are both basket cases at the moment, but promising signs nonetheless.

[Nuff Said 5,166]

46 minutes ago, TheGunnShow said:

It's beginning to vindicate Webber now, isn't it?

There’s a simple formula TGS.

We win=Webber is good

We lose=Webber is bad

We win + one or more of the new signings scores=Webber is a genius

[Monty13 2,246]

53 minutes ago, TheGunnShow said:

It's beginning to vindicate Webber now, isn't it?

I was thinking this earlier as I’ve been relatively critical of our summer business.

I’d say it’s not that simple and it is just two games, but:

Lees-Melou has looked like the player we expected the last two games.

Sargents overcome his hoodoo and added goals to his efforts.

Rashica has come back and continued the run of form before his injury and looks every bit a PL player.

Normann had looked good just shame about the injury.

Williams in my opinion has been excellent on balance and a good addition.

Gunn, too early to tell. He’s not first choice and clearly needs to rebuild confidence and he’s more of a future investment, but he’s been called upon this season and not shined so far IMO.

Gilmour and Kabak…jury very much still out for me, both talented players, both blow hot and cold and maybe not great fits for us.

I still think we brought too many new faces in the summer. I think he left Farke in charge too long and the new contract for him looks bizarre in hindsight.

But the signings that have had 6 months to bed in look a bit better in context of the last few games. Maybe we do have a competitive team for a relegation battle in these last half of games, time will tell, but I bet Webber feels a whole bunch more comfortable than two weeks ago.

[TheGunnShow 5,987]

28 minutes ago, Nuff Said said:

There’s a simple formula TGS.

We win=Webber is good

We lose=Webber is bad

We win + one or more of the new signings scores=Webber is a genius

Usually the case, as people will inevitably get very tied up in individual results and a bit less in prevailing trends. As much as I was one of the "Farke remain" crowd, primarily for his ability to keep developing youngsters as part of the model, gritty wins in close battles at Premier League level weren't his forte. Smith has come up with something that's done a bit better when he's not had most of a team missing. There is a point that Farke didn't have too many "winnable" games with most of the squad around, probably Leeds or Brighton at home would be the main ones off the top of my head.
 

2 minutes ago, Monty13 said:

I was thinking this earlier as I’ve been relatively critical of our summer business.

I’d say it’s not that simple and it is just two games, but:

Lees-Melou has looked like the player we expected the last two games.

Sargents overcome his hoodoo and added goals to his efforts.

Rashica has come back and continued the run of form before his injury and looks every bit a PL player.

Normann had looked good just shame about the injury.

Williams in my opinion has been excellent on balance and a good addition.

Gunn, too early to tell. He’s not first choice and clearly needs to rebuild confidence and he’s more of a future investment, but he’s been called upon this season and not shined so far IMO.

Gilmour and Kabak…jury very much still out for me, both talented players, both blow hot and cold and maybe not great fits for us.

I still think we brought too many new faces in the summer. I think he left Farke in charge too long and the new contract for him looks bizarre in hindsight.

But the signings that have had 6 months to bed in look a bit better in context of the last few games. Maybe we do have a competitive team for a relegation battle in these last half of games, time will tell, but I bet Webber feels a whole bunch more comfortable than two weeks ago.

Totally agree that it's only two games, and also against teams in some degree of disarray themselves at the time. But you could argue when we faced Leeds at home they were in similar trouble with a lack of form and a lack of fit players, and we didn't take advantage.

I don't think the new contract for Farke was all that bizarre though. The whole idea was giving him the weapons with the new signings, and he'd done splendid work in getting a bedraggled side from Project Restart back up as champions of the Championship in a season, which not many have done.

Arguably, the key aspect for me is that the number of new signings (and I can agree that there probably were too many) are beginning to bed in.

[Ulfotto 641]

The best thing has been the team spirit and togetherness within the squad. Everyone was chuffed for Josh when he got his goals. Watford we’re all over us for the last 30 minutes of the first half but everyone stood strong and got to half time 0-0.

This was a total contrast to Watford who were arguing with each other, niggling with the ref and the minute we went 1-0 up there reaction was really poor, Dennis got sent off. 
 

Yes this team may lack quality but they will fight and run all day.

[Monty13 2,246]

46 minutes ago, TheGunnShow said:

Usually the case, as people will inevitably get very tied up in individual results and a bit less in prevailing trends. As much as I was one of the "Farke remain" crowd, primarily for his ability to keep developing youngsters as part of the model, gritty wins in close battles at Premier League level weren't his forte. Smith has come up with something that's done a bit better when he's not had most of a team missing. There is a point that Farke didn't have too many "winnable" games with most of the squad around, probably Leeds or Brighton at home would be the main ones off the top of my head.
 

Totally agree that it's only two games, and also against teams in some degree of disarray themselves at the time. But you could argue when we faced Leeds at home they were in similar trouble with a lack of form and a lack of fit players, and we didn't take advantage.

I don't think the new contract for Farke was all that bizarre though. The whole idea was giving him the weapons with the new signings, and he'd done splendid work in getting a bedraggled side from Project Restart back up as champions of the Championship in a season, which not many have done.

Arguably, the key aspect for me is that the number of new signings (and I can agree that there probably were too many) are beginning to bed in.

No sorry I disagree on the contract. Yes Farke had got two promotions but he’d utterly failed in the PL.

Giving him a 4 year contract and then having to sack him 11 games later (an entirely predictable possibility) was a failure IMO. 

Would he have walked without a 4 year contract? Increase his wage by all means but you don’t commit to that length until he’d shown he could do the job at the level you want the club to be at, which he hadn’t.

[Jim Smith 2,339]

2 hours ago, TheGunnShow said:

It's beginning to vindicate Webber now, isn't it?

We are still a midfielder short as last night showed. We got away with it 

[Wacky Waving Inflatable Arm Flailing Tube Man 3,849]

7 minutes ago, Jim Smith said:

We are still a midfielder short as last night showed. We got away with it 

In terms of numbers, I'd disagree completely. We have six of them, and it's just unlucky that four are now injured at the same time. 

If you're speaking about quality, I'd be tempted to agree.

[shefcanary 2,444]

If all fit, think we will be okay.  My big concern is apparent lack of Academy defensive midfielders.  Our strategy seems to be to produce a lot of lightweight but highly skilful players.  We really need to have a deep lying central midfielder coming through, that is where the real value is at the moment.

[Nuff Said 5,166]

48 minutes ago, Jim Smith said:

We are still a midfielder short as last night showed. We got away with it 

Presumably that midfielder was meant to be Norman and/or Cantwell

[TheGunnShow 5,987]

1 hour ago, Monty13 said:

No sorry I disagree on the contract. Yes Farke had got two promotions but he’d utterly failed in the PL.

Giving him a 4 year contract and then having to sack him 11 games later (an entirely predictable possibility) was a failure IMO. 

Would he have walked without a 4 year contract? Increase his wage by all means but you don’t commit to that length until he’d shown he could do the job at the level you want the club to be at, which he hadn’t.

Can't agree here, I'm afraid. The first relegation will always have the spectres of Project Restart and the fact we always had three unfit centre-halves so whilst some of the performances were dross there were some heavy-duty mitigating factors. I do think people aren't quite seeing how rare it is for a team to go down as abjectly as we did to come back up the season after in such a manner - IIRC only a third of teams who get relegated from the Premier get back up the season after in any shape or form, we did it as champions and were pretty dominant, really.

So I'm afraid this idea that his being sacked (after that second promotion) after 11 games is predictable doesn't sit too well in this case, for me at least. I see that a poor run of eleven games is often enough for managers who haven't got much to start with, but Farke would surely have earned some credit, particularly for that second title.

[Essjayess 307]

5 hours ago, Beetley Yellow said:

For me, it’s a more generic thing- that some fight and spirit is being shown compared to some of the abject performances earlier in the season. I could live with being relegated as long as we did so having been seen to give it a real go. Hopefully there’s a bit of confidence returning in some of the players, and with others returning / getting up to speed (especially Normann, hopefully) we can at last see some of the potential in the squad.

This for me to. In reality our chance of staying up before last weekend was all but gone, now after two wins our chance is at most slight, but that is a little straw to clutch on to, But i to can live with relegation...you have to anyway being a City fan...as long as we tried our best and more importantly, see some signs that our new guys will have the ability to do good things in next season's Champs.

I think the difference from the last two games has been our forward line not giving up...giving it a go..putting balls into the danger zone where anything might happen. All played their part last night. Kenny's slightly over strong pass that a shattered Teemu ran down, overpowering a defender kept in play and just teed it up for that instinctive and improvised action from Josh where the ball could have gone anywhere but deserved  the goal it ended up as, Rashica's  delicious cross that just seemed to just float across the area like a magnet for Josh to jump onto and bullet into the net and Adam putting a ball into a danger area that created an own goal, just as Josh had done the previous game.

Before last weekend we were down with the prospect of a long end to the campaign  breaking unwanted records and as fans just even questioning our chances in the Champs next season. Likelihood is still relegation but heck..now we have at least a couple of weeks with us outside the relegation zone...who would'ave thunk that before last weekend.

[canarydan23 4,060]

The prospect of relegation has never really bothered me, so long as I enjoy the ride. I've not really enjoyed any of this season until the last two. As long as we make a fist of it and compete in games, I can take losing and going down. Hopefully from here on in we'll show fight in every game, win, lose or draw.

[Monty13 2,246]

3 hours ago, TheGunnShow said:

Can't agree here, I'm afraid. The first relegation will always have the spectres of Project Restart and the fact we always had three unfit centre-halves so whilst some of the performances were dross there were some heavy-duty mitigating factors. I do think people aren't quite seeing how rare it is for a team to go down as abjectly as we did to come back up the season after in such a manner - IIRC only a third of teams who get relegated from the Premier get back up the season after in any shape or form, we did it as champions and were pretty dominant, really.

So I'm afraid this idea that his being sacked (after that second promotion) after 11 games is predictable doesn't sit too well in this case, for me at least. I see that a poor run of eleven games is often enough for managers who haven't got much to start with, but Farke would surely have earned some credit, particularly for that second title.

I’m not saying there wasn’t mitigation for our utterly abject display during project restart (although I’d argue Farke should have done much better still) my point is there was zero to justify giving him a four year contract, something virtually unheard of in football management.

As impressive as Farkes second promotion was our stated aim was to be a PL club so it makes no sense to me to sign a long term deal with a manager who’d shown little sign he could achieve that aim. If he’d kept us up this season then I’d understand, but it seemed like a gamble on him doing that that massively back fired. 

As a supporter I was as hopeful as anyone else in the summer and pleased to see Farke commit, but that was what it was, hopeful. Webber’s job is to make the objective decisions and I think he got that one wrong, regardless of the benefit of hindsight.

Edited January 22, 2022 by Monty13

[TheGunnShow 5,987]

1 minute ago, Monty13 said:

I’m not saying there wasn’t mitigation for our utterly abject display during project restart (although I’d argue Farke should have done much better still) my point is there was zero to justify giving him a four year contract, something virtually unheard of in football management.

As impressive as Farkes second promotion was our stated aim was to be a PL club so it made no sense to me to sign a long term deal with a manager who’d shown little sign he could achieve that aim. If he’d kept us up this season then I’d understand, but it seemed like a gamble on him doing that that massively back fired. 

I dunno, I'd say getting that team back up on the back of such a difficult second half to the Premier League first time around had earned a chance of being supported with a team overhaul, giving him a weapon, and most importantly, giving him the time to craft the team into a weapon. It was just unusual in that we lost arguably our best two players from the previous season in Buendia and Skipp.

What I also think we're seeing here is a combination of the new lads bedding in over time when looking at the performances of the likes of Sargent, Rashica, and Lees-Melou, we're getting back towards a full-strength squad, and also (and this is where Smith should get the credit over Farke) there seems to be better awareness of what the players have as a team unit and what is needed to be competitive. Call it using the players as a foundation to build a system instead of having one system and sticking to it, and that's where Smith does seem to have had the edge over Farke.

Even that last game of Farke vs. Brentford wasn't the performance of a team whose manager had lost the dressing room. They kept fighting.

At the same time, le roi est mort, vive le roi. 🙂

[Newtopia 519]

Both of his goals were well taken yesterday, I absolutely loved the second, the way he held his run and then accelerated to attack the ball was very much like Ewan Riberts in his prime.

[K Lo 229]

I doubt the opposition placed that much emphasis on Sargent being a threat in front of goal.
They all know how well Pukki can finish and so he's been a marked man for some time now.

[Monty13 2,246]

4 minutes ago, TheGunnShow said:

I dunno, I'd say getting that team back up on the back of such a difficult second half to the Premier League first time around had earned a chance of being supported with a team overhaul, giving him a weapon, and most importantly, giving him the time to craft the team into a weapon. It was just unusual in that we lost arguably our best two players from the previous season in Buendia and Skipp.

What I also think we're seeing here is a combination of the new lads bedding in over time when looking at the performances of the likes of Sargent, Rashica, and Lees-Melou, we're getting back towards a full-strength squad, and also (and this is where Smith should get the credit over Farke) there seems to be better awareness of what the players have as a team unit and what is needed to be competitive. Call it using the players as a foundation to build a system instead of having one system and sticking to it, and that's where Smith does seem to have had the edge over Farke.

Even that last game of Farke vs. Brentford wasn't the performance of a team whose manager had lost the dressing room. They kept fighting.

At the same time, le roi est mort, vive le roi. 🙂

I’m not disagreeing with your opinion. My point is what was the justification in giving him a four year contract when apparently the clubs goal was to stay in the PL and he had shown nothing to suggest he could achieve that? Objectively that was a risky business decision that proved a terrible one.