The Battle of the Little League

[Mariner 0]

Lawrenson on MOTD seemed quite certain we shall not survive in the Premiership. Of the three promoted teams plus Southampton, he expects Crystal Palace to come out top because of their striker. No allowance made for our many injuries. It would be nice to be able to challenge that view with more confidence. The club appears to be remarkably sanguine about a pretty dire situation. Are we already thinking about a promotion fight in the Championship? I hope not. The good thing is that after the Middlesborough game we shall have a breather and a chance to regroup. We need to worry about the defence now, things are looking very ordinary, especially on the left - Charlton is badly missed.

[NavMan 0]

I think sadly a lot of the people at the club had this mentality of we may have to do a Charlton and get relegated to come back stronger.  Unfortunately this attitude I believe has grown on the players but there is no certaintly that we will come straight back up.  It is still a four horse race at the bottom so fingers crossed we can come out on top. 

[ZLF 271]

What is so frustrating is that the club is so so so close to having enough to have survived this season - it is some naivety that has left us struggling in the relegation zone rather than thinking we are 5 points clear - these are all down to worthy and include 

- tactical decisions about retaining favoured players despite being out of their depth

- favouring the ability to run all day ahead of ability with a football

- an inability to read a game tactically and adjust accordingly

- continued desire to play staff out of position due to the first above.

- blindness at seeing only problems up front rather than any other area of the pitch, in particular the defence.

This season has a been a learning experience for all at the club but none more so that our manager.  I beleive he has not and will not abandon hope until its impossible for us to survive and thats why we get the bland press conferences - he needs to keep the club and players spirits high. 

Having said that we are better placed than I thought we would be even with a widening gap to the team above Palarse and have the future in our own hands even if we do not get additional players in.

Despite my criticisms above I passionately believe that worthy is the only man for the job, even if we finish bottom come May (I am sure we wont) and HAVE to do a Charlton.    

 

OTBC

[3pmkickoff 0]

Sadly I have to agree with him, we have got worse as the season has progressed. Injuries or not, the problem we had up front looks to have been improved but we''re now leaking more goals at the back.

Palace seem to be tighter in all areas and you have to say Dowie is doing an incredible job considering what he has.

This relegation battle looks to be going right down to the wire, at the moment the team in the bottom four that get''s a mini run together will survive, the other three will fall. Unless we get tighter as a team and start taking our chances then we''re one of the three

[Kirby_86 0]

Quite right about the mini-league of 4 at the bottom of the Prem. Once Ashton has geared up and his putting the goals away things will look a lot brighter.

Regarding defence,i''m sure Worthy is on the look out for loan player at the moment to fill both a defensive and attacking midfielder role. I trust him to do the goods for us.

OTBC