This squad in the Premiership under Adams

[Tetteys Jig 851]

How many of you think this current squad would hold their own in the premiership under Adams new system?

I might be getting carried away but I think we''d at least stay up (so better than last season).

The main concern of being too brittle throughout the side has now gone with two giants at the back brought in and Jerome, Grabban and Lafferty bringing a much needed physical prescence to the side and Vadis sounds like he could easily replace what we had with Leroy.

Add to that the fact we''ve kept our best players (Ruddy, Hooper, Redmond, Tettey and Olsson)

Perhaps Hooiveld demonstrates the gap between the two levels in that he looks like John Terry in the championship (as Johnno does Pirlo) and then hasn''t been so good in the premiership but I think we have enough quality right round the squad even at lower premiership level.

Now for them all to stay fit and integrate well.

[Mr Jenkins 0]

Interesting Jimmy. We have an excellent squad with depth which will serve us extremely well in this Division and will hopefully deliver promotion.

Its a generalisation, but my view is that a lot of our guys are top notch in the Chump but are not quite good enough for the Prem. With the addition however of 3 or 4 genuine Prem Quality players I think we could sustain a good run the the Top League.

[GenerationA47 863]

Hmm.

 

For me, that all depends on recapturing the "more than the sum of the parts" spirit of the Lambertian era. Our squad is still on the lightweight side in terms of PL (objective squad value, etc. subjective ). But it has great potential if they can be inspired and technically coached to work together.

 

This touches on mouldy ole Parma ham''s interesting distinction between ''Too Good for the Championship'' and ''Good Enough for the Lower Prem'' (or something similar - I paraphrase). We don''t know the answer to the first question.. the second will only be posed if the first answer is yes....

 

 

But exciting to be able to ask the questions!

[GenerationA47 863]

Jenkins  - we crossed over - your point is similar to mine and I tend to agree with the last sentence.

[clarkey1972 0]

I think its easy to get carried away, especially we know little of some of these signings and even the ones we do know something about there is still a risk that they dont fit in etc.

 

I said on a previous post though that had NA been given 4 or 5 more winnable games last season and a little time to change the mindset of the players I feel fairly confident we would have won a few more and stayed up.

 

Thats all in the past now, but I have to say I havent been as excited about a season since our first in the prem under Lambert.  The board have backed him, am sure the fans will, its time to deliver NA

[Tetteys Jig 851]

Players I think would be good enough in the prem:

Ruddy, Olsson, Turner, Redmond, Vadis, Tettey, Wes, Lafferty, Hooper, Bassong*.

Players who I think would probably do alright:

R Bennett, R Martin, Whittaker, Garrido, Grabban, Johnson, Howson, E Bennett, Jerome.

Players we''d have to think about:

Bunn, Miquel, Murphy x 2, Loza

"Championship Specialists" who''d probably leave:

O''Neil, Hooiveld, Cuellar

*(if he sorted out his attitude)

Harsh on some of the young ones but I suppose you have to be. Our last stint did for the Norwich careers of Adeyemi and C Martin and both look tidy players now that could one day hold their own at premiership level with a bit more development.

On the balance, I don''t think it''d be pretty, but I think we''d stay up in the prem with what we''ve got.

[Tetteys Jig 851]

Forgot Rudd, he''d be another "to think about"

[It's Character Forming 1,204]

I think there are a lot of teams in the middle Prem that are very close together in quality, the ones that end up relegated and the ones that climb above the mid-table pack are really down to just a few results, in games that often turn on very fine margins.  Most teams in this group have quite a few players who aren''t what you''d think of as Prem standard.  Often they have some stars too, who lift up the rest of the team until they''re poached by a bigger team - one of our problems last season was that we splashed out on some supposed stars none of whom raised the performance of the team.

 

For example, you look at Stoke last season - at their place we won comfortably, keeping them to a minimal threat and controlling the game.  At home we were all over them and they were very happy to cling on to a point.  Yet Stoke - mainly by virtue of a run of (I think) 3 wins in a row in the Spring - coasted clear of the drop zone and had their best ever finish.

 

And consider that if we''d been able to convert a chance against Cardiff at home and had won at home against Stoke - both of which could easily have happened - the extra points would have seen us safe.  the margins are so fine.

 

So I''d say that our squad now looks stronger than this time last year and would have probably have survived fairly comfortably.

[Mr Jenkins 0]

ICF. Nail on head. Putting the CH debate to one side, what we have lacked in the Prem is the outstanding individual or two eg Benteke at his best, who could change a game with a touch of brilliance. If you have that and they can buy you 4 or 5 points then it can make a big difference to your final position. It also lifts the team as a whole so that collectively you deliver a more confident performance. Finding that individual and keeping him is a quest for many teams such as ourselves.

[Horse Renoir 1]

I fully agree with the last two posts. With the exception of Holt in our first season we''ve lacked an outstanding individual player who can turn games on his own. We lacked it badly last year and even under Hughton if we had a Huckerby type player as an outlet we would have probably just about survived.

This squad is definitely stronger than last years but I see absolutely no difference between the bottom 10 Prem teams and the top 10 Championship teams bar perhaps one outstanding player so it''s going to be tough to get back but once there, under Adams and if we don''t have another catastrophic transfer window like 2013 we should almost certainly be fine!

[Horse Renoir 1]

Unless we get really lucky I doubt we''ll have much success finding that outstanding individual though as we''ll never be able to afford someone who is proven so I''m hoping one of Redmond, Murphy, McGrandles or Thompson eventually develops into one of those

[chicken 0]

Jimmy - if you consider Redmond to be a prem player, then you have to throw Josh Murphy in with him as well. He is a year behind Redmond in age and yet his vision, ability to cross and shoot are probably more accomplished already.I''m not saying Murphy is better at this stage, but surely has shown enough at this point to suggest that he is worth a decent shout?

[Rock The Boat 1,332]

[quote user="Darth Catbeard"]Unless we get really lucky I doubt we''ll have much success finding that outstanding individual though as we''ll never be able to afford someone who is proven so I''m hoping one of Redmond, Murphy, McGrandles or Thompson eventually develops into one of those[/quote]

I think you are right about the outstanding individual.

You either get lucky (Grant Holt) or shell out an enormous sum (RVW) with no guarantee of success.

Maybe one of the youngsters will shine through.

[nutty nigel 7,902]

I love the positivity[:D]

 

However I think if Adams had this side in the PL he''d have the lowest budget in that league so would have to work miracles to stay up like Lambert and Hughton did before we had that awful transfer window last summer. However funnily enough I think he''d have more chance with these than the players that were relegated. If we get back up the task will be as always to improve year by year with the lesson learnt that a wasted budget can put you straight back down.

 

 

[Tetteys Jig 851]

[quote user="chicken"]Jimmy - if you consider Redmond to be a prem player, then you have to throw Josh Murphy in with him as well. He is a year behind Redmond in age and yet his vision, ability to cross and shoot are probably more accomplished already.I''m not saying Murphy is better at this stage, but surely has shown enough at this point to suggest that he is worth a decent shout?[/quote]

I''m going on experience being the difference here, indeed Murphy outshone him in his latest showing but we have only seen him a handful of times hence why i''ve said i''m just not sure. Redmond, even though there is lots of room for improvement I know already can handle the premiership at least to a satisfactory standard.

[It's Character Forming 1,204]

I think NN''s post needs to be remembered - for all the stats and talk about money, easily the worst performance we had came from the most expensive squad we''ve ever assembled. If you spend badly it can destroy the team quickly.

[Guest]

Got to get out of the champs first and that wont be a walk in the park.

[nutty nigel 7,902]

We only will if the team is at least as good as its parts. The signs are good but there''s 8 months to go where we have to keep it up and that''s a tall order.

[ZLF 334]

we have a squad of championship quality performers.

With the exception of perhaps one or two (Ruddy) I dont think they are good enough to compete at a prem level.

The back 4 probably needs 3 prem starting defenders to avoid last seasons performances.

In midfield the new signings excepted, only Tettey is prem standard, wes could be but is simply too old to start every game, redmond and murphy do have the ability to step up over the next couple of seasons but not guaranteed, for the rest its a step too far as proven buy last seasons efforts..

Up front Jerome is a squad player at pl level, but none of the others are currently capable enough.

So no, I dont think we do have a prem squad.

But we do have a top notch champ squad this season, with options across the pitch. We will go close - but will need to invest should we be successful.

[Stone 0]

This time last year our signings throughout the summer window were being heralded as great business... there was talk of pushing for a Europa League spot on here from some.

On the face of it we have made some good signings this summer and have a solid squad capable of being promoted. We''ve started well, but if we''ve learnt anything from last season it''s that utilising them effectively and building some cohesion among them for what will be a long arduous season is where the challenge really lies.

[It's Character Forming 1,204]

I agree with the last post.

 

As to the idea that our squad is full of Champ level players - we all have our own opinions and I don''t agree.  For me, last season our squad had many players of similar ability to the pack of 10 or so clubs in the middle of the table where we spent most of the season, and we''ve retained most of those players, so I wouldn''t view those clubs as having mainly Champ level players.  The top Prem clubs are on a different level of course and if you regard that as the benchmark, most players in the Prem aren''t "Premiership quality".

 

We didn''t go down last season because our players weren''t good enough, otherwise we''d have been relegated a year or two earlier.  We went down IMO for a mix of reasons but most important for me was that we brought in players up front none of who were suited to the style of play and formations which CH used, so although on paper our strike force (signed at record cost) was superior, man for man, compared to the year before, it was much less effective (viewing RVW at the time he arrived, not with the benefit of hindsight).  Similarly in defence, bringing in Olsson made our back line better (man for man) or unchanged from the year before, yet defensively we were clealy worse on the pitch. 

 

It is a huge irony and still annoys me that having spent record amounts and put together what was probably (on paper again) the best squad the club has ever had (at least, the best since the early 90s) we had such a poor season and ended up deserving to get relegated.

 

My guess is that our current squad would perform better in the Prem and given the narrow margins, would probably survive as comfortably as we did the two seasons before last year.

[mrs miggins 0]

These are our best players who are rotated in and out of the squad atm:

STARTERS

Ruddy

Olsson

Tettey

Hooper

Grabban - only gone by what I''ve seen so far

CONTENDERS (ROTATION)

Martin (our captain and leader atm)

R. Bennett

Redmond

Howson

Hoolahan

Bennet - I realise he''s out of form atm because of his injury, but remember the first season with him and pilks on the wing, they were brilliant

RESERVES/OUT

Turner - too slow for the premiership, but great in this league

Johnson - good to have in squad but wouldn''t be starting hopefully

Lafferty

However, we are getting a bit ahead of ourselves, having said that I have just put £35 on us going up :/

[SwindonCanary 457]

Have we a current squad that would hold their own in the premiership ?Let''s hope we have a squad that can get us up to the Premiership !

[GH9 0]

The squad we have now is stronger than the one that we had in our first Premier League season under Lambert. I mean, look at the defenders we had available to us then. Whitbread, Ward, Barnett, Tierney, De Laet, Drury. Our defence now is much stronger than that.

I wouldn''t be too confident going into the Premier League with this squad, but I''m certainly very confident that this squad could get us into the Premier League.

[Bill 1,788]

I don''t think it is solely down to the quality of players.Lambert inherited a squad of players who had just been hammered 1-7 at home, and with very few additions went on to walk the league.Llikewise with the players the following year, none of whom were what might be thought outstanding players.Even in his one year in the PL we looked up for it.Hughton seemed to have the reverse effect, taking some of the best players we have had at Carrow Road and making them look less than average.The current squad looks very strong, with the emphasis on the season and this season alone. The extra eight games and the physicality of the Championship will stretch the squad, which is why the club seems to have gone for quantity rather than quality - with lightweights such as RVW and Surnam being moved on.There is much to look forward to in the coming months, and no reason to believe that we cannot win each game we go into. A far better change from the last two seasons.

[Mr Jenkins 0]

Here hear!