Owners/Directors
After Kenny's sacking I was in shock for most of the summer and was thoroughly underwhelmed by their actions during the transfer window. JH's letter to the fans after it closed was a great piece of PR to take some heat away from Brendan and I hope they've learnt from the mistakes they admitted to making.
I'm generally in favour of their policy to reducing the wage bill and making use of the Academy but the one lesson I expect them to have learnt is that "sometimes" experience is a must. How the hell they expected us to manage after losing decades worth of PL experience and replacing it with novices, I'll never know.
They have the opportunity this month to show that they do want us to compete, they do want us to win things, they do trust the Manager and more importantly that we, the fans, aren't mugs and don't like being treated like mugs either.
Management
I never expected Brendan to go on a winning streak early on, the opening half dozen fixtures put paid to that. He's done well to keep us in shouting distance of the CL places but I fear he will fall just short of that target this season.
I understand he has a vision of how he wants the game to be played but I also agree with quite a few posters who have called into question his tactics and perceived stubbornness in sticking with it, when it clearly isn't working. He hasn't had a great deal of quality to play with and I can only assume that the reason he has used Downing and Cole more in the last few games is due to the lack of experience on the pitch and the need to give Luis some support.
I hope he's able to bring in all the players he needs to see us through to the summer so I don't have to keep hearing him telling us how thin the squad is.
My last wish from Brendan is to find some new keywords for his interviews. Brilliant, fantastic, outstanding, this group, are all starting to wear a bit thin now mate.
Players
Bit of a mixed bag for me so far.
The defense has been disappointing so far, too many goals against considering it's the same players, give or take, as last season. Possibly they've had more readjustments to make in terms of the style of play and also the constant changing of the full backs. Nevertheless our defense is our most experienced part of the team and should be doing better.
Midfield has been the most worrying for me. Confused, unbalanced, lacking creativity, determination and drive. We've badly missed Lucas and still are, as he isn't fully fit yet. Joe, I believe will be excellent for us in the future, as will Jordan but they need better quality/more experience around them for them to really push on.
Up front Luis has been out of this world and thank god he has. Raheem has also done well but has definitely been over used and really does need a rest. Everybody's been saying we need more strike power but it's not just numbers we need, it's experience. We have some of the worlds best attacking talents at the Club but most are still 2 or 3 years away from consistently scoring in the EPL.
Raheem, Morgan, Yesil, Suso, Sinclair will all get us goals in the future but Luis for now needs more than these lads and Borini to take us further.
In summary, the owners must show some commitment to help Brendan get the players he needs to challenge in the 2nd half of the season. I'm not talking about spending fortunes but the difference just one real quality player could make to the morale at the Club is unquantifiable.
Brendan needs to be a little more flexible or a little less naive and the players need to ask more of themselves every game.
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