21 Mar 2021 15:22:42
Win against the blades and I believe we can start to recognise what an achievement this season has been. Both Chelsea and Fulham results showed we are starting to manage games better than earlier in the season.
For me the ‘second season syndrome’ is a myth! Most promoted teams don’t get to stay after their return. Then there are teams the likes of Brighton, Newcastle, Palace, West Ham, Burnley etc their whole ethos is to survive first and foremost.
What have these teams demonstrated by their longevity?
Slowly improving their playing squads but in the main getting better coaches into their clubs with the experience or nous to maintain their premiership status, and nothing more.
Dyche, Hodgson, Moyes have all shown this ability. Newcastle lost Benitez and will do well to stay up, and in Potter Brighton have a very good young English coach who inherited a good squad and a diamond of a player named Ben White.
The same applies at the top not surprisingly only, Liverpool, Chelsea, Citeh have far better budgets.
Therefore, the right coach can get you survival, with slightly better players Europa League but it’s an incredible jump to get to the top tier and then stay around there.
Realistically that’s three to five years away for us, (Unless an Unknown Trillionaire comes a calling)
I think we’re fine for next year with 3 additions we will hold around 10th with 5 we could be looking at the Europa places.
We need the majority of our players fit, but when you look at what the teams sitting in the Europa areas are doing differently to us?
They score more goals across their team especially in midfield, they have a dead ball specialist (we don’t) Cresswell at West Ham they generally have more height in their sides, (west ham, Everton) football sadly like rugby, relies more on the size of the athlete rather than individual skill these days.
They have back up players for their key positions GK, CF in particular we do not as yet.
The elephant in the room conceding from set pieces. Yes we’re top of that stat on 14!
In second place Brighton yep, with a back four with an average height of around 6ft 3inches.
A mate of mine is a junior coach at Brighton who told me the only reason Potter removed Ryan and switched to Sanchez was because Lewis Dunk said they did not believe Ryan could command his six yard box in the air!
Like it or not our fantastic keeper is the same just now if we’re honest it’s his biggest area for development.
Then there is our usual suspects for conceding from set pieces and these time and time again the two main culprits are our Skipper and Luke Ayling. (weirdly only our skipper normally gets a mention? )
Both have many, many attributes, pluses but both switch off and both lose their man or are behind, wrong side of the attacker.
Watch Fulham goal again see where Luke starts and ends as CB scores.
This is the Premiership and before we all assume our skipper will not play again, Luke has a huge shadow in Cody Drameh over his shoulder just now, and has to eradicate this fault he clearly has to stay in the team.
In summary, for me our Team/ Manager’s achievements outweigh the Blades first season simply because we had a fantastic young lad in goal learning his trade making some errors as he went saving us in the main (Blades) and a different CB pairing every single week.
21 Mar 2021 16:29:47
Agree with your post in the main until you say our first season out did Sheff utds
We spent more and the finished higher that is no contest . As for your reason if a young keeper. they had Henderson who is also young?
Sheff Utd last season was an all time great achievement
We have done ok but spent a lot to finish mid table . in main due to a very poor defence off setting our amszckbg forward play.
21 Mar 2021 19:10:55
With another 9 games to play and 27pts to compete for I’m not sure, even with your incredible insight, how you can know our finishing position for this season?
Any money we spent this summer has hardly had much bearing on the team considering most of our signings have spent large periods out of the team!
What exactly did Sheff Utd achieve last season, not sure they wowed anyone much? Hasn’t done them much good this season has it?
21 Mar 2021 19:35:23
Of course I don’t know where anyone will finish but I know enough about football to know at this point of the season more often than not the pattern of rue it’s will pan out in a similar fashion. of course you have the odd great escape or surge up the table but as a rule we can expect man cit and Man Utd 1st 2nd, 3 of the bottom four to go down and Leeds to finish roughly where we are
As for Sheff of course they wowed everyone last seaso everyone was full of praise as they finished 6th I think which was nothing short of amazing
No you’re right it ain’t done them any good this season proving they could only punch well above there weight for a limited amount of time but yes they did wow by getting the results they got.
21 Mar 2021 21:11:34
They finished 9th! All time great achievement? I know quite a bit about football, and I don’t think so 😂.
21 Mar 2021 22:20:07
Did they finish that low? Fair enough
Still 17th in leauge one to 9th in prem with very little money spent in just three years. not a bad achievement
Especially coming from the same body of fans who are saying belisa has done well in same amount of time coming from promotion favourites to 12th in prem spending over 100 million
I know what I think the far better achievement in is.
21 Mar 2021 23:07:12
I have said this about Ayling before. Love him as a bloke and Championshipplayer but continually at fault for the goals against switching off and losing the player he should be marking. I really hope he can eradicate this from his game as I would be sad to see him have to be replaced bugle is a major weak link at the moment.
21 Mar 2021 23:10:55
Berm they finished 9th on 54 points. Do you know how I know that? Because I googled it. I suggest you start doing the same before you start getting shown up more and more. That’s 3 times in the last 2 days I’ve noticed you’ve been corrected on what you believe to be facts.
22 Mar 2021 06:51:27
Guys, for me this is about much more than 2 years in the premiership, it’s about building a club and squad that can stay in the premiership, develop and then aim to compete at the top end of the table. Whatever you do in year one doesn’t matter if you get relegated badly in year two! That’s not success that’s failure because what you were building wasn’t sustainable! My gut is that our second year will be better than Sheffield’s but let’s see!
22 Mar 2021 07:53:21
Absolutely Spanish, it’s all about the project and moving forward each year! It’s not just about the team with Bielsa, he has put his ethos into the whole club! He cares about the back room staff, the canteen lady, the fans, the history of the club. Everything about the club has his humble stamp on it now and long may it continue! So what if we concede a few goals from corners! I’m loving every minute of it and very proud to say I’m LEEDS.
22 Mar 2021 12:14:13
You’re right I do get the odd thing wrong but like in other post out my hands up and say sorry unlike some in here
Still don’t take away from my bigger point
Far better achievement thought ain’t it?