Confirmed Graham Alexander New Manager, Chris Lucketti as Assistant

[Archie LEACH]

There's a lot of doom and gloom on the forum recently, it's sad to see but it's expected given the current state of play!
I saw enough on Saturday though to confidently say that performances will improve.
I just hope we can get through to January and still be within touching distance of the spots above relegation, then we need to seriously re-balance the squad and hopefully start to kick on in the second half of the season

I don't know what game you were watching but it certainly wasn't at Deepdale. It was dire no different than under Heckingbotton. No idea no clue no tactics. Toothless up front again, Erabi headless chicken syndrome, Delano lost, Lang a waste of space.

 

[Walton]

The poor quality loans has really hamstrung us.

As much as I appreciate the spending of money on quality players, that is all negated this season, if the loanees are sub par. A few rough gems and a handful of duds is the same for this year, whether the loans are the gems or the duds.

Next season it could improve, keeping the good ones, but that's bugger all use if we've been relegated.

Wasn't two of those loans supposed to be permanents but some sort of deal was done to save money?

Burgzorg? Gibbs? or Erabi?

 

[pne1881]

There's a lot of doom and gloom on the forum recently, it's sad to see but it's expected given the current state of play!
I saw enough on Saturday though to confidently say that performances will improve.
I just hope we can get through to January and still be within touching distance of the spots above relegation, then we need to seriously re-balance the squad and hopefully start to kick on in the second half of the season

Such as what specifically?

I certainly didn't.

 

[HunterLionheart]

Wasn't two of those loans supposed to be permanents but some sort of deal was done to save money?

Burgzorg? Gibbs? or Erabi?

Who knows. Glad as fuck we didn't spent money on any of them though. Certainly sounded like someone was willing to pay for Burgzorg at one point.

Think there was an option on Erabi mentioned?

Gibbs was surely a last minute punt when we cheaped out on Browne. What a fucking diabolical decision that was.

 

[Whist75]

Hope Grezza can do something but wow some of the poor players he is stuck with, Lindsay, Hughes, Storey, Arabi, Borgzorg, pol, very slow/ old defence and not much up front. Looks grim already thanks to a scatter gun Sumer recruitment, the loans this time look rubbish.

 

[Walton]

Who knows. Glad as fuck we didn't spent money on any of them though. Certainly sounded like someone was willing to pay for Burgzorg at one point.

Think there was an option on Erabi mentioned?

Gibbs was surely a last minute punt when we cheaped out on Browne. What a fucking diabolical decision that was.

And some didn't want Browne back.

 

[No Danger]

Such as what specifically?

I certainly didn't.

First half was an improvement but second half we once again ran out of energy and created nothing. Couldn’t raise an attack after going behind. As is well documented lack of fitness and confidence are serious problems.
Is the quality there if those 2 aspects return?
Lang and Kenny are at an above average risk of missing too many games through injury.
So far it has been a car crash of a season.
80% of it remains though so we can still hope for a miracle turnaround.

 

[pne1881]

First half was an improvement but second half we once again ran out of energy and created nothing. Couldn’t raise an attack after going behind. As is well documented lack of fitness and confidence are serious problems.
Is the quality there if those 2 aspects return?
Lang and Kenny are at an above average risk of missing too many games through injury.
So far it has been a car crash of a season.
80% of it remains though so we can still hope for a miracle turnaround.

Not sure 1st half was much of an improvement but then TBH it's a very low bar.

 

[Archie LEACH]

And some didn't want Browne back.

To be fair Browne blew the deal, he wanted a 3 year deal and we would only do 2 then he realised the following day that he had made a gross error.

As it stands and how they are playing hopefully in jan Earbi, Delano and Gibbs go back

What Championship clubs loan out their players that are any good?

 

[No Danger]

Not sure 1st half was much of an improvement but then TBH it's a very low bar.

It was nowhere near where it needs to be but it was a small improvement.

 

[pne1881]

To be fair Browne blew the deal, he wanted a 3 year deal and we would only do 2 then he realised the following day that he had made a gross error.

As it stands and how they are playing hopefully in jan Earbi, Delano and Gibbs go back

What Championship clubs loan out their players that are any good?

Not heard that version of events before.

How do you know that?

 

[HunterLionheart]

To be fair Browne blew the deal, he wanted a 3 year deal and we would only do 2 then he realised the following day that he had made a gross error.

As it stands and how they are playing hopefully in jan Earbi, Delano and Gibbs go back

What Championship clubs loan out their players that are any good?

Even if that was accurate, both sides can move in that negotiation. 3 year deal for the right money would have been fantastic.

 

[Archie LEACH]

First half was an improvement but second half we once again ran out of energy and created nothing. Couldn’t raise an attack after going behind. As is well documented lack of fitness and confidence are serious problems.
Is the quality there if those 2 aspects return?
Lang and Kenny are at an above average risk of missing too many games through injury.
So far it has been a car crash of a season.
80% of it remains though so we can still hope for a miracle turnaround.

Car Crash?

it's been catastrophic at best.

Bolton - we should have won easily
Wolves - no complaints
Charlton - should have got a point
Bristol City - a draw
Rovers - 3 points
Watford - should have been 3 points
Lincoln - should be beating them 3 points
QPR - 3 points
Millwall - expected a draw

So that is 14 points thrown away already that's why we are bottom and will continue to be so. We could easily have been sat on between 14-18 points and in the top 6 places.

 

[simo]

A few things, trying to think constructively.

First, the two managers comments on BBC largely agree with my view of the game. The stats agree. It was tight and we came out the wrong side of it. Small details decided the game.

Second, we actually, by hook or crook, created some reasonable chances and in a different world could have scored at least one, the difference here is probably no more than something like Kenny playing instead of Erabi. It wasn’t exactly the slickest of attacking play but it was something.

Alexander’s liking of getting the ball forward quickly was obvious but it was executed poorly too many times (maybe the wind didn’t help in the first half). This can be improved.

Continuing the aerial route against a team of beanpoles was a strange choice. Whether this is instruction from the sidelines or player choices I don’t know but much more thought needs to go into it either way. This can be improved too.

I thought on the whole we defended against a well drilled, well managed and “mature” team reasonably OK. A fairly obvious system or individual error (discussed elsewhere, I thought it was easily avoidable whichever it was) caused the goal although it was a good finish.

The big concern is the flakiness of the squad both physically and mentally after about an hour. Tough to change in the blink of an eye but I’ve not given up all hope yet like many have. That said, continually offering nothing after the hour can’t continue and Alexander has to find a solution to this urgently.

A concern for me is that the players have several years of fairly slow build up plays drilled into them and it’s obvious that they weren’t always comfortably with moving things forward more quickly. Hopefully this will change over time but it’s obviously going to be small steps.

I still see no reason why we can’t improve tonight with a bit more care and concentration in places. There are a number of things that are there to be fixed but we can’t afford to delay much longer - need something out of the game however we get it.

 

[monky1234]

Not sure 1st half was much of an improvement but then TBH it's a very low bar.

Yeah I don't see that either. Bar the first two games of the season, we've been fairly decent for the first 45-60 minutes of each game.

It's a better defensive structure though. So should hopefully improve with conceding less. But we may not keep up the same level of chances we were creating. But that may help us grind out more results at least. Especially after a bit more time and knowing what's being asked of them from Alexander.

 

[Aitch]

When you go back to last Jan here is the money we have spent:

Lang - injury prone, ok but nothing special (over 2 mil)
Moran - can't even get off the bench (roughly 1 mil)
Harry Clarke - looks ok, nothing special, A RB playing either as RWB or RCB (1 mil)
Leo Leroy - is he better than whiteman? (3 mil)
Devine - liked the signing at the time but has done nothing so far this season (6 million)
Kenny - Looks decent but again he is injury prone (3 million)
Mills - A winger who is forced to play at RWB (over 2 million.)

We have invested significant money since Jan. The issue being that during pre season Hecky didn't know what formation he wanted to play. He wanted to play four at the back but we didn't have the players to do that - he then reverted to type but we had already wasted money on Clarke and Mills who did not suit the formation.

And this is why Hecky is a dreadful manager and has left us in a really bad place. Ridsdale and Hemmings haven't helped with the lack of backing etc in the past but people still look at the list above and think Hecky can do no wrong. It's some of the worst management I think I have ever seen at this club. How a manager can not decide on a formation and if you don't want to play with wingers why sign Mills? It's Sunday League management and people still think Hecky shouldn't get criticised. He is a huge reason we are in this mess.

Sorry for the long reply but sometimes I think people are too blindsided to see it.

So 18 million on 7 signings plus the loan signings and which players would you be happy keep under the current manager. Not many I'd wager

 

[callum-pne]

So 18 million on 7 signings plus the loan signings and which players would you be happy keep under the current manager. Not many I'd wager

I think as @Bobbage pointed out, the main issue for me is the lack of Premiership loans this year.

I'd actually argue the players that are officially ours are better than any of the ones we've had in recent seasons but the main issue is the lack of added quality that players like Sepp, Dobbin, Armstrong, KKH etc gave us.

 

[BPIG]

Leo Leroy - is he better than whiteman? (3 mil)

Comfortably, yes.

 

[Jürgen Krapp]

The poor quality loans has really hamstrung us.

Just want to jump on this point to add it'll likely affect our January too.

Assuming you want all loanees in the match day squad, we have one spot left in the match day squad, as you're only allowed 5. Even if we accept dropping a loanee behind the bench and face whatever sanctions that might entail, with a 24 man squad we still only have one space left for a loanee. As I understand the registrations too, the age of a loanee doesn't matter as they occupy one space.

We may well have to use our January to work out alternative loans or moves for players we don't even own if we want to get more than one higher class loan in.