This is as bad as Houghton's time..........so, tell me why it's not?

[GJP]

But had Hughton got us promoted the season before he would have been afforded a little more forgiveness - like AN has.

 

[hogesar]

Doubt it. He had a season with a long unbeaten run and top 12 finish in the prem behind him. There were minor grumblings at the time about our style of play but again reinforces my earlier point about why AN has been given the chance.

 

[GJP]

There have been minor grumblings about AN's style.

Again, I didn't love Hughton's style. But what goes for one goes for another, or at least that's how I try to see things.

 

[Wonderbar]

It's almost like AN was ordered to reel things in a bit after the first Newcastle game. Ever since we've reverted back to ANball, team performance has been on an uptick, and now the results are going our way too, belief in AN is back. 

Let the man do his job and we'll be fine. 

 

[Canaryboy]

But had Hughton got us promoted the season before he would have been afforded a little more forgiveness - like AN has.

Hughton had been handed our biggest ever transfer budget and flopped big time when it came to spending it. 

If we stay up and Alex Neil is handed a war chest in the summer he'll be expected to take us forwards too, and if we're struggling near the bottom come January then he'll be out of the door too.

The expectations placed on Alex Neil this year, and on Hughton in his second season, are completely different. 

17th this season and Alex Neil has done a good job of keeping a newly promoted side in the Premier League. Hughton spent about £25m on a team which had achieved two successive mid-table finishes and we regressed. 

I firmly believe that Hughton is a decent manager, but he simply ballsed the job up here, got it so wrong in that summer window. Said with the benefit of hindsight of course, but I still don't understand what he was trying to achieve tactically. It felt like he'd succeeded in creating the slowest counter attacking team in Premier League history.

 

[GJP]

A touch harsh. He made some very good signings. 

Really the only big flop was RVW but Hughton was never totally convinced we should sign him either. 

 

[hogesar]

I think the only time grumblings about AN style occurred was during our terrible run. Criticism of Hughton's style was criticised even when we finished so well in his first season. 

I don't think AN has got us playing brilliant, free flowing football on a consistent basis but it's a darn sight better than what we had to endure under a huge, huge proportion of Hughton's reign.

As for signings, he made some good one's. No idea how to get them playing together effectively as an attacking force, though.

 

[dj161]

I feel with Hughton he signed RVW and Hooper and thought to himself well thats the goals taken care of, yet had no real plan on how to get the ball to them, I've said all along his plan of playing inside forwards on the flanks in Snods and Redmond when RVW was known to thrive on crosses was a ridiculous approach to begin with and I stick with it. thats not to mention he tried doing this approach while also playing on the counter at the same time, seriously it was some of the slowest most dire tactically inept approach I think I've ever seen

At least Alex Neil looks to play to his players strengths, and we go out and attack games for the most part

 

[Fridgeman]

We are shite,simple

 

[Canaryboy]

We are shite,simple

Agreed.

Difficult to lose 3-0 at home to Sunderland and reach any other logical conclusion. 

 

[KeiranShikari]

Still not worse than Hughton's attempt.

 

[GJP]

It's about the same. 

 

[It's Character Forming]

At least we're still in the mix with a chance of survival.  Under Hughton I felt we had no chance left after the West Brom defeat (obviously the board agreed which was why they got rid of him then, although it should have been done much earlier).

 

[hogesar]

It's about the same. 

Nah. The universal opinion was we were down and didn't look remotely close to picking up a point let alone 3. 

Not saying we'll stay up but I still feel like we have a chance. Could partially be down to the teams around us but who knows.

 

[ZLF]

there are increasing similarities;   the players inability to turn up for 2/3 consecutive games;   failure to defend as a team; determination to play record signing despite being painfully out of form; a preference for grafters ahead of creative talent;  a midfield which is too often too anonymous;  its all strikingly familiar.  

In some ways its worse.  we have now developed a preference for playing a route one game and even worse doing it badly (no one around mbokani to win the knock ons and a failure to recognise that Thank God wins little more in the air than Jerome (46% of challenges compared to 44%). 

What is worse is the fact that this is a far more survivable league this time around and that the manager has had to compromise his preferred attacking approach (4141).

On their day we have a competitive team;  sadly there is a lack of gumption (just 4 1-1 draws recovered despite conceding first 22/23 times)) that highlights the competitive team simply does not turn up often enough.

Yet despite this I still think that sunderland, newcastle and villa are worse than us & that we can get points from at least 3 of our remaining games. I remain in the small minority that still thinks we can survive.   Just not if we play as we did on Saturday.  

 

[GJP]

Obviously the Prem is a tougher proposition but I wonder if we'd be any worse off if we had played the Wembley team every game this season.

Too many signings and changes that haven't given us anything extra and sometimes less.

 

[hogesar]

Obviously the Prem is a tougher proposition but I wonder if we'd be any worse off if we had played the Wembley team every game this season.

Too many signings and changes that haven't given us anything extra and sometimes less.

Probably not far wrong.

But of course you're including Bradders 

 

[GJP]

Yup and I didn't think that I would be seeing it like that but since his bright start I'm not sure Brady is offering much more. 

 

[hogesar]

Yup and I didn't think that I would be seeing it like that but since his bright start I'm not sure Brady is offering much more. 

I'm a big Bradders fan and I too didn't think we'd miss him after we signed and saw Brady playing, and then getting Jarvis in on loan too.

I think Brady's pace has probably helped us on a couple of occasions defensively and in terms of countering - Johnson obviously doesn't have this in his locker, nor the set piece ability.

 

[It's Character Forming]

I'm unconvinced by many of our signings especially Naismith - still not convinced we're better with him behind the striker rather than Wes and I wonder if we play him basically because too much was spent on him to leave him out regularly.  Jarvis and Brady have both been patchy, & Pinto not really contributed.  Brady has clearly been an upgrade on Bradders.

Mbokani has shared the load with Jerome but has been patchy.  I can't  help thinking if Jerome's goal vs palace had been given, his confidence would have improved and he'd have been, not perfect by any means, but would have got some of the goals from chances he's been missing.

Klose has looked good but I'd rather have had a decent CB in last summer (or the whole season) who might not have been good but would have given us a bit extra for a lot of games.

I do find it surprising anyone can say the Prem is easier now than when we went down under Hughton.  I look back to how awful we were that season and yet we still could have survived by beating West Brom.  This season I think the general standard is a lot higher, for teams in the bottom 3rd (except Villa).