What Went Wrong At The End Of The Season?

[Salvatore Matrecano]

It still hurts but trying to be a bit more constructive than saying “we were S**t”.
8 points from the last 8 games is clearly not going to get anyone a Champions League place. However a few of you have mentioned there were warning signs well before the last few months.
 So what happened, Is there blame attached or just circumstance?

Causes as follows, which do you agree with?

1. Small squad ran out of steam. Missed opportunity to strengthen in January.
2. Small squad no problem but no strength in depth beyond starting 11
3. Tactics got found out by other teams and they adapted. 
4. One way of playing, counter attack, take the lead and hang on. No plan B
5. We weren’t good enough to play plan B anyway, couldn’t break teams down when needed.
6. We were over achieving, the xG w**k**s were correct after all.
7. We weren’t as good as we thought, just got lucky particularly mid season.
8. Injuries at a bad time and we never recovered. Others lost form.
9. The cup run did for us, a few games and distractions too many.
10. We simply bottled it.
11. Stopped doing what we were good at with a 4231
12. Poor game management and substitutions from Nuno.
13. Things behind the scenes not right, distractions off the pitch, MGW head turned etc.
14. All of the above

Threw a few in there for a reaction, which do you think, any more Ive missed?

[Sausage Roll]

You've got two number threes there.

I think 1-5 yes. A bit of 6. Definitely 8 and 11. Some 12 and possibly some 13.

9 contributed to 8 also, particularly with Aina.

[Salvatore Matrecano]

You've got two number threes there.

I think 1-4 yes. A bit of 7. Definitely 10. Some 11 and maybe some 12.

Apologies, amended the numbering which has in turn messed up yours!


My own opinion is number 9 is underestimated.

[Sausage Roll]

Have updated mine now!

[DR Forest]

I don’t think we bottled it.
That’s not fair.
But certainly we lacked experience and suffered from nerves.
We need a plan B
Plan A was sussed in the latter stages- but fantastic job by Nuno to get the plan A in the first place.

Now we need to reshape the team by selling MGW and adjusting to a possession based plan B which we can develop into our new plan A.

Onwards and upwards

[Fumanchew]

I’m sure the speeding conviction that MGW didn’t help

[Sniffer Dog (Admin)]

I’m sure the speeding conviction that MGW didn’t help

It's hardly a murder conviction.

[zicorice]

1. Not strengthening in Jan.
2. Individual errors crept in again.
3. Injuries finally arrived at our door.
4. Pressure and expectations at home games played into opponents hands.
5. The blip came at a particularly bad spot.
6. There genuinely are no gimmies in this league- not even Lestuh.

All that said. 7th is an incredible achievement.

[The reds]

Personally I think the Brighton cup game ruined us. We never fully recovered from that game then we got 2 injuries the next game, no strikers or RB for Villa game.
We probably need to be honest that Wood, Aina, MGW, Murillo, Milenkovic, Elanga, CHO were all playing through injuries by the end of it.

We had 12 players that played over 1900 minutes each.
The other 11 played less than 1000 minutes each. That’s also another problem

[wassy04]

1. We got found out/luck reverted to the mean and we didn't have another tactic. There was a few teams that let us have possession for example.
2. Lack of signings in January.
3. Lack of depth, which makes the cup run an issue and finally got some injuries.

[Simon]

teams worked out how to play against us - cynical fouls on the edge of our box preventing quick breaks were a feature of the last few home games - generally unpunished by the referees.

Nuno needs to develop a more sophisticated approach for next season finding a way to play quickly through the thirds.

[Paplane]

teams worked out how to play against us - cynical fouls on the edge of our box preventing quick breaks were a feature of the last few home games - generally unpunished by the referees.

Nuno needs to develop a more sophisticated approach for next season finding a way to play quickly through the thirds.

This for sure. If we don't do that then I can honestly see next season being an almighty struggle. The other clubs won't let us get away with playing how we did in the first half of the season. Wood's not going to have the season he did this year again, and probably the same for Sels.