Confusion continued

Things I've been mulling over:

Why was there such a volte face about league position last season? We were all relatively patient in terms of the rebuild season, (please note use of relatively), probably because of what had happened under Farke, so I don't think there were many who were expecting a top 6 finish.

If the main reason for JHT to go was losing the dressing room, thus ensuring that the top 6 wouldn't happen, why weren't questions asked about the choice of bringing a coach in who had zero experience of English football, without providing either his own team around him to support, or recommending an experienced English coach to help.

Instead of which, Jack Wilshere. Again, were no questions asked about why this was an acceptable thing to do - because I know I'd be pretty hacked off if someone was introduced as my successor when I'd only be in a role for three months. And let's not forget, we did all have a theory that we declined for a while when he arrived.

And then, Jack Wilshere part 2. Having been put into his planned role, he was then moved on, despite it seeming that, given that the dressing room was lost under JHT, he had won over the dressing room.

Then the squad. Given that last season was the rebuild season, surely there was some expectation that if we were changing coaching teams, perhaps we'd have to rethink recruitment to at least have a spine of a side - and especially when you think that Sargent wasn't expected to stay. It's fine to recruit for potential, that's been a successful model, but to actually have some money for the first time in a while and to not think - you know maybe we just need someone who's a bit proven, even if at League One level. We always seem to have the extremes - Ashley Barnes or Ante Crnac - surely there's some middle ground here.

Perhaps we could look to the youth. Where each week we seem to have a representative on the bench, occasionally on the pitch, but without any real evidence that there's going to be another source of potential future success there.

And of course, we now arrive at the point where we're firmly in the relegation zone, playing like a club heading to League One at best, and yet this time we want to be patient.

Manning talked about things starting to go wrong in February - if this were just about JHT losing the dressing room then surely it might have been won back by now. Or was there something more significant?

Anyway, curiouser and curiouser and I still think that we just need to bring in some people who understand football at exec level, not administrative or analytic level, and a manager who actually seems to want things to improve, not by osmosis but by direction. Again, I know that it's just a job, but some managers commit themselves to the club while they're part of it, which of course endears them to supporters, and I'm just not getting that.

And finally, we still have the person making decisions who gave George Long a three year contract.

Posted By: camcan on October 26th 2025 at 18:01:56

Message Thread

Reply to Message

In order to add a post to the WotB Message Board you must be a registered WotB user.

If you are not yet registered then please visit the registration page. You should ensure that their browser is setup to accept cookies.

Log in