08 Apr 2018 16:20:15
Shame but we are down now.

I would give the job to Hughes and encourage him to build a team of home grown talent who want to play for the club.

I think the board should all resign and we should start again from scratch.

1.) 08 Apr 2018
08 Apr 2018 18:36:56
Our team next year should be:
GK: Harry Lewis
RB: Pied (think Cedric will leave)
CB: Stephens
CB: Yoshida
LB: McQueen
CDM: PEH
CDM: Reed
RAM: JWP
CAM: Hesketh
LAM: Sims
ST: Gallagher
Play youth players and build a quality team, that wants to play for the club.
Newcastle have somewhat done the same.

2.) 08 Apr 2018
08 Apr 2018 18:40:22
Hang on gt we are not down yet, you never know. We are down when the maths say so not before. Doesn't look great agreed but keep the faith difficult as it is.

3.) 08 Apr 2018
08 Apr 2018 19:25:16
We played well against Arsenal today despite the loss and we scored some goals! Miracles do happen, so the best we can do as fans is give our full support, and then if we do go down we'll go down fighting! COYR!

4.) 08 Apr 2018
08 Apr 2018 22:22:09
Surely you must have more faith that we can stay up after today than before? I though they showed everything we've been asking for today. Any points today were bonus points. if we play like that every game from now, I 100% believe we'll stay up. That's a big if, mind you.

I'll start thinking about next season after this one's over.

5.) 08 Apr 2018
08 Apr 2018 22:34:15
Much better shape and organisation today, we will stay up if we can get 7 points from 6 games, we have a good chance of survival now certainly a lot better than 3 weeks ago under Pellegrino.

6.) 09 Apr 2018
09 Apr 2018 06:36:10
I agree I was their yesterday and our shape was better as was our commitment
Shane worked his socks off up front
I can only hope the players still believe they can get out of it Hughes will be drumming that into them in training this week I expect
Chelsea next week we need something from that game
To close this gap
Palace have the best run in of all the teams down there so I don’t expect us to be chasing them it will be Huddersfield who will start to drop down and we’ve got to snatch their place.

7.) 09 Apr 2018
09 Apr 2018 16:24:57
Well I for one am going to take the positives from the Arsenal game. On Saturday, I held little hope of getting a result but was pleased to see most results of the teams around us work in our favour. Then, on Sunday when I saw the team sheets, I held a little more hope as we were playing a new formation that could balance attack and defence nicely and Arsenal were fielding a weakened side.

The first half was disappointing as we seemed to be happy ceding possession and sporadically pressing their defenders but concentrating more on sitting in two lines of defence. This can be effective if you stay compact and operate as a team, squeezing space and anticipating where the ball is going to press and mark effectively. We clearly need to work on this as the lines were defined but allowed too much space for Arsenal to operate in and run through. Yes, their first goal was neat interplay but if you do not anticipate the run or react quickly enough to it by following/ impeding/ blocking, then you are left flat footed and playing catch up. Defending in this way is a subtle art and one we must practice hard if we are to employ it in future.

I was pleased to see Shane Long score. I’m not his biggest fan as you know and still believe that if we are to stay up, Charlie Austin is far more likely to give us the goals required, but he was very effective in the role he was given yesterday. Crucially, he scored which makes such a difference.

I had hoped that we’d be a little more proactive from the outset, so I was pleased to see on this occasion an improved second half performance. This has happened a lot this season but yesterday was the first game under MH where we had a chance of getting something from the match. There was attacking intent, an early spell of controlled pressure and there was a real sense we were building something. MH took note and decided to go for broke by changing the formation and bringing Austin on for Yoshi. With hindsight, he may wish he had been a little more measured. Whilst Austin’s impact was important as he scored the equaliser shortly after coming on, the change in formation left us weaker in midfield and defence. Arsenal were able to create several good chances and we relied more than once on McCarthy to keep them out. Shane Long was injured and it would perhaps have been more sensible to bring him off for Austin and keep the shape as it was. Despite Bertrand being fairly quiet, Cedric was doing very well coming forward and grabbed two assists for his efforts. But when he’s part of a back four, all too often teams are able to expose his achilles heel, as happened once more here. Tadic was unsurprisingly incapable of stopping the cross coming in and Cedric was outmuscled and outjumped at the back post. If we were still operating with a back three, a better defender would most likely be out wide to try and block the cross and Stephens would likely have been in Cedric’s place and more capable of challenging Wellbeck in the air.

Those are the fine measures by which the remainder of our season will be determined. We didn’t get the rub of the green yesterday with refereeing decisions either for the most part, with fouls missed and 50-50s not falling in our favour. I won’t talk about the red cards as I’ll do so at length separately. However, the ref did make some inconsistent decisions which helps no-one.

But the positive is that there was fight and attacking intent against a good side away from home. Chelsea are in a bit of a hole too so we may be playing them at a good time too on our home turf. If we can not only replicate but build on this performance, we have a chance.