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The glorious march to CL qualification

The league table is a reflection on how well you perform relative to the other 19 teams in the division at the end of 38 games. That's a lot of games and significantly reduces the element of luck. Our (league) season has been incredibly polarised between the first and second half. The incredible tally of 45 pts from 19 games was league winning form (even if we can reflect on that and struggle to identify many games bar Chelsea at home or everton away where we put in a champions-like performance for 90 minutes). It enabled to build a cushion for any second half slump which has definitely come.

The season has felt unusual and different to last 3 under Poch. Between 2015-2018 we hit form at largely the same points from mid-September into the new year and then we found a second head of steam through Feb-April. That's all down to pre-season conditioning which was not possible to replicate last summer due to the world cup and extreme lack of pre-season coupled with the lack of new signings. You'll also remember that in 2015-18 our achilles heal was always points gained in first 6 games - this essentially killed our title challenges in 2016 and 2017 as we had too much ground to make up.

I haven't looked into how much Woolwich, Man U and Chelsea were affected by the world cup and lack of preparations and sure they've all had their own variables to contend with (namely a change of manager and subsequently different playing styles, tactics, personnel and conditioning) but I think when we reflect on the season the major caveat has to be the totally unprecedented circumstances caused by 12 players reaching KO stages of World cup, the ludicrously early start to the premier league season and subsequent havoc caused to pre-season preparations which in turn has led to an unprecedented amount of injuries.

In hindsight I wonder whether the plan from Poch and Peres last summer, knowing that the players would struggle to maintain condition this season, was to go all out from the start and try to get as many points on the board as possible early on and then try to coast through on fumes which is exactly what has happened. We still started the season with some indifferent performances but got the points. We really hit peak performance and intensity from late November through to Boxing Day (bar the defeat at Woolwich on 2 Dec but that's not exactly an unusual result for us to get beat there).

Perhaps you could suggest we're lucky that Woolwich and Man U have dropped so many unexpected points in the last 6 weeks but you can't overlook the fact that by gaining so many points earlier in the season we created a safety net for ourselves which cant possibly be explained as 'luck'.
 
GPRD81 said:
The league table is a reflection on how well you perform relative to the other 19 teams in the division at the end of 38 games. That's a lot of games and significantly reduces the element of luck. Our (league) season has been incredibly polarised between the first and second half. The incredible tally of 45 pts from 19 games was league winning form (even if we can reflect on that and struggle to identify many games bar Chelsea at home or everton away where we put in a champions-like performance for 90 minutes). It enabled to build a cushion for any second half slump which has definitely come.

The season has felt unusual and different to last 3 under Poch. Between 2015-2018 we hit form at largely the same points from mid-September into the new year and then we found a second head of steam through Feb-April. That's all down to pre-season conditioning which was not possible to replicate last summer due to the world cup and extreme lack of pre-season coupled with the lack of new signings. You'll also remember that in 2015-18 our achilles heal was always points gained in first 6 games - this essentially killed our title challenges in 2016 and 2017 as we had too much ground to make up.

I haven't looked into how much Woolwich, Man U and Chelsea were affected by the world cup and lack of preparations and sure they've all had their own variables to contend with (namely a change of manager and subsequently different playing styles, tactics, personnel and conditioning) but I think when we reflect on the season the major caveat has to be the totally unprecedented circumstances caused by 12 players reaching KO stages of World cup, the ludicrously early start to the premier league season and subsequent havoc caused to pre-season preparations which in turn has led to an unprecedented amount of injuries.

In hindsight I wonder whether the plan from Poch and Peres last summer, knowing that the players would struggle to maintain condition this season, was to go all out from the start and try to get as many points on the board as possible early on and then try to coast through on fumes which is exactly what has happened. We still started the season with some indifferent performances but got the points. We really hit peak performance and intensity from late November through to Boxing Day (bar the defeat at Woolwich on 2 Dec but that's not exactly an unusual result for us to get beat there).

Perhaps you could suggest we're lucky that Woolwich and Man U have dropped so many unexpected points in the last 6 weeks but you can't overlook the fact that by gaining so many points earlier in the season we created a safety net for ourselves which cant possibly be explained as 'luck'.
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We have won 4 more games so far than the year Leicester won the league

We have set a club record for wins and the reason we are where we are is because we won games

The game is about trying to win and yeah we have lost games but we have won more than most sides too
 
Bedfordspurs said:
We have won 4 more games so far than the year Leicester won the league

We have set a club record for wins and the reason we are where we are is because we won games

The game is about trying to win and yeah we have lost games but we have won more than most sides too
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Listen here sonny, this is no place for bringing up facts and figures, we only work on assumptions, hearsay and conjecture here, capisce!
 
NoLimits01 said:
Listen here sonny, this is no place for bringing up facts and figures, we only work on assumptions, hearsay and conjecture here, capisce!
Click to expand...
That's the thing about football, or sports in general, you can debate for eons about something that should be extremely easy. If a game ends 0-0, the teams are poor as both have failed the only goal in football, putting the ball in the net, in which they have trained most of their lives to do. If you win 1-0, you have played well. The numbers state that simple fact. If you win 2-0, you have played twice as good. If you had 5 shots hit the post/bar, had 12 shots on target and the goalkeeper has a De Gea worldy, you have played worse than if you have have barely passed the half-way line, had a penalty and win 1-0. That's fact and figures, there's no if's and but's about it.

Not being able to agree or disagree about almost everything would reduce football to what it really is, 22 more or less grown men on a lawn trying to kick a pig's bladder between two sticks where we count the number of times they have achieved this after one and a half hour, and that would be the most meaningless thing in the world to watch. With the exception of someone running 80 kilometers or cycling halfway around Europe.

Disclaimer: this is a reply made in jest.
 
GPRD81 said:
The league table is a reflection on how well you perform relative to the other 19 teams in the division at the end of 38 games. That's a lot of games and significantly reduces the element of luck. Our (league) season has been incredibly polarised between the first and second half. The incredible tally of 45 pts from 19 games was league winning form (even if we can reflect on that and struggle to identify many games bar Chelsea at home or everton away where we put in a champions-like performance for 90 minutes). It enabled to build a cushion for any second half slump which has definitely come.

The season has felt unusual and different to last 3 under Poch. Between 2015-2018 we hit form at largely the same points from mid-September into the new year and then we found a second head of steam through Feb-April. That's all down to pre-season conditioning which was not possible to replicate last summer due to the world cup and extreme lack of pre-season coupled with the lack of new signings. You'll also remember that in 2015-18 our achilles heal was always points gained in first 6 games - this essentially killed our title challenges in 2016 and 2017 as we had too much ground to make up.

I haven't looked into how much Woolwich, Man U and Chelsea were affected by the world cup and lack of preparations and sure they've all had their own variables to contend with (namely a change of manager and subsequently different playing styles, tactics, personnel and conditioning) but I think when we reflect on the season the major caveat has to be the totally unprecedented circumstances caused by 12 players reaching KO stages of World cup, the ludicrously early start to the premier league season and subsequent havoc caused to pre-season preparations which in turn has led to an unprecedented amount of injuries.

In hindsight I wonder whether the plan from Poch and Peres last summer, knowing that the players would struggle to maintain condition this season, was to go all out from the start and try to get as many points on the board as possible early on and then try to coast through on fumes which is exactly what has happened. We still started the season with some indifferent performances but got the points. We really hit peak performance and intensity from late November through to Boxing Day (bar the defeat at Woolwich on 2 Dec but that's not exactly an unusual result for us to get beat there).

Perhaps you could suggest we're lucky that Woolwich and Man U have dropped so many unexpected points in the last 6 weeks but you can't overlook the fact that by gaining so many points earlier in the season we created a safety net for ourselves which cant possibly be explained as 'luck'.
Click to expand...

Agree with all of that except the bit about getting points on the board early. If that’s what they planned, they should be fired. You can’t plan to be most tired at the business end of the season.
 
DeanoAustin said:
Agree with all of that except the bit about getting points on the board early. If that’s what they planned, they should be fired. You can’t plan to be most tired at the business end of the season.
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I think the plan was to rest players during the season, but then injuries happened. I vaguely remember seeing something along those lines back in August/September.
 
DeanoAustin said:
Agree with all of that except the bit about getting points on the board early. If that’s what they planned, they should be fired. You can’t plan to be most tired at the business end of the season.
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Forgive me I’m hypothesising without any real knowledge of how physical conditioning works or the actual state of our squad but my theory is that in July when all the World Cup players were returning late to pre-season Poch May have come to the conclusion that they are all match sharp now so let’s just go for it from the off rather than take it easy and let players miss the first few games in order to fully recover.

It seems to be a genuine dilemma for other managers who left some of the World Cup players out in the early weeks of the season. I remember being surprised that we selected such a strong team on the opening day - from memory trippier was the only one of the England/Belgium lads not involved at Saudi Sportswashing Machine?


Sitting on my porcelain throne using Fapatalk
 
GPRD81 said:
Forgive me I’m hypothesising without any real knowledge of how physical conditioning works or the actual state of our squad but my theory is that in July when all the World Cup players were returning late to pre-season Poch May have come to the conclusion that they are all match sharp now so let’s just go for it from the off rather than take it easy and let players miss the first few games in order to fully recover.

It seems to be a genuine dilemma for other managers who left some of the World Cup players out in the early weeks of the season. I remember being surprised that we selected such a strong team on the opening day - from memory trippier was the only one of the England/Belgium lads not involved at Saudi Sportswashing Machine?


Sitting on my porcelain throne using Fapatalk
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Surely, after a well planned pre season, all of the players in the squad were match sharp from day one?
 
galeforce said:
Surely, after a well planned pre season, all of the players in the squad were match sharp from day one?
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Agreed. That sounds logical but how often have we taken half a dozen games to get into flow? (usually after buggering about with signings in/out on transfer deadline day 3/4 games in!)


Sitting on my porcelain throne using Fapatalk
 
GPRD81 said:
Agreed. That sounds logical but how often have we taken half a dozen games to get into flow? (usually after buggering about with signings in/out on transfer deadline day 3/4 games in!)


Sitting on my porcelain throne using Fapatalk
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Indeed, but we had a core of players either not at, or back early from the WC, we didn’t sign anyone, the 11 for the first month should have picked itself and shouldn’t have included anyone from the knock out stage of the WC imo.
 
galeforce said:
Indeed, but we had a core of players either not at, or back early from the WC, we didn’t sign anyone, the 11 for the first month should have picked itself and shouldn’t have included anyone from the knock out stage of the WC imo.
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that would have cleaned out half the squad
 
galeforce said:
Indeed, but we had a core of players either not at, or back early from the WC, we didn’t sign anyone, the 11 for the first month should have picked itself and shouldn’t have included anyone from the knock out stage of the WC imo.
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If we had left out all players who progressed through to World Cup knock out stages out strongest xi would have been:

Vorm/Gazzaniga
Walker-peters
Foyth
Davies
Aurier
Wanyama
Winks
Sissoko
Lucas
Lamela
Son (who went to Asia Cup after first game anyway)

Subs: n’koudou, Llorente +kids.




Sitting on my porcelain throne using Fapatalk
 
GPRD81 said:
If we had left out all players who progressed through to World Cup knock out stages out strongest xi would have been:

Vorm/Gazzaniga
Walker-peters
Foyth
Davies
Aurier
Wanyama
Winks
Sissoko
Lucas
Lamela
Son (who went to Asia Cup after first game anyway)

Subs: n’koudou, Llorente +kids.




Sitting on my porcelain throne using Fapatalk
Click to expand...

Exactly
 
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