Dean Smith - Confirmed

[danno]

Dean used to be the West Midlands Chess Champion when at school. Evidence of a highly strategical mind.

Jack is our Queen, can move everywhere. Mings our castle, a fortress. McGinn our bishop, great diagonals. Martinez our knight, great leap. Lots of pawns.

Barkley is our King. Only moves a bit. 

Brilliant.

[Risso]

Dean used to be the West Midlands Chess Champion when at school. Evidence of a highly strategical mind.

Jack is our Queen, can roam everywhere. Mings our castle, a fortress. McGinn our bishop, great diagonals. Martinez our knight, great leap. Lots of pawns.

Barkley is our King. Only moves a bit. 

We should sign Souček, he could be our Czech mate.

[Bobby Boy]

Dean used to be the West Midlands Chess Champion when at school. Evidence of a highly strategical mind.

Jack is our Queen, can roam everywhere. Mings our castle, a fortress. McGinn our bishop, great diagonals. Martinez our knight, great leap. Lots of pawns.

Barkley is our King. Only moves a bit. 

We should sign Souček, he could be our Czech mate.

Tish Boom!

[Risso]

The last ten games have seen us average a point a game, which after a great start to the season is really disappointing, and in terms of points extrapolated over a season is staying up by the skin of your teeth territory. We're also back to giving up c.20 shots a game, which is the problem we had all season up until the break last year. Given how much the first team has improved, what's gone wrong?

[ChicagoLion]

The last ten games have seen us average a point a game, which after a great start to the season is really disappointing, and in terms of points extrapolated over a season is staying up by the skin of your teeth territory. We're also back to giveing up c.20 shots a game, which is the problem we had all season up until the break last year. Given how much the first team has improved, what's gone wrong?

Lazy team selection and stubbornness.

[Ian.]

The last ten games have seen us average a point a game, which after a great start to the season is really disappointing, and in terms of points extrapolated over a season is staying up by the skin of your teeth territory. We're also back to giving up c.20 shots a game, which is the problem we had all season up until the break last year. Given how much the first team has improved, what's gone wrong?

Deano winning manager of the month in December.

[CT]

Dean used to be the West Midlands Chess Champion when at school. Evidence of a highly strategical mind.

Jack is our Queen, can roam everywhere. Mings our castle, a fortress. McGinn our bishop, great diagonals. Martinez our knight, great leap. Lots of pawns.

Barkley is our King. Only moves a bit. 

We've definitely played better at knight this season.

[Drummond]

The last ten games have seen us average a point a game, which after a great start to the season is really disappointing, and in terms of points extrapolated over a season is staying up by the skin of your teeth territory. We're also back to giving up c.20 shots a game, which is the problem we had all season up until the break last year. Given how much the first team has improved, what's gone wrong?

11 Points from last 10 matches.

Losses to Man City (isn't everyone) Man Utd (typical), Burnley (how the fuck did that happen?), West ham (great run in Chumps League places), and Leicester (doing really well). The only one to be really disappointed with would be Burnley in my view though West Ham potentially too.

Draws to Chelsea (not bad really), Brighton (the form team other than Man City).

Wins against Newcastle (quite right too), Southampton (good result that), and Arsenal (another positive result).

Chelsea - D
Man Utd - L
Man City - L
Newcastle - W
Burnley - L
Southampton - W
West Ham - L
Arsenal - W
Brighton - D
Leicester - L

I don't think those results look to bad in the context of where we finished last season and in the way we're developing. Over the course of the season, we're doing better than we would probably have expected to, but it's a shame our earlier really promising form has dropped off a bit.

[aj2k77]

We haven't freshened things up at all. Players naturally go through peaks and troughs performance wise. We've stuck rigidly to the same formation and same players pretty much through thick and thin. If it's Leicester at home after they've had a midweek game in Europe or Brighton away after a week off we approach the game in exactly the same manner.

We need a little more nuance to our approach and we need to rotate out of form players.

[SoccerHQ]

Too loyal to certain players currently.

Not sure if he's star strucked by Ross Barkley or there's some clause in the loan deal he has to play but he really needs to come out of the team now so I'd be amazed if the midfield isn't freshened up now and it really has to given who we play next.

I get we're trying to ease in Sanson in slowly but this isn't some 18 year old kid, he's played at top level in France and europe for many years so well overdue a start and perhaps we'll see Ramsey at Leeds too.

It may not work but the regular 11 has hit the wall currently.

[eamonn]

Is he intimidated by Barkley? He's probably the most high-profile player he's ever managed (Jack is different as he came through the ranks and we were a Ch'shit club when Dean took over).

[Drummond]

Is he intimidated by Barkley? He's probably the most high-profile player he's ever managed (Jack is different as he came through the ranks and we were a Ch'shit club when Dean took over).

No, and Terry and Shakespeare won't be either.

[dave.woodhall]

As has been said before, if you loan a player then there is an understanding that if you don't play him you haven't as much chance of getting another loan from the same club (and before anyone says how terrible it is that we're doing what Chelsea want how low have we fallen, that's the current reality). Plus, managers sometimes fancy, or don't, a player, as we saw with Lansbury, who was given every chance before he got binned.

[danno]

We changed personnel and formation a bit last season, desperately trying to find any combination that could get us points.

It's understandable after getting 36 points he's reluctant to change things too much, but I think it must be time now. We've underwhelmed for a few weeks.

[Risso]

As has been said before, if you loan a player then there is an understanding that if you don't play him you haven't as much chance of getting another loan from the same club (and before anyone says how terrible it is that we're doing what Chelsea want how low have we fallen, that's the current reality). Plus, managers sometimes fancy, or don't, a player, as we saw with Lansbury, who was given every chance before he got binned.

I really do hope that our chances of future success aren't based on Chelsea loaning us any more players. It was fine when we were in the Championship needing to get out, and excusable this season taking a chance on Barkley, but next year will be our third year back, so I hope that we'll just be looking to buy the players we need to continue to improve. By my reckoning they us more than we owe them anyway, after paying some of Drinkwater's wages last year, and now doing the same with Barkley.