I wouldn't include Leeds, but I do think for us to survive we might need to drag another team into the mix. Everton or Brentford are good candidates. They're the only teams outside the bottom 4 currently below us in the form table. Unfortunately, Everton have some really kind fixtures coming up, where no result benefits us: Villa (H), Newcastle (A), Leeds (H), Southampton (A), as the next 4, with Newcastle (H) and Burnley (A) still to slot into the schedule. I think it'll be interesting if Everton fail to pick up form over those games, their end of the season is awful. Final 10 fixtures involve visits to Spurs, West Ham, Liverpool, Leicester, Arsenal and home games Wolves, United, Chelsea. They have games vs Palace, Brentford and Watford that look like their best hopes of wins. Brentford's end to the season looks slightly kinder than ours, Watford and Newcastle's fairly similar. Burnley have a tough run of games now, and then their postponed fixtures to rearrange are all tough games. Going to be tough for them playing Sat-Tues for several weeks with a thin squad, and tough midweek fixtures. They're a little fortunate that it's mostly home games that need rearranging.
I was thinking Brentford have a chance of being dragged back into the relegation mix, because they had a good start, but not many points recently. We needto keep getting the points though to drag other teams into the dogfight
Everton lose again. Saw an interesting point about them earlier. When Benitez came in it was intended to be a long-term project, remaking the club the way he wanted it. So they sacked scouts and basically anyone in charge of transfers because Benitez wanted control. That's seriously backfiring now, they badly need players but have no manager, no head of recruitment, a tight FFP situation, and no time with the window shutting soon. Do you sign players you've no idea if the manager wants? And who signs for a managerless club who like they're headed for a relegation battle? If you're a manager, do you join a club knowing that you'll have no time to assess the squad before making signings, or may not get any new players at all? You're likely stuck with a squad Benitez failed with, without many underutilised players you might be able to use better to boost performances? Everton's bench today has very few options, Iwobi is at AFCON, Delph injured, and Tom Davies back in 1-2 months, it's not like there's anybody else to come back and improve the squad, or anyone not on the pitch today who you look at and think could step up.
Norwich 21/22 Premier League record with Billy Gilmour: W:1 D:2 L:9 Norwich 21/22 Premier League record without Billy Gilmour: W:3 D:2 L:5
That's probably a slightly unfair stat. We have had a bit of luck in the last two games. Two OG's and two of our goals yesterday marginal decisions that have gone against us on VAR before now. Not wishing to take anything away from either Sargent or Smith, these have been two massive results in six pointers. I think that our next game will be the crucial one. Win that and we really are back n the game.
Thought this might interest some of you. The host can be a little grating at times but Tifo put out some interesting football content on youtube. This one is with Michael Bailey, obviously talking about Norwich, filmed before the Everton game so it’s a bit doom and gloom still.
I generally really like Tifo, but it felt like they tried to cover too much ground at times, and letting MB loose on the tactics board didn't go too well. Would have loved JJ to elaborate on why he rates McLean so highly as to put him alongside Pukki and Aarons as our best players. I mean, Farke and Smith clearly rate him, but the reviews from journalists and the fans have been much less positive. What are we missing? Don't think it's just JJ's Scotland-bias, he clearly doesn't rate Hanley despite him being our best CB this season.
JJ is an Aberdeen fan. McLean was a big player for the Dons in the seasons immediately prior to our recruiting him.
I enjoyed watching that because it shows how simplistic most punditry is, especially given our two wins since then, scoring 5 goals to one against, taking us out of the relegation zone. The analysis of our players and tactics was pathetic and glib. McLean was picked out because he played at Aberdeen and Hanley wasn't because he has played all of his football in England since 2008 when he left for Crewe at 16. This is also why I don't value Paddy Davitt's subjective player ratings, preferring the more objective WhoScored ratings. Bailey confirmed my doubts about his ability to analyse what is going on at City and how the model works. The tactics board was just a muddle of half baked opinions. We get better analysis on here. Painful as they were, the games against Palace and West Ham with a decimated squad showed the new direction Smith was taking, with Idah coming into the lineup and emerging as a viable option with a a 7.5 rating in the 2-0 loss to West Ham. When we beat Everton fairly comfortably that change in Idah was finally recognised on MotD, but other than that there was little change in attitudes towards us. The Watford game showed our new potential even more clearly and demonstrated that we are not yet 'f*cked'. We're out of he relegation zone for now and there's still a lot to do, but there's also hope again.
For what it’s worth, our relegation/survival betting odds have climbed: on average they roughly give us a 25% chance of survival now. I’d say that sounds about right, my non-scientific gut feeling is it’s around 20%. If we can’t get some momentum and particularly a point or two from one of the big sides to give us some real belief, the chances will climb further.
Michael Bailey has no pretensions to tactical analysis. When his articles for The Athletic encroach on that territory, he recruits the assistance of one of his tactician colleagues. You could see he was uncomfortable when invited to use the tactics board.
Yeah I think we're going to need some points from unexpected places to manage it really. 16 games to go... Key home games to come: Palace, Brentford, Burnley, Newcastle (+9 points) These are all must-wins, 6 pointers, etc. A loss is incredibly damaging, but I think it's improbably we win all 4. Key away games to come: Southampton, Leeds, Leicester (+3 points) Our only other games against bottom half sides, assume a point from each, or one win. That would take us to 28 points, probably 5-6 short of target. With 9 more fixtures to try and gather points from. Italics where I think we stand a chance of something: Man City, H Liverpool, A Chelsea, H Brighton, A United, A Villa, A WHU, H Wolves, A Spurs, H Maybe 2-3 points from all of those fixtures, to give us 30-31 for the season?
I don't agree that the OGs were "a bit of luck". As is often (rightly) said, in many cases you make your own luck through good play. Both OGs were instances of that, created by the quality of Sargent's cross and Idah's pull back and the pressure on the defender to react created by the Canary threat behind him.
Yes, in having the ball played there with runners (not just an isolated Pukki chasing lost causes) the defenders didn't know who was around them and stuck out a leg to try and cut out the cross.
I agree, and it shows the advantage of our current attacking strength with Pukki, Idah, Sargent and Rashica all carrying a scoring threat, thus suddenly 5 goals in two games. Normann should be available soon to add to that, though Smith suggested we'll not have the 3 strikers against the big teams. As for the upcoming games, I don't see Palace as a 6 pointer, but it is important for the points and to keep the run going. There's also a chance that Spurs will be 'on the beach' by then, so there could be points and I think there will be one or two upsets against the others.
The Palace game is important, I think, because with Man City & Liverpool to come after, if we lose to Palace we could well be plum bottom with 16 points after 25 games, having played more than all of our rivals. A win over Palace might keep us off the bottom and would certainly keep us looking competitive even if we are back in the bottom three after the Liverpool game.
Definitely true of the last goal against Watford. If the defender doesn't touch it, it's a tap-in for one of our players (I think Rashica).
Probably fair comment. That third one at Watford was running through to Sargent for a hat trick. On the night I wouldn't have put money on him missing it.
In the highlights you can see the keeper moving towards the middle of the goal because of the threat if the ball got past the defender. I think that was also the case for the Everton og.