Hope you're right.

7 minutes ago, Plastic Goat said:

Hope you're right.

I think the upcoming transfer window will be slightly different to last summer.  We have more depth now so it will be about adding to what we've got to put us over the top.

I agree, I was massively disappointed in the transfer window when it closed. In hindsight it was probably better than I thought at the time, specially considering we only had £10m to cover those positions. However you can also if we had brought in even one more established forward it could have been enough to get those extra 5-10 points that would have got us into the play offs. 
 

On the other hand we could still finish above Coventry who spent £40m in the summer, so we probably have done better than it seems.

Still some of the goals we’ve gave away are nothing to do with transfer windows, it’s not even just that we made the odd mistake, we made the same mistakes repeatedly and seemed to take multiple games to iron them out. Game management can bring in a similar amount of extra points as a slightly better forward who gets an extra 4 or 5 goals, the hull game for example, if we’d have warnocked it for 5-10 minutes and just weathered that storm we could have took the 3 points. It’s the championship, you can’t play perfect football all the time sometimes you have to get down and dirty.

21 hours ago, BoroWales said:

I was there - however I was sat 50 metres away from the Boro fans, behind the goal in the family stand.

My 9 year old wanted to sit with his mates.

I have to say the Boro fans were outstanding all game.

Also, a mate of mine lives in Penarth, posh little town outside Cardiff, bus loads of Boro fans stopped there before the game for a beer and a song; he said they were awesome.

well done all.

UTB

Boro fans spread sunshine wherever they go!

13 hours ago, Changing Times said:

I don't feel disappointed in the sense that I don't believe this squad is better than where we've finished, if you see what I mean.  I think we're finishing roughly where we'd have expected to.  This isn't really the right thread for it but where I do have disappointment it's in relation to the two transfer windows where I felt we've set ourselves up to not quite be good enough.  And that in turn is where my frustration comes from with regards to this season.  Everyone is bouncing at the moment because we're on a strong run, and as it's close to the end of the season then thoughts naturally turn to the next one, and if we carry this form through next season then we'll be this or that.  However, 11 games is just that really, it's a nice run of form but 46 games gives you a better idea of what you are, and what we are is not quite good enough.  The hope that everyone has is that we've gone a little backwards to go a lot forwards, and this strong run reinforces the belief that things are going to plan.  But we've also all seen teams finishing a season strongly and not then kicking on at all in the next one so there's no guarantee of that.  But yeah I'm not disappointed because to me we are where we should be.  Every team around us can point to games that they 'should' have won and so on but it's about getting it done, and we haven't this season.  So in the summer we will hopefully improve ourselves from a 60-70 point team just not quite good enough for the play offs to a 80+ points team with a good shot at winning promotion.

Yeah kind of agree with that. Last summer we brought in quite a few projects and hopefully we can keep hold of players like VdB and Latth who have really acclamised to the league now while Engel and Bangura will have made some valuable experience too. Add to that the keeper situation is sorted and the middle kind of too with Hackney and Azaz and also right wing with Jones. And we have decent defenders coming back in Fry and Lenihan. So if we can keep those players, because we've already made that big sale i Rogers, and then add a few key players like proper DM another quality forward then I see no reason why we shouldn't be able to take an sxtra step and at least get into the playoffs. Maybe a LW if McGree is leaving. A bit more luck on the injury front goes without saying, but every team would like that 🙂 

13 hours ago, Changing Times said:

I don't feel disappointed in the sense that I don't believe this squad is better than where we've finished, if you see what I mean.  I think we're finishing roughly where we'd have expected to.  This isn't really the right thread for it but where I do have disappointment it's in relation to the two transfer windows where I felt we've set ourselves up to not quite be good enough.  And that in turn is where my frustration comes from with regards to this season.  Everyone is bouncing at the moment because we're on a strong run, and as it's close to the end of the season then thoughts naturally turn to the next one, and if we carry this form through next season then we'll be this or that.  However, 11 games is just that really, it's a nice run of form but 46 games gives you a better idea of what you are, and what we are is not quite good enough.  The hope that everyone has is that we've gone a little backwards to go a lot forwards, and this strong run reinforces the belief that things are going to plan.  But we've also all seen teams finishing a season strongly and not then kicking on at all in the next one so there's no guarantee of that.  But yeah I'm not disappointed because to me we are where we should be.  Every team around us can point to games that they 'should' have won and so on but it's about getting it done, and we haven't this season.  So in the summer we will hopefully improve ourselves from a 60-70 point team just not quite good enough for the play offs to a 80+ points team with a good shot at winning promotion.

I've no issues with the last two transfers windows. We've stuck to our plan and not over extended ourselves. As a club without parachute payments and tight FFP, we have to be diligent in the way we go about things. There are times where we're going to have to gamble but given where we were with are poor start and the relative strength of the league, i thought it was diligent to stick so to speak. It gives us room to have a real run at things next season. There are no guarantees, absolutely right but we've played out of our skin since the middle of February to get to where we are and we're still someway off the play offs, which for me at least demonstrates why we made the right choices in January.

23 hours ago, Plastic Goat said:

Agree entirely. We shot ourselves in the foot so many times this season. Even with our ridiculous amount of injuries we could easily have made the playoffs. Unfortunately defensive frailties have never been a priority.

pretty much everyone is not consistent outside of the top 4, everyone outside of them positions have performed as typical different degrees of inconsistent championship clubs and we are one of that pack this season 

 

easy to pick a few results against the very worst of teams, that start ruined everything where we had just forced lots of new players into the team and was clear that inbetween that and some key injuries we had a team that didn't know each other and performed as such.

some of Carrick's worst mistakes for me were made at this point, maybe his hands were partly forced at that point but he changed from his previous tactic of keeping a steady team that almost picked itself - where even if you were new and better than what we had you had to be slowly brought into the team, and several people were forced in from the start, if I remember it seemed that when we started to get the results back we had pretty much gone back to as much of last years line up as we could at the time.

if we did this from the start where we not forced to bring the new lads in gradually we should of picked up more points during that bad run, people like mcgree having to fight for his place for the likes of silvera (who had got the nod from the start) was even without hindsight a huge error I think on carricks part. the way he played when he did bring him back makes me think we would of picked up a few more points during that spell at the least. too many fishes out of water during that bad run for me.

38 minutes ago, Humpty said:

I've no issues with the last two transfers windows. We've stuck to our plan and not over extended ourselves. As a club without parachute payments and tight FFP, we have to be diligent in the way we go about things. There are times where we're going to have to gamble but given where we were with are poor start and the relative strength of the league, i thought it was diligent to stick so to speak. It gives us room to have a real run at things next season. There are no guarantees, absolutely right but we've played out of our skin since the middle of February to get to where we are and we're still someway off the play offs, which for me at least demonstrates why we made the right choices in January.

If we'd signed a striker in Jan on loan and he did a reasonable job, would we have seen ELL break through in the way that he has? He might have been in and out of the team like he was at the beginning of the season and never got that run going. We would have let the striker (example keifer Moore) go back to his club and we'd be at square one in terms of trying to find a first choice striker. 

It was a blessing in disguise imo. Now we know what latte lath is about we can focus on getting someone who compliments him rather than replaces him. 

29 minutes ago, Rob said:

that start ruined everything where we had just forced lots of new players into the team and was clear that inbetween that and some key injuries we had a team that didn't know each other and performed as such.

some of Carrick's worst mistakes for me were made at this point,

I think you can give Carrick a fair amount of leeway for the beginning of the season. It is clear that he sticks to the same 11 day in, day out if he can, sometimes to the detriment of keeping a player fresh over a whole 46 game season. One of the silver linings of our injury crisis is that many of our players are actually at peak levels right now due to the limited number of games they've played.

The mistake he made that I am worried about was his thinking against Leeds. The way we set up to attack them was idiotic as was picking Dijksteel to go up against Summerville. For me, that looks like he's learned nothing about when his favoured tactics don't work. Even against Cardiff, we could almost as easily have lost that game 4:3 as won it. 

 

2 minutes ago, Bruce said:

I think you can give Carrick a fair amount of leeway for the beginning of the season. It is clear that he sticks to the same 11 day in, day out if he can, sometimes to the detriment of keeping a player fresh over a whole 46 game season. One of the silver linings of our injury crisis is that many of our players are actually at peak levels right now due to the limited number of games they've played.

The mistake he made that I am worried about was his thinking against Leeds. The way we set up to attack them was idiotic as was picking Dijksteel to go up against Summerville. For me, that looks like he's learned nothing about when his favoured tactics don't work. Even against Cardiff, we could almost as easily have lost that game 4:3 as won it. 

 

Do you think he would have made those decisions vs Leeds if we were still in the play off race? I don't. I think he plays how we played vs Leicester. I think the element of freedom of not having anything to play for made him go "let's see if we can play our preferred game plan against one of the big boys and see how we do" and see what it tells us about what we need to do for next season. 

I could be wrong of course but that's how I viewed that game. 

19 minutes ago, Neverbefore said:

Do you think he would have made those decisions vs Leeds if we were still in the play off race?

Personally, yes. Before the match, the public statements he was making were that we had to win and needed to go for it. I think one of the players said something similar afterwards. I think he though this was the best way to win the match. As other teams have shown, it was exactly the wrong way to do it. We all know that Carrick ball doesn't work when we try it against teams who are stronger going forwards than us.

Leeds last 5 matches are won 1, drawn 1, lost 3. Goals scored 5 (4 of them against us). 

Leeds against us, less than 30% possession. Leeds against QPR, 61% possession.

It was the combination of setting up to attack Leeds combined with putting Dijksteel, who even at his best is rusty after timeout, against their best player.

Pretty much a cardboard copy of how we managed to get tonked by Chelsea and that worries me more than the start of the season. I feel that against Leeds, Carrick showed no signs of having improved as a manager. Maybe a one-off but still.

 

45 minutes ago, Bruce said:

I think you can give Carrick a fair amount of leeway for the beginning of the season. It is clear that he sticks to the same 11 day in, day out if he can, sometimes to the detriment of keeping a player fresh over a whole 46 game season. One of the silver linings of our injury crisis is that many of our players are actually at peak levels right now due to the limited number of games they've played.

The mistake he made that I am worried about was his thinking against Leeds. The way we set up to attack them was idiotic as was picking Dijksteel to go up against Summerville. For me, that looks like he's learned nothing about when his favoured tactics don't work. Even against Cardiff, we could almost as easily have lost that game 4:3 as won it. 

 

I understand (and like) the idea of sticking with the same starting lineup as much as possible, but think the coaching staff (and physios?) need to do a better job of monitoring the players and recognising when they need a break.

Some players will keep going until they break down - out of pride, worry about losing their place in the team, whatever - and sometimes they need to be rotated out for their own good.

Of course freak injuries can and do occur out of nowhere, but I do wonder how many of ours were down to fatigue or niggles where players should have been rested? Was really concerning to hear some lads were being given injections to get through matches.

 

As for tactics, I think we have to accept the club has chosen to go with an attacking philosophy. With a high quality squad like we had in Carrick's first season, we were able to run riot most of the time. I think that set the blueprint in the minds of Gibson and the rest of the management.

Even with a fairly modest squad we've managed to have a decent season overall, in spite of horrendous injury problems and an awful first few games. There will always be some teams where we come undone, if we don't adapt, but if we end up getting promoted that way, I don't think there will be too many complaints.

Edited April 29, 20241 yr by AnglianRed

2 hours ago, Bruce said:

The mistake he made that I am worried about was his thinking against Leeds. The way we set up to attack them was idiotic as was picking Dijksteel to go up against Summerville. For me, that looks like he's learned nothing about when his favoured tactics don't work. Even against Cardiff, we could almost as easily have lost that game 4:3 as won it. 

 

I understand the thinking behind the Dijksteel selection. He had three realistic options:

1. Play Dijksteel

2. Play Howson at right back.

3. Play a back three and drop Jones into a right wing back role.

 

Option 2 wasn't really an option. Matching Howson up against Summerville and losing him from midfield was unacceptable. Option 3 was feasible but it meant changing back to a system that Carrick clearly doesn't favour in order to accommodate one player. Dijksteel is naturally athletic so i suppose there was a thought that you match up some of Summervile's main attributes by selecting Dijksteel. In hindsight his rustiness was too big a factor. I certainly don't think it was idiotic as there's reasoning behind it. In reality we were actually a couple of better refereeing decisions away from getting a result.

4 hours ago, Neverbefore said:

Do you think he would have made those decisions vs Leeds if we were still in the play off race? I don't. I think he plays how we played vs Leicester. I think the element of freedom of not having anything to play for made him go "let's see if we can play our preferred game plan against one of the big boys and see how we do" and see what it tells us about what we need to do for next season. 

I could be wrong of course but that's how I viewed that game. 

Dont agree with this, he clearly still was pushing to stay in the play off race hence why Dieng was rushing up for set pieces before stoppage time had even started. It was idiotic defending (dijksteel and Clarke) plus an idiot linesman that cost us rather than tactics.