[Albion] Are you OK with TB’s long term ambitions for the Albion?

Westdene Wonder said:

We could improve but if we try to play attacking attractive football in our present league we will be destroyed so the choice is a very defensive rather boring very defensive system or a flowing attractive style in the Championship

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I disagree. It's not a binary choice. Leicester played good football. Bournemouth play good football. You don't have to be Stoke under Pullis. I'm not in a rush or expecting to win the league but in time I hope we can entertain and be in the Premier league

Westdene Wonder said:

We could improve but if we try to play attacking attractive football in our present league we will be destroyed so the choice is a very defensive rather boring very defensive system or a flowing attractive style in the Championship

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Palace play smart counter attacking football. It can be done with pacey forwards and that suits CH who gave us that in the Championship. But we need some squad improvements to enable that.

The PL as we know it will have ceased to exist in 10 years. Look around Europe, how many 1- and 2-team leagues are there?

England are a best-case scenario.
Bundesliga -- FC Bayern sewed it up by March.
Ligue 1 - PSG up by 20 points.
La Liga -- 3 teams, two of which are nailed on every year.
Serie A -- Two-team league, occasionally enlivened by scandal.

The Super-League is inevitable.... when it happens, it changes everything.

We will never win the premier league, our ambitions should be to stay in the Premier league and a cup final, if we win a cup final then enjoy Europe!

He didn't say 17th forever. I'm sure the aim will be to be somewhere in the 7th/8th down to 17th bracket forever. There will be seasons we flirt with better and seasons we flirt with worse, but if we stay up forever I'd be delirious!

I got my first season ticket as a kid in the 80s. Since then there have been years when I don't have one, mostly coinciding with years when it was the same ol' same old. If each year is the same I get bored and need a break because it feels like going every other week is a routine, almost an obligation, taking a season or two off refreshes my enjoyment and I get back into it. It's why I don't get too worried about relegation (a change of scene, a largely different list of opponents for the season, change of competition and expectations) and it's what is for me as a fan a big part of the fun of promotion (again, new opponents, new competition, different expectations).

It is a personal worry that our long term aims are almost looking for a sort of monotony. So if we achieve those aims, I risk getting bored and wanting a season or two off (though hopefully such monotony would mean others would be drifting in and out and getting a season ticket again would be possible, should I get to that point). But the premier league has changed. It is no longer a case of largely the three promoted get relegated. This has had a levelling effect, which is good for championship clubs and newly promoted sides - greater chance of staying up, but this is at the risk of more established lower and mid table sides now no longer being automatically safe every year. Villa, Stoke, West Brom, Sunderland, Newcastle, West Ham to varying degrees would have considered themselves the sort to be safely mid-table, but all have been relegated in recent years.

It's only really the top six that can be confident of staying up long term. The rest of us are all likely to get relegated at some point in the next 10-15 years. So maybe the monotony won't be an issue.

But as a club, as owners, I think their approach shows a spot on realism about the club's standing in football and the reality of the premier league right now, and I hope it frames all if their decisions (e.g. not rush to fire a manager if we're struggling, or even if we go down - depending on why we struggled/went down, of course).

I’m sure West Brom, Stoke & Swansea fans would settle for that outlook right now

The history of the Premier League is littered with clubs who got too far ahead of themselves and paid the price. Four of the team who have been in the biggest trouble this season (the relegated three and Stains) are living examples of that.

Nothing wrong with being a club whose sole purpose is to be in the PL season after season. It's a lot better than the alternative could be, look at Sunderland or Blackpool.