[Albion] At least we're 'too good to go down'

dazzer6666 said:

Not quite right. ‘We’re not one of the three shittiest teams in the division so we’ll probably be ok’

Not ‘too good’, more ‘just not quite as shit as the others’.

It’ll be better next season [emoji6][emoji6]

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DavidinSouthampton said:

What gets me is the seeming assumption from some on here that if we had a better manager who was more attack minded we would be challenging for the top four.

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e77 said:

We are in a relegation scrap every season up until the stage we either have enough points not to be or are relegated.

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Mo Gosfield said:

Correct.
It doesn't matter how long we stay in the PL, 3 years, 5 years, 10 years, we will never be established. There are only seven teams 100% guaranteed to be in the PL, season after season. The rest have to fight like crazy to get points on the board. We may, if we are lucky, have one season where we get off to a flier, like Watford, B'muff and Wolves this season and Burnley last. We are always going to be competing with 8 or 9 teams to avoid relegation and with those odds, we will do well to last 5 years.

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erkan said:

It's just a stupid phrase though, isn't it?

At the moment the industry experts give us a roughly 10% chance of being relegated. I'd pretty much go along with that - although as an optimist my instinct says the real likelihood is smaller...

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dwayne said:

Yes we were brilliant first half. Some of the gross , propper interplay was immense. People have forgotten that due to the worst half of football of the season in the second!!



Sent from my SM-G950F using Tapatalk

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father_and_son said:

Bookies odds are not the true probability of things happening... otherwise, for a start, it would all add up to exactly 1. There is a chance that the bookies believe that we are too good to go down, but want to attract some bets on us doing so, so that they can make some money..

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Not Andy Naylor said:

but have we got the leadership on the field?

Dunk and Duffy lead by example, throwing themselves in front of shots, although that didn't seem to have rubbed off an the players standing watching them as Cardiff scored their winner. Bruno exudes calm and organises the defence.

But who issues a bollocking when a teammate isn't doing the business? Who reminds Jose that he's allowed to pass instead of shoot? Who calms everyone down when we're under the cosh and keeps them trying to pass the ball rather than wellying it anywhere in blind panic? Who's prepared to make himself a bit unpopular with his teammates to make sure we get a result? Fist-shaking is seen as old-fashioned and too British in some quarters these days but I think anyone who has played at any level would agree that there's a place for it at the right moment

Mullery always used to say that Brian Horton was his manager on the field, but who is CH's? Ryan maybe, as Stockdale was, but his position limits his effectiveness there. Duffy? Perhaps Sidwell was the nearest thing before his injuries...

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Boroseagull said:

There's a resume of the lower placed teams in the Premier League in today's Telegraph - nothing startling in the conclusions.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/footbal...ague-relegation-battle-open-race-years-going/

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SAC said:

I wasn't able to read it without signing up. Are you able to summarise?

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Boroseagull said:

Don't know if this will work - but here goes;

Telegraph Sport Football
Premier League relegation battle: the most open race for years, so who's going down?
Save
Mark Hughes, Wilfried Zaha, Matt Ritchie, Claudio Ranieri
It's all to play for at the bottom of the table CREDIT: GETTY IMAGES/REUTERS
Alistair Tweedale Ben Bloom
27 NOVEMBER 2018 • 10:33AM
Follow
While it's looking increasingly likely that we will be watching a two-horse race for the Premier League title this season, the battle at the bottom is about as open as it's has ever been.

Just one point separates Crystal Palace in 16th and last-placed Fulham, and every team up to Wolves in 11th will be glancing nervously over their shoulders.

So, at the 13-game mark, who is in the most trouble in this season's relegation battle, and who is well set to turn things around.

Wolves
11th, 16 points

Good signs
Already have points on the board and have put in some really positive performances against big teams, including Manchester City, Arsenal and Tottenham. Wolves have a hugely talented squad and plenty of players capable of cutting it at this level. It's a dangerous thing to say but they do really look too good to go down.

Bad signs
Wolves' recent form is a slight concern. One point from a possible 15, culminating in Sunday's 2-0 defeat to Huddersfield, means they are on this list. But only just.

Manager safety
Nuno Espirito Santo has done a marvellous job and is going nowhere.

Survival chances
9/10. It would be a real shock if they were to get dragged into the mix at the bottom.

Brighton
12th, 15 points

Good signs
A great manager who so clearly knows what he is doing and the players trust in him as a result. In Glenn Murray, Brighton have the Premier League's third-highest scorer this season, and their defence is more secure than many of their relegation rivals.

Glenn Murray acknowledges the crowd after a Brighton match
Glenny Murray should score enough goals to keep Brighton up CREDIT: PA
Bad signs
If Murray is missing, the goals dry up, and at 35 years old he can't play 90 minutes in every single game. They also have 15 points already, and a significant cushion between themselves and the drop zone.

Manager safety
Solid as a rock. Chris Hughton is the man for Brighton.

Survival chances
8/10. Brighton could still be sucked into a scrap at the bottom but their start to the season suggests they have enough to avoid that. Should be looking up rather than down the table.

Newcastle
13th, 12 points

Good signs
Three wins a row have seen Newcastle shoot up the table, but as Rafa Benitez said after Monday's win at Burnley, his side "have to keep winning games" as they are still very much in the mix.

They now have confidence and momentum behind them, having beaten three tricky opponents, and in Kenedy they have a player who can create chances from next to nothing. Their defence looks solid, too, with only three goals conceded in their last five games and 16 shipped all season.

Bad signs
Goals still look hard to come by. 45 per cent of their goals this season have come in their last three matches, and centre-back Ciaran Clark is their joint-top scorer.

They still don't have a goal-scorer leading the line, even if Salomon Rondon ended his drought in the win over Bournemouth, and will probably have to rely on clean sheets to keep them out of trouble.

Newcastle United's Ciaran Clark and Mohamed Diame celebrate after the match
No Newcastle player has scored more Premier League goals this season than centre-back Ciaran Clark CREDIT: REUTERS
Manager safety
Benitez is adored on Tyneside and rightly so. He'll be staying as long as he wants, something that Mike Ashley is testing by refusing to back the Spaniard in the transfer market.

Survival chances
7/10. Decent enough survival chances given recent form. They do have a tough Christmas, facing Liverpool and Manchester United before Chelsea in early January, but that shouldn't derail them.

West Ham
14th, 12 points

Good signs
As ever, the theory goes that West Ham should have the quality of personnel to keep them in the Premier League. Possessing the likes of Marko Arnautovic, Felipe Anderson and Jack Wilshere gives them the type of class lacking among many other teams in the bottom half of the table and it has clicked a few times this season - most notably in the 3-1 win over Man Utd.

Bad signs
A frustrating lack of consistency. Defeats against the top six are to be expected, but going down at home to Bournemouth and Wolves, while losing at Brighton does not give fans much confidence. Their poor record at the London Stadium shows how their ground still feels a long way from home.

Manager safety
Manuel Pellegrini only took charge at the start of the season and the hounds have been kept at bay with a drip of points accrued every few weeks. He looks to be in no immediate danger, but a poor run could see him under real pressure come the new year.

Survival chances
8/10. Logic suggests there should be three teams worse than them.

Huddersfield
15th, 10 points

Good signs
They are absolutely flying right now. Take only recent form into account and David Wagner's side would be flying high with the big boys at the top of the table after wins over Fulham and Wolves in recent weeks. Those wins have seen them climb off the foot of the table to the safety of 15th.

Bad signs
Go back to the start of November and they looked to be dead and buried already with just three points from their opening 10 fixtures. Even with the four goals scored in their past three matches, they have only found the net eight times this campaign - a Premier League low.

Manager safety
There is an acceptance that the club is operating on a different level to most others in the Premier League and thus Wagner is in little danger of the sack. He remains hugely well-respected having kept them up last season and will be given time to try and repeat the feat.

Survival chances
4/10. Tricky to know whether this recent form will last, but it's going to be difficult to survive again.


Crystal Palace
16th, nine points

Good signs
Draws at Old Trafford this weekend and against Arsenal a few weeks ago were both good results, and Palace might well have won on both occasions. They also have a better defence than any of the teams around them, with Wayne Hennessey improving in goal and 21-year-old right-back Aaron Wan-Bissaka looking a fine young player.

Bad signs
They just can't score enough goals. Eight for the season is a woeful tally and that is at least in part because they don't have any fit and firing centre-forwards. There have been a number of games this season where wingers Wilfried Zaha - on whom they still rely far too heavily - and Andros Townsend have started up front. They need Christian Benteke back (and scoring) but that doesn't look like it will happen too soon.

Manager safety
The fans are starting to grow impatient with Roy Hodgson, who often waits far too long to make substitutions, but it isn't entirely clear that there is a better alternative out there. They wouldn't want another Sam Allardyce, while they have been scarred by a risk like Frank de Boer. The result is that Hodgson will probably stay for the foreseeable future.

Roy Hodgson and Wilfried Zaha on the touchline at Old Trafford
Can Roy Hodgson and Wilfried Zaha turn Crystal Palace's season around? CREDIT: GETTY IMAGES
Survival chances
5/10. Every year Palace flirt with relegation but things always work out in the end. They need to start scoring if they are to escape this time, and right now their hopes hang in the balance.

Burnley
17th, nine points

Good signs
Burnley finished seventh last season - they were in the Europa League for goodness' sake - so surely they can't go from that to relegation. The group of players who achieved that feat last campaign have largely remained intact and it is easy to forget the club did so despite going 11 games without a win before triumphing in five consecutive matches. They have been in tricky situations before and know how to fight their way out.

Bad signs
Last year was undoubtedly an over-achievement, so this may well be Burnley reverting to type. A defence that was so solid in 2017/18 has become worryingly leaky this time around, with 27 goals already conceded - the second most in the league. Recent defeats against West Ham and Newcastle do not bode well.

Manager safety
As the second-longest serving Premier League manager, it would be a radical call to ditch Sean Dyche just because things are looking dicey. The club have stuck with him before when relegated and been rewarded by an immediate return to the top flight. He is not going anywhere in the immediate future.

Survival chances
6/10. Burnley have been here before in recent years and the end result has gone both ways. It will be close.


Southampton
18th, eight points

Good signs
This is now Southampton's seventh successive season in the Premier League and they have finished in the top half in four of them. There are some serious players knocking around the club - players who are a cut above Championship level. Even with things looking as bad as they currently do, a feeling remains that a new manager can swiftly turn the season around.

Bad signs
Southampton's last league win was way back on September 1. Mark Hughes has an appalling win ratio of five victories from his 24 games in charge. They have not won a game at home this season. They lost 3-2 to Fulham at the weekend. In short: it is not hard to see bad signs.

Manager safety
Hughes is done for. Southampton face Manchester United, Tottenham and Arsenal among their next four league matches. It will be a huge surprise if he survives them.

Survival chances
5/10. Hughes will surely be dismissed imminently and then it all depends on what the new man can do. Another manager could (or should) get more out of these players.

Cardiff
19th, eight points

Good signs
Given this particular writer suggested Cardiff might challenge Derby's record-low Premier League points tally of 11, that Neil Warnock's team are already on eight this season could be an indication they are performing above expectations, or more likely, that they are far better and far more effective than many gave them credit for. Goals haven't been too hard to come by, and they have given both Tottenham and Chelsea decent games away from home.

Bad signs
Cardiff remain severely limited, and while they play to their strengths, they don't have a Premier League quality squad. In fact, they barely have any Premier League quality players.

Manager safety
Neil Warnock has done astonishingly well to get Cardiff to the Premier League and to this stage of the season still in touching distance of safety. He won't be sacked.

Survival chances
1/10. There simply aren't three teams they will finish above.

Fulham
20th, eight points

Good signs
Having recently replaced Slavisa Jokanovic with Claudio Ranieri - and won their first game under the new man - there is hope at Craven Cottage that a new manager 'bounce' will be enough to save them. They have so much attacking talent and in Alexsandar Mitrovic they have a forward who could hit 15 goals this season. That could be what keeps Fulham up.

Aleksandar Mitrovic of Fulham celebrates scoring the winning goal during the Premier League match between Fulham FC and Southampton FC
Fulham got back to winning ways in their first match under their Claudio Ranieri CREDIT: GETTY IMAGES
Bad signs
They are bottom of the table, have conceded 33 goals already and the win on Saturday was against the only team who look more clueless than they do. The defence just looks all over the place and their hopes probably rest on whether Ranieri can plug the holes at the back.

Manager safety
Presumably pretty safe given he has only just joined, but clubs at the bottom have been known to sack two managers in a season before, so he will need to prove hiring him was the right call.

Survival chances
3/10. So hard to call given they have a new manager, but given what we've seen so far, their defence could be their undoing.

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dazzer6666 said:

Best price 12/1

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Giraffe said:

Only value there is Southampton I'd say. Look doomed to me.

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Mike Small said:

Reckon we'll finish above Cardiff but who else? Huddersfield have more spirit and will beat us next weekend, Fulham score, Burnley will sort it out, Palace are Palace, West Ham have a lot of quality, Benitez will get Newcastle up the league. Maybe Southampton but when Hughes goes shortly - they'll have a bounce again. We've been dreadful since Newcastle.

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Icy Gull said:

“If Murray is missing the goals dry up”

That’s bollocks though, he missed two games , one was City where we weren’t ever going to get anything and the other was Newcastle and we won 1-0

We have no idea if the goals would dry up because the other forwards haven’t been given a run

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durrington gull said:

Can’t rely on Loco based on what we’ve seen - Andone hasn’t got goals in his career so perhaps we get someone in January??

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