Patience, our time will come again, hopefully.

[Costello 77]

11 minutes ago, Lichfield alien said:

We peaked in the early 90s...we will never be that good again..luckily for me I was at my best age when we wer good..goin to palace in with a shout of winning the top division..sorties into Europe..cup finals etc..I realised at the time..this is as good as it gets...just accept it then you won't be as angry when we lose a few

Nobody cares what you think.

 

WTF!?

WTF!?

WTF!?

[Lichfield alien]

2 minutes ago, Costello 77 said:

Nobody cares what you think.

 

WTF!?

WTF!?

WTF!?

 

2 minutes ago, Costello 77 said:

Nobody cares what you think.

 

WTF!?

WTF!?

WTF!?

The 3 nuggets certainly don't 

[Plonk]

My first season was 69-70. We got relegated in typical Wednesday fashion. Went through the depressing seventies. Went to Wembley for the centenary tournament as it was going to be the only chance to see my team at Wembley. 

Then four trips to Wembley in one season and going to Europe and thinking this is how it would always be.  Only for it all to go to boobies up.

its what watching your teams about. If you want trophy’s go and go and watch one of the” big clubs” whichever it is this year ( saw a fat count in a city shirt this week)  but that’s not what it’s about is it really.

Enjoy the good times when they come. Shake your head and despair at the bad times, but you will always be wednesday.

[ReluctantNicko]

Unless SWFC get a mega-rich owner like Wolves, the Premier League is likely to be out of reach for many more years. It's 18 long years since top-flight football and 14 for Leeds.

 

For both clubs, fans will have to be patient.

[Aingarth]

23 hours ago, Treborowl said:

A few 'elite' clubs, namely Liverpool, Manchester United, Arsenal and latterly Man. City and Chelsea are continuously battling  each other for honours while the rest of us also-rans feed off the scraps.

They constantly rebuild and improve, never sitting on hands and waiting for a good team to grow old before replacing it.

Lucky them.

The rest of us, without the money success brings, have to battle on in hope of one day getting it just right and putting out a team good enough to challenge the elite.

It has been done;

In my 50 years of supporting Wednesday I've seen two successful, exciting teams;

The one begun by Big Jack and finely tuned by Wilko. Some would say not great to watch, boring long balls etc. Not in my view; I loved 'em all; Sterland, Varadi, Bannister, Chapman and the rest.

They were usurped though by the team built by Big Ron and honed by Tricky Trev. We won the Rumbelows cup and narrowly lost to Arsenal in two cup finals. Now that was a team to watch. Legends, all of them.

But it's all been said before on here before so I move on.

To back up what I'm trying to say, here are a few examples of clubs who've managed to upset the odds and actually win something;

 

Champions:

Derby, 1972 champions, managed by Clough and Taylor.

Forest, champions in 1978 under Clough and Taylor then went on to win the European cup twice!

Villa, champions in 1981, European cup winners the following year.

Everton, won it in 1985 with Howard Kendal's school of science.

Leeds United, twice champions, under Revie in the late sixties and Wilko in 1992.

Blackburn Rovers in 1995 with the dream combo of Sutton and Shearer.

Leicester city in 2016, when that Vardy fired 'em to the top.

 

It can be done!

 

The cups offer an even better chance for success; FA cup winners in my time include Sunderland, Coventry and Wigan.

We've won a cup too.

 

So, SWFC, are you going to get it right once more in my lifetime?

We're competing with 20 or 30 others and we can't all be winners but,

 

Hope springs eternal.

Probably the greatest team in my lifetime was that if 1961 where, but for an outstanding Spurs, would have been champions. But your critical comment is”are you going to get it right once more in my lifetime”. As someone who will be 70 later this tear and who has been going to watch since 1955, I am starting to doubt that. I thought we had a great chance the last two seasons and we fluffed it. Every year now it is getting more difficult. 

[trevdi9]

been sucked in since 1957 who knows whether we will do owt , but for the youngsters who have seen  bugger all then I hope if we do  it comes to fruition soon and gives them sommat to look forward to

 

 

[Geedee]

We are so far behind that it will take a miracle to repeat the early 90's level. 

 

Sadly in reletive terms to the 'elite' clubs we are a lot smaller club now. 

 

[Animis]

5 minutes ago, Geedee said:

We are so far behind that it will take a miracle to repeat the early 90's level. 

 

Sadly in reletive terms to the 'elite' clubs we are a lot smaller club now. 

 

 

I think this is partly true.

 

The (also rans) teams who are battling it out for the scraps are coming at this from different positions and backgrounds. 

 

Some. like Bournemouth, Watford, Burnley etc, will enjoy the ride of mid-table PL stability with few expectations.

 

Most of the others, like Leeds, Notts Forest, Newcastle, Everton, Villa, SWFC etc, all have historical, and fan-base pressure to achieve success and achieve it now!

 

This is the risk and challenge of the owner-chairman who take on these clubs - how to manage the expectations.

[dorian gray]

On 12/04/2018 at 10:57, Treborowl said:

A few 'elite' clubs, namely Liverpool, Manchester United, Arsenal and latterly Man. City and Chelsea are continuously battling  each other for honours while the rest of us also-rans feed off the scraps.

They constantly rebuild and improve, never sitting on hands and waiting for a good team to grow old before replacing it.

Lucky them.

The rest of us, without the money success brings, have to battle on in hope of one day getting it just right and putting out a team good enough to challenge the elite.

It has been done;

In my 50 years of supporting Wednesday I've seen two successful, exciting teams;

The one begun by Big Jack and finely tuned by Wilko. Some would say not great to watch, boring long balls etc. Not in my view; I loved 'em all; Sterland, Varadi, Bannister, Chapman and the rest.

They were usurped though by the team built by Big Ron and honed by Tricky Trev. We won the Rumbelows cup and narrowly lost to Arsenal in two cup finals. Now that was a team to watch. Legends, all of them.

But it's all been said before on here before so I move on.

To back up what I'm trying to say, here are a few examples of clubs who've managed to upset the odds and actually win something;

 

Champions:

Derby, 1972 champions, managed by Clough and Taylor.

Forest, champions in 1978 under Clough and Taylor then went on to win the European cup twice!

Villa, champions in 1981, European cup winners the following year.

Everton, won it in 1985 with Howard Kendal's school of science.

Leeds United, twice champions, under Revie in the late sixties and Wilko in 1992.

Blackburn Rovers in 1995 with the dream combo of Sutton and Shearer.

Leicester city in 2016, when that Vardy fired 'em to the top.

 

It can be done!

 

The cups offer an even better chance for success; FA cup winners in my time include Sunderland, Coventry and Wigan.

We've won a cup too.

 

So, SWFC, are you going to get it right once more in my lifetime?

We're competing with 20 or 30 others and we can't all be winners but,

 

Hope springs eternal.

i'm afraid what you speak of is of a 'time gone by' 

the prospects of a side getting promoted to the top table and winning the division at the first shot are now very much a distant dream, SURVIVAL is the season's target for the 'new boys'.

take the league cup, or whatever it's called at present, the big guns can send out their reserves and still make the semi's.

it's beyond consideration that man. u, could be relegated to the second tier as we saw them.

but there is nuggets in what you post, wilko (is he still the last englishman to win the top fight title?) had us playing to our strengths, and a number of sides certainly didn't like our all out approach.

i remember when our promotion season started, pundits claimed that our 'all action' style would fail once the 'heavy grounds of winter' came. i thought to myself how can we get bogged down in m/f when the ball is 20 yards above them? is was a pisspoor argument from the 'knowalls'. 'footballing' sides got bogged down in the sludge, and allowed our hungry m/f to get in among them.

eventually it was undermined by the 'dinosaur football' brigade who generally had an interest in a club who just been turned over on their own turf, until picked up by our own supporters who 'wanted better', and as the saying goes 'an empire is brought down from within'

blackburn showed us that a side can have success if they build their strength down the spine of the team, top class keeper, good central defence, good competitors in the m/f and a vicious attack, i'd personally add to that the best winger you can afford (and with age on his side).

for me i'd give jos his pre season and take stock of what we have, the if we're not knocking on the door look at what we need to make us so?

however, in a 'whatever it takes' scenario of that coming time, there's a kick in the b*llocks for many of you, there's only one man in our level of football who i believe strongly can achieve that success, as he does so more frequently than others do. so get some practice in by sucking a lemon. 

[Treborowl]

On 4/13/2018 at 10:07, Andrew Robinson said:

Probably the greatest team in my lifetime was that if 1961 where, but for an outstanding Spurs, would have been champions. But your critical comment is”are you going to get it right once more in my lifetime”. As someone who will be 70 later this tear and who has been going to watch since 1955, I am starting to doubt that. I thought we had a great chance the last two seasons and we fluffed it. Every year now it is getting more difficult. 

I was only 6 or 7 in 192 so too young appreciate that team, but I'm aware of Vic Buckingham's record as a manager.

Alan Brown was the first manager in my memory - he took us to near glory in '66 then we suffered the disastrous Danny Williams and it's been up and down ever since!

[dorian gray]

15 hours ago, Treborowl said:

I was only 6 or 7 in 192 so too young appreciate that team, but I'm aware of Vic Buckingham's record as a manager.

Alan Brown was the first manager in my memory - he took us to near glory in '66 then we suffered the disastrous Danny Williams and it's been up and down ever since!

i don't think williams was totally to blame, team funding, or rather a lack of it was a serious blunder.

[thewookieisdown]

Some of this discussion is conflating two separate questions. The first is can we expect another period when for a while we are one of the best teams in England genuinely competing for trophies. Even before the revolution of the past fifteen years, that was the exception not the norm for us, but we were there in the early 60s and early 90s, and to an extent in the mid 80s. (In all cases a position of strength was squandered by low quality Boards). Can that come again?

 

The second is can we get into the premier league and become something of a fixture.

 

To which the answers seem to be

 

(a) highly unlikely. And for sure anything that happened prior to about 2005 is an irrelevance. Football's not like that any more. 

 

(b) why not. Hope springs eternal. 12 points from 6 games is excellent form in anyone's book. Next season is hard to call but I certainly wouldn't rule out a play off campaign

[BC1867]

Can’t see it OP. Thanks to FFP and Premier League TV sponsorship money the game has become a de facto franchise with fewer and fewer clubs being eligible to play and more importantly stay in the top flight.

 

Unless you have a very special manager and a unique transfer policy (Wolves represent this with their links to a major agent; we half-arsed it regrettably), I don’t think you stand a chance of breaking in that group. 

 

Sadly, I think we’ve blown our beans on relatively pony players. Can only hope Luhukay is able to radically shuffle his pack with a couple of inspired frees and he becomes the exceptional coach he has (at least so far) shown no signs of being. But I’m not hopeful.

[the monk]

On 12/04/2018 at 15:42, asteener1867 said:

I understand where you are coming from mate...but............. "patience"???....not actually heard that one before

Seem to remember you once describing patience as waiting for a bus.....

Classic 

[ReluctantNicko]

On 4/14/2018 at 09:27, Animis said:

 

I think this is partly true.

 

The (also rans) teams who are battling it out for the scraps are coming at this from different positions and backgrounds. 

 

Some. like Bournemouth, Watford, Burnley etc, will enjoy the ride of mid-table PL stability with few expectations.

 

Most of the others, like Leeds, Notts Forest, Newcastle, Everton, Villa, SWFC etc, all have historical, and fan-base pressure to achieve success and achieve it now!

 

This is the risk and challenge of the owner-chairman who take on these clubs - how to manage the expectations.

 

 

Also-rans and mid-table PL stability? Burnley are on the verge of qualifying for Europe!!! They may finish above Arsenal this season. Their defence is better than that of Liverpool, Spurs, Chelsea and Arsenal.

Edited April 15, 2018 by ReluctantNicko

[Costello 77]

2 minutes ago, ReluctantNicko said:

 

 

Also-rans and mid-table PL stability? Burnley are on the verge of qualifying for Europe!!! They may finish above Arsenal this season. Their defence is better than that of Liverpool, Spurs, Chelsea and Arsenal.

Yes...and good for them!

The overall trend is for 5/6 teams lapping at the cream tho.

WTF!?

[ReluctantNicko]

Cardiff spent a lot to go up in 2012/13 but look like going back up again this time on a shoestring budget.

[nevthelodgemoorowl]

Maybe sooner than one may think. This year/season, perhaps more than any before complaints regarding lack of competition in the Premiership are a growing phenomenon. So much so that 12 to 14 teams regard their season as being a relegation slog before a ball has ever been kicked. Yeah the money, but such vast amounts just to stand still. It will be interesting to see if the West Brom yoyo strategy holds good next season.

 

In the mean time the Premiership is into new ways of tarting things up as though they have invented a brand new game.

• Most prem goals
• Most goals as a sub
• most points gained from being behind
• most points dropped from being in front.

All getting a bit irksome really; Well it will be when the title is owned by Manchester City as early as December.

 

The game would be better and stronger if equality were introduced as a matter of principal. 25 man squads aren't any use what so ever if squads of 40 + players are deprived the opportunity to show their skills; The top 6 clubs being the biggest culprits. 

[Animis]

11 minutes ago, ReluctantNicko said:

 

 

Also-rans and mid-table PL stability? Burnley are on the verge of qualifying for Europe!!! They may finish above Arsenal this season. Their defence is better than that of Liverpool, Spurs, Chelsea and Arsenal.

 

Burnley have been excellent for four years now under Dyche - they hardly get a mention and as you say to be pushing an Arsenal team, albeit one who are underperforming, is a tremendous achievement.

 

However, they are an exception, and I'm sure their fans would settle for mid-table year-on-year. 

 

Normally the pressure is how to improve on this, but i suspect Dyche, because of the fans and club owner's expectations, will be given time if they finish 12th next season. 

[NYCOWL]

I rarely watch PL these days, I haven’t watched a CL game in years.

 

It occurred to me a few years ago that watching the champions league is like cheering when a banker gets a bonus.

 

The thing is designed to take the game further and further away from the likes of us. 

 

It’s Wednesday and not much else for me these days.