Realistic 22/23 expectations

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Personally I’ll be a tad disappointed to finish out of the top 10.
Yes, we struggled massively last season but when you factor in the midfield we had, and the number of centre back pairings we played, it wasn’t a massive surprise. Add in a manager for the majority of the season who most of the fan base were majorly against.

Defence is solid now, as is midfield. If DCL can somehow manage to stay fit he’ll grab goals and we should pick up plenty of points. We’re 11th now (albeit having played a game more than a number of teams) but that’s with no win in the first 6 games and following a run of 3 defeats against some of the better sides. We also had Rondon/no striker for a number of those games.

I’m looking upwards!!!
 
Personally I’ll be a tad disappointed to finish out of the top 10.
Yes, we struggled massively last season but when you factor in the midfield we had, and the number of centre back pairings we played, it wasn’t a massive surprise. Add in a manager for the majority of the season who most of the fan base were majorly against.

Defence is solid now, as is midfield. If Dominic Calvert-Lewin can somehow manage to stay fit he’ll grab goals and we should pick up plenty of points. We’re 11th now (albeit having played a game more than a number of teams) but that’s with no win in the first 6 games and following a run of 3 defeats against some of the better sides. We also had Rondon/no striker for a number of those games.

I’m looking upwards!!!

It's a competitive league and we could easily lose a few on the spin as seen in recent weeks. Top 10 is defo possible but so is struggling in the bottom half.

The main thing for Lampard is to have us well away from a relegation scrap. Fortunately for him that'll be seen as progress, which is a nice position for a manager to be in. I see there's already West Ham fans calling for Moyes to be sacked. Happy there's very little appetite for that with our fans. We are desperate for stability.
 
10th is the best we can realistically hope for in the Prem this season. We still don't have the squad depth to do better than that over 38 matches.

We do have the potential to get to a cup final if the draw falls kindly for us, but there's too much luck involved there to get excited about it.
 

After the weekend results everyone from 8th are looking over their shoulder’s. There are just so many average teams to predict this season’s outcome.
 
Think top half would be an excellent season and probably largely would depend on DCL staying fit and/or quality reinforcements in January.

TBH I’d just be happy for us to stay up comfortably, which would demonstrate progression from last season. Anything else is a bonus at this stage.
 
I'll be fine with any sort of season which doesn't involve us being involved in the scrap at the bottom end

Think any expectations above that might be unfair given what happened last season

Next season I'll want a bit more than that
 
Might they have been holding back some dough over the summer as they weren't able to get in any top targets through the doors? In the end we desperately needed literally anybody with decent PL experience and got Maupay on the relative cheap.

Would love us to have realigned our needs over the last few months and get a striker in early doors in January. Can even be either a up and coming attacker or a proven but slightly past his prime one on a two year deal - obviously not like Rondon who was never good enough even in his prime which was about five years ago.

That said, there are 9 more points available until the window and it's three very difficult games: Few points from that and we could genuinely be bottom three going into 2023 as we're 4 points off bottom as we speak. That would require instant action in the window to avoid a repeat of next season.

If we could get 7 points then I think we can forget about a relegation fight and look at a comfortable mid table finish, in which case it wouldn't be as urgent to go out and get a striker in a famously difficult transfer window.

The next three games will be very, very telling.

In relegation zone or within 3-5 points of it by January 1st = desperately need a striker and probably a winger asap or it's likely we'll be in a relegation fight

Fulham, Brighton, Brentford and Newcastle all doing much better than anticipated and they are teams we should be finishing above comfortably with this squad.

West Ham and especially Leicester you'd expect to fly to the table, which leaves us in a precarious position if we cannot get significant more points per game than we have so far.
 
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If DCL stays fit I reckon we will finish top half. If not I reckon 12th/13th. He's so important to us whrn it comes to sticking the ball between the pegs.
 

Somewhere between 10th and 14th, I think that would be a decent season considering where we were when Lampard came in. He inherited a club with a number of players who did not have the stomach for a fight, a squad with no confidence, a fractured back room set up and a diviided and demoralized fan base.
 
I’d just like to put a couple of mini-runs together. We’re unlikely to finish top half, but we’ve got a more solid foundation to build on.
It would be good to string a few wins and draws together and quickly amass points so we’re not in trouble at the tail end of the season, rather than a win, false hope and some demoralising defeats and terrible performances.
 
It could really go any way at the moment; if DCL picked up another injury tomorrow then we can basically rule out more than maybe a point from the next three games total, which would probably leave us going into January and 2023 in the relegation zone.

If he stays fit and the team continues to gel, then we can pick up good points before World Cup (9 still to play for) and go into the new year with optimism, looking upwards instead of nervously over our shoulders.

Given our points per game ratio without DCL this season, it would be incredibly naïve, potentially even suicidal for the club, for us to not be looking to strengthen up front as a matter of priority at the turn of the year. If we went down, we'd have one chance only to avoid moving into Bramley Moore as a Championship club.

So right now I find it impossible to predict how the season will pan out. Do I trust Thelwell and the board to deliver a striker at the start of January? Not at all. Am I confident DCL will be fit to start 75% of the remaining games? I'd put that at about 50% chance at best. It really is that simple: Get a striker and not be reliant on one player, and we don't need to worry about the bottom half of the table this season.

If we neglect to do that, one single injury could relegate us. We could finish anywhere from 7th to 20th still at this point, although I'd put our chances of a finish somewhere towards the top end of that as significantly higher than at the bottom end.
 
Anything but a relegation battle will be an improvement and that's all that matters. Think we're easily top 14 without any hassle of being dragged into it. If things go right though there's no reason we couldn't end up top half. Newcastle looking like the only non-"Big 6" side that look to be in good standing and will probably finish 7th, anything after that is up for grabs in my opinion and no reason why we couldn't challenge for it.

Constant progress under Lampard and Thelwell is what matters though, we desperately need some stability and if we can continue to grow and improve, even if slowly, then we'll be in a far better state heading into BMD and hopefully in good standing financially too after that with no more silly spending like we have in the past.
 

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