Top Four Possibility

[davek]

Swansea turned down a 30 mil bid from a Chinese club, how much did you want Everton to pay 40-50?

A nonsense story. If a PL club like Everton had come in for him the player would have pushed for it.

 

[davek]

Was offside for their goal, tough one for the Linesman to call because of the distance it travelled, but he was defiantly offside

Well we cant argue with dodgy decisions on the night can we?

 

[Barnfred 55]

We are in with an outside chance. United are stumbling again and Liverpool look shot to me. We need City to keep being inconsistent.

Hi mate.

I made a post in the Koeman thread just over a week ago. It was a direct response to being asked whether I thought we could finish top 4 this season.

The short answer was, as a direct result of our very poor run in the autumn, No! If we were to stand any chance at all, then we couldn't really afford to draw any further games as 1 point returns wouldn't be sufficient.

So we would have to make a decision to be brave and "go for it" during the final 20 minutes of matches that are hanging in the balance (i.e.drawing or losing by a narrow margin). Now by "going for it", we are of course putting ourselves more at risk of losing the game too, which is a brave decision to make.

At the time of the post we had 16 games remaining. Assume that 6 of these games would fall into that category, and we win half of them, that would give us 9 points as opposed to 6 points if we held out for draws. if we won 4 of them, obviously we would get 12 points. It's a high risk strategy but could also be high reward. Even if we only win 2 and lose 4, we are no worse off.

However, it would take a completely different mind set of both the management and the fans for this to happen. Nobody likes to lose. We sometimes grudgingly accept a draw, but a defeat is always hard to take, even against the teams we should possibly expect to lose against given the resources available to both clubs. So the natural fall back position for most teams is to make sure you don't lose first, and go for the win second.

I didn't think that Koeman was the type of manager to throw caution to the wind. Last nights game was a prime example of this. The game was in the balance with 20 minutes left and RK could have thrown Valencia on and gone 2 up top. But he didn't. Plus, when he made the Holgate change at half time, he could have made a more positive change, but he put McCarthy on, which showed his priority was to not lose.

I'm not being critical of RK here, he is playing the percentage game and, over a season, that is probably the way to go. What I am saying is, if we wanted to seriously have a go at finishing top 4 THIS season, we have to be prepared to take more risks in the last 20/30 minutes of these type of games. But by doing so, we have to accept that we will lose more matches too.

 

[MrGrumpy]

A nonsense story. If a PL club like Everton had come in for him the player would have pushed for it.

its not, there windows open for another month, they have bid 30 mil and Swansea have rejected it. We would have to have paid at least 40mil to get him, if they will even sell him for that

 

[JonS]

Hi mate.

I made a post in the Koeman thread just over a week ago. It was a direct response to being asked whether I thought we could finish top 4 this season.

The short answer was, as a direct result of our very poor run in the autumn, No! If we were to stand any chance at all, then we couldn't really afford to draw any further games as 1 point returns wouldn't be sufficient.

So we would have to make a decision to be brave and "go for it" during the final 20 minutes of matches that are hanging in the balance (i.e.drawing or losing by a narrow margin). Now by "going for it", we are of course putting ourselves more at risk of losing the game too, which is a brave decision to make.

At the time of the post we had 16 games remaining. Assume that 6 of these games would fall into that category, and we win half of them, that would give us 9 points as opposed to 6 points if we held out for draws. if we won 4 of them, obviously we would get 12 points. It's a high risk strategy but could also be high reward. Even if we only win 2 and lose 4, we are no worse off.

However, it would take a completely different mind set of both the management and the fans for this to happen. Nobody likes to lose. We sometimes grudgingly accept a draw, but a defeat is always hard to take, even against the teams we should possibly expect to lose against given the resources available to both clubs. So the natural fall back position for most teams is to make sure you don't lose first, and go for the win second.

I didn't think that Koeman was the type of manager to throw caution to the wind. Last nights game was a prime example of this. The game was in the balance with 20 minutes left and RK could have thrown Valencia on and gone 2 up top. But he didn't. Plus, when he made the Holgate change at half time, he could have made a more positive change, but he put McCarthy on, which showed his priority was to not lose.

I'm not being critical of RK here, he is playing the percentage game and, over a season, that is probably the way to go. What I am saying is, if we wanted to seriously have a go at finishing top 4 THIS season, we have to be prepared to take more risks in the last 20/30 minutes of these type of games. But by doing so, we have to accept that we will lose more matches too.

I do hate draws but I guess you're right in that if by taking risks in the final 20/30 minutes we won one game and lost one game, we would have more points on the table than by drawing both of them.

Against that though, there is the negative affect a defeat can have on morale and future performances.

On balance therefore I prefer the not too much risk approach and to keep it tight while at the same time still look to score and nick one if we can

 

[Barnfred 55]

I do hate draws but I guess you're right in that if by taking risks in the final 20/30 minutes we won one game and lost one game, we would have more points on the table than by drawing both of them.

Against that though, there is the negative affect a defeat can have on morale and future performances.

On balance therefore I prefer the not too much risk approach and to keep it tight while at the same time still look to score and nick one if we can

I'm not saying this should be our policy Jon, just saying this would have to be the culture we adopt for the rest of this season if we were to have any chance of finishing top 4. RK showed yesterday that he isn't prepared to take those risks all the time, but I would imagine he would take a different approach if it were still 1v1 against Bournemouth this weekend with 20 minutes remaining. The basis for this is a 1v1 draw away to Stoke would be more acceptable to fans than a 1v1 draw at home to Bournemouth.

I think the bigger issue would be the fans accepting the larger number of defeats. I think the players wouldn't be overly concerned with the odd additional defeat brought about by playing riskier football. Think most are intelligent enough to understand the consequences of the higher risk strategy. The danger would be if we sustained a run of defeats which would effect confidence. But I don't see this happening as I'm only talking about adopting this strategy late on in what would probably be a small percentage of games.

 

[bluestevon]

A point away to Stoke was decent. My point is that it's not the sort of result you need when you have pretensions of muscling into the group of teams above us.

Same could have been said about United drawing there last week though mate and there top 4 chances.

 

[bluestevon]

I'm not denying any of that. I just dont think Holgate was the problem. The decision to play the way we did was the problem - he set him up on a collision course with a very canny and athletic player like Arnautovic which he was unlikely to win.

Thing is mate, until last night Holgate had shown no problem when dealing with better players so to naysay after the event is a bit snide, because against arsenal and city he was superb against players with a lot more cannyness and athleticism than aunautovic

 

[Steve0]

We are in with an outside chance. United are stumbling again and Liverpool look shot to me. We need City to keep being inconsistent.

City have been resurrected by Jesus. Think tottenham could implode again though.

 

[ToffeeTim]

We have absolutely no chance of 4th and only a tiny glimmer of hope to get 6th.

 

[Foot Long Hot Dog]

We have absolutely no chance of 4th and only a tiny glimmer of hope to get 6th.

Unfortunately THIS ^

 

[NilSatisOptimum]

City have been resurrected by Jesus.

Looking like a good nailed on prediction to me.

 

[Brennan]

We have absolutely no chance of 4th and only a tiny glimmer of hope to get 6th.

That's nonsense, particularly the comment about 6th when we're only five points off.

 

[ToffeeTim]

Unfortunately THIS ^

It gives me no pleasure whatsoever. All we can do is hope someone slips up and we sneak 6th.

 

[LEONARD]

If we beat Stoke tonight, were only 7 points off 4th and given the recent form of the sides ahead of us apart from Chelsea, is 4th place achievable as currently were the most inform team in the league.