We have seen this exact type of performance more often then not this season, it’s nothing new, we have lacked energy and fight in nearly all matches I can remember, both in the EPL and CL. I can’t remember a game we controlled for long periods at all this season, yes we have a couple of games where they decided to give it their all, I.e., the Liverpool game, but they are the outliers, and they are because the emotions take over and the crowd get them going, anyone who thinks they are our ’level’ are kidding themselves. Yesterday is our current level. We are only in 6th position due to pure luck. We should have actually lost a lot more this season and comfortably be in the bottom half of the table. The commentators kept going on about Brentford losing 14 of the last 18 games, that could easily have been us.
Why is this? For me it’s everything.
Ownership - Accepting mediocrity in performance and professionalism. They give underperforming managers and players far too long to ‘turn’ it around as they are happy with the business side.
Terrible recruitment - I don’t think anyone could argue against this, we have been far too scattergun in our approach.
Player Management - We seem to always have ‘reported’ issues with someone in the squad and the managers.
Coaching - Must be non existent as we put in the most horrific displays and haven’t played like a cohesive team in years. We are the worst coached team in the league by far and make every team we play look like prime Barca.
Players - Either simply not good enough for the level we are aiming for (not their fault, we bought them) or are but can’t be bothered because they aren’t ‘happy’. Also we have a lot of senior players in the squad, they need to take some responsibility on the pitch and ‘manage’ the team and mould them into a unit. They don’t do this and just look bemused that things are going so badly.
We have a lot of issues from top to bottom, they have been there for years and it will take time to sort it all out. My hope is INEOS will not accept this level of performance and professionalism and move fast to cut out the rot.