Now he's settled in is Hughton doing that much better than Hyypia?

[Icy Gull]

Genuine question. We are harder to beat but less likely to win

To me it's looking like the problem is the quality of players we have.

I am not optimistic about the rest of the season and I think Hughton plays pretty negative football. If you remember with Hyypia in the first few games, at least we showed attacking intent even if we did ship goals.

The end result is not that different at the moment...

 

[The Optimist]

Genuine question. We are harder to beat but less likely to win

We only won one of the last eighteen games under Hyypia so I don't think we're less likely to win.

 

[KZNSeagull]

I am not surprised we were defensive minded last night - we did ship 3 sloppy goals against Forest after all. He is probably not entirely sure yet what his best team is, but he will have a much better idea after last night. Also other than Tex, our creative players are either injured, returning from injury or new to the squad, which does not help.

For Saturday, I would like to see Ince, Holla and Kayal playing together (the latter 2 can pick a pass), with Baldock back if fit, or CMS if not, with O'Grady in place of Bruno/Calde, JFC and Best

 

[Diablo]

At least he has picked Ince,COG seems better but Nothing much.
At Charlton it was two poor Teams...It seems a blip against Ipswich..but now Mediocrity resumed..

 

[scooter1]

Harder to beat is a good starting point, but looking at last nights team sheet where was our attacking threat(other than Tex). Kayal is still settling in, March and Baldock are injured and KLL was on the bench for 70 odd minutes. I expect CH to dip into the loan market, but my fear is we don't get offered anything better than we have

 

[Thunder Bolt]

Harder to beat is a good starting point, but looking at last nights team sheet where was our attacking threat(other than Tex). Kayal is still settling in, March and Baldock are injured and KLL was on the bench for 70 odd minutes. I expect CH to dip into the loan market, but my fear is we don't get offered anything better than we have

Motivating the players will help. KLL couldn't have looked more disinterested if he'd tried, for the 20 mins he was on the field.
I don't see the fight for a relegation scrap in our team.

 

[Mo Gosfield]

Hyypia...18 pts from 22 games...average per game ( 0.82 )....end of season.....38pts....Relegated.
( Jones 4 pts from 2 games.....you can do the maths )
Hughton...8 pts from 6 games....average per game ( 1.33 )....end of season.....61 pts....Comfortable survival.

I can still see the problems we have but Hughton will keep us up.

 

[Mo Gosfield]

Before I get shot down in flames...I know...I did the Hughton projection over the whole season....If projected over the last 16 games we get 51 points. ( Tight....but lets hope for a bit more improvement )

 

[Foul Play Rocks]

Just as I was going to get my flamethrower Lol. I agree that it will be tight and please let's hope we get better.

 

[Tony Meolas Loan Spell]

Getting in Hughton gave us a fighting chance at least. If Sami was still here AND LETS NOT FORGET THE BOARD TRIED TO GET HIM TO STAY (read into our ambition there) then we would be ROOTED to the foot of the table.

 

[el punal]

Genuine question. We are harder to beat but less likely to win

To me it's looking like the problem is the quality of players we have.

I am not optimistic about the rest of the season and I think Hughton plays pretty negative football. If you remember with Hyypia in the first few games, at least we showed attacking intent even if we did ship goals.

The end result is not that different at the moment...

The best quote that describes the difference between the two managers - " Hyypia is an idealist, Hughton is a realist."

Hyypia came in with plans to transform the team into playing his brand of football (whatever that was). Unfortunately for him, and the Albion fans, it never came to fruition. Either the players wouldn't, or couldn't, play to his system or tactics. The result was a downward spiral of bad results, bad performances and complete lack of confidence all round. There never seemed to be a Plan B. The nadir of all this was the debacle against Millwall where Hyypia really did look like a dead man walking.

Hughton comes in and straight away there is an upturn in confidence (granted that wonderful win at Fulham under Nathan Jones helped). Players who were dire over the previous three months were suddenly performing positively. I would imagine Hughton's remit was simple - stop the club from being relegated. So in his reign so far we have seen wins against Charlton and Ipswich (superb), an unlucky defeat to Brentford, a sloppy one to Forest, and an unexpected one to Blackpool. The second half display against Arsenal showed wonderful commitment.

Then, last night a pragmatic 0-0 draw away to Cardiff to gain a point. This was a game that under Hyypia we could have easily lost.

So to sum up, yes some of the players are not consistent or up to the standard required. I think Hughton realises that,and despite that, I am confident that he'll take us to the end of the season with a bit of momentum and the chance to rebuild the squad in the summer. Says me, the eternal optimist!

 

[Tony Meolas Loan Spell]

I would imagine Hughton's remit was simple - stop the club from being relegated.

Basically this. The board ****ed up BIG TIME by keeping Sami in for so long.

 

[el punal]

Basically this. The board ****ed up BIG TIME by keeping Sami in for so long.

Yep! You're probably right on that on that one. Hope it won't cost us at the end of the season.

 

[deletebeepbeepbeep]

Just look at the options up frfront, Mourinho would find it difficult to get us scoring.

 

[Icy Gull]

Just look at the options up frfront, Mourinho would find it difficult to get us scoring.

This is my biggest worry, we don't have ANY goal scorers in the squad, COG is a good hold up man but he doesn't have the pace or the guile to beat Championship defenders very often. other than that Baldcock, maybe, but he seems to be a sick note. Colunga gone, CMS, yeah right! Best, we will see but I'm not expecting much from this journeyman.

When a central defender is your top scorer at this stage of the season, alarm bells SHOULD be ringing, not sure that they are though.

 

[Gully Forever]

To me it's looking like the problem is the quality of players we have..

I stated this last night, All i got was negative comments and thumbs down. People are so ignorant these days!.

 

[kevtherev]

Staying up is the priority. If that happens with 0-0 draws and 1-0 wins then so be it. Hughton brief is to keep us up whatever then look forward.. I think he will do it, under Hyypia we would have been relegated no doubt about it in my mind.

 

[Julio]

Hughton is arguably the most experienced manager we have ever had - a number of promotions under his belt, campaigns in the Premiership and rather unlucky to lose a few of his jobs. Throw in the most expensively assembled and handsomely rewarded squad and you'd hope we'd do rather better than scrape fourth from bottom. But, this is football, and clearly there's a lot gone on behind the scenes which is resulting is some pretty timid displays. Players out of contract, loan signings not being too ar*ed etc etc.

I honestly believe that by hook or by crook, Hughton will keep us up - but don't expect it to be pretty and in what's a pretty poor league they'll be a few more games like last night.

What worries me is another summer of rebuilding...then the old problem of new players settling in etc etc, dallying around with transfers, new players not having a pre-season. What would be lovely would be a string of results to get us a few points clear and start the process of getting ready for next season in March / April - not going to happen though is it.

 

[BlockDpete]

I think the test for Houghton will be how he can improve our dire home form.

This season if we had one the home games we drew, and drew the games we lost, with the few away results we have got, we could have been comfortably mid table by now

 

[The Hon Sec]

Hughton is a vastly experienced manager in this division and above. He has also been able to bring in two other people with great experience in Colin Calderwood and Ewan Chester. Improvement will continue and we'll be safe from relegation in their hands.