• Welcome, guest!

    This is a forum devoted to discussion of Wolverhampton Wanderers.
    Why not sign up and contribute? Registered members get a fully ad-free experience!

Pre-Season Fixture thread (22/23)

Wilf Wolf said:
I presume all those thinking we’re stronger than last year will be filling their boots on a top half finish given SkyBet have us at 5/2? Bloody good odds for a team that finished top half last season you’d think.
Click to expand...
We can be a stronger team than last season but also finish lower in the table. Some serious competition to get in the top half this season. It would be a good achievement if Bruno could do it again.
 
Wilf Wolf said:
I presume all those thinking we’re stronger than last year will be filling their boots on a top half finish given SkyBet have us at 5/2? Bloody good odds for a team that finished top half last season you’d think.
Click to expand...
Bookies? Those lads are never wrong.
 
Given that prize money aside it doesn't matter too much where you finish between 8th and 14th (providing the latter means you're never really getting sucked into danger) then that's not how I'll define progress. We were 10th last season but it meant so little as we were an absolute chore to watch. We are very unlikely to finish 6th/7th.

Better entertainment, more goals, better in game management, no relegation scrap and a better tilt at the cups. That would all be very welcome.
 
5/2 for top half is crap odds!

4 or 5 to 1 I might have been tempted.
 
Deutsch Wolf said:
Given that prize money aside it doesn't matter too much where you finish between 8th and 14th (providing the latter means you're never really getting sucked into danger) then that's not how I'll define progress. We were 10th last season but it meant so little as we were an absolute chore to watch. We are very unlikely to finish 6th/7th.

Better entertainment, more goals, better in game management, no relegation scrap and a better tilt at the cups. That would all be very welcome.
Click to expand...
This. In that section of midtable, the positions are quite irrelevant. Palace finished lower than us last season but their fans had a hell of a lot more fun watching their team than we did and we both got the same outcome.
 
I don’t buy it’s a new season so it’s a fresh start mantra. Players we will be starting out with are very similar to identical of that finished last season so badly.
The change in formation is fine as long as Bruno can fathom what his best attacking options are something he didn’t do last season.
 
jd1981 said:
I don’t buy it’s a new season so it’s a fresh start mantra. Players we will be starting out with are very similar to identical of that finished last season so badly.
The change in formation is fine as long as Bruno can fathom what his best attacking options are something he didn’t do last season.
Click to expand...
Just one small thing .

If we start with a back 4 containing Kilman and Collins , Jonny and RAN......that's a lot different to a back 5 of Semedo , Kilman , Coady , Boly and Marcal . That's a fresh start .
 
The point was on an attacking basis and how our manager struggled to get a tune out of what was available to him.
 
jd1981 said:
The point was on an attacking basis and how our manager struggled to get a tune out of what was available to him.
Click to expand...
For all Lage's faults, and he seems to have a fair few, it does appear as if he was hamstrung in an attacking sense by being restricted to playing 3 at the back. Doesn't excuse the fact that those attacking players he did have are essentially the same as now so why could he not get any decent level of creativity out of them, but still, the point remains that the 3 at the back undoubtedly hampered his options going forward.
 
Dire Wolf said:
For all Lage's faults, and he seems to have a fair few, it does appear as if he was hamstrung in an attacking sense by being restricted to playing 3 at the back. Doesn't excuse the fact that those attacking players he did have are essentially the same as now so why could he not get any decent level of creativity out of them, but still, the point remains that the 3 at the back undoubtedly hampered his options going forward.
Click to expand...
It did (mainly as our wingbacks are never going to be goalscoring/assisting machines, and Doherty wasn't one either before anyone brings him up).

But he didn't *have* to play that way. We were losing all the time with three at the back, as I say, that form is inexcusably awful. What was there to lose from trying something else, wasn't like we could get fewer than 0 points out of games? Didn't even try it at home to already relegated Norwich when there was effectively nothing at all to play for.
 
jd1981 said:
The point was on an attacking basis and how our manager struggled to get a tune out of what was available to him.
Click to expand...
By the looks of the friendlies he's very much changed that tune.
 
Kenny said:
I hope you are like this across all aspects of your life

"We are going to have a great holiday"
No we won't. It will rain, the beer will be shit and the restaurants will only serve foreign muck.

"Going to cook your favourite meal tonight, you looked stressed out"
Hardly call it my favourite and I can guarantee you will burn it and ruin whatever nice memories I have of this meal.
Click to expand...
If Jeff Shi had anything to do with it my holiday would be dreadful and the steak would come from farm foods.
 
Deutsch Wolf said:
Seasons don't exist in isolation though. We won 3 of our last 14, Newcastle won 12 of their last 18, they ended up finishing not far behind us, we have both signed a highly rated centre half each for the first team...who do you think goes into the season with higher hopes? Who finished above us last season that we can realistically hope to overtake, based on the current state of affairs? You don't just press reset in May and it's as if nothing that happened in the last 9-10 months exists any more.

It's historically a far better indicator to look at the previous actual season's results and performances rather than anything in pre-season.
Click to expand...
We lost 7 out of the last 10 games in 20/21 under Nuno.

Yet we had a decent start to the season after, first three games aside, which was a tough start with Leicester/Spurs/Man Utd, coupled with trying to play an attacking 4 at the back with no real training for it.

The following 10 games when we went to 3 at the back again we won 6 and drew 2. I don't think it really matters how you finished the previous season unless you're already a favourite for relegation before the season started.
 
I don't think losing 4 of your first 5 games and scoring one goal through one of your own players along the way is a "decent start".

If we do that again then we'll have a new manager fairly soon.

We never played four at the back last season in a competitive game, not from the start anyway? Where have you got that from?
 
I thought our attacking first three games was with Lage trying a back four? I may have misremembered that though! Even still, it was a tough start and an abrupt new style of playing. And was widely regarded by everyone in here to be a completely undeserved set of results.

It's all irrelevant any way. We'll perform however we perform. Either the new formation clicks and we do alright, or it'll be a mess and we'll struggle to get going.

But I doubt any of the players are remembering back to any of last seasons games and shitting themselves before they even get out there.
 
No, we tried a back four in pre-season and looked beyond abysmal.

It's not about "shitting themselves", it's that we didn't look very good for months, the manager could have changed a lot of things and chose not to, so while it might be different now, there's limited evidence to suggest it will be. And 14 games is a very decent sample size, it's not a blip. We also weren't great when we were winning for the most part, the odd good performance (United and Spurs away, West Ham at home) but more often we were average at absolute best and won. We haven't had that very often in the PL. At Brentford we had two shots and both went in. Fortunate to win at home to Southampton, they missed a gilt-edged chance to make it 2-2 then we scored more or less straight after. Villa away, FFS. Total robbery.

I want us to play some good, exciting football as it's just cost me a lot of money to sit through it again, I don't want us to be shit.
 
Last edited:
Deutsch Wolf said:
It did (mainly as our wingbacks are never going to be goalscoring/assisting machines, and Doherty wasn't one either before anyone brings him up).

But he didn't *have* to play that way. We were losing all the time with three at the back, as I say, that form is inexcusably awful. What was there to lose from trying something else, wasn't like we could get fewer than 0 points out of games? Didn't even try it at home to already relegated Norwich when there was effectively nothing at all to play for.
Click to expand...
2nd paragraph I 100% agree with but I don't think he had the appetite for trying to use Coady and Boly in a back 4. Understandably, it would have been even more disastrous and I think for all the talk towards the end of last season of him losing the dressing room, trying to change the system in the middle of a bad run with potentially damaging consequences would doubtless have lost the dressing room that was still with him!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

The Bear
2023/24 Fixtures-Results-Highlights-Reports-Verdicts-Stats
2 3 4
Replies
63
Views
7K
SSB
SSB
The Bear
2022/23 Fixtures-Results-Highlights-Reports-Verdicts-Stats
2 3
Replies
45
Views
7K
SSB
SSB
Back
Top