Premier League 2010/11 general thread

[Flabio]

I wanted Blackpool to stay up, mainly cause Forest never manage to beat them and I'd rather not have to play them...

[stevie vip 99]

Blues gone, we just haven't been good enough all season. Can't score or pass the ball, essential really for football.

Oh well, I won't lose any sleep over these 30 grand a week players.
Congrats to the teams who stayed up.

[C']

Absolutely gutted that Blackpool went down. They've been a joy to watch this season and deserved to stay up in my opinion. Holloway looked devastated when they interviewed him. I hope he can keep the majority of his team together and try and bounce back up but even he seems resigned to the fact that that is extremely unlikely.

Surprised by Birmingham too but I suspect they have enough to come straight back up again.

[Ginger Tosser]

Blues gone, we just haven't been good enough all season. Can't score or pass the ball, essential really for football.

Indeed, maybe we'll have a clear out in the summer.

[Anpanman]

Pleased for Wigan.

Me too, sorry for Blackpool though, some nice comments from their fans & the PL will be worse off without Holloway and his comments.

[MonkeyJuggleDX]

I guess at the end of the day it was Ian Evatt-able Blackpool would go down.

[MisterBubbles]

Kinda glad Wigan stayed up cause they try to play a good passing game and are mostly positive in most games.Page last

[prinnysquad]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thefootballtacticsblog/2011/05/premier_league_sets_new_standa.html

Beeb article on Premier League entertainment and competitiveness.

[abigsmurf]

Some of the analysis I'd disagree with. Basing entertainment on successful short passes is questionable (just ask Arsenal fans this season on how much they enjoyed the ball endlessly being passed around the box) and surely fewer away wins by visiting sides points to them playing less attacking football (which hardly makes for entertaining football)?

Still an interesting article though.

[EJG1980]

I don't think statistics are a very good basis for judge how entertaining a football match has been, so much of it is down to feel, atmosphere, circumstances, and other such things that you can't measure with cold hard numbers.

As said above, short passing isn't always exciting. Long passes don't always mean a lack of technique. Does a pin-point accurate sixty yard cross field pass to a player who instantly controls the ball with a deft touch of the foot, not contain a huge amount of skill and technique from both players? Numbers can be skewed any way you like.

[Mayhem]

Basing entertainment on successful short passes is questionable (just ask Arsenal fans this season on how much they enjoyed the ball endlessly being passed around the box)

Reminds me of the comment my brother made at the end of the last World Cup, following Spain's consistent 1-0 victories: "With all that short passing everywhere, mostly doing nothing a lot of the time, they essentially bored the opposition into submission."

Have to say, he has a point... I find most of Spain/Barcelona's play to be incredibly boring to watch...

[prinnysquad]

Oh, I'd agree with a lot of the criticism of the statistics, I just thought it raised some interesting points. The raw crux of the matter for me is the simple fact that the big teams, despite remaining the top dogs, have been beaten, and often. It's nice for fans of **** loathesome teams who play hideous anti-football (tm merf) to have a game against a big team and know that you can get a result. Just knowing this raised the excitement/anticipation/entertainment factor. Plus, a ridiculous number of teams were duking it out in the area of relegation at one point or another. Purely results-wise, it's been very entertaining for me.

[EJG1980]

Martin Jol has been appointed as Fulham manager. Glad to see him back in England, as a person he's my favourite Spurs manager since I've been a supporter. Happy he's back with a club I like too. He's gonna get a rousing reception when Fulham come to White Hart Lane

[prinnysquad]

Well, it looks like Henderson is on his way to Scouse Red.

I'll reserve final judgment until I see who Bruce spends the money on, but it's disappointing after all his **** about 'building a team around youth and home grown players', 'it would take an incredible offer for it to even be considered', etc. Yeah, yeah. The first club to come along with a bid and the club is lowering its pants. First Bent, now Henderson, oh, what joy to be a selling club. It's good money, but what this deal means is far more worrying. That's our second star player to be flogged in six months, the core of the team getting ripped up, the first names on the team-sheet gone. There seems to be zero ambition in the board's decisions at the moment, the good stuff is going and replaced with tat.

He's lining up the money to bid for Brown, Gibson and O'Shea. FFS. Replace sicknote Mensah with sicknote Brown. Don't know much about Gibson, meaning he's the most interesting of the three, and don't rate O'Shea. Also, N'Gog is apparently part of the deal. Never rated him, ever. All a bit depressing really, a home grown star replaced by largely middling players who haven't seem to have cut it at their clubs. We still haven't replaced Bent, and N'Gog as one of the three top strikers is a sick joke, compared to Welbeck.

[hudson]

Apart from the clips shown on SSN today, I haven't seen much of Henderson. What are your thoughts on him, Prinny?