Premier League 2019/20

[DFF]

Weird season. Beyond happy with finishing 9th in our first season back - expected a tooth-and-nail relegation battle! 

Suspect we are gonna see a semi-overhaul of the squad though. Too many players look to have been pushed a little too far / playing to their absolute limits. We definitely need more depth at most positions. Also need to tweak the system a little bit - we spent far too much time in the past few games defending too deeply and not harassing the opposing players enough. Some of that is definitely fatigue, but I think we probs need 4 or 5 more players. We definitely need a clinical striker, some midfield depth and a CB. 

But yeah, fun/weird season. Well done to Liverpool. One of the better sides to have won it (though not in the league of 2018 City imo, and probs a little behind Arsenal's invincibles - on a similar part to the late 90s United treble side). 

[Cymbols]

15 minutes ago, It's Pronounced Zoom-E said:

This place definitely makes me want to see Villa get relegated next season

Congrats on the title win. 

[gunnar hendershow]

I was indifferent to who went down. Watford's play was exciting and the players were definitely fighting for survival until the inexplicably sacked Pearson with 2 matches to go. Zero sympathy, bet most of their players can't wait to play elsewhere next year.

Not a ton of overall sympathy for Bournemouth though. They were bankrolled to get here. They had their fun in the Premier League for their supporters and will probably settle into a yo-yo club status as long as Maxim Demin is still owning the club. That'll quickly become uninspiring. 

Villa are a club with a decent history who in the entire time I've been following English football have been mid-table at best. Much like Everton and Leeds I see how they could be a big club but aren't due to a strange convergence of things happening at the same time. At this point their ceiling is perennial mid-table side who get surpassed by the big spenders and the annual one or two clubs who surge up the table for a season. There's a glut of English clubs like that, but Villa have more history than most. Admittedly the fact they're staying up because of the bogus goal line tech issue against Sheff Utd is garbage for Bournemouth supporters, but there's any number of decisions like that through a season.

[DavidMarrio]

Met Leighton Baines on a night out a few times, really nice guy. Had a good career and was at one point the best left back in the league. 

I didn't really have a horse in the race of who I wanted to survive as Villa and Bournemouth don't really mean much to me, wanted Bournemouth to win today to have a chance of surviving however Watford can go get fucked. I'll never have to hopefully watch Ben Foster time waste from the 1st minute like the big massive gobshite that he is. 

Bournemouth's problem is I think they've just hit their ceiling with Eddie Howe, it's been hte same story for a while now of peetering out second half of the season and it's eventually caught up to them. I don't know if they'd get any better then they have been with another person in charge either. Probably doesn't help that they spent loads of money on the likes of Jordan Ibe. 

[METALMAN]

I always liked Leighton Baines. He had a music blog which I thought was a really cool thing for a footballer to do. Decent taste too.

Edited July 26, 2020 by metalman

[DavidMarrio]

13 minutes ago, DFF said:

Weird season. Beyond happy with finishing 9th in our first season back - expected a tooth-and-nail relegation battle! 

Suspect we are gonna see a semi-overhaul of the squad though. Too many players look to have been pushed a little too far / playing to their absolute limits. We definitely need more depth at most positions. Also need to tweak the system a little bit - we spent far too much time in the past few games defending too deeply and not harassing the opposing players enough. Some of that is definitely fatigue, but I think we probs need 4 or 5 more players. We definitely need a clinical striker, some midfield depth and a CB. 

But yeah, fun/weird season. Well done to Liverpool. One of the better sides to have won it (though not in the league of 2018 City imo, and probs a little behind Arsenal's invincibles - on a similar part to the late 90s United treble side). 

Think the thing I'm most proud of is the consistency over the two seasons from us. 97 and 99 points in back to back seasons is ridiculous. Best Liverpool team of my lifetime by a long shot and there's still a few seasons left with this group of players, I think we need to strengthen the squad and I don't think we'll quite hit the same points but I still expect us to be in the top 2/3 next season. 

[Adam]

I think it's testament to Liverpool's dominance that they finished 33 points ahead of Man Utd in 3rd place, and United actually finished one point closer to Watford in 19th than they did Liverpool.

[TCO]

Just saw Pickford and his teeny little arms were at it again. It'll be hilarious if Henderson or Pope aren't picked ahead of him for England. 

[Kaney]

30 minutes ago, metalman said:

Oh calm down. It's a football thread on an Internet forum, not the Queen's garden party. I speak relatively freely (yet with 100% accuracy), as should you. 

Well we'll never get to the queens garden party if we can't be civil will we?

[Benjamin]

Really happy the new season is in less than two months, and there’s the champion’s league next month. Football is awesome. 

[Marcos]

I hope when fans are allowed back that David Silva gets the send off he deserves. I'm not a massive fan of the English game but Silva has been one of those players that you just like if you have any interest in football at all. 

[Lineker]

That's made my day!

[DFF]

A few mad stats about our season - 

• Lowest number of goals conceded by a newly promoted side since 83/84
• Highest ever finish in the PL for the team with the smallest wage budget, and the only one to finish in the top half (average position of lowest wage club has been 17th and 15 of the sides were relegated). 
• This is our highest top flight finish since the mid 70s. 

Wilder has done an outstanding job. 

[Colly]

I had to check that first one as we were pretty spectacular in 93/94. Conceded 2 more goals than you, but played 4 more games. 😛

Also, this is the greatest single word tweet any footballer has ever twatted. 

 

[Baddar]

19 hours ago, DavidMarrio said:

Was gonna post this in the betting thread but Paddy Power are doing a £5 free bet on the Prem games if anyone is intetested

I used this offer to do a quick double of Arsenal and Man Utd. So now there's £15.45 sat there for when the new season starts, unless something takes my fancy in the Europa/CL mini-tournaments. 

[Baddar]

Jan Vertonghen has confirmed he's leaving Spurs. 

[Jimmy]

3 hours ago, DFF said:

A few mad stats about our season - 

• Lowest number of goals conceded by a newly promoted side since 83/84
• Highest ever finish in the PL for the team with the smallest wage budget, and the only one to finish in the top half (average position of lowest wage club has been 17th and 15 of the sides were relegated). 
• This is our highest top flight finish since the mid 70s. 

Wilder has done an outstanding job. 

I am surprised this isn't Ipswich in 00/01. 

edit: Just found a document which suggests they had the 16th. Still pretty impressive to finish 5th on an £18mil budget. 

Edited July 27, 2020 by Jimmy

[DavidMarrio]

3 hours ago, Jimmy said:

I am surprised this isn't Ipswich in 00/01. 

edit: Just found a document which suggests they had the 16th. Still pretty impressive to finish 5th on an £18mil budget. 

Ahhh the days of a young Richard Wright and Titus Bramble. Mad how they got a Uefa Cup spot and got to the League Cup semis that year

[Baddar]

I remember nothing about the matches themselves, but do recall watching them play in the UEFA Cup. Pretty sure it was on BBC.

[METALMAN]

And Marcus Stewart scoring 19 goals. That came out of nowhere.