Weathering the Storm.

[JockStrap]

[Kev0909]

I don't know why people go on about Chiesa like he's a god, same with the song....

Maybe he's just shite in training? who knows

he's a tidy player, but nothhing special injurys ruined him

[Insidious]

Currently on an unbeaten run of 10 games.

Too many draws and a couple of lacklustre performances within that spell, however we've definitely stabilised a fair bit.

A couple of the main questions for me revolved around whether or not we could start to click somewhat for the key stage of the season (late February/early March) and whether or not our Champion's League place was under major threat.

We're thankfully in 4th, but there's no denying that there is a cluster of teams that are right behind us, so it'd be great to get a few wins on the board.

We have matches against the likes of Burnley, Wolves and Tottenham soon and could really do with finding enough of a rhythm to be picking up those key points as I'd like to think we could have "pulled away" slightly by the time April comes around.

If we end up juggling a Champion's League campaign whilst maybe being in 5th spot in the closing weeks, or in 4th with multiple sides breathing down our neck, we could falter.

Holding on for now though and we'll have the Qarabag and Marseille matches over us within the month, so we'll have a better picture of what we have to do this season.

[jozza800]

Whilst we're nowhere near where we should be, it does appear that we're doing exactly what the thread title suggested.

We've had 4 clean sheets in the 10 games since getting hammered by PSV.

Hopefully we can push on from here.

[Steveo]

Does it..? and I agree with your last line.. Hopefully we can push on..

Facts:
Since the Palace game - it's won 5 games in 16. But we are without a win in 3.

The only wins apart from Brighton at home (and we were fortunate to win) since losing at City were against sides in crisis. West Ham - the 9 men of Spurs and a wolves side that had 2 points to their name at the turn of the year...!

Did we continue the relegation form after losing 6 games in 7...no - but then no team in the league has matched that detritus either.

I personally prefer to wait until we have truly emerged from the funk before getting too giddy. We need to go on a run of winning games now. And I am scared to look at the fixtures and say they are winnable.. These are the games wher we look most uninspired. Time to change that.

[miller0863]

My worry is that while we looked pretty solid against Arsenal, from 25 minutes onwards at least, that was our game plan, to be solid and not worry about creating anything.
So while it’s acceptable to just keep the ball and the opposition away from your goal away at Arsenal, what happens when we decide to go on the offensive?

We will get opened up again like a can of beans. Couldn’t even see out injury time at Fulham or Leeds. When we tightened up again v Leeds and Sunderland at Anfield we stopped scoring.

We haven’t solved the conundrum of keeping it tight while scoring goals, in fact we have failed miserably all season to get that balance right and I haven’t seen any improvement in that aspect whatsoever during this run of improved results.

Though 4 draws with Leeds, Sunderland and Fulham show how far we fell to call that run of results an improvement

[jozza800]

Absolutely on both posts. I haven't said we're playing particularly well but we have definitely steadied the ship / weathered the storm a little.

Slot has to find the right balance. But unbeaten in 10 is certainly better than losing 6 in 7.

[miller0863]

Yep