I am going to write my general thoughts on our club here because I have no idea where I should write them on the forum.
First of all, I want to say that I don't think any of our problems can be solved by changing the manager, we have seen time and time again that the "solution" to our problem is "change the manager!" and it never works, it's like the Tories changing leader, the issue runs deeper than the face at the top.
The truth is, it seems like we are building towards getting some sort of decent planning behind the scenes, we have been active in the market and we seem to have a plan for building a team going forward under Conte but frankly I do not think we are anywhere near a finished product and that brings up the ultimate problem in all this.
Will Conte stick around long enough or be given enough time for him and the DOF to actually build a winning model? It's going to require lots more investment (200m+) or less money and some VERY good scouting in order to fix the fundemental issues here.
We are also looking at Kane and Son both getting older and we need a replacement GK and essentially, imo, a whole new back four, a RB, a LB, a CB and then a creative mid and another forward player (depending on if or when Kane/Son finish being effective/leave we may need even more.)
I don't think Conte will be here that long and I also think that when he does go, the funds and the forward thinking in the market and squad investment might grind to a halt if we can't get another top manager because after Conte not getting any success, I think it will be a hard sell to get a manager to come here.
Look at what happened with Nuno, nobody wanted to come here, took us months to get anyone and then we got Nuno, I think the only reason we got Conte is because he is an utter nutcase and just wanted to prove to himself he could elevate this club (which he did already by getting us back into the top four imo.)
Which brings me to my next issue, is it Levy and ENIC's plan right now to try and throw everything at the wall to try and bring success under Conte as one last throw of the dice? If it fails this time are they going to just go back to a long term project manager on a tight budget and hope for a miracle like under Poch? Will we go BACK to Poch? Jesus, what a mess this whole thing will be.
I feel like, whilst we seem to have made strides forward I am still very untrusting of the leadership behind the scenes in terms of the long term planning, I still feel like the rug could be pulled at any moment and we could be back to square one.
This isn't just because of the result today, I maintain that we have had a good season so far, the numbers have shown that. However, the nature of the result today felt different to others, it just felt like the crowd are fed up, the players look sluggish and unmotivated and the manager looks like he has run out of ideas.
The amount of mistakes we make on and off the pitch is what is holding the club back, off the pitch, things have slightly improved imo, on the pitch things have improved massively from Nuno but still nowhere near the heights of Poch imo where we all felt a sense of pride and joy and it felt like magic was happening.
It felt magic towards the end of last season under Conte but we haven't quite hit those heights since.
I really don't know what the solution is, I feel like we need better communication from the medical team also, our injuries that are supposed to be short term always seem to take forever and like I said earlier, it feels like the medical team is almost a fingerprint from a bygone era, maybe we need a staff overhaul behind the scenes to rid ourselves of the old staff, we started doing that by removing Hitchen and giving Conte his own staff, maybe we need to go further?
The main issue for me is that this club just has a stink of weak mentality around it, we flake at the most important times, we seem to commit more mistakes than any other team and you can just feel the negative emotions around the club, like everyone has had enough of being the nearly men.
And I think that's a great step forward, we should all be fed up but I also don't know what the solution is to actually ridding ourselves of that tag besides winning something, that's the only real thing that will change the atmosphere of the club at this point I feel.
TLDR
I dunno, I am just ranting now, I guess, like many of us, I am just tired of things always ending the same way, something needs to change but like I said, I don't think changing the manager will fix anything.
