I disagree regarding Peltier - I think he's a good solid championship defender. Konchesky has not impressed me at all.

I feel the issue we have is that we do not had a team suite to any formation. However we play certain players are having to "do a job" in a position. Konchesky is not the marauding wingback required to make the diamond work, nor is abe good enough as a holding midfielder.

We have no right winger to play 4-4-2 or 4-3-3 with width so Vassel ends up there.

The biggest mistake Eriksson made as entering the season without a balanced team. We have quality for this division and I disagree that the players aren't good enough. I personally feel the mix is all wrong.

great piece..... agree with what your saying, i also feel we are quite flat footed we never seem to be able to turn quickly or react quickly to opponents.

I also hate to say it but PVA as much as we didnt like him last year too often was very good. Looking back with the investment the owner put into the squad i cannot for the life of me understand why we didnt put in some kind of audacious bid for kyle naughton be it permanent or on loan again! It seems crazy given what we replaced him with.

I few other concerns that have bugged me for a while is that every manager wants strength in every position, i feel that the strength is too strong, did we need st ledger? as bad as he has been he is a very good footballer and players completely different with the irish team. Lacks confidence i feel!

Michael Johnson.....where to start with this chap we dont need him but his obvious quality when fit must have been too much to turn down we now have way too many midfielders ALL with no width

Our strikers must be the most frustrated strikers in the division. They have no service, they have no support, have to create the chances and finish them themselves as we have no wingers and nobody creative enough to get through a flooded midfield!

No wonder beckford is looking useless he must be thinking what on earth did i do wrong to end up here! He could of sat on his contract at everton knowing he would have some point got picked, he didnt exactly do badly last year!

The New manager has to the strong minded not afraid of doing what he wants and not what the players or owners want.

I also am hoping that he brings with him a decent coaching team, i thought Sven needed more than Faz and stowell who coaches goal keepers! He never replaced Didi hamman, and a defence coach wouldnt go a miss, gerry taggert?

Anyway what do i know, probably a good reason why im behind this computer and not on a training pitch!

You are right about coaches Jimmyfox... but also remember Chris Powell -his influence at Belvoir was immense and commanded respect.
Stowell !!!- as a goalkeeper coach he was responsible for Logan, Weale and Ricardo.... team coach ?**

John, there is a lot here in which I have to disagree with you.

First, Peltier: this guy is perfectly good enough to be part of a promotion-chasing side. He's hard working and was part of a team that kept 4 clean sheets in a row a few games back. It sounds like he didn't have his best game at the weekend, but how can you really judge any one player in a managerless team? Similarly with Konchesky; although I can't udnerstand how he's played in the Premiership for years, he looks solid as a Championship defender with decent technique and fine for a promotion push.

We all know that neither of these two were as good as Naughton, who looked quite special for us. But to pay £6m for him would be ridiculous - You simply cannot pay that amount of money for a right back in the Championship. And that's if he even wanted to come here anyway, which it's rumoured he didn't. Ben Mee was decent last year, particularly as a foil for Bamba, but showed a lot of inexperience; meanwhile Van Aanholt may have come with a good reputation but I remember him mostly being caught completely out of position and making horrible mistakes. Whatever anyone thinks of them, their record on the pitch suggests the back four you mention was not the best in the Championship, and Van Aanholt's pace was not enough to hide the many issues in his defensive game.

As for Mike Stowell, I think you're again being very unfair. If you're to blame him for Weale and Ricardo, you have to give him credit for making Henderson, Martin and Weale (under Pearson) better than they have ended up. While I too am not sure about his abilities as a general coach, I think he's pretty decent as a GK coach and there's a reason he's been here for a long time and so many managers have been able to work with him.

What we're on our way to proving is that you can't get promoted from this league just by throwing money around. Your players need to fight together, for each other and the club, every week whether it's West Ham or Bristol City you're facing. Then, hopefully, if you match your opponents in the fight, your skill will shine through and you'll take the points. While I accept we could do with more pace in the side, most of the players are good enough. What they are not is a settled unit ready to put themselves on the line for each other every week. That will only come with /a lot/ of time, which is why I fear the next manager coming in will still only get a year at most when they probably need 2 to 3 with just occasional tweaks to the squad to get things right.

I partly agree with both John Gee and Mersey, although they disagree with each other. As Mersey says we have good players, but no balance. I thought from the Real Madrid game onwards that Nugent looked isolated and lacked suuport and nothing has changed since.

It's alright saying that wide players are a thing of the past and they probably are at the highest level. The difference is that in the very best sides they have players who can defend, pass and take the ball past people - in every position across the midfield. Teams in the Championship are much more reliant on a system that fits the personnel.

I also agree with John Gee's comment that we weren't too far away last season. If Sven had not been so determined to tinker with the defence every game then we may well have made the play-offs. Mee and Vitor were the two who suffered most. At one point we'd changed at least one player in the back four for something like 10-15 games consecutively.

I honestly think that the right manager, with a bit of drive and organisation, could turn the team around relatively easily with perhaps one or two loan signings in the right positions - to give the team balance.

I don't even want to think about what the wrong manager could do.

Sorry Dunge - not pay £6m for a full back as part of Premiership driven team but pay it for an average centre back!! Cannot believe your logic -in todays football top class wing backs are the most sought after commodity-we are a Premiership financed team - the owners express policy -
I understand that at the end of last season -Naughton was told by Spurs that his namesake was preferred and he was "available" -he enjoyed Leicester,the club and actually Sven

What effort and committment alone can give you is mid table safety and possibly mediocrity - having Howard come on and play with heart gives us the fans a warm feeling -but in all honesty its not a strategy for promotion.
Sven spent a lot of money and the result is not good enough and camouflaging it will not pay off. We need an influx of speed and touch -and a system that provides adequate supply of chances to what are potentially excellent strikers - not just long balls over the top

Think Konchesky has done fine so far - if you really want to nit pick, Peltier was at fault for two of the goals on Saturday - out jumped at the back post and ball watching for their third.

John - I don't want effort and commitment alone, but at the moment we're lacking in them at all. West Ham aside, when we've gone behind this year that's generally been it. After going a goal down against both Birmingham and Millwall we didn't even look like getting back into it. This is my point that you've got to compete first, then your skill can shine through and claim the victory. Simply put, there are no easy games in the Championship and I don't think Sven had got to grips with that fact. (Although that's not to say that I think sacking him was the right decision.)

As for Matt Mills, do you remember the constant complaint that we have no leadership on the park? Well, that is in part what he's been bought for. We also started to see the kind of form we need from him before he did that idiotic lunge against Brum. He could yet be a good signing and worth the money. Naughton on the other hand would have a heck of a time living up to a £6m price tag. You may not think of it as much because the owners can supposedly afford it; however not only is it a millstone around any player's neck (particularly a young right back) but I am a firm believer that no bottomless pit of money is in fact bottomless. If we go wasting £6m on full backs now it will cost us later.

Sorry Dunge -cannot underatand your reluctance to pay 6m for a Premiership full back - plucking out of air -Johnson to Liverpool aws around 16m from memory -Cole was valued at 25 million some years back - Jose Enrique... taken from Spain years ago at around 8- if you wanted Naughton now after his Norwich performances 10+ - he would have been fantastic business

I usually agree with John but not completely on this occasion.

I think both Peltier and Konchesky are half decent but they are not wing-backs. Equally (as others have pointed out) Sven over-loaded the squad with central midfielders and failed to add any width. I think the Sunday Times described him a tactically inept and in terms of the Championship, I concur.

Johngee - you also refer to Bamba as one of the best centre-halves in the division. Just don't get me started on that one. Although, St Ledger has had some below par performances, I honestly believe our pairing under the new regime will be SSL and Mills. Sol goes walkabout far too often for my liking.

Whilst it is currently very difficult to see anything beyond scraping into the top six this season, a sustained run is achievable over the next two months if the owners bring in a motivator. There are no easy games but I think we have had our fair share of the more difficult ties and we should also benefit from the "strength" in depth over the winter months when injuries tend to plague smaller squads.

I haven't completely lost the faith but as much as liked him as an individual, Sven had severly tested it over the past few weeks.

"Sorry Dunge - not pay £6m for a full back as part of Premiership driven team but pay it for an average centre back!!"

At the end of 2010/11 Mills hadn't had an 'average' season, in fact he was one of the best defenders in the division.

If you had asked most fans in the division who they would prefer their team to buy, I don't think many would have been critical if Mills had been picked over Naughton. Although both were excellent last year.

The only argument for Mills being 'average' is that he has had some average/poor games at the beginning of THIS season, but obviously there isn't really any justification for taking this is to account when reviewing a purchase made prior to this.

PS - Unless of course, you are suggesting that in real-time when we purchased Mills, you felt he was 'average', which I wouldn't have agreed with, but would be fair enough.

Sorry keep the faith -been busy
We almost succeeded last season by having all the back four -comfortable on the ball -able to control one touch- and pass and move.... Mills has never been or even purports to be other than an up and down defender who believes -if you clear the ball they won't score... to me he was Hobbs plus a bit of experience- so I always rated him accordingly and felt it was a departure from last seasons success ethic. To me Mee plus Tunchev on the bench was preferred

This is why a forum is great. I personally feel Mills is a premiership quality centreback and my everyon mates agree with what they've seen of him.

I also think Bamba is an absolute liability and one of the reasons we're conceding too many.

But that'd where we differ in opinion John, you want footballing centrebacks from the school of Barcelona, and I want defenders that are no nonsense and won't et bullied in the championship. I'm more Nigel Pearson than Sven.

I don't feel we can get out of this division playing pretty football unless we can convince good prem players to step down and not even Sven managed that (look at Naughton at an average prem team).

Let's see what tact the new manager takes, because at the end of the day, that's all that counts.

to be honest Mersey -I can live with Mills and he is not the reason that we are doing so badly -BUT given the choice to buy Mills or Naughton -its Naughton every time because he would contribute massively to our ability to counterattack -and its my information we could have got him at the end of last season with a 6m bid

Its the total trade off to artesans -not artists that worry me - Peltier and Konchesky plus Mills = low on ball retention and movement

I don't agree with this notion that to get out of the Championship you have to play long ball football. Swansea played wonderful football last season and got promotion and Norwich pass the ball around quite well as well.

I think with Bamba & Mills, you get the no nonsense - footballing combination which is a good one to have. If you look at Bamba, he hasn't really been punished for playing out from the back in that it hasn't led to the concession of any goals. If we're going to pass out from the back then people like Bamba are good to have because they will start our attacks when teams come and put 10 behind the ball so if they can bring bring the ball out and give us an extra man in midfield then that will help us to break them down.

Joby is right that Sol has all the talents to be a top centre-back and he just needs to play consistently at his best. If he did that, he'd be playing in the Premier League no doubt and this season, he is starting to find that consistency. I don't think it's a bad thing that we have a centre-half who is also technically good as well as long as he is smart about when to play from the back and when to play the percentages and again he is improving with that.

As I said before, I think Mills and Bamba are good as a pair (and they were showing that before Matt's suspension) because you get the best of both world's and I think they are actually both capable of playing in the Premier League. Hopefully that will be with us because it is paramount you have a good defence to get promotion and these two, when on-song, are as good as any in our division.

I'm not saying we need to play long ball stuff. I'm saying that no matter how good a footballing side you are, you've got to be up for a battle.

I agree Konchesky offers very little dynamism and don't think he was a clever signing to suit Sven's system.

I personally think the beat footballing sides in the championship are the ones that have a solid back 4 or an attack minded midfield. We seem to have neither!!

As for Naughton, if we could have got him for £6m, maybe we should, but I do think the owners need to show try cannot be held to ransom and if thy means missing out on the odd player then so bet it. Naughton or not, they invested a lot of money in the summer on a team that still lacks balance. As much as I think Sven should have been given time, you've got to question how that happened.

To be completely honest, if we had paid £6m for a fullback who is proven at nowhere above a decent championship team I would have been gob-smacked and a little embarrassed.

He is better than Peltier, but not £5m better IMO and I don't think his inclusion in the team would have made a huge amount of different to our current situation.

I am quite shocked that you think Konchesky and Peltier's movement is bad, I think Peltier has done very little wrong at all this season (could he be suffering from a perhaps unfair comparison to a player of the season performance from Naughton last year??), and with Konchesky he gets forward plenty for me, just perhaps not back quick enough.

With regard to Mills, I don't want him to have much ball retention. In fact, I'd argue if one of your CBs has a high perecentage in the ball retention charts it means there isn't enough movement in front of him. Infact I think its only the fact that he is sometimes the opposite of Bamba that makes the partnership works, and often IMO, gets Sol out of trouble.

My preference was to get Mee and Vitor which I think would have been at least equal to Mills and Bamba, if not better.

I hear bits and bobs from a relation of one of the SMT at City, from what I heard Mee's parent club did not want him to go out again to the same team and he didn't particularly argue against this (mainly because he was dropped intermittently last year, in his opinion unfairly). I also heard Naughton's preference was to any Premiership club (understandable), so this was out of our hands to a certain extent.

The loan players last year did their job but Sven was give a hard time over loan players.
This season he buys the best he can get to come to a non proven championship side... Theres the rub the best guys would not come as you say the best people are in a job so the best players are not prepared to take the risk in the drop. The list of won"t come was extensive!

The problem this season is IMO the expectation that new 50% of the workforce to become a fully fledged team by the 10th game.

As for Best managers are in work yes and no given that all managers get fired some will be good enough.

The only criteria i want is a manager who has got a team promoted from this division.