What’s your realistic aim this season? try and get top half?
We got top half last season with about half a week's worth of pre-season and a ridiculous FA Cup run disrupting the flow of the season so kicking on from there and getting a playoff spot is the aim.
Not seeing the massive improvement in Grimsby so far - Vernam looks like the only stand-out signing, and is he better than McAtee? The others just look like the same old one-year contract fodder that does the rounds in this division.
We don't need to improve massively to be in with a shout of a playoff push though.
Rodgers and Mullarkey look like great signings. Vernam is a different type of player to McAtee too. I absolutely fucking love McAtee but he's quite a complex player that you really need to build your team around. Shoehorning him in last season hamstrung us to a certain degree. If you want to directly compare them though, there's no doubting McAtee is the more talented player of the two but Vernam should slot in easier and cause less selection headaches for Hurst. I'm happy for Danny Rose to keep on doing his usual same old round with us too, as it means we'll end up in the top 7. Plenty of people shitting on that signing but he's a nuisance at this level.
We've only handed out one one year deal by the way.
Agree regarding Grimsby.
With our current squad I’d like to think we’d just about scrape play-offs.
They’ll be plenty of comings and goings for both clubs, but our squad is significantly better than Grimsby’s (on paper) right now.
Of course your squad is better on paper than ours, it's probably about three times more expensive.
We've had a better window than you so far though, so that gap has currently closed at least temporarily. The pluses in our column are that we've got a better manager at this level than you and from what I've seen you're more of a collection of individuals than us, there seems to be a bit more cohesion to our recruitment and a stronger togetherness from top to bottom.
Got to admire your optimism.
Let's face it, the standard last season was pish. Even with every other club Going For It™ this coming season the general narrative is still going to be that most clubs are going to try and not lose most matches. Enough of the sides chucking money at it will bomb, ensuring that the sides that have a bit of continuity and are steadily improving will be in with a chance. If we keep Hurst I'm very confident we'll be going up in the next 3 seasons and I don't really see any reason why we can't challenge the top 7 this season.
