I think for the season to be considered decent without promotion we would need to be in a really strong position at the end of the season with a happy settled squad that are ready for the following season.
if we don’t get promoted then half the team are getting their heads turned by championship teams/their agent, we could end up back in a position of needing to rebuild half the squad and this season will be remembered only for being another failed attempt to get out this bastard of a league
in summary, anything short of promotion is a failure, imho.
Play-offs at a minimum, if we don't go up we then need to improve even more under Jones and get promoted the following year with hopefully a slightly easier division.
To expand on my "Promotion. Nothing less" earlier answer.
- each season we remain L1 we shrink as a club. - this means we are less appealing to players, owners, sponsors, new fans etc. - we also lose £8-10M a year at this level. It is not sustainable, we either get promoted or some day the academy and women's team are closed and our future at The Valley comes into question, particularly with a dwindling lease. - our closest rivals, Palace, Millwall and West Ham have all improved and grown in recent years, floating fans are moving away from us. Who knows, with Gills money they may well be L1 again next season too.
Hence, whilst it would be nice to simply watch a competitive team and finish in or near top 6 and call that a decent season; for the future of our club I genuinely think promotion is absolutely vital, and soon.
I have said before but at the end of this season, unless we have some large player sales to offset losses our owners will be c£30M down for pretty much nothing if we remain L1. As new as they may be, when do they lose interest? They surely won't have signed up for that.
I think we can all agree the football has been pretty bad over the past few years. I'd like to go to the football and see us play well, be competitive and have the belief we can get all three points.
16th-10th having lost the league’s top scorer , our captain , our best player in January .
I obviously have hopes for much better BUT fear that the above (or worse) could happen.
Really not confident about next season.
We can’t keep clean sheets, have a lightweight midfield, no creativity & we’ve sold our goal machine.
It will be interesting to see where we are after the first 5 games as we have been dealt a tough set of fixtures (Wigan away, Bolton, Rotherham etc) to kick off with.
A decent season for me depends on how the overall season goes. If we're playing good football, we look like we're progressing on and off the pitch, then I'll settle for disappointment in the playoffs.
7th or lower is automatically not a decent season because we need to be in the mix
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if we don’t get promoted then half the team are getting their heads turned by championship teams/their agent, we could end up back in a position of needing to rebuild half the squad and this season will be remembered only for being another failed attempt to get out this bastard of a league
in summary, anything short of promotion is a failure, imho.
Anything else is a total failure. Promotion is the only goal, I'd be unhappy with anything else. League 1 is shit.
A good season is getting promotion via the play-offs.
A great season is automatics.
Anything else = Crap
There will be plenty of examples of other clubs in this league having to replace their better players who left in January or this summer.
We’re doomed as a club if we start thinking that anything less in the third tier is ‘decent’.
No Promotion = failure.
It really is that simple for me.
- each season we remain L1 we shrink as a club.
- this means we are less appealing to players, owners, sponsors, new fans etc.
- we also lose £8-10M a year at this level. It is not sustainable, we either get promoted or some day the academy and women's team are closed and our future at The Valley comes into question, particularly with a dwindling lease.
- our closest rivals, Palace, Millwall and West Ham have all improved and grown in recent years, floating fans are moving away from us. Who knows, with Gills money they may well be L1 again next season too.
Hence, whilst it would be nice to simply watch a competitive team and finish in or near top 6 and call that a decent season; for the future of our club I genuinely think promotion is absolutely vital, and soon.
I have said before but at the end of this season, unless we have some large player sales to offset losses our owners will be c£30M down for pretty much nothing if we remain L1. As new as they may be, when do they lose interest? They surely won't have signed up for that.
We need to turn the draws into wins.
Yep, anything else can be considered a poor season.
My barometer for how season goes is what the table looks like after 15 games.
Really not confident about next season.
We can’t keep clean sheets, have a lightweight midfield, no creativity & we’ve sold our goal machine.
We have spent too long skidding uncontrollably down the football ladder.
7th or lower is automatically not a decent season because we need to be in the mix