Pre-season assessment

[Three of Diamonds]

IMO, JE & PD still have a lot to do to get this squad up to full speed. Injuries have blighted us and the management have played safe by not risking anyone unnecessarily. Tomlin's move to 'Boro has also thrown a spanner in the works as we've not had a settled line-up who are anywhere near bedded into their roles. I've been disapointed with Charles and Keehan so far, I've not seen a spark of creativity down the right side (it's too reactive, not proactive), but I do think that Jamie Day, Spence and Johnson show great potential. I think Power will grow into a good centre midfielder, but he's not as good at holding as Terry (yet), nor as attacking as Byrne (also not yet). For me Porter must step up a notch this season, last season was good but he can be so much better. With Miller I'm as frustrated as hell. We have a "proper" right back but I'm yet to see him play! If Cockers can raise his game to the level he showed in the first half against WBA, he will be a regular starter and deservedly so. Up front Smith - WAKE UP MAN!! You can obviously score goals as shown in pre-season and now is the time. This is NOT a false alarm, this is NOT a test Sam.
There are some damned fine squads in this division now, ours must raise itself to the challenge.
Success is not a matter of spontaneous combustion, you must set yourself on fire!

[sussexdiamond]

I have not seen any of the new players and can only go on what the match reports say and the comments by you the fans.

But I have to say I am not very confident that we are going to equal last seasons achievements.

We have had too many injuries, no one showing outstanding form, some iffy results and now we have no Tommo.

Of our regular midfield from last season only Porter remains.

I would be a lot more confident if we could secure Rene Howe at least until Xmas.

We start with a couple of moderate matches so we may be able to at least get off to a winning start.
But it will be difficult playing against promoted teams as they have so much to play for. Fleetwood with all their money will fancy their chances and Bath will want to win at home.
At least we cant start worse than last year.......can we?

[Bob's Bitch]

I'll post a reminder to not overreact after the first game in a couple of days. Last year was stupid and even if we do lose (which there's more chance of than last year) it won't be the end of the world.

I haven't seen any of the PSFs either but from the results and the reports along with the fact that there's no Byrne or Tommo I'm not confident of much more than mid-table. I hope that we can carry on our fantastic home form however, we haven't lost a league game at home in this calendar year and if we could manage to carry that through to 2011 it would certainly get some fans to NP. I just hope JE can carry on giving us attractive, attacking football because then at least the games that we don't win will be more bearable to watch.

[DiamondsFan]

Lets not forget the fact that we MASSIVELY overachieved last year..