Unbelievable. I cannot understand where the albion fans thinking comes from.
Name me a side this season that has gone through the whole season not losing a match !!!!
Unconvincing performances but we were still the 2nd highest scorers in the division !!!
Harvey Barnes was the best player in the championship.
Perhaps its this negative thinking from some of the fans, I do say some because not all think like that way, that has communicated to the players on the pitch.
I am sure if we were in Man City's position we would still have fans moaning, because that's the nature of the beast !!!
I'm not even sure he was the best player we had during his loan, for me that was Phillips before his injury.
A lot of people felt we would implode following Barnes' departure but I thought we would adapt and not miss his absence too much. The stats bear this out.
We had a 1.7 points per game average with Barnes and a 1.7 ppg average after he had left.
We scored 46 in 26 matches while Barnes was here and 33 in 20 after he had left. The average dropped only slightly following Barnes' departure but considering this also coincided with the injury to Phillips so I would say we managed very well without him.
What let us down all season was our poor defensive record. To keep so few clean sheets with the personnel that we had in the squad is downright criminal. The blame for this lies squarely with Moore and Jones and their decision to adopt the tactic of playing out from the back and their subsequent stubborn refusal to move away from this when it was obvious to everyone that it was often proving disastrous.
I would also add that Moore made an error by not giving game time to some of the younger players, especially in the early stages of the season. Harper and Field should have been given chances in the middle instead of Brunt and I would have liked to have seen Edwards and Tulloch given opportunities off the bench in the first half of the season.
Ultimately however the blame goes back to the board for appointing Moore in the first place when we should have moved for a more experienced manager. If they had done that then I'm convinced we would have finished in the top 2 this season.