We have got some promising young players in NDiaye Lindstrom Ireogebunum O Brien Dixon Armstrong. Play them and see were ot takes us? They have pace and athleticism
Who says they won’t be played though?
I know people want to see him slap down an 11 based on new signings and whichever 17 year olds are in the academy at the moment but frankly no manager in world football does this as immediately and consistently as the fans want. Just because we lost the first two games still doesn’t make it a sensible thing to do. Lindstrom still needed an U21 game after Brighton just to get upto a level of fitness that still wasn’t really that great against a league 2 team yet there’s people splitting their spleen he wasn’t starting v Brighton.
We have to stop looking at games and lineups in isolation and focus on the bigger picture and bigger objectives for the club which were probably something like this when Dyche took over:
Stay up in the immediate season (22/23 - not the Luton season!!)
Come back into compliance with PS&R (and survive any penalties)
Decrease the wage bill of the squad
Increase the squad value
Reduce net spend
Improve league position
Arrive at new stadium as a PL team
This was the team when Dyche took over:
Pickford
Coleman Mina Tarkowski Coady Mykolenko
Gueye Onana
Iwobi Calvert Lewin Gray
it wasnt as though he inherited a crop of exciting young attacking players and has completely sidelined them. Gordon, Simms and Cannon were sold for FFP.
Despite that though we’ve seen Mina Coady Godfrey out the door for Branthwaite and OBrien to come into the squad.
The midfield 4 is now Ireogbunam Garner Mangala (hopefully) and Gueye after Onana was developed and sold for big money.
Gray and Iwobi have left and we’ve bought Ndiaye Lindstrom Chermiti Beto. Maupay is probably on his way out.
Simms got some game time before he was sold, Chermiti had started games for us, Armstrong and Dixon have seen first team debuts, Iroegbunam is playing.
He hasn’t been here five years it’s been 18 months. The improvement in points last season, culture, professionalism, and consistency was built on us getting the most out of the core of the squad of players. Pickford Branthwaite Tarkowski Mykolenko Garner Gueye Doucoure McNeil all probably played some of their best football that they have for us. It’s based on them being fit, available, confident, and consistency in selection.
Playing players who are not fit, playing teenagers who aren’t ready, chopping and changing line ups every week, are not things a manager thinking long term should be doing and they’re not the things that improved us last season.
Hopefully we can properly integrate Ndiaye O’Brien Lindstrom Ireogbunam Mangala into the team this season, hopefully we can also see more of Chermiti and Patterson if they get themselves fit. If they follow what we’ve seen with Branthwaite Garner Onana then this should bode well for us. Hopefully we can see if Armstrong and Dixon can step up to become squad players and get more minutes in the first team. If we do that we’ll finish the season in mid table and every single objective the club would have had for Dyche will have been more or less met.
I get annoyed as much as anyone seeing Michael Keane and Young in line ups, and seeing poor results but the bigger picture is more important than knee jerk reactions to lineups in certain games, and Dyche has looked after the bigger picture at this club.
If we are taken over and we make it into the new stadium as a PL team it will have been job done for Dyche in stabilising the club and giving us a platform for a new owner to take us forward. That is a far better reality than the one where we went down in May 2023 into administration and find ourselves in the championship with zero assets to our name on or off the pitch.