10-01-2022, 11:44 PM
Jackett had left him a pretty hard task to make the play-offs but having reached the final game against Acrrington he and the players should have, at least, given us a victory. He then found himself in a position where he had to get rid of his better players as they were out of contract, a reduced budget or as a 'punishment' demanded by the majority of the fans for failing four years running.
He knew he was stuck with the high earners and had to put together an experienced squad on limited resources. Overall he didn't do too bad a job and aided by some kind fixtures we were off to a reasonable start but then the wheels came off, 4 at Rotherham and then another four to Ipswich here at Fratton just three days set the alarm bells ringing.
Since then he has turned it right around and we've gone ten games unbeaten and despite covid postponements we continue to maintain a healthy position just outside the play-offs.
Cowley would have you believe that are rich benefactors from across the pond gave him the backing to land Romeo, Ogylvy and Morrell.....arguably our three best players. Any Pompey fan looking at the squad for tomorrow evening can see that in defence and midfield we have the numbers and the quality to push on but upfront we have virtually nothing unless you count Curtis and Harness as out and out strikers (not in my view).
I like the guy (Cowley) enormously but when he talks about the problems of attracting new players I get very frustrated when I hear 'too far south', 'price of property' and 'we're surrounded by water'. This is to glaze over that for a famous debt-free club going for promotion we don't pay the wages because the owners have no genuine ambition. Loan players are loan players (five months tops) so those factors don't come into play. The fact that we are severely disadvantaged by our extremely unfortunate geo-economic location seems to have coincided with the arival of our American cousins; it's an excuse.
Nobody will dispute that we need to strengthen up front and possibly another central defender. The onus is on the Eisners to back their manager to show that they actually do have some kind of ambition. I fear that they won't and that may leave Cowley with a dilemma as to whether to stay or go.
He knew he was stuck with the high earners and had to put together an experienced squad on limited resources. Overall he didn't do too bad a job and aided by some kind fixtures we were off to a reasonable start but then the wheels came off, 4 at Rotherham and then another four to Ipswich here at Fratton just three days set the alarm bells ringing.
Since then he has turned it right around and we've gone ten games unbeaten and despite covid postponements we continue to maintain a healthy position just outside the play-offs.
Cowley would have you believe that are rich benefactors from across the pond gave him the backing to land Romeo, Ogylvy and Morrell.....arguably our three best players. Any Pompey fan looking at the squad for tomorrow evening can see that in defence and midfield we have the numbers and the quality to push on but upfront we have virtually nothing unless you count Curtis and Harness as out and out strikers (not in my view).
I like the guy (Cowley) enormously but when he talks about the problems of attracting new players I get very frustrated when I hear 'too far south', 'price of property' and 'we're surrounded by water'. This is to glaze over that for a famous debt-free club going for promotion we don't pay the wages because the owners have no genuine ambition. Loan players are loan players (five months tops) so those factors don't come into play. The fact that we are severely disadvantaged by our extremely unfortunate geo-economic location seems to have coincided with the arival of our American cousins; it's an excuse.
Nobody will dispute that we need to strengthen up front and possibly another central defender. The onus is on the Eisners to back their manager to show that they actually do have some kind of ambition. I fear that they won't and that may leave Cowley with a dilemma as to whether to stay or go.