Tues 25th/Sat 29th fixtures

[leedsvaliant]

He keeps contradicting himself, how have you confirmed his point btw when you have categorically showed how weak and daft his argument was in the first place. Just accept his view that budget makes absolutely no difference at this level but however having a bigger budget enables you to have 2 or 3 player who will nick a goal. And therefore win the game

I don't have the time or inclination to go through my old posts but after the posts above I believe I said that clearly those with the biggest budgets will form the basis of the top 10. I never said that budgets make absolutely no difference because clearly they do. My argument at the beginning of the season was that people were saying you might as well hand over the points to the bigger teams as the gulf is so huge and insurmountable. I'm saying that the GENERAL STANDARD of teams is much of a muchness and with a bit of luck through youth development and signings the gap can be bridged. Look at Wycombe, and in the not too distant past Yeovil, Burton etc. If we went up to the Championship, we'd be rock bottom and miles away from the top without serious investment.

We've actually finished a bit lower than I thought we would and without 2 of the poorest refereeing decisions in living memory we would have finished about where I thought.

I don't believe we'll finish top half next season either as we can't buy our way to promotion. We need to rely on gradually improving our squad over a few years.

 

[bigfatron]

On the promoted teams debate, out stats guy did some research at the start of 2021/22 season that proved that promoted clubs on average have a statistically better first half to their first season than second half, presumably as teams take a little while to suss newly promoted sides out.

Also, teams are no more likely to get relegated in their first season after promotion than seasons two, three and four after promotion - only after four seasons do teams start to be 'established' and the rate of relegation reduces.

For what any of that is worth...

 

[Soz]

I think the point I (and potentially others) are confused at is you say it’s not that much better here, but you’ve gone from top 6 to bottom 6 - that doesn’t make sense without a bit of deeper analysis, it’s too general.

You say you’ve competed for play offs (debatable) and used that as a measure to say how you can compete, the bad form has more been written off as not a true value of your team/form/standard of the league, but the reality is it works both ways. In the same way as us, your poor form equally defines your season and the standard as the good form. Which is why we both are where we are.

Vale complained a lot about injuries last season, we had loads and have had loads as well this season - it’s football. It’s why teams like us, right now at least, have the players we do because if our best players weren’t injury prone, they wouldn’t be playing for us.

We can all compete with top teams for a time being, but the real quality shows over 46 games, not 15, 20 or 30. As Exeter, Vale and ourselves have all proven. It’s having the quality of players to consistently produce week after week, and not rely on form, that makes the difference in any division.

I dont think ive said its not that much better here to be fair, which is another problem. it seems with vale fans currently one person says something and then we've all said it or even if one exeter fan says something then vale fans have said it too

im not saying we were ever on for the playoffs but what I am saying is that over half a season we were up there. you can't blame our budget for that the same as you can't blame our budget for the collapse. clearly theres other reasons for why relatively speaking we've had an excellent first half and a terrible second half of the season. we don't know them. I suspect that not having a fit striker for 5 weeks played a big part but even that doesn't explain it. we've had to change manager because of a historically bad run of form. the fact that we've not competed over a season with ipswich isn't proof that budget = success, the fact that we're in the same league as them if anything is proof that it doesn't. they will eclipse our budget every year and yet we've played at the same level as them and in fact, over the two games, we gave them two good goes and were a bit unlucky to get no points.

yet we were being slammed on here for disagreeing with the mentality that league one is actually 2 leagues and that you can't compete without money. the football pyramid is full with teams competing far above their budget levels and those competing far below their budget levels. otherwise whats the point, may as well knock the games on the head and just sort the table by balance sheets once a year.

i think the debate is getting lost a little bit now. the only points im making are: vale fans weren't arrogantly predicting playoffs at the start of the season, we weren't saying money doesn't matter, we don't speak as one group and no idea why we're getting lumped in with an exeter wind up merchant. we've finished maybe a handful of points below where we pretty much all agreed we expected and predicted and achieved our main aim for the season. anything else is a bit silly from people trying to project stuff on to us that is nothign to do with us

 

[Greenacres]

On the promoted teams debate, out stats guy did some research at the start of 2021/22 season that proved that promoted clubs on average have a statistically better first half to their first season than second half, presumably as teams take a little while to suss newly promoted sides out.

Also, teams are no more likely to get relegated in their first season after promotion than seasons two, three and four after promotion - only after four seasons do teams start to be 'established' and the rate of relegation reduces.

For what any of that is worth...

We can prove your first point, definitely better in the first half of the season when we achieved 20 points, since then in 22 games we have added a further 7 points...if we win on Sunday it would give us a total of 10 points in the second half of the season, which would be exactly half what we achieved in the first half of the season. I would like to say that teams managed to find us out, but that would be an outrageous lie, they didn't need to!

As for your second point...bugger!

 

[HutchECFC]

I blame Devon Lad for all this to be honest.

 

[leedsvaliant]

I blame Devon Lad for all this to be honest.

Me too. Where has he gone?

 

[BRFC_Gas]

Me too. Where has he gone?

His hard drive got checked I would imagine

 

[valefan16]

Me too. Where has he gone?

Who only appears when Exeter are on a good run!

 

[HutchECFC]

Me too. Where has he gone?

He's around, seen him out and about a couple times.. Just think real world stuff has taken over.

 

[PlymouthCasual]

Certainly a strange kid

 

[leedsvaliant]

I enjoyed him. Top level banter.

 

[UppaTowen_ITFC]

I don't have the time or inclination to go through my old posts but after the posts above

Just thought it worth pointing out, I wasn’t going through your old posts like a stalker. I happened to click the ‘promotion odds’ thread to see the early season thoughts of everyone before the season began and your quotes were on pages 2 and 3. They were of contradiction to what I’d read from you on a thread not 15 minutes earlier and thought it worth highlighting.

It wasn’t as a way to attack yourself personally but more to question whether you believe it possible to buy the league or not? Because before the season started you believed that not to be the case. But now Ipswich have achieved promotion, it’s a case of it being something of a formality it seems to you with the money that we’ve spent.

I’ve no ill-will to you and don’t wish to come across as though I’ve gone through your posts as it wasn’t at all that way. The Port Vale crowd on here have been good fun all year. I wish yous luck for next season but more importantly for a result on Sunday against Plymouth.

I’ve already been warned that the Championship forum is somewhat quieter so I’m sure I’ll pop back in here next year from time to time anyway through nothing other than curiosity to see how it’s going for your teams. And of course I’ll be back in July anyway to apologise to Masi when half the Bolton side get sold for 25m each.

 

[White horse]

It's been interesting banter with the Port Vale fans , there are probably more of them on this board than any other club, they have livened it up, particularly the one who keeps insisting money doesn't make much difference, it always has and always will, it goes without saying ,matches will be close in every league but that bit of quality is normally the difference in all leagues and that's normally because of a player who has cost or is being paid more than the average player in whatever league

 

[leedsvaliant]

It's been interesting banter with the Port Vale fans , there are probably more of them on this board than any other club, they have livened it up, particularly the one who keeps insisting money doesn't make much difference, it always has and always will, it goes without saying ,matches will be close in every league but that bit of quality is normally the difference in all leagues and that's normally because of a player who has cost or is being paid more than the average player in whatever league

I'll say it again....I've never said that money doesn't make any difference...jeez!