Return to the top flight

[Armardar]

Bit of a sweeping question here, but I wonder what everyone feels about the prospect of us returning to the top flight this season?

I know there is the opinions that MAF left the club in a financial state ready to capitulate at the end of his tenure ( a view I don't support) but it has been 3 years under the new ownership oh Shahid Khan and every season we have dropped lower and lower..... Is it going to happen under the this owner, or is it something else entirely?

[NogoodBoyo]

I cannot see it happening this year.  In fact I'm not sure we'll be back there for a long time.  Insufficient revenues.
Nogood "gloom, doom or reality, isit" Boyo

[Aldo]

Maybe next season, once we have a settled team!

[Southdowns White]

We use to have 2 hopes, Bob Hope and No Hope, Bob Hope is Dead so what are you left with.

[Fulham Tup North]

I would be very happy if we looked like we might make the Play-Offs this season.
If you make the play-off's its a lottery, so who knows?
COYW

[Southcoastffc]

I wouldn't put more than a tenner on it and I'd hope to get very good odds.

[Kent Cassandra]

when you ask 'Is it happening' do you mean premiership football or further free fall?
If you reject the MAF conspiracy theory what is your explanation for what went wrong?
My opinion is that premiership football is a possible dream but dreams are like farts,
if you try to force them too much you end up with cr@p.

[filham]

Too many teams better than us in the Championship as Bristol City showed us last week. It will take time to build a winning team , at the moment we are doddering between climbing and falling in the table.

[The Rock]

All the above are true. It starts at the top, and Khan is too frugal and not shrewd enough to get us promoted I don't think. I'd say it's more likely we get relegated, but not that likely either at the moment.

If you look at his Jacksonville Jags team, they have had a losing record every year, and the goal of that vehicle is to turn a profit. Until Fulham starts turning a profit, I wouldn't expect to see a promotion chasing side, and that may take a long long time. I hope I'm wrong. There's always a chance. There's always outliers. Leicester.

[Armardar]

@Kent Cassandra .... "is it going to happen", was in the context of returning to the premier league. I was asking if people thought it would be possible to have a promotion campaign under Shaid Khan, or if the owner if irrelevant and as long as he provides the funds then it is purely down to the manager and players.

You asked what I think the fall of Fulham from the top flight was due to. Realistically it is difficult to point to one fault as I think there are a number of elements that brought us to where we are. Firstly I think one of the key aspects is love for the club from both the owner and players. I think Hodegson loved the club in the same way MAF did, we can see that from when Roy was almost brought to tears in the 07 season after the 3-1 home defeat to Sunderland  in April 07. We definitely haven't seen that level of emotion from any proceeding managers. Plus the players all had a tight fellowship (Davis, Baird, Hangleland, Murphy, Zamora, Hughes, Schwatzer, Dempsey etc) that resulted in a great resilience and chemistry, which was ultimately a key ingredient for our Europa success.

I think we can see the first major slip in the Club during Khans first season, I think Jol agreed to a budget that Hughes didn't think was possible operate under and as a result we developed this aging team without chemistry or love for the badge on their chest. Any football team has both ups and downs, however we didn't bounce back from our downs as I think we lacked ingredients far more fundamental then a replacement striker (Bearing in mind we have had Berbatov, Mitroglu and McCormack).

Moving forward to the present day I think we need a few things to repair the damage, first is building Fulham as a brand, make us an attractive prospect for both fans and players, I think our youth academy is a major selling point of the club, Also We need another Hangeland, Murphy figure, someone who would turn downa big money move to Arsenal to stay with us like Brede did! However at the moment I fear the simple processes that make a club efficient has become saturated with unnecessary bureaucracy, Mike Rigg's role is a perfect example of this, having a panel of people selecting a manager etc etc.....

I haver great hope in slav and I believe he defies many of the characteristics that restrict us into being a constricted inconsistent club; the owner needs to be challenged and a style of football needs to be implemented and I think Slav could be the man to do that..... Will just have to see? 

[Armardar]

with khan it's 2 steps forward... 1 step back

get some more faces on the board and a decent manager... put your son's mate in charge of transfers

buy a decent centre back, some wide players... sell both your strikers

khan is slowly undoing the massive damage he did in that first year or so but at this rate it will take a while to get back where we were

i full except khan to sell up before then (just as soon as he gets a half decent offer)

Agree good points in this

[HatterDon]

You can't turn over half your squad and still make a serious run at promotion. We need the stability of the same manager in charge four transfer periods in a row before that can happen.

[@jolslover]

You can't turn over half your squad and still make a serious run at promotion. We need the stability of the same manager in charge four transfer periods in a row before that can happen.

You can do this, Look at Wednesday last year, completely new manager and a new squad, go to the play off final

[nose]

IMO we have a brilliant chance of promotion!!!
A couple of tweaks needed and maybe a proper striker in the winter break
If the board would have got AL:L the players in in time for pre season we would be miles clear by now.

we play really well, just need to work out how to pop the ball dans le net monsieur!

[Kent Cassandra]

Armardor...Lots of valid points and a good post.
Not sure that MAF loved Fulham in quite the same was that Roy did 
His insight into Fulham fans who ridiculed the famous statue (most of us)
that If we didn't like it we could all go and support that club down the road
had me wondering if the exercise for him was pure vanity.
     Having said that, like most of us I was very thankful for his money
and his input. I know that probably makes me as shallow as he obviously was.
However the point I was making (rather crudely) was that it s alright to dream
about the top league but sometimes one has to be realistic and patient as regards to expectations.
I think and dearly hope you are right about Slav but I do worry that he might be put under too much pressure
to get results too soon.  I think he is strong enough but are we...

[Logicalman]

MaF did a great deal for our club, eclipsed by very few really, but even if he did leave us in a financial quandary, it was no worse than other teams have faced, and survived in the past, and 3 years on I should have expected to see somewhat of an improvement on our outlook, unfortunately I don't, well not in the short term anyways.

My overriding goal for the club isn't to get back into the Prem, it is to get stabilized, get a coach and set of players that can gel the same way we saw with Roy, and once we have that, top flight footie will return again. How do we get that? Well obviously finances play a big part, and if that is all SK needs to do then let him do it, but we need a management team that exudes confidence, and unfortunately we have not really seen that in the past 3 years at all, especially the often knee-jerk reaction to some of the managers/coaches (both employing and firing), but perhaps with SJ we have a coach that can and will stay for the long run, provide a good base to build from, and then we will see what happens.

[EastEndWhite]

At the moment it's too early in the season to know whether or not we will end up pushing for a top six finish or have to settle for a mid table finish. (I don't think we'll end up in a relegation battle). Depending on the results across the championship from one Saturday to another teams are moving up and down the table like yo-yo's.  I'm still optimistic but am concerned about our goal difference.

[Whitesideup]

@Kent Cassandra .... "is it going to happen", was in the context of returning to the premier league. I was asking if people thought it would be possible to have a promotion campaign under Shaid Khan, or if the owner if irrelevant and as long as he provides the funds then it is purely down to the manager and players.

You asked what I think the fall of Fulham from the top flight was due to. Realistically it is difficult to point to one fault as I think there are a number of elements that brought us to where we are. Firstly I think one of the key aspects is love for the club from both the owner and players. I think Hodegson loved the club in the same way MAF did, we can see that from when Roy was almost brought to tears in the 07 season after the 3-1 home defeat to Sunderland  in April 07. We definitely haven't seen that level of emotion from any proceeding managers. Plus the players all had a tight fellowship (Davis, Baird, Hangleland, Murphy, Zamora, Hughes, Schwatzer, Dempsey etc) that resulted in a great resilience and chemistry, which was ultimately a key ingredient for our Europa success.

I think we can see the first major slip in the Club during Khans first season, I think Jol agreed to a budget that Hughes didn't think was possible operate under and as a result we developed this aging team without chemistry or love for the badge on their chest. Any football team has both ups and downs, however we didn't bounce back from our downs as I think we lacked ingredients far more fundamental then a replacement striker (Bearing in mind we have had Berbatov, Mitroglu and McCormack).

Moving forward to the present day I think we need a few things to repair the damage, first is building Fulham as a brand, make us an attractive prospect for both fans and players, I think our youth academy is a major selling point of the club, Also We need another Hangeland, Murphy figure, someone who would turn downa big money move to Arsenal to stay with us like Brede did! However at the moment I fear the simple processes that make a club efficient has become saturated with unnecessary bureaucracy, Mike Rigg's role is a perfect example of this, having a panel of people selecting a manager etc etc.....

I haver great hope in slav and I believe he defies many of the characteristics that restrict us into being a constricted inconsistent club; the owner needs to be challenged and a style of football needs to be implemented and I think Slav could be the man to do that..... Will just have to see? 

Interesting you point to the camaraderie of the squad. A number of them used to frequent an Italian restaurant not far from Shannon's corner, and there was a definite "team" feel  to their outings. They could be quite noisy and on one occasion Schwarzer bought a friend of mine ( a regular and frequent customer) a decent bottle of red to apologize for the boisterous nature of their group. We should not underestimate the importance of the team as opposed to a group of talented individuals. 

[sunburywhite]

I am quite happy to stay in the Championship. It is more like football used to be and we always have a good chance of beating the league leaders or losing to the bottom team

With the Premiership it is more a case of three divisions and you never really have a chance of beating the top teams. The money spent on players is obscene.

This board would go into meltdown (if we had the money) should we buy a player for £50m

[Berserker]

I can't see us getting promoted this season. I would like to see us go back eventually though

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