Decent result that

Given our last 2 matches were against Barnsley and QPR, I don't get your point.
I don't think anyone can deny Reading were the form side going in to this match.

More generally, I think we've beat easy beats a bit too much in recent years; I'm inclined to think of these tough, hard fought points as positives against the background of recent years. I'm glad to be hard to beat.
What’s not to get we have played Watford, Bournemouth and Reading so far and gained 2 points. The easier teams we have played in QPR and Barnsley we gained 4 points and you look at the next 4 fixtures and we have Bristol City, Cardiff both away then an easier fixture of Coventry before playing Forrest who will be buoyant having Houghton in charge now with their squad.
We need to take our chances and get 3 points, sure a draw is a decent result against the relegated teams with superior squads but we should be pushing more for a win against the teams who have been in and around the championship for years. 6 points from 5 is just not good enough and neither is 4 goals from 5.
 
I thought Reading were solid and strong physically, but limited creativity - I would put them top 10 but touch and go for top 6.

We have improved on last year, but very mid table.
 
Our target is 4th bottom or above.
Given that view this was a good point.
Lots of clubs papping themselves over finances this year and happy just to hang on in there.
We are definitely one of them.
BUT we'd have lost that match under Woodgate.
Funny that as fans weren’t happy with that stance from Karanka when in a much tougher league.
 
Good point against the form team
Britt looks off the pace and doesn't look like scoring . He looks over weight also .
Was he injured or just subbed ?
 
They've only conceded one goal so far, they've won all four of their games and we stopped them from getting a single shot on target.

It was awful to watch, but that aside a decent result.
 
We need to start putting wins together unless we’re happy to finish mid table

My worry is that this is Warnocks' plan. In his pre-match interview he said hopefully we can stay around mid-table and then make a late push towards the end of the season.

I think they were there for the taking today to be honest and if he'd been a little braver and brought on Roberts we could have snatched it.
 
We are building a team. The likes of Bola, Dijksteel, Spence will only get better. If you keep clean sheets early in the season and get an unbeaten record going then the spirit and confidence go up and the wins arrive. It is a long season. We are 3 points off 6th. Just keep going and don’t lose.
 
Priority 1 has to be that we do not get dragged into a relegation battle as Warnock tries to develop. Solid performances like this are a good sign of a well organised side. He will soon be looking to build on this and aiming to put us in a playoff spot.
I hold plenty of faith in Warnock but we do need to show some patience. I see us hanging above mid table for the first half of the season before finishing strongly. Fingers crossed.
 
Decent result happy enough with the result. I don’t see it with Bola mind. I don’t think he gets to enough quick enough when defending and isn’t aggressive, don’t think he’s particularly good going forward either. But he looked better when he had Johnson in front of him.
 
They've only conceded one goal so far, they've won all four of their games and we stopped them from getting a single shot on target.

It was awful to watch, but that aside a decent result.
And we didn’t have one shot on target and kept our best player on the bench.
 
Maybe Roberts isn’t fit. We have two tough away games this week. Maybe he will get more room away from home? Get the feeling beating old club Cardiff away next Saturday will be one of NW’s targets.
 
We aren’t going anywhere with a creative 4 of saville, howson, Tavernier and bola, they just want to continuously knock it back or sideways rather than having a go at the opposition.

fair enough though if a 0-0 draw is the objective every week, because we’re playing an in form team / relegated team / team with parachute payments / team full of internationals (delete as appropriate)
 
Different financial model entirely when Karanka was in charge.
Not really, if your suggesting Karanka had loads of money to spend and aimed for 4th bottom as being different because of the the money then look at the clubs around who spend money first. We may have spent money in the PL but nowhere near enough to have a squad of the standard as the rest of the PL who had been there for years. Even lesser teams spending £20/30m for players we could have only dreamt of. 4th bottom was the aim, 4th bottom would have been a success but as we all know he never got the chance to finish what he started and we wasted it on Agnew.
 
Not really, if your suggesting Karanka had loads of money to spend and aimed for 4th bottom as being different because of the the money then look at the clubs around who spend money first. We may have spent money in the PL but nowhere near enough to have a squad of the standard as the rest of the PL who had been there for years. Even lesser teams spending £20/30m for players we could have only dreamt of. 4th bottom was the aim, 4th bottom would have been a success but as we all know he never got the chance to finish what he started and we wasted it on Agnew.
But this is a different league, in a different era.
A completely different challenge.
I think most Boro fans would have been overjoyed at staying up in the PL - 4th bottom or wherever
 
But this is a different league, in a different era.
A completely different challenge.
I think most Boro fans would have been overjoyed at staying up in the PL - 4th bottom or wherever
I would have but I disagree with the most part. Many fans calling for him to be sacked because of his lack of ambition and wouldn’t have been happy if we weren’t challenging for champions league football. Statements of the money he spent without looking at our squad compared to average teams in the PL and their player valuations for average players. We would have needed to spend probably 150-200m to get an average squad finishing 10-16th with our squad being championship standard.
 
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