Latest / Minnows Football / August, we hardly knew 'ye: A Championship vibe-check after Matchweek 4

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August, we hardly knew 'ye: A Championship vibe-check after Matchweek 4 · Minnows Football

• Sam: Welcome to the Minnows Football Podcast. Thursday, September third. I'm Sam Martin, host of Minnows Football. Want to start today with a reading, if you'll indulge me, something I was reading earlier today. I'll try and do it some justice here. The madness of an autumn prairie cold front coming through. You could feel it. Something terrible was going to happen. The sun low in the sky, a minor light, a cooling star, gust after gust of disorder. Trees restless, temperatures falling, the whole northern religion of things coming to an end. No children in the yards here, shadows lengthened on yellowing zoisha, red oaks and pin oaks and swamp white oaks rained acorns on houses with no mortgage, storm windows shuddered in the empty bedrooms, and the drone and hiccup of a clothes dryer, the nasal contention of a leaf blower, the ripening of local apples in a paper bag. The smell of the gasoline with which Alfred Lambert had cleaned the paintbrush from his morning painting of the Wicker Love Seat. Now, that's of course from Jonathan Franzen's The Corrections. And before you say what an absolute wank of a thing to start the episode with, first of all you're right. Second of all, you cynic. the corrections is twenty five years old today, and that doesn't that paragraph still hold up? To describe the world, a haunting opening to a novel f leaves you with these feelings of, I don't know, all sorts of things, r really massive uncertainty, which is kind of how the world feels right now. If if that was written in 2001, how would that book open today? but let's let's leave that world behind. Let's leave that world behind, but apply those same feelings of uncertainty to some underdog football, some second tier football and the EFL championship in particular. And so today we're gonna have a look. We're gonna do a vibe check on where all the clubs are going into week five, match week five this Saturday. We had a fantastic double game, double dose of of games since we last spoke. Match weeks three and four, the midweek round this week. a bit of housekeeping before we dive into today's episode. Go check out minnowsfootball.com where we have fixed the belief index and fixed the performance component. Turned out I was counting something twice in there and then multiplying it out. Who would have known that a creative writing major could make a mistake to a mathematical algorithm like that? But anyway, we are back and rocking and rolling now. So go check out minnowsfootball.com for the latest belief index. Today I Wanted to check in on how each club is vibing coming out of of August. And vibe is it's not a power ranking, it's not definitive. It's I use the word vibe really intentionally there, because it is just a vibe. It's a feel to the whole thing. it's a castle reference, a reference to the castle. If anyone's out there, any great Australian film aficionados. And it's because in in August, the one thing that we really know about August, and this August has proven it. just like every other August, is that it's hard to trust anything that we truly see. So things that look really good might not be quite so good. Things that look really bad might not be quite so bad. They might be really bad and they might be really good, but we really don't know. Clubs are still gelling. The transfer window literally just stopped. and that doesn't just bring change to squad with new members coming in, but it's also super distracting for players, for managers, they're feeling uncertain. Now we are at that point of the season where the squads are the squads. They're largely the squads for the whole season, but they're at least the squads until till January. And so clubs now really can start to bed down and we can start to see their true colors. That said, we can get a vibe from what's going on around the league. So in order to do this kind of top to bottom ranking, I went through and I listed Put every team into three really simple groups. And we're pulling a lot from the belief index here to put these into an order. But here are three groups that we're going to go through every every single club and put them into. Feeling good, feeling okay, and feeling not great. Really basic. But you'll notice there's no like feeling ecstatic there. There's no feeling awful. Cause I truly believe every fan base, maybe with the exception of one or two, but maybe every fan base is still thinking there's hope here. And in the same way, I'm still thinking there's potentially pain here. You go and you look and read around some of the fan forums right now, even the clubs that are doing really well, a lot of fans are saying, Yeah, but let's let's check back in again in Christmas. I'm sure it'll be starting to come down by then. So there's still a lack of true belief out there, but there are some big broad brush strokes that we can put across the season. So let's crack on and let's start at the top. We're gonna go top to bottom in these groups. So let's start with the feeling good group. And at the very top of that group, I've got two clubs that have had different starts of the season, but they are one and two in the table. So this is kind of it's a coincidence that they're at the top of this and the top of the table. The coincidence is that neither of these clubs probably expected to be top of the table leaving August, and that's Swansea and QPR. Both of them massively outperforming expectation. QPR has had wins against Portsmouth, Blackburn, and Cardiff, and they've drawn with Bolton. That's Great. That it's not the the strongest resume out there, but it's you play what's in front of you and they've had a really strong start to the season. They're groups that both these teams have managers who are not new but new ish, who may be finally starting to execute on their plans from both a squad and strategy perspective. And in the case of Swansea, they are outperforming expectations pretty significantly, but they're also doing it in this style that has has been talked about a lot in the last week or so in particular. But it's just absolutely fantastic to watch under Vito Matos. And let's t think about their wins a little bit. So they've they've won against Stoke, West Ham, and Watford. They drew with Sheffield United. but they play in this way that that Matos seems to have instilled this real confidence in this squad to be ambitious, but to also be absolutely relentless on the ball. He wants to play this stylish. Eye catching, possession based football. but he's also linked it in in talking about it. He's linked it not just to clubs like I I want to play like Manchester City. It's not that that same kind of thematic correlation there. He's talked about wanting to play like the old Swansea teams when they were really successful in their own heritage under managers like Roberto Martinez and Brendan Rogers. He wants to play this attacking, stylish football and The reason it's all gelling for Swansea right at this moment is that he's got this ambition and he's executing on that ambition. You just got to go and look at that that fantastic first goal. I think it was the first goal they scored on the weekend against Watford. Both goals were were phenomenal. But that goal where it was it's they played out from goalkeeper, went up the wing, a couple of quick sharp passes, and then Eon finished in the from a from across in this really smooth and stylish way. It's just fantastic and sublime football to watch. And if you go and look at Matos's locker room speech, he has this he has this pragmatic style to him, which is really appealing and and makes him really empathetic for the players and the people in that dressing room. But he's also ambitious. And so he talks about his ambition, but he puts it alongside these ways in which he's going to do it. Anyway, it's a really Phenomenal star for Swansea. Great start for QPR as well. Both those clubs flying high, vibes very strong at the start of September here. How sustainable is it for both clubs? We're not going to answer that right now. We have no idea. But I think definitely in the case of Swansea, there feels like there's the shape of something which makes a lot of sense. And we'll see how long and and how far they can start to take that. Next group of clubs here in the feeling good vibe category. We've got Charlton. West Brom, Blackburn Rovers, and Bristol City. All four of these clubs, they're also outperforming expectations and in some cases pretty significantly. I wanted to start with Charlton because they they have to be one of the big stories coming out of August. And I think the key, the key point out of them is this evolution that we're starting to see out of Nathan Jones. Now let's remember, let's go back a month and think about how we previewed Charlton going into the season. We thought they were a club that Had some uncertainty at the ownership level, obviously with them putting being put up for sale, that process still undergoing. But we also felt they're a club that had stagnated a little bit under Nathan Jones. Nathan Jones has this, but with the tenure of his the length of his tenure at the club and the way he is as a person, has this gravitas to him that really is something that a lot of championship clubs would love to have. Someone who's trusted, someone who's disciplined, has a really rigorous defense. But they're coming off a season last year where they really struggled to score goals. And one of the key questions going into this this season was can he evolve the way that he manages his squad and the way he plays? And so far we've seen that he can. And they've evolved from this kind of rock solid team, into a team that can really attack. you've got guys like and I'm gonna use his full name here, Tyrese, Anthony Tupac, Sh Shakur, Campbell, four games, three goals. He's the an example of the kind of spark that they really needed last year. He's already equaled his goal tally from forty-five appearances last year in his first four games. And so they've they've found a way to attack. they signed a conquo from Wrexham who's looked great in goal. their wins a couple of their wins over Derby and Preston, you could maybe say against not the greatest opp opposition, but they have a win against West Ham as well. They drew with West Brom. And then they play Stoke next. They play Stoke this weekend. And so they're really you know, kind of flying high here as they as they enter the into September. And just a phenomenal start that fans probably couldn't have expected going into the year. A couple of other of these clubs here, West Brom and Blackburn Rovers, we're we're seeing they're gelling really well early with their new managers or newish managers in West Brom's case. some surprising results, not quite as successful as Charlton, but fans would be happy, cautiously happy with their early results. With both those clubs, it still feels early. Like it feels early to really know where Blackburn Rovers goes from here. But at the same time, you'd be much happier where they're at than where you thought they might have been. And the same can probably be said to maybe a little lesser extent with West Brom. I think both of them it's it's we're not sure with those clubs how it really feels, but we can t and taking them on face value, we feel reasonably good about the start. Bristol City has been impressive from their bounce back from opening day. They just looked completely lost on that first day against Millwall. But since then, two two at Birmingham, beat Portsmouth, beat Preston. Soft there's a couple of soft opponents in those last two games, but they've found this way to do something which they weren't really able to do successfully and consistently last year, which is taking care of business in some of these games. they they were ruthless in the game yesterday. And they've got a lot of new guys coming into this squad. They got a new manager in Skubala. They're trying to play a different way. We maybe started to see some of that yesterday. Dom Ballard scored up front. and so they've they might be learning how to win, which would be incredible for this club. We talked a lot in the the preview for them about the fact that they were a club that had so much promise. But had been really unable to execute been unable to execute on that promise. And so are they starting to learn and develop a way to win? We will find out. But good signs to start the season after that disappointing first week. And then the last group in this section, so this section of vibes, vibes equal good, I've got four clubs in this last section: West Ham, Watford, Bolton, and Lincoln City. And The thing which which unites these four clubs is that they're inconsistent, but for very different reasons, there are definitely some positive signs as we go into September with these clubs. Enough that you should be feeling kind of net positive if you if you were a fan of these teams, at least with what you see on the pitch. And we'll get into some of the off-pitch stuff in a second. Let's take the sort of simple simpler ones first, which are Lincoln and Bolton. And they're simpler because they're promoted teams and we're really defining success for these clubs as staying up this year and looking maybe even not more than staying up because the result is kind of everything in the end, but but looking like they belong and looking like they can survive at this level. And so the answer for both those clubs is yes. They they have had a lot of moments where you've you've you're following this club and you're watching their games. You'd think these clubs, these teams really belong at this level. Like if you'd said to an imps fan, you it's beginning of September, played four games, you've had two losses, one win and a draw, they they would take that every day of the week. The loss to Portsmouth is probably the most disappointing performance so far, but since then they beat Bolton away, they drew with Blackburn, they've shown the intent to grind as well as some attacking flair. That first week loss to Middlesbrough. Yes, it was a loss, but they showed a lot of promise in that game and showed that they wouldn't be overawed playing a big opponent like that. And then they also they're flying in the EFL Cup. They play Bournemouth next week after beating Derby and Blackpool. So they've got a lot of momentum in the club right now, as well as to say that they are a miracle club. They're a club that really doesn't historically, and with the expectation around them, doesn't really quote unquote belong at this level. That's not a dig on them at all, but like this is borrowed house money that they're playing with here. They added a bit of depth at the deadline. They've got a huge home game against Southampton this Saturday. We'll get to Southampton in a second. They look fantastic in their game against Millwall on the weekend. but if they could get a result there, even a draw, they're really starting to show signs that they're not going to be a pushover or potentially won't be a pushover at this level. Bolton, similarly have just looked fantastic at times. Like there are moments in their counterattack and they look like they really, really belong at this level. They're a little inconsistent sometimes. Had a tough loss at at the last minute last night to Sheffield United. but they're creating chances. There's a lot to like about Bolton and the way they've started the season. The other two clubs in this group, with an inconsistent start to the season but plenty of on the pitch promise, Watford and West Ham. Both both clubs I think can be happy with where they're at. If they're not necessarily happy with the number of points, they would be happy with the product they're seeing on the pitch and where it is in terms of where they think they'll finish and what they might have expected going into the season. West Ham, I think, should still be favorites to to win the league. I haven't checked the latest odds, but I would assume they're still favorites to to win the league. The game against Wolves was To me, a real warning shot. They looked like a class above not just Wolves, but the entire competition. I thought actually Wolverhampton played quite well in that game and showed that they could hang with a club like that, but it just looked like a really good professional outfit with a ton of firepower and class. They could they could execute in ways that you don't see from other teams and other games around the weekend. So they on the pitch I feel like they're really starting to get things together. It's still a shit show off the pitch. I wanna read something to you that I read on Twitter on the weekend, which kind of sums some of this up for us. So this is from a West Ham fan of why he's calling it quits after thirty-eight years of supporting the club. Born with clariton blue balloons in my crib, first game in eighty eight against Liverpool, a shift worker since fifteen, but I've always carved out time for matches. However, tonight against Wolves, I left it nil nil. I'm officially done attending games. It's not about the football. It's the lifeless matchday experience. £7.50 for terrible beer, one and a half hour commutes, and sitting near tourists who can't tell if it's a cup match or clueless vloggers, end us endlessly rambling into cameras for live streams while real fans just shake their heads. I defended the London Stadium for a decade against the critics. I accepted the ball in was a thing of the past. But tonight it hit hard. Modern football and this stadium are no longer made for folks like us. I adore West Ham. It's etched on my skin. But from now on, I'll be watching from home. The spirit has left the building. And then a hammer's icon. I mean, that's that's dark. That's dark stuff. it's kind of it's kind of the last thing. I mean, I'm trying to think of different perspectives to to see this through. But as a if you were the owner of a I hate to put it into like brand terms, but it's like if you were the owner of a business and this is what people are saying about your brand, you're like, we're in real trouble here. Like this is someone who has been really caring about the core of the club, who's just feels like they've been left behind by this modern move. And there's obviously so many different elements tied up in that. everything from the commercialization of football to the profit focused, lens through which we see the world these days. the modernization of of everything. Like it's there's just so many different angles at which you can you can see that. But it's it's the the bleeding heart of a fan who yeah, they might be getting a a product on the pitch which they can see being promoted this year and going back to the Premier League. But if you think about what's going on off the pitch for West Ham supporters, you've got a bad owner To put it lightly, you've kind of sold the soul of your club. Feels like you're no longer who you said you were. You're inauthentic. You've got this vibeless home stadium that's a real pain to get to for fans. if you had any one of those things going on at your club, it would be a really hard thing. if you've got them all, I I just don't know where you go from there. So yeah, West Ham's getting it to get on the pitch, still some existential time for their fans and We'll see where they go. Speaking of kind of existential pain, Watford. Watford on the pitch has looked pretty good. And I think what surprised me and others is that D and EC seems to have a plan. it's n and actually it's it's a multifaceted plan. It's partly on the pitch where they've looked really strong. Only one loss to Swansea's. They've played some really entertaining football, in the win against Southampton, the draw with Wrexham, the draw with West Ham. Like they've they've seen that they can be disciplined and they can also attack and and they've got some ideas there. But he's also looked like he's he's been quite thoughtful about how to connect with the club and its fans. he stayed behind after a fan forum to help pack away tables and chairs, and that just that went down really well with fans. Like it sounds really simple, but that's a really great tactic if you're new and you're foreign. He's worked really hard to speak English. Like it's like there's all these things that he's doing which seem like small things, but he's really building a connection with the fan base, which is something that managers can often really struggle with. He dealt with the circus over Imran loser by dropping him to prioritize the squad. and so, you know, it's it's still early, but He seems like he's got a plan on the pitch which could be good for Watford this year. that said, Watford's had good starts in the past. And so it's it's we'll be curious to see not only how long he can sustain it, but then does ownership actually have a plan? And if you go and you talk to Watford fans and hear from them what they're saying, they still feel like ownership is not backing the club and backing the manager in the same way that they'd like to see. They feel like they've still got holes. At center back and central midfield, the ownership's not really willing to invest in this club. So these are the same kind of trends that we heard at the beginning. It's why the trust score is so low on the belief index and why the Watford score overall on the belief index index is so low. So Dionysus' good vibes, his chair folding, they they can only go so far. But it's better than if he hadn't come in and done that. And if they'd come in and they'd lost three of their first four games. So some positives at Watford, even if some of those Other problems still loom. Okay, let's move on to the next section, the middle section of the table. So that was all the feeling good clubs. These are the ones that are feeling meh, feeling okay. they should these clubs that should probably be fine, but we definitely need to see more. We need to see more from every club, obviously, but definitely these guys. There's been a lot of inconsistency through this group. So the first group are the big guns who haven't quite fired yet or have fired inconsistently and looking everywhere from fantastic to to terrible. And that's in that group I've got Wolverhampton, Middlesbrough, Millwall, and Southampton. Now first off, why is West Ham not in this group? They they have also been inconsistent. I push them up to the top tier because I just feel that they've seemed on the pitch a tier above these other teams, which is giving them that that higher vibe. But that you could argue for them to be part of this group as well. These groups, these clubs are all good clubs who should be in the playoff and promotion race right you feel right now, and have done nothing in the first month to really set themselves apart or feel like something's wrong. In fact, they've done things on both sides at different times, which maybe cancel each other out. But they have had different August arcs. Wolves, for example, they've had a draw, two wins against soft opponents, Preston and Stoke, and a loss. I thought the loss was against West Ham that was almost their best performance so far, strangely, because that game just felt a step up in quality like I was talking about before. And for large parts of that game, they really matched it with West Ham. Like that looked like a Premier League game. I get that you can kind of get tricked into that because they're two teams from the Premier League last year. But it they looked a a step above there. They have been inconsistent. The the squad is now settled and you would not be surprised if they go on a bit of a run here And start to separate themselves. And even though they've looked unsettled, the two wins against Preston and Stoke mean they're they're close to the top of the table. So they've had an inconsistent but reasonably okay August. Middlesbrough has been confoundingly inconsistent, to me. They they had a gritty opening day win against Lincoln City, a frustrating loss to Blackburn, a Hells Hellsburg ball. At its very best, win 3-1 against West Brom, and then a draw at Burnley at Turf Moor last night. They probably just need a little more time to gel. You can see the plan here. And one of the reasons you can see the plan is that, you know, Kim Hellsberg came in last year, completely changed the way they were playing, started to play this really flowing, direct, attacking, pressing football that is so in vogue, but it looked really good. And then he's now had the offseason to get the guys that presumably he wants to execute this vision. And but it's taken a little bit of time to gel. And you're just not seeing it so far in the season really be executed consistency consistently across 90 minutes. Bearhalter has looked better and more cohesive every game. Aiden Morris scored last night. Like they they are starting to put these pieces together in a way that you can really see them going on a run. And you could see them either winning the league or or being in that automatic promotion spot. You would just like over the next few months to see them do it with greater discipline and and a little more execution. They just kind of switch off sometimes, which is understandable in August, but also, you know, leads them to be in this group rather than the top one. Millwall is is Kind of a it's not a season in two halves, it's a month. It's a month in two halves though. The first couple of games and then fifteen minutes into the Southampton game or twenty minutes into the Southampton game, for those first two games and then twenty minutes into game three, they looked like the best or one of the best teams in the competition. since then they've looked like one of the bottom teams in the competition. And it's not necessarily their fault. They've had a ton of injuries, as everyone will tell you, they'll s you know, they can barely field a team. When I was watching the game against Wrexham last night, you know, commentators couldn't stop talking about the fact that they just really had no one on the bench to turn to because the the squad is so bare. They've got a really intense run of games over the next few weeks. They played obviously on the weekend, they played last night. They're playing on Saturday and then they play Newcastle in the FL Cup on Tuesday. So there's a lot of games in a row. The those three, the one last night, and then the next two are all at the den. So at least they're they're not traveling. I was singing their praises in the last two weeks ago, I guess, as being so disciplined and so locked in and knowing who they are. Alex Neal, what a legend, blah, blah, blah. but we'll see what happens when they get some players back. You know, this could be something where they've Just been hit seriously by injury. Coburn went down as well last night. You know, they're they're losing guys who they really can't afford to lose. but they have been thrashed those last two games. Five one at Southampton, three nothing home to Wrexham last night of the den, and never really in that game. So we'll see. We'll see how how they kind of pop out of this of this troublesome run with injury and where they settle. S Southampton, then the demolition of Millwall was was great. and they looked like a different club in the latter 75 minutes of that game. It started out as a bit of a battle, and then midway through the first half, they just really took over. And you saw a team there that can pass, they can dribble, they have class. You've got guys like Leo Sienza who just took over that game and made it look very, very easy. they've got Kyle Larren who just puts the ball in the back of the net when it comes to him. It's been a choppy start to the season for them. And I think it's hard to look at the start of their season without seeing that minus four points, Spy Gate, the ripple effect of Spy Gate as being impactful to them. And if they didn't have the minus four points, they'd be close to the top of the table. Not that the table is particularly meaningful at this time of year. But if they can put that in the rear view, then you have to think that They're going to be not just okay, but they're going to be pretty, pretty great. and it's it's an interesting competition here where if you think of the quality in the in the championship this year, if these clubs really perform to their potential, you've got a lot of firepower between West Ham, Southampton, Middlesbrough, Wolves, Millwall, quality clubs. they'll be really vying for those top two positions. And should be a great race. So I you kind of as an impartial observer like myself, without ties to any team, you're really rooting for the best of all of these great clubs to just continue to get great football. So we started to see that from Southampton and we'll see where it goes here. The last two clubs in no, I have four clubs left in the middle group. Two and then two. The next group, more is expected, but still feeling all right. Two clubs, Wrexham and Birmingham City. Funny to kind of pair these guys up. I'm not doing it intentionally because of ownership and ambition and all that stuff. I think they just do kind of naturally fit together. Birmingham's Birmingham's undefeated. But only one win. And ironically, that was against Wrexham away. And the question for them is: are they tough to beat because they're resilient, or are they just not quite putting teams away? And it's kind of a question of what tier are these guys really going to be in from a performance execution standpoint as the season goes on? Are they going to be a club that is really pushing and vying for promotion? Or are they just a resilient mid-table team that is well structured and disciplined? And will be very safe this year. I think they they would obviously like to be the former. but to be the former, a lot's on the shoulders of guys like Jay Stansfield, who's he's so talismanic as a character and as a as a scorer. No goals so far this season. They had to wait for a 95th minute penalty to split the points at Bristol City. you just need you'd want to see a little more consistency with this team, especially up front. The team the game where they really got it together against Rexham and one, that wasn't necessarily a strong performance up front. There was a really strong performance from set pieces. You have these two giant center backs, Newman and and Clara, who were just top-notch and they looked unstoppable from corners, especially in the first fifteen or twenty minutes when they scored their first goal. And then the second goal came from just a poor clearance from Kiefer Moore and just banging the ball back in and and Newman getting a second goal a a header. But that that was the difference. They haven't really stood out as a strong attacking team yet. that spark has been inconsistent. That attacking spark has been inconsistent for them. But some really good signs, good enough signs that you'd think they're gonna be one of those types of teams this year, either pushing or safely mid-table. Rexham has just started slowly and they had A really good look about them yesterday taking apart an under-strength Millwall. Like really, really good. They were were really in control for the whole game. and they can maybe settle now a little bit. They had seven players in in this transfer window, 13 out, including some of the club legends, or at least legends of this latest iteration of the club as they've pushed out of the National League. You know, guys like Elliott Lee and Paul Mullen leaving. which, you know. rattles the fan base or has the potential to rattle the fan base. and it means you've got to kind of artificially, in some cases, take some of these existing players or new players and say, well, these are the new Paul Mullen. This is the new Elliot Lee for us, the Kiefer Moores and Sam Smiths and and those kind of guys to to really take that next push. But the reason Elliot Lee and and Paul Mullen are legends in that club is that they oversaw great success and they oversaw promotions, the guys I just listed haven't really executed that same vision. They've really been, you know, keeping them up in the championship. There's this question to me, which is does Rexham really, it's a bigger question that we could answer right now here, but it's like, does Rexham really belong in the Premier League? The answer to that is probably no, clearly no. They're living in this kind of miracle spot. But then if you don't belong there in the short term, And belong is kind of in inadvertent con commas, but if you don't do if you're not belonging there to start, how do those aspirations meet the right altitude for where you're meant to live? Because you're living this miracle life right now, if you're Wrexham. And how do expectations start to play into that? If you stay at the championship level for a few more seasons, does the club start to feel like at what stage do supporters think, this is a championship club? At what point does the the great victories that you saw under the guys like Lee and Mullen getting up from the National League and up into the second division, at what start does at what point do those successes start to fade into the background and this starts to become a grind? I think we're a little way off that yet. the way they've managed the club, the ownership has been to be relentlessly positive, but also in terms of the transfer window, like relentlessly chaotic as well. They got called out. excuse me, called out a few times across this transfer window as being kind of interested in everyone, linked to almost every player out there. And then there's this also this frenetic energy for the way they play on the on the pitch and and sometimes that's really good frenetic energy and sometimes it's not quite as good and leads to lack of discipline. So there's a vibe around this club right now. It hasn't been the most successful start to the season. It may just all take off from here with the win against Millwall, but a lot still to learn, a lot to see. Last two clubs in this group, not really sure yet, but I don't think it's the it's that bad. Sheffield United and Cardiff City. So this this may be the hardest category to put together. And for these clubs, it's like I just I really couldn't tell you. I really the vibe is I have no idea. And I don't think supporters really know either. Sheffield United's unbeaten as well, like Birmingham, only one win, but just a little less convincing. than them. They've had a tough run. They've gone against Birmingham City, Swansea, Cardiff. So not the easiest, but not the hardest run at the same time. But they didn't score a goal until week three. they had a great win midweek this week against Bolton. And by a great win I mean a dramatic win. 3-2 winning in in stoppage time. Maybe that's a turning point. But Maybe more so than what's happening on the pitch. Well, maybe it's matching. Maybe what's not happening on the pitch is matching what's happening off the pitch, but there are these huge storm clouds looming with the ownership battle going on. They still could face a point deduction from all the turmoil that's happening in terms of ownership. No real just this silence coming from ownership as well. So there's no clarity about what's gonna happen, big anxiety for supporters, and then That was matched with deadline day. They let Kalamo Hare go to Wrexham and that wasn't really well received by by some fans. So it's it's tense at Bramel Lane right now. Winning solves everything. If they get a win against Norwich this weekend, that could start to show that they've turned the corner here if they string a few wins together. But it's some tense times there. I'm I'm not really sure which way this season is gonna jag up or down. Another club that's really uncertain in the the same bracket is Cardiff City. Same uncertainty, different issues though. They've got three draws and a loss, but plenty of goals. They've looked really good in patches. Against Wrexham in the opening game, they looked fantastic. They really controlled the game for most of the game. They let in one stupid goal or not stupid goal, but like a ill disciplined defensively goal. And then they equalized in in stoppage time. Since then they've gone two two to Derby, two two Sheffield United, two one loss to QPR. And they're playing really nice football. High possession football against QPR, eighty nine percent passing accuracy. You know, they're playing this way that they want they've just they've explicitly stated they want to play. They're being highly intentional with how they're playing, and the results on the pitch have not quite matched it yet. in that they're yet to win. But three draws, you know, against pretty good opponents. we'll we'll see what happens. They'd acquire transfer window, but they've said they've come out and said that they're not going to unnecessarily go and sign players. So more needed to be seen from both those clubs, Cardiff City and Sheffield United. So that brings us to our final group where where The vibes are kind of kind of shitty, kind of not great. And I've split this into two groups. There's a group which is really saying that is this really us? Are this really who we are? And then there's a group saying, Is this really who we are? And it's really that tone which is which splits them. And I'm sure you can pick a couple of the clubs that are going to be in that bottom team, bottom tier. With the ones who are saying, come on, really, is this is this us? Is this who we are? I've got four teams: Norwich, Burnley, Derby County, and Stoke City. Let's start with Norwich, who I think have maybe been the most frustrating team in the championship for their fans, just in terms of the gap between their skills and their promise and the results that they've gotten in the first first four games. Three losses, including two they probably should have won, West Brom on the opening day. And then Stoke City this week. There's 72 per 72% possession, 14 shots, lost one nothing. Massively frustrating to lose those kind of games. But then they also had a huge win against Burnley 4 1. They have really big firepower with guys like Andre Brooks. Motorre's had a really great start. They've sc he scored a lot of goals. but is the way they're playing this kind of attacking flair way of playing under Clemente Is is that exposing some of their defensive weaknesses? They're getting caught on the counterattack too many times. They're failing to break down low blocks super successfully. And so it's one of those things, are they gonna just live and die by the sword? And is that gonna be satisfactory? Like, is that gonna be something that fans can really and ownership really puts up with over a period of time? I don't think Clemente necessarily wants to play that way. But it's what we've seen on the pitch so far. Like we haven't seen anything in any of these games to say that this can be a really disciplined team. And so a lot of question marks still on the pitch. Off the pitch, you got Hugh Jackman looking to get involved, buying a stake. His mom is from Norwich. He says he's a lifelong fan. So that's exciting. It's exciting news. Is it? Is it exciting to have a celebrity by your team? Maybe. I don't know. Something for another podcast, maybe. But anyway, a lot going on in Norwich. Burnley. Burnley has this Burnley has had a tough start to the season. They've got they've still got this question which other clubs have answered and it's so frustrating to their supporters that they haven't answered it yet, and also so predictable. Like if you were reading what Burnley fans were saying in the run-up to the season and listening to Burnley fans, they were all saying this we have to hire this manager. We have to hire anyone. They're saying this in in May, June, when they fired Scott Parker, they were saying, We have to just get this guy in the building so we can start shaping a strategy. They took so long to hire Nikki Hayen. And so they still have this question which which most other clubs have answered, which is who is who is Burnley under Nikki Hain? Like w who is this club? What do they look like? And what do they stand for? what are their principles? How are they gonna play? We have no idea. And That might not be fair to Nikki Hayen, who was parachuted in at the last minute, but it's what we're seeing, and it's true, and it's what fans are seeing as well. two draws, two losses. There were bad losses too. Three one to West Brom, four one to Norwich. they've got a lot of question marks at the back. The battle they had this this midweek one one against Middlesbrough, that might be the start of something. They started to look a little more disciplined. But they've conceded 10 goals in four games. Is this the relegation hangover team this year? Is is my question. You know, if you look in the past, clubs like Sheffield United when they came down, Luton when they came down and had a double relegation. Like, is this this team this year? And all signs point to maybe. Derby County was last year a mirage. Do we have to start feeling. shitty about John Eustace again. It's just a sad state of affairs to start the season for Derby. not to mention the weather and their last was it their last game or the game of the weekend? It looked absolutely dreadful. two losses, a win against Portsmouth and a draw. Sammy Smodic has been a good story for him, but is that a good thing to have Sammy Smodich as your creative centerpiece in twenty twenty six? Maybe. Maybe he's not as as long in the tooth as you would think, even though he's like succeed in the championship and then gone up and then come back down again. I think it's a bit unfair on John Eustace. Like he he has been, if not asked, like he's decided to expand his playbook a little bit more and play more expansively. But it hasn't worked. And in fact, when they won against Portsmouth, they only had thirty-six percent of possession and showed that maybe the the way through for this squad is to shrink the playbook, soak up the pressure. Rapid counter strike, which if you keep winning is good. But like we started to see last year and the hope this year especially was that Derby could play in a more expansive way and would compete for the playoffs and and for promotion. So I think this is an example where, you know, expectation we're really for the fan base, it's really underpacing what they expected at this start of the year. And they would expect to do a lot better as the year goes on. And so There's a lot of work there for Eustace to and the squad to make up. and maybe they've maybe they've started to figure it out, but but there's there's a lot more that needs to happen there. And then Stoke, really tough start, three losses, one win. The losses were to Swansea, Southampton, and Wolves, who are all great, looking like really good teams. but they were big losses three one to Southampton, four one to Wolves. They brought in a couple of new guys at the deadline from the US, Jack McGlynn from Philadelphia Union, Luca Bombino from San Diego. I can't say that I know much about either of those guys, but they're clearly trying to re-energize the midfield. that they also sold Sauber Thomas to Hull, which was kind of their creative spark. And they have also tried to play in this more expansive way in August and and in the one win that they've had, they ditched that way of playing and and tried to defend for their lives. And so I think you've got a similarity here between Stoke and and Derby County in that you might see a different way of playing. And some of that is also tied to the manager and the manager being in the hot seat. You know, you got Mark Robbins there, people starting to call for his head a little bit, and he knows that results are the only things thing is the only thing that matters in terms of keeping his job. And so You know, you've got all these questions, who is Stoke really? Like, can they really compete? But at right now it's just can they get a win? And they got one and they'll see how they can then push on here into September. So that brings us to the very bottom of this group of not really believing and feeling kind of shitty. And that's just two clubs. This is the group, gee, this this might really be us. This might be who we are. And the two clubs, Portsmouth and Preston. Who've both had really tough starts to the year. Portsmouth, three losses to QPR, Bristol City, and Derby. A win against Lincoln City, the only saving grace. John Massino was probably on the hot seat to start the year in a lot of people's minds. Maybe the first manager fired. They just don't have they've looked they haven't looked disciplined and they've looked negative. They've looked slow. Fans have started to have it, they've kind of had enough of this way of playing. And the difference in this bottom bracket with these two teams, Portsmouth and Preston, is that for for all the other 22 teams above them, there's something redeemable about their performance for the first first four weeks. It's hard to find something particularly redeemable for how Portsmouth and Preston have played. There's just kind of this perfect storm for these clubs. I mean, Portsmouth, they've lost Josh Murphy. He's out for eight weeks. it's just a perfect storm of of injury and and not what you want happening at the transfer deadline and negative play and lack of of defensive discipline and lack of attacking spark. And if it looks bad in Portsmouth, Preston is somehow even worse. They've the only club to to have four losses to start the year against Bolton, Wolves, Charlton, Bristol City. The they've got this issue with the they've got all these distracting issues there. Like the pitch and the turf at at Deepdale's not quite right. So they had to play a game elsewhere. they've got some something called a hybrid stitched playing surface going in. Like, you know, it's a bit of a a shambles. Paul Hackingbottom has been bemoaning the squad turnover, lack of talent. you know, you're gonna have Spud Bros wondering what they're paying for that shirt sponsorship soon. If you don't follow Spud Bros, they're a fantastic follow on Instagram. You will watch one of their videos. Don't watch any of their like super influencer influencerish videos. Watch their ones where they just sit down and they make a jack of potato and they put in the butter, the garlic butter, the baked beans, the cheese, and they do it all with the headcam. And they're just there in the van. It's fantastic. Like you will you cannot watch that video and not want to bake jack of potato. So check him out, Spud Bros on Instagram, probably on TikTok too. Although I'm not on TikTok. anyway, they're gonna start wondering why they're the sp shirt sponsor. They have a huge game, a derby this weekend against Blackburn. That this game, this is it's hard to say it's their season in beginning of September, but it may be their season this Saturday at Deepdale, Preston versus Blackburn. So Nothing really there to cheer for for those guys and not a lot of hope that we're seeing at this point. But as we said, it is just August. All we know about August is that we don't know what's gonna happen. So that's the vibe check top to bottom, 24 clubs. Let's look ahead to this weekend. just shout out Preston versus Blackburn Rovers, other games that I'm looking forward to. QPR plays Middlesbrough. I'm always excited to watch Middlesbrough 'cause I really like watching them play, but even more excited on the Rangers side here, What are are they are they the real deal? Like they haven't truly been tested yet. And I am excited to see if this is it it is a kind of a freshish team. If you go back 12 months on this QPR squad, it's a very different squad. I was watching them this last week and I've had various passing interests in QPR over the years and and have watched them fairly consistently for the last, you know, almost a decade. But It's a really different kind of squad and different feel, but they haven't really come up against a hard hard opponent, tough opponent. So excited to see them play Middlesbrough at Loftus Road. Swansea versus Wrexham. You've got a surging Wrexham coming off a big win against Millwall. Swansea absolutely flying. And, you know, can that continue for both those clubs? You do feel with Swansea at some stage they'll kind of come back to earth a little bit, but I wouldn't necessarily say it's going to be this week. And then Birmingham City versus Wolves. Can Birmingham get their second win of their so far undefeated season, or can Wolves start to put a few things together, even with that kind of tough game against of West Ham and the weekend ringing in their ears? So a lot to look at there. A couple of other EFL Cup games again as well. Next week, next midweek, Bournemouth takes on Lincoln City, go Imps, and then Millwall Holmes and Newcastle. So, some interesting EFL Cup action going on as well as we move along here in the season. So, that's all we've got for this week. Thanks so much for listening. Keep watching EFL football and check out MinosFootball.com, and we'll see you back here the same time next week.