With a wage bill in the bottom 4 of the division, I'd question that

Hughton looked at our squad and clearly concluded we couldn't take a particularly positive approach and expect to survive - that crab ball and grinding it out was the only way to do it instead.

Then this season, under mounting pressure from board and fans, he fell between 2 stools: didn't have the strength of personality to insist his way was right. So we lost structure and consistency in performance as a result.

That makes him culpable, but the board more so. The board who started to make public comments putting him under pressure, but failed to either invest in the new players were desperately needed, or put him out of his misery until we were practically beyond saving.

In the end though, Hughton's not daft. His perspective on our quality - clearly massively influenced by losing 5-0 at Fulham in his first game in charge - was probably a lot more right than wrong.

Posted By: thebigfeller, Apr 27, 01:23:38