A lot of discussion at the moment is around the blame game.
Is it the fault of Hodgson, Parish, Freedman, the owners, players or some combination of the above?
That discussion can possibly wait for another day, but what is for the best going forward?

Looking at it objectively over the course of the last calendar year, 2023, both our results and performances were poor other than for a brief period at the end of last season.
This would indicate that we’re possibly not very good, other than the brief honeymoon period after Hodgson returned.
In a sense it didn’t matter whether Vieira or Hodgson was in charge , we weren’t very good over the whole calendar year.

This season we’ve failed to score in 36% of our games .
That means in around a third of our games we give ourselves no chance of winning.
That’s a hell of a handicap to carry around.

Going forward we have a number of choices.

1)Bring in some genuinely transformational players to make a difference - unlikely because of the cost.

2) Change the tactics to play more progressively and hope that Eze and Olise stay fit - a risk because of their fitness records and Roy seemingly unable to find a way of carrying a threat in their absence.

3)Change the manager to create a new impetus and remove the air of stagnation and staleness which runs through the team and the performances- this assumes there is a good manager available and willing to take over at this stage of the season.

At the moment 3 looks the most realistic option to me.

This is not to suggest that Hodgson is a bad manager, but sometimes a change is necessary to inject fresh impetus and create a positive environment where all the players start with a clean slate desperate to prove themselves.
It’s all gone a bit stale and it’s easier to change the manager than all the players.

Under this board and this manager "going forward" is not a viable reality. We haven't gone forward in 11 seasons. As I keep saying we were a better side under Pulis. We don't move forward, we tread water. For some just being in the PL is enough, but all the signs are there that it could come crashing down sooner than one thinks.
Keep spinning those plates Steve.

I thought your thread title was Roy’s new training MO.
Then I realised he doesn’t like to !

We all know there’s an option 4……stay exactly as we are and hope we scrape enough points to stay up, which is the more likely

I think 1) can be addressed. We’ve all known for some time that as little as 3 or 4 players could transform this team into a highly competitive unit and yet we’ve ignored the holes and spent poorly for numerous windows.

The secret to success at our level is to identify players who are not at their peak yet and are therefore more affordable. We did it with Olise and Eze. We missed out on players such as Toney, Bowen, Gyokeres, Hamer, Walker-Peters, and a whole host of others that were low to mid priced. We could have got Gyokeres at around £20m and he now has an £80m plus buy out clause which Chelsea are apparently considering having scored something like 20 goals in 23 games.

The whole França situation stinks to me. Olise and Eze were known quantities both having excelled one league down. Franca is an unknown quantity and yet we have risked more on him than both of our young stars. We then buy a keeper and a centre half that we didn’t really need and when we looked in the cookie jar, surprise surprise it is empty.

As good as Dougie has done in bringing Johnstone, Anderson, Doucouré, Guehi, Eze and Olise to the club, we’ve made some errors and failed to address important areas of the squad, the main two being the full back positions and a proper Zaha replacement, a creative midfielder also wouldn’t go amiss.

I'll call this post for what it is, ridiculous observation.

You can't just buy players, they have to want to actually come to the club and for a certain wage and to wsnt to play for a manager. Lordy, if it was as easy as buying something off the shelf it'd make our lives easier. As for the goalkeeper thing, yes it was a silly purchase but the irony is we did need a goalkeeper in the end as Sam.J had an injury and Guaita had buggered off. DF has done a decent job and Franca hasn't actually been given a chance unless the teams already lost or hes played out of position. Same for Ahemada.

You've picked such a basic principal of player acquisition that I find it baffling. I mean you have to be able to retain those players also, Olise being a prime example. You can buy all the great players but keeping them is a battle and fans will have to face the fact that Palace needs to sell assets to buy more assets(in terms of players.) I highly doubt DF has not bothered with enquiring about players, there's a whole scouting team behind it.

If you were a player, would you be enticed by the stadium, manager, type of tactics used, team position?

I highly doubt it.

So, what has it got going for it? High wages which affect us buying more players, a chance to prove yourself and use Palace as a stepping stone.