Firstly this is not a woeful declaration that everything is downhill or that we will be poor next season, just thinking out aloud as to whether we will go up further, down a bit or remain the same next season.
Things which point towards next season being tougher than this:
Statistically when any change is made to something that is far away from the mean the likely change is towards the mean. In terms of performance we are miles away from the mean just now, it will be bloody difficult to get improvement.
We are losing a captain who has clearly been inspirational and is when fit still a first choice defender, I am not sure we can improve on this.
Two of our key players Silva and Aguero are getting older, whereas Aguero has not shown any diminution this season he has in the past been injury prone and at some point will become less effective. Silva started the season in great form but has undoubtedly been less effective later on, doubtlessly he will still have moments but whether he can regain his best form is uncertain.
We may be losing Sane, I hope not but he has contributed hugely to our attack often in important matches like against Liverpool and in the CL. Latterly he has played less and we have not been scoring as many goals. He adds something that defenders find very difficult to plan against.
We still have a weakness at left back which other teams have occasionally exploited, all suggestions are that this is not going to be remedied in the close season. If Mendy has another injury prone season I am sceptical about Zin for a whole season with an injured back up.
Reasons to be optimistic:
KDB is probably our biggest talent and hardly played at peak fitness all season, he should definitely improve the team if fit next season.
No major competitions this summer, we had more players in the later stages of the world cup than anyone else I am amazed we lasted as well as we did this season our players should be rested better for next season.
We undoubtedly will be getting new signings, it will take time for them to bed in but if we get quality we will have something new that has not yet been analysed by the opposition.
Foden, Sterling, Jesus, Bernardo, Laporte, Stones & Zin are all at ages where they can still improve, I think several of them need to if we are to improve lets hope they do.
I don't know how we will do but I do think improvement will be tough, it should be a great ride though especially if tour younger players can step up.
Things which point towards next season being tougher than this:
Statistically when any change is made to something that is far away from the mean the likely change is towards the mean. In terms of performance we are miles away from the mean just now, it will be bloody difficult to get improvement.
We are losing a captain who has clearly been inspirational and is when fit still a first choice defender, I am not sure we can improve on this.
Two of our key players Silva and Aguero are getting older, whereas Aguero has not shown any diminution this season he has in the past been injury prone and at some point will become less effective. Silva started the season in great form but has undoubtedly been less effective later on, doubtlessly he will still have moments but whether he can regain his best form is uncertain.
We may be losing Sane, I hope not but he has contributed hugely to our attack often in important matches like against Liverpool and in the CL. Latterly he has played less and we have not been scoring as many goals. He adds something that defenders find very difficult to plan against.
We still have a weakness at left back which other teams have occasionally exploited, all suggestions are that this is not going to be remedied in the close season. If Mendy has another injury prone season I am sceptical about Zin for a whole season with an injured back up.
Reasons to be optimistic:
KDB is probably our biggest talent and hardly played at peak fitness all season, he should definitely improve the team if fit next season.
No major competitions this summer, we had more players in the later stages of the world cup than anyone else I am amazed we lasted as well as we did this season our players should be rested better for next season.
We undoubtedly will be getting new signings, it will take time for them to bed in but if we get quality we will have something new that has not yet been analysed by the opposition.
Foden, Sterling, Jesus, Bernardo, Laporte, Stones & Zin are all at ages where they can still improve, I think several of them need to if we are to improve lets hope they do.
I don't know how we will do but I do think improvement will be tough, it should be a great ride though especially if tour younger players can step up.