Had a bit too much time on my hands lately so decided to do a thread of the pure banter season that is Stoke City club de futbol 19/20.

Likes and RT’s would be mint cheers x

So lets start with some context going into this. Having been relegated, we brought in Gary Rowett along with around £45m worth of players. Having been around 8th place for the majority of his tenure we dropped off towards the end and he was sacked in Jan 2019.

In came Luton manager Nathan Jones who spent a further £10m on Batth and Vokes. He promised us attacking football and a team to be proud of. During the rest of the 18/19 season we saw 3 wins, 15 goals and a 4 match run of 0-0’s. We fairly, gave him the time he needed.

Now here we are, the 19/20 season oh this going to be fun. In the summer window Jones brought in 10 players to suit his system. After a falling out, first team left back Erik Pieters was sold to Burnley for £1m. He claimed winger James McClean could do just as good a job there. https://twitter.com/stokecity/status/1143552563171778560

PRE SEASON: We had some good results against much weaker opposition and only just lost 2-1 to premier league Leicester, however in that game we lost captain, and arguably our best defender in Ryan Shawcross to a broken leg. This was less than ideal a week before the season start.

However, Jones having spent £2m on Liam Lindsay surely had a replacement to come in and take Shawcross’ place? He had other options too such as former Netherlands international Bruno Martins-Indi.

So obviously in our first league match against QPR, Jones opts for Danny Batth and an 18 year old Nathan Collins, BMI only makes the bench, Lindsay not even in the squad. McClean also makes his debut in his new LB role.

A Jack Butland mistake (this won’t be the first time) and Ezes run through a static defence puts QPR 2-0 up, a Sam Clucas goal to pull one back isn’t enough, we lose 2-1.

After getting booed off Benik Afobe leaves to Bristol City on loan, he scores 3 in 5 for them before suffering an ACL injury and is ruled out for the season. The best thing about his move to stoke so far is his perfectly legitimate twitter account @_BenikAfobe

Jones makes 6 changes for the trip to Charlton, McClean is dropped for 89 year old Stephen Ward. We lose 3-1. I think Butland made a mistake, can’t be bothered to go look ngl but he probably did something wrong. We move into the bottom 3 where we stay until Boxing Day.

Stoke win away at Wigan to progress in the EFL Cup. We then get a respectable 2-2 draw at home to Derby with Scott Hogan getting a brace. Jones says he’s devastated and calls us an ‘extraordinary team outside the two boxes but an average one inside them’.

We then lose 3-1 to Preston, Butland makes two horrific mistakes. He is dropped but we still lose 3-0 at home to Leeds. We then actually beat Leeds on penalties in the cup 3 days later. However a loss to Birmingham gives us a league record of (0-1-5) in August.

If people somehow weren’t worrying already, they were after September. 2 losses and a draw mean we have got 2 points from 9 games. We also exit the league cup to Crawley Town. Somehow Jones is still in a job going into a crucial game against fellow winless side Huddersfield.

We lose 1-0. Jones played CB Carter-Vickers at RB and still McClean is playing LB. Tensions finally start to rise in the crowd. Jones practically hands in his resignation on air admitting he “expects the inevitable to happen”. He’s given the next game away at high flyers Swansea.

Somehow we win courtesy of a last minute Scott Hogan goal. We then beat promotion favourites Fulham 2-0 at home and look good. Has the tide started to turn? Are we finally seeing the side Jones promised us?

Err no. We lose our next two matches 1-0 and 2-0 to Sheffield Wednesday and Millwall respectively. Jones stays in charge for the next few days, however he’s sacked on the Friday before the West Brom game only after John Coates finishes his holiday. Priorities. https://twitter.com/stokecity/status/1190238276046725124

So after 10 months in charge, a total of 5 league wins and a lot of out of position players, we said goodbye to Nathan Jones. For some reason a lot of stoke fans still love him because he’s a ‘nice bloke’. We somehow aren’t bottom, just above Barnsley on GD.

Club hero Rory Delap takes caretaker charge as we lose 2-0 to the baggies. Up to now our record is 2-2-9. Rory can’t do a lot and in his post match interview calls the whole situation “heartbreaking”. We’re bottom 6 points adrift of safety, the future looks grim.

Friday 8th November: Stoke somehow convince Northern Ireland manager Michael O’Neill to take over as manager. He says he’s delighted and calls it a great opportunity. He takes charge of the must win game away at Barnsley the next day.

WE WIN. WE ACTUALLY WIN. After MON does the crazy thing of playing players in their actual position Stoke storm to a 4-2 win. Clucas scores two worldies, a new song is born and the future maybe doesn’t look as bad as it did.

We follow this up with a 2-1 win at home to Wigan. Mame Diouf scores his first goal since April 2018 in the last minute to secure the points (legend has it he was trying to pass the ball). We’re now only in the bottom 3 on goal difference.

However, we’re brought back down to earth. 3 losses in a row the last being a 2-1 defeat away at Hull leaves us 4 points from safety again. The players get booed off and told they aren’t fit to wear the shirt. O’Neill is probably questioning his sanity after coming into the job.

A 3-0 win at home to he who must not be named’s old club Luton gives us a massive 3 points. For some reason McClean and Allen decide to cup their ears to the fans after scoring causing unneeded anger. Shawcross makes his return but it’s short lived as he goes off injured.

Fast forward to Boro away, a big game. Stoke lead but bottle it to lose 2-1 and end up bottom at Christmas. Very rarely have teams stayed up after being bottom at this point.

Boxing Day. Shawcross returns. Arsenal fans gutted. After trailing 2-1 going into the final minutes Campbell bastards one in and Vokes pokes one over the line to secure a late win and lift Stoke out of the relegation zone for the first time since week 1. Limbs. https://twitter.com/stokecity/status/1210591166011453440

We lose a close match at Fulham but then go on a good run, thumping Huddersfield 5-2 away on New Years Day and then winning two and drawing one including a win away at West Brom. We also welcome, Jordan Thompson, Tashan Oakley-Booth and James Chester in the January window.

Oh we lost to Brentford somewhere here in the FA Cup too. One okay game from Julian Ngoy convinced half the Stoke faithful he was the second coming of Henry. We don’t see him again this season.

Yeah hi you’ve probably got to this point wondering where the rest of the thread is, messed up a bit here we go https://twitter.com/curtisscfc/status/1287804050218639361?s=21