The9

"James Ward-Prowse, making his second Premier League start of the season" from the BBC commentary of Sunday's match tells you plenty.

I'm not going and it's only the second first team match I've missed all season (Man City away was the other as I had NFL tickets months before the fixtures). Just can't justify the midweek away game to watch a reserve team and a half when I've got work on Thursday, as opposed to anything else (though we are already skint from going to Man U, Arsenal, West Ham, Leicester, Hull, Be'er Sheva, Milan and Prague, and paying for Palace and Bournemouth!).

Robbie Williams has a lot to answer for.

Yup, 3-ish League Cup wins (with maybe a draw or narrow defeat in the two-legged semi final) to get into Europa League qualifiers, or 5 FA Cup wins, or 6-ish Europa League wins (from here), or 18-ish league wins...

Williams was booked for gobbing off about 50 yards from where the ball had gone off the pitch at a set piece.

Best ref we've had all season, to be honest - with the exception of a couple of dodgy corner/throw-in decisions where there were deflections he got all the important stuff right apart from not giving a blatant penalty for Van Dijk's shirt being held practically over his head for a couple of seconds in the box. No completely nonsense calling back advantages an age later either a la Clattenburg.

I'll always put "I think" when I'm not sure and don't have time to check.

Unlike League Cup finalists of the past 6 years Sunderland, Swansea, Bradford City, Cardiff and Birmingham?

I'm still blaming the ref for not giving a high foot a second before when someone nearly booted Robson Kanu in the head.

He'll continue to pick the same squad-wide teams that he has so far. If he's not picking the "first team" in Prague when a win could have got us through, and he's not picking the "first team" for Everton, he's not picking the "first team" for Arsenal's reserves away in the League Cup either.

Shaw's full debut was against Stevenage in the League Cup in 2012/13 and he was average at best. He played in an FA Cup game in January 2012 too but only as a sub. I don't think Walcott was ever going to be much better than he has been, and Chamberlain has been a bit too injured to have done more - I thought he was a bit over-rated when we sold him, and if anything he's done better than I expected. Walcott played about 10 times before scoring on his full debut in a defeat at Leeds, and he was indeed the only positive thing worth watching for just-relegated Saints in the 6 months we had him, and absolutely the only thing worth watching when he scored against an awful Millwall side in the next game. I first saw him pre-season at Yeovil, and he looked rapid and more twisty-turny than he has been since (a bit like Sims) and clearly had been told just to slot the ball across the box every time he got the space to do it. Took him YEARS to get out of that habit.

I was also told that Cook did an interview the other week where he got narky that an interviewer told him a player would be suspended for the Luton game due to 5 bookings and he first denied it and then said "how should I know?"... well, because it's your job. In other news, Newport got stuffed 4-1 at Blackpool, mainly due to bringing on a 35-year old day-before signing and playing him for the last half hour despite missing a penalty to go 2-1 up seconds before. I'd still have Graham Westley's quirks though, made them competitive practically overnight, though how much more game time Abdoulaye Meite gets remains to be seen.

Fairly sure Shaw's first start was away to Stevenage in the League Cup, and he was bloody awful defensively despite putting in a couple of good forward runs with the ball. He was a LOT better in his first Prem game shortly after, and there was a story that he'd been ill in the week - which I think came from Pochettino.

I believe that "The9" bloke once described him as the next big thing and "Lallana with pace" (this was about 3 years ago and he was a lot less twisty-turny yesterday). So far that makes up for the Billy Sharp and Jake Thomson things...

Yeah, that was his nadir, but he'd been showing signs of a few of those in the games leading up to it. Even yesterday he had a fair few touches which ran away from him and "second touch is a tackle" was a fair assessment for a couple of those. But you can see he's got a big upside, good workrate, skilful on the ball, strong, decent at regaining possession. I suspect he's the permanent Davis replacement a year or two down the road and he's a good "Saintsy" signing.

I suspect we spent most of Friday afternoon and Saturday reminding the players how to pass the ball quickly and move forward into space. I think a lot of the criticism of Martina is unfair when he's clearly getting games away in the EL precisely because he's a more defensive player which comes at the cost of Cedric's delivery. It's also VERY obvious that the instructions to the wide defenders away in Europe are to play safe and not get us in a position to get caught on the counter, plus playing possession across the back is a good way to timewaste without getting bookings. Also, until the late Be'er Sheva winner, scoring an equaliser against Sparta would have made absolutely no difference to the result we needed in the final group game - though it would have given us the opportunity to win the group and avoid the seeded sides.

Agreed with the OP, but there's that thing about form being temporary and always expected he'd find a way back from his slump - though he's still not quite at his early levels he's already showing he's up to the task.

I wouldn't wonder too much, there's no way I'd be bringing my nice car to park anywhere near 31,000 passers-by irrespective of whether I had 2 or 3 others I could use.

Hojbjerg was playing better than he did yesterday in his first few matches before he hit a brick wall and his form went through the floor about 6 weeks or so ago. He is still nowhere near the level he was at in the first few weeks and he wasn't particularly great with the ball yesterday compared to his teammates either, but his defensive work along with Romeu meant he was still a positive overall.

2 points behind the promotion places with the side in the last promotion place having a match in hand. Ho hum, still in a playoff place. Meanwhile Newport lost their first match in 7 and drop back to the bottom of the division - only 9 points off the playoffs though!

One on the left, one in the hole. Sorted. I'd be inclined to play Boufal centrally, he offers more threat with the option of passing or shooting.

Good video, but all it actually told me that I hadn't already worked out is that the ticket machines don't take notes, which is a ballache and a half as I have no intention of using my card and won't have any coins at that point (and wouldn't have the 110 CZK for the ticket I want to buy in change anyway). Off to the info booth to buy the ticket for me, they speak English anyway, just as well as my Czech's not great (i.e. non-existent).

Time for a bit of a Champions League drop-in recap. Eight 3rd place teams dropping in to the Europa League last 32, best 4 as seeds and worst 4 unseeded... Tonight's results leave the following potential drop-ins - haven't checked the tiebreakers however which might eliminate one or two: Group E: Spurs 4pts or CSKA Moscow 3pts will be third (most likely Spurs who are home to CSKA last match and only need to avoid defeat) Group F: Sporting 3pts or Legia Warsaw 1pt will be third (unlikely to be seeded) Group G: Porto 8pts or FC Copenhagen 6pts will be third Group H: Sevilla 10pts or Lyon 7pts will be third (and will definitely be seeded) Tomorrow's Champions League groups (2 games left) Group A: 3rd place will be Ludogorets or Basel (both on 1 point) and they'll be unseeded unless they win both their last games Group B: Anyone can come third: Napoli 7, Benfica 7, Besiktas 6, Kiev 1 Group C: Man City 7, M'gladbach 6 or Celtic 2 will be third. Group D: PSV or Rostov (1 pt each) can come third - and they'll be unseeded unless they win both their last games Basically if we win the group we play away first to an unseeded team (a runner up or worst 4 CL drop-in) If we come second we play home first to a seeded team (a group winner or best 4 CL drop-in). Oh, and we can't play either Spurs or Man U if they're in the Last 32.

Yeah, I did a bit of Googling and there are ticket booths in Terminal 1 and 2 at Vaclav Havel so that's all good.

Yup, 110CZK (about £3.50) for 24 hours, 24 CZK for a half hour ticket or 32 for 90 mins. Now if anyone knows if you can buy them at the airport and whether they're valid for the bus towards the Metro...