The9

Hassle Baj.

The fact that I *did* misread it, posted about Lambert's free-kick, then realised, edited it and left the stuff about Schneiderlin's shot (and presumably Minty saw the original but by the time he'd quoted the message I'd changed it) adds to the comedy value. FWIW I don't think either Morgan's shinner or Lambert's divot-kick were remotely like MLT's goal, other than both of them did some looping, both caused by completely different kicking methods to MLT's ball juggle goal.

Well obviously.

We had a fairly amusing (if limited use) "Rickie would have scored that, Rickie would have scored that, na-na-na-na".

Huh ? Are you referring to my... "edit" ?

To be fair they won lots of Cup games (inc UEFA Cup) with him in the side before he got the monkey off his back (hoho) in the Prem last year.

Not really, if you mean the one MLT juggled and looped over the wall? He shinned it, one of the reasons it dipped and swerved so much .

FWIW the terrace couldn't hear the Beer Tent most of the time either.

You wouldn't have said that in the 42nd minute with us 1-0 down and Hammond having just missed a sitter with his head, I assure you.

The sooner people get fixed formations out of their heads at the top level of football the better. Its only a beneficial concept to defenders for structure and organisation now. Last night we had one striker up front, with Antonio and Puncheon overlapping ahead of him practically all the time in the first half. There's no way of defining that kind of mobility in a conventional formation, especially when Puncheon is out wide right one minute and sitting in front of the left centre back the next. Equally, some more astute tactical coaches are describing Barcelona's formation as 4-6-0, due to how deep Ibra and Messi come to receive the ball on a regular basis. As players are now fitter and standing one bloke up front generally makes him easy to mark, players are dropping deeper and deeper to give defenders difficult choices under pressure and forcing opposing midfielders to make those psychologically difficult runs back towards their own goal as a necessity. 11-a-side is rapidly becoming an exaggerated version of the fluidity you see at 5-a-side between two fit sides.

Well of course... and his usual ones (at least for the last few matches) aren't "red", they're black Nike CTR360s with a red heel. He was wearing very plain black adidas adipure IIs with gold stripes at the start of the season, dunno why the change in manufacturer, maybe he didn't like the adipure IIIs. Pretty sure he shinned the goal anyway, so not sure why we're discussing his boots PS yeah I was there.

It definitely did, but he made it bounce there. No deflection at all, just hit the ground right in front of the goalie where it was a bit worn out. Our relentless chant of "dodgy keeper" as he was lining it up must have helped too. Pitch was absolutely fine with the exception of about 2 square yards of the 6 yard box.

*Coughs*

Sounds like a poor referee who doesn't apply the laws of the game equally to me. 0 out of 10.

For now I'll take The Miracle of St Mary's © Me still being on in 8 hours' time.

Not so sure they were so much a "flash in the pan" as an unknown quantity who were easily worked out once they'd played a few games in the media spotlight.

Are the cumulative odds on us winning the next 6 games more than 11/1 ? It takes dropping any points and still going up out of the equation but might be much better odds - and that's without the 3 playoff matches.

What I'll find interesting is IF we manage to get into the top 6 (which we can actually do by the end of the matches a week today if all the results go our way) whether we'll be able to maintain the momentum when the pressure is suddenly on us. I'm also hoping we get the chance to find out.

Indeed, I only just looked at the fixtures.

To follow my previous post re top 6 fixtures against each other : Millwall are on 78, Swindon on 77, they have to play each other, ergo we can't come top 2, because by virtue of that match at least one of them goes over 78 pts.

Very true, which is why I'm about to run it all through BBC predictor. Or maybe I'll just have a look at the top 6 v top 6 fixtures and see if it can (theoretically) be done.

Not sure there are that many games between the teams above us that two are *guaranteed* to get over 78, even with Norwich already there? Not that I think there's any chance of us coming 2nd...

You haven't, you have just you are "not willing to settle" for being 8 points clear of 2nd and 9 points clear of 3rd with 6 games left ... if the team happens to lose one match in their last 3 (which in Norwich's case was to Tranmere, away from home). I would say it's unrealistic not to expect people to think that you're very very difficult to please given that evidence, if not quite asking that the team NEVER loses. To be honest you're coming across like one of the owners of Man City - "we've got loads of money, why aren't we winning everything - I keep sacking the manager when things go slightly wrong after all".

The two tickets I know of are from the bloke above who has just PM'd Spades, so you might want to PM South City Si for second refusal.

I shall take myself out of this equation now