Chez

Ho won earth has KWP not got booked there? This ref is a proper homer...thankfully.

their goal is never offside...and then we score. Luck is certainly on our side.

Total domination, but twice they caught us on the break and were three on two. A stronger pacier attack (something like Leicester) and we could easily be behind. I guess you need to ride your luck a bit, but why is Edozie saving us? Where is Manning, a CB or defensive midfielder?

I like him. He has ability with the ball and a lot of confidence when he plays. We need to harness those attributes and get him doing things like flicks and nutmegs in the right areas of the pitch. He needs good coaching so as to really learn how to play the position. He also needs a manager that trusts him and shows some faith in him. The trouble is, he's miles off the finished article and unless we stay in this league it will be difficult for him to make it here.

5-0. Grrr. Had money on us winning 4-0. Apart from that, happy fucking days.

Perraud will be back in the summer as he can't get a game at Nice.

Nightmare. I know it's a different injury, but signing injured players is madness.

what's happened to Stewart - I have missed that.

SArmstrong earned him his first with a suicide pass. Excellent yellow. Second was a good yellow too as we were going t to get caught badly (again) with lots of players upfield. We still haven't learned how to set ourselves up when taking our own corners. The coaches at this club are fucking useless. Every week the same, nothing done about it. We almost got caught in the second half. Keeper catches a corner throws it out and they are two on one. Only SArmstrong busting a gut prevented them scoring. It's getting boring now. Sort it out.

there was one crossfield backward ball deep in the second half that was an absolute shocker putting KWP in massive trouble. Thankfully his touch was perfect and it came to nothing, but it typifies Manning. He just makes some terrible decisions with his passing. I honestly don't understand what he is thinking with some passes. Overall though, I thought he did OK.

ha. everyone misses chances, some more than others, but when he stops making the necessary runs then it needs calling out. He was on the edge of our own box when we broke quickly and he didn't get catch up, which is understandable, but we broke again and still he failed to get on the box. For me that's him being lazy.

Fraser breaks twice...where the fuck is Adams in support? Should be busting a gut to get in the box.

We play like every opponent is a Prem side. We don't ever want to give the ball away, so we don't play much speculative stuff. I don't have a massive problem with our style of football to be honest, but would like to see us play it direct to the striker and some long diagonals every now and then. I also think our midfielders need to look to play on the turn far more. More often than not there is actually quite a lot of room/time compared to Prem football and they could simply play/drive straight through the middle. Last, but not least, we should get to the byeline and cross the ball a bit more often. Again, it's more speculative than recycling and playing short passes to feet around the box, but I think we almost give teams too much respect and in the end don't make opposing defenders actually do any defending. We are just a little too neat and tidy.

Walker Peters rumour comes from our friend Alex Crook. The reason he is still here is that we wanted a shed load of money for him in the summer and no one coughed up. He's got 18 months left of his contract, so his value will be falling, but I can't see us now suddenly giving him away as he is so vital to our promotion hopes. West Ham or whoever else ain't getting him on the cheap in January.

Not sure we always agree on players, tactics and what we have both seen in games, derry, but I can't agree with you more here. I spent a couple of years moaning about how the Perraud signing wasn't indicative of the gradual erosion of quality at the club and I fear I will be moaning about another left back for a couple of years. I honestly don't know what he is particularly good at. His touch is OK, and that matters a lot in high level football I suppose, but his choice of passing is absolutely dreadful, often trying to thread balls through the eye of a needle when he simply doesn't have the skillset to achieve it. He is not a great dribbler, has no trick or pace and his crossing is pretty average. To describe him as an attacking fullback is basically just another way of saying he is poor defensively. And he is. He isn't quicker running towards his own goal, never gets tight, always seems to be out of position and just doesn't make it difficult for his opponent. Unless RM has specifically told him not to go out to meet wingers and stop crosses, then I don't understand why the manager hasn't identified that as an issue. I know we have been unlucky with the Larios injury, but I've lost count now of the seasons we have `got by' with one left back and cover provided by KWP. Not easy to sign players in January, but getting a left back (perhaps on loan) should be our priority.

Is Sulemana injured?

Charles attacks on the break...gets a nose bleed and then loses it.

Manning is really poor.

Not sure Coventry are playing in this game. It's basically attack verses defence. Our attack is so samey though. I can see Adams and AA making runs on the shoulder of defenders, but they are never found, ever. We never look to play that pass. Only other thing I noticed was that Charles plays it backwards too much. There are times when he could turn, but it's his first instinct. Hopefully we can find a route through them, but as usual it's going to be tight and we will be vulnerable on the break.

Fulham, Bournemouth and Forrest all spent loads and all survived last season. Norwich spent about £60m (only about £25 net though), Watford about £40m (£30m net) and Brentford about £35m. Only Brentford stayed up.

Not sure if the tactics of Burnley last year and Fulham the year before would be classified as similar to our own, but they spent over £100m and about £70m, respectively. How about Swansea back in 2011 (who came up via the play offs)? They only spent about £12m, which brought in Danny Graham, Routledge, Lita, Vorm and Sigurdsson. They finished 11th. As a guide, we spent about £40m the following season, finishing 14th. That feels a long time ago now though, and you'd need some amazing scouting to spend £12m (or even the equivalent for 2024) to stay up.

Newcastle home in the league cup, he was excellent IMO. Unfortunately the twat of a manager subbed him on the hour and then didn't pick him for the second leg. He's still young and has got some genuine skills, which makes me loath to write him off, but he has to do more and keep improving and quickly, otherwise his window of opportunity here is going to close.

After Pickford, they have Virginia and Longergan.

Good point. We signed Skacel, Rasiak, Saganowski, Pele, Kelvin Davis, Idiakez, Viafara and Wright-Philips to help reshape the side. Please tell me we have another `Gareth Bale' coming through the youth ranks though, as he made a huge difference.

Matt had two brilliant seasons in 1989-91 playing out wide. Not sure the French side was blessed with fabulous wingers during those couple of years. Ginola started to emerge in 1990. Pascal Vahirua played a fair bit around that time. Not sure there was much talk about MLT playing for his country at that time though, despite his exciting performances for us. 1993-95 was obviously when MLT was in his pomp and tearing up the Prem. Not exactly the best era for the France National side, but in 1995 they did have Djorkeff and Zidane as attacking midfielders (although the latter was only just emerging) and Cantana, Ginola and Dugarry further forward. So Houllier/Aime Jacquet may well have shown him more faith and provided more opportunities.