Jack

It’s completely pointless playing Fellows without a proper centre forward unless we change the way we play. He usually gets to the byline then floats a weak cross with his wrong foot, or cuts inside and runs into traffic. To be effective with what we’ve got we need to be cutting it back from the byline or drilled low crosses, which he won’t do with his weak foot. Maybe he’d look better on the left to provide width? Who knows. Regardless, his confidence is shot and he won’t even take a player on any more, let alone provide some final third quality. Still young but really hasn’t been good for us. His best form was at RWB in a relegation battle under Still

Tonda appeared to fix a few things during the last break and we started the block well, he needs to do the same here and I’m sure that getting on the front foot in games will be high on his list. We’re not the only ones doing it, West Ham have been doing it too. Very much hoping he bins his bad habit of trying to be too clever tactically against these weaker sides, play everyone in their best positions and let the superior players do their thing

Another worry is what the hell has happened to Scienza? Looks completely devoid of confidence. It drives me nuts, he just doesn’t back himself to take his man on any more and when he does get a shot off, it’s always at a perfect height for the goalkeeper to save. Hit it low and hard and you give yourself a chance

Was keeping a close eye on Mubama when he came on yesterday, and it’s only reinforced my opinion that I never want to see him play for us again. Our players did well to avoid trying to pick him out as it would’ve been completely pointless, he was literally never onside. Not that he’d be able to control it if they had tried to find him. Spors has got work to do in January, him and Dobbin are a million miles off the required standard for the top end of this league. More shambolic officiating yesterday but we can’t keep blaming that, we need to be bigger than that and find a way. Decent night out in Preston, locals were sound. Helped by the gifted 3 points I’m sure.

Preston has one thing going for it - £9.10 for a Guinness and a Neck Oil. Few decent old school boozers about. Still a shithole though

2-1 Derby now. Could be good for us, might keep Eustace in a job. Both of these are garbage, absolute travesty we didn’t put Bolton away

I’m not sure I was even aware that there was a second professional football team in Oxford. Russ is the gift that keeps giving

Dave, mate, leave the ‘enter’ button alone when you’re typing out a reply. Preston away chit chat isn’t the best material for a Haiku or whatever that two-line poetry is

One of my favourite away games ever that. 3 English goal scorers, all starting to be in the conversation for England call ups and Saints playing great football. And like you say, really good Saints end as well with taking over most of the ‘neutral’ bit.

7k is top class for this stage of the season and the ‘turmoil’ they’re in, fair play. Far too many trips to the north west this season, it’s a lot of travel for us. Big allocations available though so those who want to go, can. Much easier from London of course with direct trains to Manchester, without having to remortgage.

It’s class, topsy turvy and anyone can beat anyone. I do think there are some false positions in there though: Stoke - regularly score screamers and win by a single goal despite not doing much else. Unreal run but unsustainable Swansea - really good start but being found out whenever they play anyone up the top end of the table. Will be top 8 I’m sure but not in the autos conversation Pompey - like Stoke, they’ve won a lot of games that were a coin flip and don’t actually play that well, but still find a way to win. Won’t last. Hopefully their form will drop off with their usual Xmas/January meltdown West Ham - you’d think Scott Parker will implement his boring brand of football enough for them to tighten up at the back, while having enough individual quality to score goals. Will probably still be in the mix for top 2

Yeah I’m pretty confident we’d be top if we’d won every game this season

You say that, in a lot of the games that they’ve actually scored in, they’ve been ahead and then fucked it up. We should fancy it and go for the throat even if we go behind, they’re dreadful

Some goals for Wrexham and Bristol City would make it a perfect evening

I noticed that too. I like it though, he went absolutely mental at Manning for terrible positioning and putting us in the shit. Great to see they’re holding each other to account

Has to be said that his lack of composure has probably cost us 4 points since the international break. It can’t all be put on him I know, but you need your centre forward to put away their one on ones more often than not, and he hasn’t.

Fair enough. Let’s hope so, they’ve lost to Boro, Wolves and Birmingham so far, obviously beat WHU who are in meltdown but yeah let’s hope they take some points off our promotion rivals the rest of the season

Not with finishing like that we won’t, we’ll be letting teams off. Dobbin was a massive improvement which says how bad Mubama is. Frustrating one, WBA are in decent form but I don’t think they’re all that. Teams that want to go up automatically will find answers to what they’ve got and we didn’t.

Got to agree with Tonda’s assessment really, we bottled it first half. Sat in and watched them play rather than giving them anything to think about. Mubama has shown he’ll be replaced in January, Edozie too despite a goal. Part of me thinks it’s a good point considering how bad we were first half, but really I think it’s two dropped as we should’ve been more front footed from the off.

Yeah exactly. Sure Tonda’s medical team will be telling him how well he recovered and if he can go again. Would 100% start him if possible, he’s not been at his best this season but still a lot of our big chances go through him

Maybe that’s a Wolves decision rather than us? Would be weird considering we’re selling bigger numbers than that allocation for midweek and north west away games this week

Jesus, don’t think the WHU board are reading the room if they think Scott Parker’s football will appease the locals. I’m sure results would improve but do they want 1-0 and 0-0 score lines for the rest of the season?

Weirdly confident for this one, we should have nothing to fear. Can’t deny that WBA are in decent form results wise but when you take a closer look, there are vulnerabilities. They’ve conceded first in 6 of their last 7 games but clearly know how to fight back, but can be leaky. Hopefully we take it to them early and get a goal to then create some space in behind. Last 6: West Ham (A) 3-1 win. Looked great tbf, can never sniff at a win at WHU even if they were miles off it. Preston (A) 1-1 draw. Didn’t look great, conceded on 78 then equalised a few mins later. Blackburn (H) 3-2 win. They were 2-0 down in 11 mins. Came back to win in the 89th min. Wrexham (A) 2-1 win. Fair play, they did what we should’ve done there, coming from behind to win with 2 late goals. Birmingham (H) 1-0 loss. Comfortably second best despite a tight scoreline. Wolves (A) 1-0 loss. Comfortably second best despite a tight scoreline.

Maybe it just confirms that this West Ham team hasn’t got the stomach for the fight in the Championship? I haven’t seen much of West Brom this season other than a lucky win at Norwich and looked pretty poor against Wolves. Obviously their results are very solid and improving.

Weird game. Atmosphere was flat despite an entertaining and fairly end to end game. I thought we kept picking the wrong pass in the first half and were only really in 2nd or 3rd gear, but had way too much for them. Delighted for Bragg to get a goal to cap a brilliant performance. Matsuki was immense as was big Kev, I called really early that he was going to get a goal, lovely bullet header. We should be a scary proposition as I feel we’re still miles off our best but cruising past decent teams at home. Need to be consistent and keep taking points off the other teams at the top which we struggled with last season. Another massive game Tuesday.