CamSaint

Something similar happened back in the old 1st Division in November 1968, although in a slightly different context. Bill McGarry walked out on Ipswich Town to take the vacant position at Wolves. His last fixture @ Ipswich on 16/11/68 was an 0-0 draw away at Man U and his first fixture @ Wolves was a 2-0 defeat also at Old Trafford on 30/11/68. However there was actually another fixture between these two so that they weren't consecutive fixtures, but McGarry hadn't actually taken over at Wolves for that intermediate fixture.

Be interesting to see how Gilmour develops under Smith. Thought he had another good game for Scotland yesterday.

Also interesting that we have 4 clean sheets in the 7 games that Bednarek has played, so I wonder whether Stephens would get back into the team if fit for the Norwich match?

Given that JWP played on Friday yet withdrew from the England squad on Monday (I think), I wonder if Ralph's 'work from home' directive for this week is an attempt to prevent any further possible spread through the squad? This assumes, of course that JWP does indeed have Covid.

Romeu, JWP & Diallo all played together for the last 20 minutes of the home game against Manchester United, when Diallo replaced Djenepo.

Is JWP eligible for this? I'd assumed his 3 match ban was for PL games, so presumably he could play in this one?

Looked like he was feeling his hamstring, as went off.

Adams off injured......

My tickets for the Chapel End were delivered by post within 48 hours of ordering them. We got to the ground at about 12.50 thinking there would be long queues & unsure how many people might be asked to show Covid passes. Walked straight up to the turnstile - no-one in front of us & straight in. Queued behind 2 people to buy a coffee & were in our seats by the time the teams were announced at 1 PM. I applaud the club's decision to reimburse the ticket prices as quite a few people with seats near us were still coming in after the game had started, and clearly many experienced real problems in other parts of the ground. However, the stadium looked about 2/3 full @ kick off so a lot of us must have made it in on time even though some will have no doubt had to queue for some time in order to do so.

What are the odds on Ramsdale having 3 consecutive relegations?

Maybe the TO performance is much worse for season ticket holders. Even before the pandemic, work commitments meant that I couldn't get to many matches, so I've never had a season ticket. However, I had an e-mail last week saying that my purchase history made me eligible for Man U tickets. Discussed it with my lad on Sunday & decided we would go. Went onto the ticketing site, selected 2 tickets behind the goal in the Chapel End & paid for them. The whole process took less than 5 minutes. When I confirmed the purchase, it said that the tickets would be sent in the post. They dropped onto my doormat first thing Tuesday morning. For me, it really couldn't have been any more efficient.

44 has F at the beginning of each number like Fraser's name.

Stevens also only has one year left on his contract.

Aside from any safety issues, which obviously would need to be dealt with, would the club have to divert money from player investment in order to fund infrastructure improvements? If so, would people be happy with that or prepared to put up with a green roof for another couple of seasons?

He also only has one year left on his contract, so unless Ralph really does rate him & they plan to offer him a new contract, this could be an opportunity to get a small fee for him.

I think the fact that he played in his 'normal' position is telling. Apart from the tall end of the Bournemouth QF, when he and Stephens replaced Bednarek & Vestergaard, I am pretty sure all of his previous outings have either been as part of 3 at the back or at LB. Given a proper chance in a back 4 he demonstrated exactly why we bought him. @LeG has been extolling his virtues as one for the future ever since we signed him, even when he was unavailable for so long. Last night was an assured performance and an exciting glimpse of what might be to come.

Eight outfield players pretty much pick themselves. With Minamino cup-tied, the remaining slots will almost certainly be filled by two from Tella, Redmond & Djenepo (doubt Nlundulu would be considered for a start), so I guess there is a reasonable chance that Redmond could start today.

He was marking (or rather not marking) Dunk from the corner for the first goal yesterday.

I was about to say the same thing. At that time we saw high tempo pressing, hunting the opposition down, forcing mistakes to turn the ball over. Then with the ball, using the high tempo approach to create space so that we could play those clever little triangles to move us up the pitch quickly. Today that was pretty non-existent throughout the game (apart from 2 or 3 decent fast paced moves) and in many other games we have only been able to sustain it for the first half at best. I am convinced we are suffering from player burn out due Ralph's preferred playing style & frequency of games. Bielsa's teams have often suffered the same fate. Leeds blew promotion the season before last for the same reason, although obviously they overcame it last season & have held their own this season (albeit with only 3 points more than Saints at the moment). Presumably Ralph's current approach of recycling the ball endlessly is designed to try to conserve energy in the hope that one or two opportunities will open up. But that doesn't seem to happen often, mainly since opposition teams seem to play the high tempo press against us and we have nowhere to go. If this suggested 'burnout' is a real thing, we just have to hope that the less frenetic schedule after the international break will help a bit.

But who on here would have wanted to give Vestergaard a contract extension this time last year? Most were offering to drive him to Leicester or anywhere that would put in a bid, but we would have needed to extend his contract then to protect the position now. What price a crystal ball?!

Ferry, Ramsey & Watts played for the U-23s today. They were all on the bench against Everton which suggests that KWP, Diallo & Minamino will at least be in tomorrow's match day squad.

Actually they didn't. They brought in KWP on loan to replace Cedric. In fairness, KWP was injured when he arrived, but he started his first match for us at home against Burnley on Feb 15 2020. I don't know if Valery was injured, but JWP played RB in the few games before KWP's debut & Valery wasn't even on the bench. KWP got hooked in the Burnley match & didn't start a match for us again until the 3rd match after lockdown against Watford, having replaced Valery at 1/2 time in the previous match at home to Arsenal. In the 3 matches before lockdown following KWP's debut, JWP played RB twice & Valery once. Valery started ahead of KWP immediately after lockdown at Norwich and then again against Arsenal.

The free agent market doesn't really solve any problems - you're not going to find anyone who's match fit & ready to go. Even if you could get someone without any work permit issues you'd have to ask whether, even when fully fit (& that could take some time), would they offer anything better than our current 'square peg' solutions such as Stephens? After all, on paper, you'd say Martina would be the obvious choice - PL experience with Saints & Everton - and an actual RB. But would anyone really want him back here? Unless KWP is going to be out for a very long time, bringing in a free agent will just add to the wage bill for someone who may never be in a position to get any game time.

Its an interesting conundrum. You're right that Romeu has only missed the one game, but before his return in the Villa game he was out for about 4 weeks (he last played before that on 29th December against West Ham). KWP, on the other hand, last played against Arsenal in the cup on Jan 23rd, so although he's missed 3 matches, he's only been out for 2 weeks. Of course, we have no way of assessing the extent of the injuries they suffered. I agree with you about Vestergaard. It wasn't even clear if he has returned to full training, so I'd be very surprised if he was risked, but who knows? (Ralph, I suppose!)

When we got our first win of the season at Turf Moor, Burnley were without Tarkowski, Mee, Gudmundsson, Cork & Rodriguez through injury and their bench was so young the commentators kept referring to the fact that they only had a tiny number of PL appearance between them. I think Burnley's injury problems hit them hard at the beginning of the season.