Holmes_and_Watson

Nope. It doesn't do that. I don't know Scott's level of involvement. Since there's nods to everything else, there are nods there too. And each of the characters has some sort of personality/ subplot, which was also decent. Hope you enjoy it.

Oh. This is the match I've erased from my memory isn't it. Just little warning signs coming up there. Whew! You nearly said "six pointer" and the first poster to say that gets...oh heck...>ACME sound effect of falling piano< We're a little unsur going into this with all the changes, and set up to be fairly solid. Forest don;t offer much, and it looks very likely to be a draw. But since that's no fun for a prediction, I'm going with an Archer winner, late on.

I saw Alien Romulus yesterday. Since Aliens takes a lot from Alien, it's not necessarily a bad thing. This one looks back, and lifts from pretty much everything across all the other films, including prequels. Not to mention what I think might be unreleased screenplays and other non film bits. Some of it works fine (and good in a couple of bits), but I was tripping into references quite a bit. There's a number of set pieces. They work to underplay the aliens, quite a bit. There's some set pieces of what would be certain death, that aren't...well, because. Looks good, sounds good, is a decent enough watch, maybe getting better if you've not seen some of the others. Not a patch on Alien and Aliens though. Sometimes, all those call backs are just reminders to the better bits of other movies, at the expense of this one.

Bad

Crime

Edozie tried a number of different things, yesterday. He took on opponents, both inside and outside; looked to hold it and release a pass; cut in field to draw a foul or a shot, and at least once looked for one of our successful cut backs. We got little from it. Mainly because we did nothing at a pace to worry a Newcastle side, happy to be given time to get compact and hold a lead. As a unit, including Edozie, we needed to work them at a higher tempo, and use that, and them getting that ball, to create space and punish them. Instead, we had loads of possession but didn't move them about much. So, he was varied but everything was too slow a Ross our attack and played into their hands.

Yeah, and Martin's system, when it was working with Baz, made a lot more use of this than others I saw. I think that this brings a bit more pressure on Alex, as they know it's not a strong suit, that there will be times he'll be expected to do it anyway, that it's now in the PL, and that errors are going to happen with it anyway (shout out to Baz, who was excellent in that department). An error to be sure, but there's always more going on than just the pass out itself. There were also a lot of misses in yesterday's highlights. Some a lot easier than anything we had.

Looking at the Sky highlights, another 2 'keepers played the ball directly out to opponents. Of the 3, we were the only ones to concede.

You forgot your cot pic of how you scored 🙂

Ferox

Posters to watch out for...

I only caught the second half. Where the comments seemed to suggest we were doing fine, until an error cost us. Looking at the highlights ... One off the line, a strong save to stop AA among other good moments. We have a system where I'd trust Baz with passing it out and accross the box, and McCarthy to be a better shot stopper. Neither is currently ideal, but the replacement must genuinly be able to play to Martin's system, or we're going to have the same issues. Completely fair red card. Silly use of the head. Second half, we failed to stretch 10 men. Loads of possession. But the old lack of incisiveness when needing to change the risk. Newcastle were allowed to settle into defensive shape easily, and we did little to move them out of shape. We created none of the quick passing moves needed to shift and create chances there. The slow approach play gave Edozie lots of the ball, but with no outcome. We caused them no panic when holding their lead. Quite a lot of positives from the game, with new signings bedding in. Good to see youth used from the bench, and hope that Martin thinks they've developed enough to get more minutes. No surprise that we lacked that creative midfielder to try and unlock things, a 'keeper decent with both feet and hands, a more experienced driver out wide than Edozie and a strong presence up front. All areas we know we have to improve in.

Edozie wins a freekick. Considering the end product they could just have let him run until he fell over. 🙂

Absolutely. Ideally, Edozie would be the developing player getting regular minutes from the bench. His directness and speed of decision aren;t there, so his opponents are coping fairly easily, regardless of what he tries.

Archer and Edozie combining to be less than effective there.

Edozie: He's trying lots of different things - passing through and running behind; stopping and passing back; trying to get to the byline. Zero joy from any of them today.

Making use of the young 'uns today rto freshen things up (and give them game time ahead of any decisions in the window). As above, lots of possession, but fairly controlled by Newcastle. We've made little from all those corners. We're looking for a deflection more than anything. At least KWP is looking for just that.

It's all the tougher when we allow them to get back, get central and block everything.

Headless

He will be inspirational, wherever he happens to be on the park. It's an attitude that unsettles the home crowd this afternoon, and then their players.

Execute

I think banishment is that they can only play football in car parks outside football stadiums. 🙂

No. There is chance a return story will include a reference to a fictitious friend handing out water bottles in Gaza. I'd not rule any subject out, as we saw with Nazi belt buckles.

That's what I was thinking. The radio likes to have the judge read out the whole sentence, and I just assumed he was one of the "keyboard warriors" that came up. The alternative was we were going to get a "return from holiday" approach, just looking to pretend nothing had happened. An extended version of the tactic used for years.

Going into the window, I thought we clearly needed 6 first team (lots of minutes) players, with an ongoing requirement to strengthen DM, that's been there for ages. Leaving: Alex, Che, Stu, Brooks, Fraser, Flynn In: Alex, Flynn, BBD, Cameron. Up front is not like for like with Che, but Martin may have different tactics in mind. A unit of BBD, AA, TP, Cameron, Mara as it stands (Stewart perhaps at some point) BBD and AA can both play in attacking 3. It would be nice to have someone with Tella's profile on the right. But we do still have Edozie, Sule for the left and SAA pushing for a spot on the right. Leaves a Stu replacement to be found. We have Dibling pushing through too, and Alcaraz and Aribo here too, with Will supporting any other 2. Les incoming, to give Charles a loan move, may give us that DM cover we've been needing too. With MOR and Fraser presumably still ongoing, we're not that far away. There may also be incoming competition for Alex, even if on loan. We've also got Taylor, Suga to push for first team berths, with Edwards and Woods too. A lot of decently budgeted business there.