coalman

Gotta go for the win. Play our best team. Take players off if they get tired. Playing with an eye on penalties is a mug's game.

West Brom are no slouches. No point thinking too much about Leeds unless we walk the walk tonight.

Rumour has it Leeds already won the playoff final. Never mind that, let's turn up against West Brom.

Or Che banjos one wide of the corner flag when clean through

I'm sure Sunak will be there which can only create a hostile atmosphere.

That's a horrific tackle. Red card with VAR

The key word is "jump"

No Manning's land nearly gets us in trouble again

I see we're saving ourselves for the final

Moyes is great until he is successful. As soon as he starts buying flair players his teams fall to pieces. I have this on good authority from my West Ham supporting mate.

This is where Mara shows why we bought him. You heard it here first.

Surely it was "nuts"?

I got a kitten a week ago. Already she's caused Lando Norris to win his first F1 race. Saints winning the playoffs seems well within her capablities.

Manning was lucky not to be off for a second yellow there.

Another great ball in. Adams absent.

Great goal. Where the hell was our centre forward though?

Good to see us resting ALL our attacking midfielders

That suggests us winning 3 out of the next 4 games.

Going to put my head above the parapet here. I think Mara is a victim of the Brooks/Rothwell loan madness. When they arrived he was regularly getting minutes at the end of games and starting to find the net and there were calls to start him over Che. Then he was completely frozen out. The last few games he's been indifferent at best. Though I thought he was much more committed against Stoke. He took a punch in the face getting to the ball before their keeper. Don't think Saints is the place he's going to succeed at.

The only foreseeable result is a Saints win. Raising the hope that we're ready for the playoffs and meeting Leeds in the final only for us not to even make the final. The cow's arses have enjoyed a long enough break from the banjo so Che to be at his clinical best. Martin to continue his midfield selection via random number generator. Brooks to slot in at defensive midfield.

We still need to lose that last shred of momentum before the playoffs. Plenty of chances of injuries/suspensions to key players too.

Martin's comments are concerning. Last night should be a wake up call. We didn't make any decent chances. We couldn't win the ball back. We couldn't pass through our midfield. We gave their attackers and midfielders as much time and space as they wanted. We lost all the physical battles. The players didn't play for each other. I'm struggling to think of anything we did well as a team. There were odd bits of individual competence from time to time but that was as wretched a team performance as much as the Preston game was a great team performance. In fact the only positive I'm drawing from that is that we're unlikely to face Leicester in the playoffs now.

Last night Rothwell was as bad a midfielder as I've seen. He didn't win the ball, he didn't close space and he constantly gave it away. The only times he didn't give it away he passed to Brooks who managed that for him. Brooks was anonymous last night and has been for a couple of games. Central midfield is not Rothwell's position. We should stop trying to play him there. If we're playing Armstrong on the right we know he's not going to beat his man so we need someone direct and able to stretch play on the left. This is either Edozie or Fraser. Our run came with a front three of Edozie/Fraser, Adams, Armstrong up front. Dibling, when he has come on, has looked really good there - strong enough to compete and always willing to go at his man. Our central midfielders need to be able to find pockets of space and/or be able to play on the half turn if we're to play through a good press. Rothwell isn't able to do either of these things. Downes can do both. Smallbone is great at finding pockets of space and keeping the ball moving. Stu has always been good on the half turn. Aribo is good on the half turn. Our run came when Downes, Smallbone and Stu/Aribo were playing. If Charles tries it more I think he's also a player who can play on the half turn. Lavia was insanely good at this last season. Without that platform our wide players have to be an outlet that carries threat but it means we have to hit the ball long and hope our front three are going to win their physical battles. Armstrong is not going to. Brooks is not going to. Che sometimes does. Rothwell and Brooks have made us collectively worse in both midfield and attack unless we're on top.

We had no outlet last night. Rothwell and Brooks conspired to made our right hand side ineffective. Armstrong shouldn't play on the left. Adams lost the physical battle. The way to get at that Leicester defence was to stretch them and get the ball wide at pace. At no point did we manage that bar a couple of late runs by Edozie where he couldn't make the final ball. Out defence was regularly caught ball watching and invited crosses and shots. 60 minutes was far too late to address this. We looked much better in possession when Smallbone came on. He gave us a player able to find space to receive the ball. We looked much worse in defence when Manning came on even though KWP was having a stinker on the left. Charles was neat without driving the game except a couple of times. When he tried he was able to play on the half turn a couple of times. Want more of that. Aribo was good until he tired. Need to abandon the AFC Bournemouth experiment and get our balance back. Plus pray that Downes is fit for the play offs and THB doesn't get banned.