Gloucester Saint

And that’s down to SR not biting the bullet as Kat had to with writing off Osvaldo. Sometimes in a business an investment goes wrong and you have to pay to fix it. SR just won’t do it. In fact, they’ve doubled down in many of them. Mind you, not sure Martin would get success at City - look at the horrific second goal yesterday caused by needless playing from the back. Horrible football and delighted to see it being undone.

We’d have lost 1-4 or 1-5 if that were the case against a physically strong and mobile Stoke midfield. Downes was struggling as it was to drive forwards and Shea had an off day. MF tried but mind clearly elsewhere, probably still our best performer even so. At Wrexham they have CM options like O’Brien to do the stuff he can’t, and no five at the back.

All joking aside, Parkinson uses a midfield heavy system, we aren’t going to. Will is very good in a central three, hopeless in a two, and Wrexham need someone at the top of that midfield to play people through and score a few. He is proven to do that, and the likes of O’Brien will do the dirty stuff that he physically can’t at the moment, although I strongly suspect Parky would have weight training and high protein diet on his first day to bulk up because he’s an attention to detail person. But it’s Nixon, and even Richard Nixon told the truth more than Alan does.

Far from the first time: Pellegrino - hired on the basis of bringing back Poch and Ronald’s pressing football when he’s a 4-5-1 shut-up-shop merchant at slow pace Jones - likes athletes and players with some bite and snap, not technical players, inherited an incredibly passive squad who were slower, smaller and more technical (and the summer 2022 signings didn’t suit Ralph either). He didn’t handle it well at all but some empathy. Martin - a squad not comfortable on the half-turn and even Pep is struggling to make that style work now on City’s astronomical budget, let alone Martin’s horrific start at Rangers Spors said it right first time that the stables needed a full cleansing but I suspect Solak and Ankerson have refused to authorise the fee and wage write-offs needed at SR board level to make that happen, because it would mean admitting failure. Whereas Brady has realised he has had to take a few painful losses to get Brum going forwards again.

Sadly it is Nixon but if remotely true rip their arm off.

If Still stays, I’d be very pointed if I were him towards the owners and question the lack of direction to protect my reputation. Nuno is doing a very fine job of that at Forest with an owner that is an even worse basket case than ours.

Agree with playing the strongest team available but prior to that, a bit of psychology and if I was Still I’d be saying at the presser that Aribo and Edozie are starting as they need minutes. No intention of playing in them in actuality but watch their agents scurry to complete moves they’ve been stalling for months over.

Rationally what you are saying makes perfect sense….but at the moment there is a huge amount missing. Confidence - clearly. But also physiologically trusting their instincts, not worrying about retaining possession or checking back like they did under Martin. Just digging into that muscle memory of what made them top level forwards in the first place and reading the game. Link up the play as you see it. Get shots off and work the keeper when there’s a space. Play people in when you think that’s a better option. If we are not bringing another striker in, and I don’t think we will, then it’s a different management approach to let AA, BBD and Archer play their natural games with hopefully wide areas and midfield transformed during the next week to enable that. Jeremy Snape was helpful under Adkins and Poch and I think some 1-1 psychology would help them move on from last season. Ditto Ross Stewart to start trusting his body.

And the biggest earner of the striker group. The only club I could see him going to is Boro and will they want to strengthen a promotion rival? Personally, to free up wages and space for a sorely needed new focal point (Downs won’t be that for at least a couple of years and a loan out or two) I’d gamble and let him go, for AA’s benefit as well. But I don’t think that’s what they’ll do.

His post-match comments were indirectly pointed at Spors and Solak, so if those two don’t co-operate next week, I suspect it’s interim manager Adam Lallana against the skates. Hope he is putting them both under some intense pressure and he should, his stock is good, theirs is rock bottom. I despise Harry Redknapp but he was a master manipulator with DoFs and boards. Need a bit of those dark arts right now to pull SR along by their noses.

I think there needs to be some audible dissent from the away fans if he does. 🎵 5 at the back, you’re having a laugh 🎵

Probably moving on then next week, can’t see him as a lone striker any more than AA. Doesn’t have the link and hold up play of say an Ings. More buyers potentially than AA and certainly BBD or Stewart. Pity, as I think he will score if used properly and actually has pace. But better to bring another striker to suit the manager’s set-up rather than another individual transaction to try to turn a profit on like Archer, Downs or BBD.

Before that I reckon, or Spors is gone by October (more likely). He’d want assurances that Solak will be spending right up to the PSR limit for 26/27 though.

Archer has a role to play but feeds off a target man. It’s either Stewart, Downs, or one comes in on loan.

I suspect Still trying not to push the forwards under the bus whilst texting Spors afterwards and saying ‘Damion Downs? Seriously? Send me a proper striker this week’.

Another reason why several new faces come in who challenge Russell’s boys when they do it in training. Need some shouts of ‘weak’, ‘cop out’ ‘weak dick’ and ‘bottled it’ when it happens to knock it out of the existing squad. Build some character as well.

We lost this 1-0 to them 1984/85, John Deehan scored https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/225126258408 They won the League Cup but got relegated, bittersweet, so can’t have been 1985/6.

We’ve been incredibly vulnerable and sluggish against counter-attacks since spring 2022 so under Ralph. Some of it is diabolical recruitment but not all. There’s a fitness element, but also an awareness aspect of where their runners are which is missing.

Similar to Nathan Jones in that 6 weeks game and formation training for a manager is like 6 months to plan and prepare for a DoF. Very rare to get the luxury yet the performances resulting from both are unacceptable. Huge week for Spors and he must be perfect in terms of 4-5 new faces who start the next league game. No room for mistakes after signing the two fringe players from Germany neither of whom we needed.

Hardly a surprise if true (after all, the skates are about as likely to tell the truth about SFC as Allison Pearson about Kier Starmer) as SR are too busy counting the Dibling proceeds.

Interesting, and clashes with Still’s post-match comments. Perhaps he didn’t want to push the strikers under the bus in public?

Both you and @aintforever can be right here. Spors has been very poor so far and underdelivered massively but Still got schooled by Robins yesterday.

Exactly this. It’s too easy to point to Downes’s and Bazunu’s errors. Stoke countered shrewdly and at pace, they were dangerous all game, ideal away display at this level. And yes, we’ve long lacked players to unpick a low block, the red card made zero difference.

About the manager - yes I agree. Far too soon, had a stinker yesterday and Robins took him to the cleaners, but it’s one game. About the club, DoF and SR board? No, far too soft for too long. There should have been protests and boycotts some time ago. They are now under enormous pressure to transform the first XI in a solitary week. Tick tock.

Not sure judging by the Dibling thread that he’s a Saints fan, many suspect Everton. Although a poster in here who was on the misery side during the heyday of Adkins/Poch/Ronald stopped posting recently, so could be him under a new name.