Saint_clark

Formation is weird going forward. Djenepo is playing between the centre forwards, Orsic is dropping back into midfield...

Piss poor from Armstrong. Have to say I'm not a fan of sending the message that the players who failed at the weekend get a rest and will be back in the side come next Saturday.

Bazunu concedes that.

Bazunu concedes that.

From a freekick probably with JWP not playing.

Yep, or Bazunu. This team with JWP in for Djenepo would keep us up.

She also said Lavia needed to stop being so attacking and work on the defensive side of his game as we'd conceded a lot of goals this season. Clueless.

Against league two Grimsby? I'd hope a few of them. Armstrong banged them in in the championship, Orsic has a decent record, Alcaraz has a good shot on him.

Difficult one. I can see there being the thinking of he'll give us one season down there to get back up, but he'll be almost 30 at that point if he does and unlikely to get a move back to the top flight then. If we go down he's either got to move then or commit to spending his entire career with us, really (which in his own head he may well have already done).

Really hope he gets two more freekicks before the season is over, would proper piss me off to have to hear the commentary when "Liverpools/Tottenhams/Man Uniteds" James Ward-Prowse sets the new record.

That's not a good thing, it means he'll play at the weekend because he'll be rested.

Alright, well i've suggested trying something different. What's your suggestion - keep trying the same thing?

Honestly, even I am surprised it's that bad. I didn't realise our defence was actually doing a relatively decent job, but if you think back there have been so many times where the match thread is filled with people saying "ffs they've scored with their first attack/shot on target".

Yeah it's a shame really as we could have easily got another 4 or 5 years out of him if we hadnt treated him so badly.

Jesus... I am genuinely stunned that there are people who have watched us play this season and believe that Bazunu is better for us than Forster would have been. Frasers only played 4 games this season and equalled Bazunus clean sheets tally. Bazunu is unequivocally the worst first choice keeper in the league and worse than at least half the leagues reserve keepers too. People go on about not getting a striker in the summer, but signing a 20 year old league one player rather than an experienced keeper is the decision that will most contribute to us going down. He hasn't once made a significant positive impact upon a game.

He also played in the 2-0 win against Everton, the 2-0 win against Norwich, the 1-0 win against Arsenal and the 8-0 win against Newport. I'm not saying we never lost a game or conceded a goal with Forster in the team, i'm saying he was a lot better than Bazunu and we would be a lot better off with him in the side now. His overall record in the Prem is a clean sheet every 3 games, Bazunus so far is a clean sheet every 12 games. Or another way of looking at it; Forster last season - 19 games, 3 clean sheets, 35 goals conceded Bazunu his season - 24 games, 2 clean sheets, 41 goals conceded.

I think that's kind of the point, isn't it? It may be a few players only chance of playing in Europe in their career. When was the last time a team played in the 2nd tier and in europe, was it Wigan?

Can you all stop reminding me of how much better life was back then please.

Yeah of course it's not impossible, but it would take an incredibly unlikely turnaround at this point. As it is right now i'm pretty sure we'll be down the end of the season - if we beat Leicester and then get a shock win at Old Trafford (I know, we won't, but IF), then I might say we have a chance again. I think the biggest thing it's going to require is big changes to the things we've been doing all season that haven't worked, namely Bazunu in goal and slow ponderous build up play. Get Willy or McCarthy in goal, play 4-3-3 with Lavia, JWP and Alcaraz in the middle and get Sulemana and Edozie or Orsic running off the shoulder of the full backs for balls down the line and crossing the ball in for Onuachu, with JWP and Alcaraz making late runs into the box.

What's nuts is that other than Diallo for Lavia that looks better than our "premier league first choice" team.

If it's the hope that kills then i'm immortal right now.

Forster would have been better positioned and got one of his size 15 clogs in the way of the ball, wouldn't have needed to dive.

Genuinely believe we'd be outside the drop zone if Forster was our number one.

Doesn't fucking look like it.

When!?