revolution saint

For all this talk of formations, I think it'll come down to determination, passion, guts, hard work and skill. Whatever team or formation we put out - we're better than Pompey in every department. Yeah, tactics play a part but the squad we have is miles better than theirs - what did we spend 48M compared to their 2M? Everything I've seen, their fans are bricking it that they might get thrashed so let's give them that nightmare.

Got a bet on Ipswich to win. Should I cash out?

They’ve got no cutting edge whatsoever and leaving Hamer on the bench is a massive call when your main problem is creating chances and taking them.

I don’t know enough about him so I’m not going to give an ill informed opinion on that. I do agree with him that these kind of tragedies along with high school shootings are the price America has to pay for lax gun control laws though.

That’s quite subjective. Can’t pretend to be an expert on Kirk but I watched a clip of him a few months ago and didn’t think he did that good a job of debating and fell into the old whataboutery arguments that are fairly typical. All subjective though. Just for the avoidance of doubt, he didn’t deserve to be murdered for his views though and I’ll happily condemn that.

To be fair he’s been pretty clear that he didn’t want to play with a four at the back until he had genuine wingers in. You can disagree with it obviously but that’s why he’s said he’s been playing that formation. He’s got wingers now so you’d expect us to go to something closer to the kind of formation he would rather play now.

I think: Jelert - Elly Wood - Woody Unconfirmed: Jander - Jandy Pandy

Yep, that’s been my thinking too. If we’re expecting a front four of Archer, Scienza, Azaz and Fellows to press high up the pitch then it’s probably only Fellows who has done that effectively in the past. Defensively we’re not blessed with much pace in the cbs if we play Stephens and THB either so playing a high line to condense the play is going to come with some risk. I reckon we’ll play more of a mid block which might not be a bad thing as it should invite the opposition onto us a bit and leave a bit of space for the forwards to exploit

Thoughts and prayers

This Ireland team is so poor. Although he didn't see much of the ball Finn didn't have a good game either. Disappointing from a Saints perspective. Spertsyan looked decent and lovely through ball for Armenia's second goal.

I can see Aribo getting some minutes and he's a good lad to bring on if we need to calm the game down and keep hold of the ball. Not so much Edozie - he's probably behind Scienza, Robinson and Fraser so will probably take a couple of injuries or suspensions before he even makes the bench.

Yes, it was actually a good competitive game last night. Quality wasn't all that but had a lot more excitement than the England game. Shea Charles Vs Germany tonight.

I think ROI always play him left mid rather than fullback and think he started out in midfield at QPR too. He did drop to left back in the second half last night but that was after Hungary were down to 10 men and defending for the most part. He’s a decent player without so much defensive responsibility and delivers a good cross. Debatable whether we have better options for that position but he’s better there than left back

Yeah, Doherty was behind him but the formation was more like a 4 2 3 1 or 4 3 2 1 at times. Azaz certainly wasn’t playing up front most of the time.

So basically your point is the formation and not really where he plays within it. Yeah, I agree we should change to a back 4 but that’s not specific to Azaz

He didn’t play alongside Charles against Watford when we didn’t have many options so I don’t think it’s likely Still will play him there when we’ve got Downes and Janker available

Mostly but they moved him around a fair bit and he played on the left for some of the time. I’d have liked to see him drop a bit deeper at times. Even in a difficult game that he struggled to get into he still managed to play a lovely one two with Manning, force a very good save from the keeper and took some decent corners too. Strikes me as a player that will do better in teams that have more possession (which we should in the majority of games)

Yeah, I did the same thing and pretty much agree with you. Manning had a very good game and shows up very well on set pieces. Difficult game for Azaz. I think he’s going to divide opinion, he’s not really going to press effectively or offer too much defensively but does have good vision and tie things together going forward. I like how he gets his head up and spots an early pass.

Haven't heard anything so it's hard to tell. I'd have thought Edozie would probably be moved either loan or permanent but that's only because I'm not sure we'd have sanctioned the Scienza deal if we thought he'd still be here.

Yeah, don't think we ever did find out the reason for that.

Yeah, Still doesn't seem afraid to chuck new players in quickly. I remember Ralph - he didn't want to play anyone until they'd had about a month of training with us.

I'd probably swap Downes for Jander but that's only because I haven't seen Jander play. Other than that I'd go for the same.

Stephens ain't great either but he's been better than Edwards. I'll be honest though, I don't rate Edwards. There seems to be a lot of hype about him but I haven't seen anything to justify it.

Have to be honest, I don't see how he gets into the team now. THB, Stephens and Wood all ahead of him and probably Quarshie too. Small sample size but he looks slow(ish) and too passive in his defending.

Welcome Leo. You look like Bobby Davro.