VectisSaint

He probably injured his foot giving his hairdresser a good kicking

Tubbs hat-trick will see the Red Devils through against, umm, the Other Red Devils. Or are they the Green & Yellow Devils now?

You forgot young Pulis as well. Should not forget that Butters can also play MF. The folks that question Morgan's ability are largely the same ones that used to question Matt Oakley, people who think all MFs have the same role. I think we do have a problem in MF if Morgan is injured or suspended, we do not have a ready made short term replacement, Hammond, Chaplow and Gobern cannot play that role in my opinion. Wotton was usually the backup (Heaven forbid) but now he's gone, does that leave us with Pulis to fill in? I hope note.

Strange really, apart from distance I thought Bart's kicking yesterday was much better than Davis generally, nearly always found a Saints player and I don't recall one of his kicks finding touch. His distribution generally is more intelligent, mixing it up, bowling it out sometimes to the full back and not always playing the giant hopeful hoof down the middle that KD tends to use 95% of the time. Bart is also more assured from corners and has better management of his defenders and their positioning. KD is a better shot stopper, of that there is little doubt, but with a run of games under his belt and not just an occassional run out, Bart will in my opinion blossom into a better all round keeper than KD. KD still makes me nervous, whereas I feel quite relaxed with Bart between the sticks, and it seems to rub off on the players as well. Very difficult for young keepers, they tend to mature later (in terms of their profession). We are fortunate to probably have the best 2 keepers in the division, but not sure how long we will be able to hang on to both, Bart will feel the need for 1st team football very soon (again, as he already looked to leave last season), would be a travesty if he left now after all these years, but wouldn't surprise me just as he is getting to be fully ready. Bit like Poke, let go just as he was coming to goalkeeper maturity, proved how good he could be during his loans at Torquay.

Messrs Channon, Fisher, Rodrigues and Holmes for a start. I wasn't there either but they were interviewed on the pitch by ITV.

What I saw yeaterday was that we will be OK on The Championship and we could even compete with lower end Prem teams, but we have a battle to get out of L1. When we have space and time we look excellent, but not so good when we are closed down and hassled and have to break down a 10 man defence. Our weakest area is up front. Lambert and Barnard especially looked out classed yesterday. I really don't know what has happened to Barnard, he has lost his touch & his confidence, Connolly would have been a better option against Manure on yesterday's evidence. Guly will be good when he just learns to look up and get his passes away more accurately.

Forgetting he hit the post in the 1st half, and actually was probably best player during the first 45 minutes (not that that was difficult, as they were made to look awful by us)

Did they? Thought the ref was very good yesterday. I expected him to be Manure biased but he wasn't. Only gave 1 card, Morgan was fortunate not to get one. Thought Owen's post match comments were reasonable as well, all he was saying was that the fitness of lower league teams (in general) begins to tell after 60 minutes or so, and frankly he generally has a point, although that wasn't wholly the point yesterday. We losy yesterday because they changed their system and we couldn't cope with the width in the late second half, I don't think we ran ourselves ragged in the 1st half, we played very controlled patient football.

Yellow for Butters, but otherwise no cards Cherries won 2-1 by the way.

Thought the lads did really well, result in the end was what I predicted so no surprise, but disappointed that we gifted them 2 goals. Had to laugh at WGS who reckoned it was down to us being knackered, when the major gaff was by a player fresh off of the bench. Interesting watching the last 5-10 minutes when it was blindingly clear that we were not going to try and get an equaliser. Might have been different if we had held on to 1-1, I think we would have gone gung-ho and either won or lost. 1-2 against Manure, no disgrace for a 3rd Div side, and we were by far the better footballing side in the 1st half. Harding and Chappers were outstanding. Right, now for the League

Back to 4th, Carlisle equalised

Did anyone really think they would fold today against Argyle? Plymouth are heading for oblivion. Don't think today was much of a test for Cherries to be fair. I know its not League 1 but Scott Bevan has saved 2 pens for Torquay against Crawley, Matt Tubbs goal still separates the sides though.

Some people are just weird. Really find it difficult to get my head round the idea that someone can support a team (any team) and hope they lose. The fact the we have shown over and over again that the cup run last season did not cost us a play-off place indeed we never lost a game following an FA Cup game) doesn't seem to have gotten through. Our performance after our last cup game was diabolical wasn't it, I'm sure we would have scored 12 against Oldham if we hadn't been distracted by Blackpool. Of course we aren't going to win the Cup this year, but I don't think there is any way that today's game will have even the remotest bearing on whether we are promoted. If we don't get promoted it will be because we are not good enough. The only thing I want today is for no-one to get a Red Card, and that we don't get tonked, but if we win I will be ****ing over the moon.

Just a minor little point, but if MLT wanted tickets for today's game how come he is working on Sky today? Clearly had no intention of being at the game today if he had other commitments, just trying to get tickets for mates and family. MLT & Franny really are making themselves look like complete mugs. Still just goes to prove that great players and Franny don't neccessarily have much common sense.

Leeds? or is it Burnley, Leicester, maybe Donny or Preston. Still good to see you Sun readers can get cheap tix to see Pompey, bet they still won't fill their shed, but will increase the average IQ of attendees for the day.

Blackpool were fined by the Premier League for fielding a weakened side against Aston Villa in the Lague. Nothing to do with the game against us. Ferdinand will not be playing AFAIK. I would not be surprised if Rooney is rested as well. Really wouldn't surprise me if Lallana does play some part today - just because NA said he wouldn't on the OS interview means nothing, all part of the misinformation smokescreen.

Well, as long as we go awayon the Oldham bus and not the Tranmere bus we will be fine when we are away from the building

To be fair, unless Charlton win by 16 goals (the influence of BWOffside), whatever the result tonight we would not have dropped out of the top 6 following the midweek games as MK do not have a game this weekend. Likelihood is that we will still actually be 4th.

But other than that and reference to our CEO as "Nicolas", it is actually a very good, accurate article. It does make good reading, but does remind us all of the frustrations of having the "ultimate academy". I even acknowledge that he who shall not be mentioned did do something right (even though we had had a good foundation previously).

Thought Charlie was a Gooner...

Glad I wasn't the only one that noticed, not once but several times. Not a good sign.

Oh know, I fell into this trap on another thread. Given we still have to play them, it is still in our hands, if we win all of our remaining game s(unlikely I know) we would finish 2nd whatever other teams do, because in winning all our games Posh would have lost 1. Must admit I am worried that certain people think we have an insurmountable challeng to get 2nd let alone 1st. FFS we are in 4th place, games in hand over most, and apart from Posh have the possibility of the 2nd highest points total. We will still catch Brighton IMHO, there is still a very long way to go.

If Charlton win 16-0 we will be out of the Top 6 after Saturday !!!

Sorry Docker but that is a myth, common term used throughout Hampshire, both the civilised part and Pompey, very common term on IW as well, usually used like "mate" rather than "bloke" though. A'right Mush?

Difference is Punch was here before him, if Adkins does take us to the Premier League then any players would have been brought in by him (or currently in squad). Adkins would probably have not signed the scroat in the first place, whereas Pards probably dealt with him to some extent as a fellow south Londoner and was also responsible for bringing him in initially. It often happens, someone like Punch can work well with one guy who brings him in but doesn't get on with his replacement. Bummer, lets hope we get shot of the little brat and replace hime before the end of the month.