Whitey Grandad

He should have done more to put Quinn off his jump. There are ways of doing it that don't involve jumping. And why are they getting space to put in a good cross? We need some fullbacks, but we all knew that already.

My thoughts.... Defence were shocking as usual. Please sir can we have some fullbacks? Davis was brilliant at stopping shots as usual but we can't keep on relying on him. Dyer was very poor, should at least have hit the target when the chance came to him. BWP was more penetrating initially, running past players instead of running into them like Dyer but then everything descended into a disorganised mess as the second half went on. James was outmuscled for their second goal. Pekhart took his goal well, at least there's some promise there. The whole experience was like watching a reserve match. At least a point keeps the table ticking along and there's always next Saturday but I don't look forward it like I used too. I much prefer last season.

We were awful for the first 37 seconds at least.

I agree. My concern is that our current situation has arisen because of Lowe's apparent obsession with almost exclusively playing youngsters from the academy instead of bringing them through gradually into the first team in small dribbles.

These are all valid points and I will wait until Saturday evening before re-assessing the situation, but we were down to 10 men because of the inexperience of a debut youngster. Whether this inexperience leads to a sending-off, letting in silly goals or giving away a penalty is irrelevant, these are the direct results of the decisions made to concentrate on youth and inexperience. It will be interesting to see who he picks for tonight's game.

For those who haven't heard it yet: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yg_xa-c9hHY

There is absolutely no way that his last and most violent 'tackle' could be interpreted as an attempt to get the ball. The red mist had clearly descended and any reasonable person looking at that 'assault' would expect the outcome to be serious physical damage to his opponent. If he had done it in the street he would have already been charged. There is no place for that sort of behaviour in any level of football.

Easy! Are you available and would you be cheaper than Poortvliet?

That seems to be a common strategy by the opposition. Defensively we there are wide open spaces behind both our full-backs and going forward we have been getting crosses in but they have been poor quality and there is nobody in the middle to feed off them. On top of that we have no-one who can shoot from distance and we are hardly a threat from set-pieces (Perry apart). Now Holmes is out for the next couple of months and there are no reserves because they're already playing.

It was only last week that some people were saying how quiet this forum was!

Will somebody please tell the manager? Our defence is getting worse as each game goes by.

They obviously know nothing about how to organise a defence.

I've tried hard but I can find absolutely nothing in common between us and Man U

Ouch! Let's wait 'til Saturday night before we start panicking. Anything less than 2 points this week would be very worrying , don't you think?

I'm sorry to hear that. I'm glad to be going, it's the only pleasure I get these days.

Heaney was never the same after that mistake at Anfield. I can't quite remember exactly what it was, can anyone remind me?

Good point!

I've got two tickets which I bought before Lowe came back. I shall be there, of course, the same way that I would be at the bedside of a relative who was very sick. We don't have to watch Saints, we can always admire that giant of a club, Ipswich.

There have been wide open spaces behind both fullbacks in all the games that I have seen and these have been gleefully exploited by the opposition. Surman is too slow to play there and James has often gone AWOL. The first goal on Sunday was cringeworthy and Lancashire's misjudgment was down to him trying to cover the right-back position. I accept that it is early in the season but at the moment I see the defence getting worse as each game goes by.

Yes, I was there and I thought he played well there alongside Thomas. I suppose I mean an untried pair in the centre of defence.

Then his judgment was poor. Two debut centre halves in the same match?

The same as they are now, but we get more games to suffer.... but I suspect that you knew that already.

We get 4 more home and 4 more away games in the CCC and I stopped going to places like Chelsea when they started charging idiotic prices for the tickets, so all-in-all we get more days out. What I meant was that even though we are crap, we can always admire the opposition and learn from them.

We don't always get crap football from the opposition. At least it's a day out.

We get more games in the CCC