saintant

Achilles for Baz - that's him for the season.

McCarthy is not great with his feet - could be a worry. I'd probably prefer Lumley.

McCarthy in goal. Baz injured in warm up 🙂

I've always maintained the atmosphere depends a lot on the intensity of the start. Get out of the blocks and put them under pressure and the fans will respond. Play timid walking football and the atmosphere will be flat and it will be hard to up the tempo. It's down to RM to whip the players up before the game and send them out fired up. If he does that and players respond I think we'll win with reasonable comfort. If he doesn't it'll be tense, nervy and could end up in us dropping points and any chance we had will be gone. Must win if we are to keep alive any hope of automatic promotion.

Think Baz might save the second because those are the ones he can deal with. However, the first low to his left - no chance.

I totally agree on leaving Fraser or another player upfield for defensive corners. I suspect the stats show that teams concede less goals from corners with all ten outfield players back.

Possibly because he has always championed Baz so why would the club look for a better quality alternative?

If we can beat Preston it's on to Cardiff who have a mixed home record. Beat Cardiff and the then Leicester game next Tuesday becomes massive.

Probably not plus it would actually be a seven match winning streak because we've won our last 2 and have 5 to play.

The fact that we have to rack our brains to recall his decent saves speaks volumes. He should be pulling off great saves in most games.

To be a decent professional goalkeeper surely you have to demonstrate an elite ability to regularly make incredible saves that defy logic. We see this time and time again with keepers even in the Championship. Unfortunately we rarely, if ever see, it from Baz. A shot towards the corner is inevitably a goal. This often makes it hard to win matches and we drop points that we shouldn't. We've had a mixed bag of keepers but every one of them was capable of pulling off worldie saves on a fairly regular basis even if some let in too many howlers. Surely the coaches at the club can see the glaring weakness in Baz when it comes to saving the ball. He seems a great lad and has some attributes but shot-stopping is not one of them. Strange for a goalkeeper making his living at a high level.

Why are some claiming Downes handled the ball before scoring? I've watched replays and it seems clear to me that the ball brushes his chest before he bundles it home.

I totally agree with your rant about the lack of ingame management and RM not reacting to periods when we are under the cosh and have been banging on about this myself. If he was sensible enough to include this single aspect I feel we'd have been nailed-on for automatic promotion. It is a glaring tactical weakness.

We are still just about in the chase for automatics so it's going to be exciting. If we were totally outplaying sides I'd be a bit more confident about our chances but, with how we are scraping wins, it seems likely we'll not quite get over the line but at least it keeps the interest alive for another few games.

Not sure - looks as though it brushes off someone's head before Downes bundles it in.

Timed to perfection. Well done Russ. Is it back on?

For the last time, nobody hates Baz. Many don't rate him which is a different thing entirely.

When will Baz make a brilliant save?

Play-offs it is then. Should really be winning comfortably when 2 nil up.

SBT!

Not watching it. Have Watford been the better side? See they've had more shots than us.

Get at them from the first whistle. No walking football, go for the jugular and get the game won asap.

The biggest hurdle is us winning all six games - not impossible but extremely unlikely. However, if we did somehow manage it I think we'd probably be promoted automatically. Ipswich have a tough run in and would need 3 wins out of their 4 games. Leeds would need to win their 3 games (if we beat them) and Boro away won't be easy. Clutching at more straws than a scarecrow having a wank I know but while there's hope....

In his defence he may not be fully match fit - he's missed games through injury, been dropped and then there was the 3 week break. Think he needs games to get back up to his normal levels.

I thought a goal resulting from handball was always meant to be disallowed and a free kick given. If so our first should have been disallowed and can only think the ref didn't spot the ball brushing Adams arm. That referee was hopeless - he blew for every slight touch and pretty well every time a player fell over.