up and away

Also it speculates that there might of might not be a loan back. It was mentioned yesterday that IF he is sold, we would NOT get him back on loan. Lazy Journo's again, I think. Just absolute ******, I can't believe anyone taking this seriously. Wenger stated publically there has been no contact on Friday. He has not lied about these things before, why would he start now? All this lazy **** of an ink smudger has done is to take the Walcott deal and line that up against Oxo. Why would we need to take a part payment, we are not in a forced position as we were with Walcott? Then with still 3 years on Oxo's contract, why would we let his go mid-season , something I doubt even him or his family would want. Everyone at Saints has said there has been no contact and just like Wenger, not in the business of making things up. There has been no price mentioned, so amazingly it comes up exactly the same as Theo!

Not going to be too hard on a team that have just played 3 times in a week, they just look jaded. Really concerned with the nigh nailed on rumours that Lallana is out for a good while. I am a little disappointed by either Adkins or the players after hearing Richardson comment that they left a lot on the bus coming back from Oldham. It's their job to hold their hands up and the managers to spot if they are up to it. Mind you I don't think swapping the full backs would have made that much difference, but there is a chance. But loading up tired players even more than you have to is never going to gain when we have a load more games coming up. I don't mind the draw, that has to be expected now and again, but i don't feel we utilised our resources to the maximum. After the greatest win of the season, the squad has suddenly developed holes that need loans to adjust. It's easy to say with hind sight, but I am wondering if Adkins feels we should have subbed our more important players at Oldham when the job was done?

You could well be correct and I feel we have only scratched the surface with Guly. I must sound paranoid about the midfield but it is the one weakness over the last couple of seasons that has halted us. With Guly operating as he does, the risk diminishes considerably and I can't see the logic in taking any risks. What we don't know is what the players have in the tank and what injuries they are now carrying. Although I feel the Oldham team is our strongest starting 11, it would not surprise me to only have Fonte and Davis nailed on for the defence, Hammond and Puncheon coming into the midfield, subbing Oxo and Guly when the job is done. One thing that has been exceptional is Adkins ability to figure out the opposition, rotate the squad and come up with a successful set of tactics for the resources he uses. Going to be looking at interest at who and how we play on Saturday. Firmly believe Puncheon will be giving Lallana a rest, too big a cog to over play at this stage of the season.

I don't feel that would be the best formation and I expect Notts to be better than that Blackpool side. Ince will play a 451 and try and throttle the midfield. Neither Lambert or Barnard has shown themselves suitable to go back into midfield, be that extra man and gain control, Guly has. I would start off with the 4411 we played at Oldham with Guly just in front of the midfield, we have a lot of possibilities for all the other positions and I expect we will be making subs based upon squad rotation, maybe even start with a few. Once we get control and are comfortable, then we can consider changes. I think the team we put out against Oldham is our strongest, but with the amount of games we have coming up I would not be surprised to see a couple of changes to the back four, Puncheon and Hammond in in midfield. It's all about how the manager rates Notts and what is required to over come them. Going to be a very difficult balancing act as all the games come up, nigh on diabolical for other teams without our squad.

I have been saying that for a while about Morgan, combine that with a half hearted petulant response to defending and I could see no value in him being in the side. But Since the Huddersfield game there has been the start of a turn around, two of those games I have witnessed, the others I have had to rely upon reports. But every indication at the moment is that he is performing the defensive job so well that he has to go down as a major part of our current renaissance. I don't give a damn if he is not getting the goals or the assists, this position has been our achilles heel since Pardew and before. Well done Morgan, welcome to the team! We are only as good as our midfield allows us to be, failure to secure the midfield and a Brentford will always be waiting to happen, defence exposed and lack of supply to the forwards. The two most important aspects to make this work is a defensive midfielder doing their job (either Morgan or Dean) and a forward who slots back into midfield and does the spade work until we get that area secured. Guly has been excellent in this regard and allows us to play with such an effective style that none of our other forwards allows. Chaplow being the other piece of the jigsaw with his constant harrying. We have such an attacking line up of form players that other teams can only partially dream of. An in form Lambert, Lallana, Oxo, Puncheon, Guly, Barnard, such that all we need to do is get some grip on midfield first and I can't see a team in this league not capitulating. The Oldham result came as no surprise, neither did the Brentford result. This attacking line up cannot be held at bay if you are getting a half decent supply to them. Get total control of the midfield and the Oldham result will start to look common.

Man, you really see what you want to, dont you ? Everyone else who heard the interview has interpreted this as Puncheon is not really up for the fight, is not really committed to the club. For me, it suggests that his Blackpool performance was indeed shop-window stuff. When I read this thread last night, my impression was the same as Nick's. But being out of kilter with everyone else thought I must have had it wrong. Thinking about it further Adkins went out of his way to emphasise Puncheon was ill more than once, to then undo those statements with the final interpretation does not make a lot of sense to me. My initial impression was that Puncheon was onboard, but could be anything on that one, time will tell.

I think they have been clever on this one, maximising profit and encouragement for the Carlisle game for those desperate to attend. This only works because the match is live on ITV, I wonder what would have been offered if that was not the case? It's obvious they are expecting a full house even with a late televised kick off, such must be the pull of ManU. And for all those locals with ManU sprogs, welcome to Carlisle. There are some aspects here I would not be happy with under normal conditions, but the fact the match is live on ITV takes care of that nicely. But it would not surprise me if we were not a few short of a full house, but the club should have done their homework.

Guly was always going to play, more important to me than Ricky at the moment. Was not sure whether Hammond Or Schneiderlin would play, just hope Morgan has something left in the tank for tonight. I expect Oldham will line up 4411 and I expect Saints to do likewise. If we don't lose the midfield we should win this one (everything crossed).

True. I suppose they could look at future cup games but this all looks like getting too messy and complicated. Best to knock that one on the head straight away.

What guff. Shresbury wanted to charge high prices for a match that hardly anyone gave a toss about. They wanted to squeeze the maximum out of the small number of people who wanted to go. Demand for this will be far in excess of capacity and therefore it is only right that the prices go up. No hypocrisy at all. Considering the original response on the OS, I cannot see anyway this cannot have the possibility of hypocrisy to some degree. If your only argument is because of the scale, then you have to remember the effect of that scale for Shrewsbury compared with ourselves. Hypothetical at best at the moment and far too early to be stupidly putting the boot in, as we don't know what Saints want to do, or what ManU and the FA will insist upon. If the club wanted, they could offer free / reduced league seats to those who have purchased cup tickets. Very difficult to do trying to tie this in at the time (possibly at any time) with the ManU game, because of the strict FA cup regulations. As IFHO has already commented, that is a no go because of the stewarding / policing. The reasons ST's have not been able to retain their seats, where the away fans take up their full FA allocation is because You already have one section of fans having to move and the restricted choices that subsequently places upon them. ticketing becomes difficult because you have to wait for ST's to see if they actually claim the seat they normally use. ST's will often want to move if some / all of those around them do not want to take up their allocation. When this has been looked at in the past, it has been proven to be far more practical and fair to have no reserved seats. It may sound simple enough and I expect Cortese responded upon that basis, but it would not surprise me if no changes were made for this game when the detail is looked at again.

From someone who has nearly had their head taken off from a Davis goal kick, I really doubt there can be much in that aspect. Bart has always been good for his distribution from hand, something our goalies should be doing most of the time. Kelvin is more than good enough for this league, but he's down the bottom half in the championship. We will need to replace him should we go up. I saw one of Bart's flap at a cross on the highlights, not a bad effort and the main reason Ormerod failed to make anything of it (IMO). Compare that with the failure to come from Davis against Brentford and you get a possible two goal swing. It's impossible to say without having seen the whole performance and one I expect Adkins to get right. I suppose it's more intrigue in what would happen if Bart were given a run as I feel he could do it because we need someone who can deal with crosses effectively. If there is anything there I fully expect Adkins and his team to latch onto it straight away.

If we hold our own in midfield, we have more than enough for Oldham. I would expect them to play an extra man in midfield and would be far happier with us playing 451, until the need dictates a change. We have more fire power in this league even playing 451, so it should not be an issue. I do see an issue getting a performance out of Schneiderlin or Hammond for this game. Morgan has never been blessed with stamina and it sounded like Hammond had a tough time against Blackpool. But equally Oldham had to put in a shift on Saturday and the whole Saints team are buzzing at the moment and Adkins is doing his homework very well. This should be an easy win for us given our current form, it's whether the midfield can hold it together for the attackers to inflict the damage.

I am a very big fan of Adkins, but I would rather we never got to play this game today. The acid test will come against Oldham and the games following, lose that and this win means very little. The couple of areas where I am not comfortable is playing both Schneiderlin and Hammond in midfield, Gobern I feel should have played. Playing both Bernard and Lambert for so long just does not feel right if either are to start on Tuesday. The target has to be automatic promotion with no distractions from any other aspect. Any build up of injuries / problems to the team because of these games is totally unacceptable. Failure last year cost us millions as would this year, along with the issue that investment into the team may be far more difficult to achieve. Everyone is overjoyed that Lallana has signed a new deal and I hope most of us view Puncheon being played as another positive point. The only reason this is possible is because of the money available to the club, start sticking in this division for much longer and those star players would not be prepared to stay longer and investment could become a major issue. We need promotion to keep everything on track! We have an unprecedented amount of games to be played and hopefully our squad will be a major advantage. Hopefully this will have no effect but this was a nothing match, where it's importance will be measured by the possible damage done to the league campaign, This was a very weak Blackpool side, maybe just a championship side from their players, but hardly a compact unit used to playing together and nothing to bragg about. Well done Saints, who played well by all accounts.

Very true, something you have consistently said for a good while now. Just out of interest, did you have any clue this was in the offing? It has repeatedly been shown that there are no ITK any more. The club has tightened up on the visitors and others allowed around the club, especially the training ground. As fans we are locked into the club and it's rare when you get a player echo the fans position in an action such as this. That maybe over the top, but it's along those lines. I noticed the comment "People often say, 'I want to play at the highest level', but there's not that guarantee of playing. which appears relevant to signing the deal. It would not surprise me that feedback and watching his friend Andrew Surman could well be a strong influence here. It's vital for a young players progress to be in the thick of the action where it matters, something he just would not get for playing in the reserves. Looking at Theo and I expect most of us would believe he would have developed far better if he stayed another couple of seasons with us or a similar club. Where he would be given an automatic start and allowed the luxury of learning from his mistakes.

I would go some where in between here. Yes, we have had problems with Puncheon, because he would not listen to Adkins and he substituted him, resulting in the toys getting thrown out, but that does not mean things are not fixable. Puncheon was just like the rested of the squad at the start of the season, gave it a go in the first half, ran out of steam and ideas in the second half. Maybe that was again down to fitness or carrying an injury. We need a player of Puncheons talent, if not necessarily him. Now Adkins is not daft and he will sit down with puncheon and lay out the various options with him, underlining that it is all down to Adkins what happens. It's not impossible to see that being to the benefit of both parties, whether that is for the window, until the end of the season or further. It can make a lot of sense for Puncheon to hold back for a moment to see what transpires with all the offers and the choices these present to him. If this coincides with Adkins believing he can make use of Puncheon within that period, then everyone's a winner. From Puncheons attitude previously there may be the problem you are pointing out, but there are a lot of reasons here for both parties why they could not work something out for their mutual benefits. If Adkins feels he can get a better package by using the money from Puncheon on another target, I would expect him to do that. What I have severe doubts about is the ability to bring such a player to Saints in this window, underlining why it would make sense to find some middle ground with Puncheon.

Given this team at the present, I would expect Pardew to be getting similar results. Pardew was sacked because of the damage he did to the squad, something that would cost him and anyone following him points for a long while to come. When Pardew was good, he was very good and we were in total control, the trouble was the inconsistency. I prefer Adkins, not yet got the total control of Pardews good days (Huddersfield(H), Leeds(H) and Norwich(A)), but more consistent. I can understand the logic of being better off if Pardew had stayed (eliminatinging the Wilkins tenure), but he screwed up big time and deserved the boot. Unavoidable after the publicised rumpus from the season previously.

Don't want to deflate everyone, but I have heard we have put a bid in for a young lad, London team ( championship? ). More promise than the finished article. This came from a Spurs source, but I don't believe it is their player, more one they have been looking at as well. Should not be too difficult for anyone who knows their onions as I can only guess it will be from Palace, Watford or Millwall??

Might sound like Kerr, but that taxi is definitely for you!

Adkins kept on telling Puncheon to hug the touch line, he wouldn't. That resulted in him being substituted for Holmes and the toys came out. People keep on saying Pardew played the long ball, he didn't, but the players did anyway. You could see from the look on Pardews face and the disgust when they pumped it long. The difference is that Adkins makes sure they do his bidding. The major problem we have is that Oxo cannot go on for much longer without having a spell out. Just tell Puncheon he's in for a few games until things get sorted with Milllwall or whatever, give Oxo his rest so we can use him for what remains. There is no doubt in my mind that Oxo is a far better player, but puncheon is very useful when fit. I would try everything I could to get Puncheon playing for us the rest of the season.

Your right, the more continuity the better players react together. But we will have to make changes with our schedule! Butterfield and Richardson I see as a very easy choice, Butterfield better going forward, Richardson better defensively. I was disappointed with Butterfield against Huddersfield, glad he was taken off as I thought he could have done better in letting the cross in. But each have their own merits and just select based upon requirements.

I am pretty sure we have more than enough for D&R at the moment, but I would not say that about every team. We struggle to get control of the midfield when the opposition has that extra man in there, Brentford being a stretch too far for us. We will suffer against a team like Brentford, who are good, physical and energetic enough to take the midfield away from us. On form as we are at the moment, I would still expect us to nick it, but only if we have the energy and put in the performance. It's how we maintain a fit squad playing twice a week that going to be decisive for us. We can do it and Adkins is rotating the squad to minimise our weakness, but all it will take is a couple of key injuries to have us wondering again.

We have to be sensible here and although there were problems with Puncheon, there is no doubt he is performing now. Oxo just does not have the physique to put in the amount of games that we require from him. If we don't treat him gently, he is going to fall apart on us. Take Puncheon back and get him in the squad, play him as much as his performances deserve. Come the end of the window and if things are not working out, consider selling him to Millwall. If they won't come up with enough cash, keep him in the reserves until the end of the season and sell him to the highest bidder. Puncheon is performing very well at a level higher and now in full fitness, there is no reason that we can't use him, even if that means forgetting some of the harsh words traded. Oxo is a far greater talent, but we just cannot keep using him as we have. He has to be used more sparingly, which will prove difficult with the volume of games we have coming up.

"Crying to Cortese" why demean your argument with that, unless you are posting this on behalf of Leftback? I understand your point that you have no good knowledge of the reports to Cortese being correct. But we have reports from Cortese himself via the fans dinner "The start of our season was ruined by pre-season training, because the players were pushed too hard. Ricky for example was in great shape just before pre-season and he’d been training in his own time during the summer to ensure he was in good shape, but then the level of pre-season training un-did a lot of that work. Pards basically wanted things done his way and didn’t listen to people telling him he was pushing the players too hard." It's all there in a nutshell, I did not go back and edit that Plymouth match report that Hammond was either injured or woefully unfit. Neither did I tie weights to him for the forthcoming games where he was a shadow of his former self. Hammond is looking very good now, but it took him a several games to get his fitness back. We all have differing points of view, but there is more than enough backing this up, unless you believe Cortese is a liar!

I think Charlton got it all wrong here. The FL have set up procedures such that instances like this need not / do not happen. If they have any doubts, they inform the FL and they send someone local to do an inspection early on the day of the game (or previous day). Charlton never used these procedures and took it off their own back, freely admitting the desperation to get the revenue in for this game. By the time D'Urso gets there, most of the damage is done to travelling fans and he's caught between a rock and a hard place in trying to see if this can be turned around. Without getting into the rights and wrongs regarding the decision by D'Urso, all I would say is that it cannot have been totally clear cut, otherwise the game would have gone ahead. When you consider that all the other nearby teams called their games off, unless you were throwing resources at fixing the problem, you really had little chance. Charlton just crossed their fingers and said ****** to all those fans having to travel for a posponement.