S-Clarke

If we go to a flat 4, with proper wingers, the full backs/wing backs won't need to be so advanced - so the protection on transition will be greater. Charles and Downes 'should' be enough to anchor this level, but in my eyes they're too samey and it makes us a bit slow in there - but we'll see. At the end of the day we need to stop conceding as much ground as we do in the wide areas, as teams break on us too quickly at the moment.

A lot of clamouring for a player who hasn't scored double figures at this level since 2019, and is now 33, and cost Wrexham £3.5m. Not really the sort as a club we'd go for, let's be honest. He's scored a couple of goals to start the season but generally, these days, he's a bog average journey man striker and I'd hope the club target better than him.

Yes, exactly. In isolation a couple of points away and a win at home is a good start - but it was that Stoke game, like you say, which paints a different picture. Still a lot to do, but it isn't a 'horrific start' as I've seen some proclaiming on social media, it's an average start. No more, no less.

Norwich want between £20-25m, even Wolfsburg baulked at that. We're not spending that on a player at this level and we never will.

We're still playing Bazunu, Manning and Stephens, so it's no surprise really. That trio means goals, goals, goals. If we take yesterday in isolation, we had no midfield. It was Charles and no one. There was too much space on transition and we were just run at, which lead to us conceding free kicks. I don't think we gave up too many chances in open play generally, it was just a couple of brain farts really which came on the back of us not having any transition cover. I still think some of our players are thick as shit though, which is why they often have those brain farts. A little bit of higher IQ in our group wouldn't go a miss.

How I'd argue that is Sargent, who we are all clamouring for right now, was signed from a 2.Bundesliga club with a similar rep to that of Downs and was actually quite a joke figure for Norwich in their PL season, their fans hated him. It took him time to settle, but he has at this level - not sure if he'll ever be a PL player though. We aren't in a position to buy Sargent now, we don't have the money to splurge £20m+ on a player, so we went and looked at Downs as someone who could become that level. It's a risk but it's how we operate and that isn't ever going to change due to our lack of financial power. We need to find the Sargent before he goes to Norwich, or the Mbeumo, Wisa, Tony etc before they go to Brentford - that's the market we're operating in.

It is harder to compete, 100%, but getting just 12 points shouldn't ever happen for any professional team. Certainly not in England where the prize money for promotion and TV revenue is huge, even the clubs at the bottom should be competitive if they have someone resembling a manager - which the 3 do this year, well - jury out on Burnley, I think Parker is a bit of a fraud tbh. If I were Wolves, Brentford or WHU I'd be a little bit nervous right now.

Agreed, hope he has a good career. The injury hit him at a really unfortunate time. I'll be interested to see how he does at Leyton Orient.

The midfield was a bit of a kicker today, definitely. But Sessay was involved in the u21's last night, so he couldn't be with us as well. If anything, when Downes is not available and obviously Smallbone is offski, we could do with maybe 1 extra in there. (even though we got Jander)

On Comms Blackmore suggested he was in the building and should be announced at the weekend, but probably Monday at this point so we can keep a deadline day arrival up our sleeve.

Window shuts on 7pm on Monday. We'll bring in a full back, and dependant on some attacking options leaving, we'll grab a winger too. I cannot see us adding a GK, CB, CM or ST. Think we've sorted those areas, well the club think so.

Yep I heard that same thing, they certainly don't have a clue about football.

Is it a case that as a fan base we've been conditioned to expect a fixed philosophy? I don't think Still brings a specific philosophy to the table that you can ring fence, I think he'll just bring a standard, common sense approach to football games and our style will alter for whoever we face, once we have the full squad. I don't think he's wedded to a philosophy as such, so I'm not sure we'll ever see any specific characteristics to take away, as you saw with Martin's pass, pass, pass, pass. Once we gets bedded in I'm just hoping the 'better' players being played in their best positions just win us games. No clever bollocks.

They've got a few Aussies in their squad who will be away, and some South African's. No idea who they are.

Leicester have been credited with an approach from some of their ITK's, and their journos aren't denying the chance of him moving. One to watch. Why Leicester would want him is beyond me though.

Not the same GK coach either. Dean Thornton, Andrew Sparkes and now Ruben - all different coaching setups, different types of GK coach, different mangers...same frigging decision to pick this guy. What do the performance analysts do when they highlight the goals we let in? It's impossible not to think that his inclusion is a club strategy and the coaching staff have no say in the selection.

Blackstock CDAJFU.

It's a shame the fans views went 360 on this guy so quickly, but he made his bed by having his little spat during January. In our worst ever season, he downed tools and wanted out. Yeah, cheers.

Even if the club are too proud to give up on the Bazunu project, the very least they should have done is brought in a GK to challenge him and make him look over his shoulder - someone the fans would be confident in coming in. We don't have that, Bazunu has no pressure and thus the theme will continue. We had a blind spot at RB for years before KWP, but a blind spot at GK is catastrophic.

And they've already got half our points before September. It took us until boxing day to get 6 points. I don't think we'll ever see a team as bad as us at that level again.

Thought they'd drew, what a sucker. I guess this means Man Utd are the greatest again.

I don't think we had any CM's to put on the bench. Matsuki was the closest. Sessy was with the U21's yesterday so wouldn't have travelled.

Compare him to Mads on the other side and it's light and day. Mads always knows where to be, what touch to take, when to pass, when not to pass. Manning does run around like an out of control Jack Russell at times, which is why he's often out of position. Cannot say the same for Mads - so we need a similar signing for LB please.

I don't rate Stephens, I think he's shit. THB is good, he gets a bad rep because of the teams he's played in - but he's the sort you build around. I like Edwards as well personally, so did QPR. There are another CB's at this club to get a tune out of, I wouldn't worry about that area - it's what's behind them.

This is the normal Bazunu argument, it's the same thing. They're not howlers, he doesn't drop howlers. He just lets in goals, all the time, every week, which make you think ''could he have done better there?''. Maybe, maybe not. But given that we ask the same questions every week, I'd say a good % of the goals he lets in should be saved by a competent GK. I'm not going to micro-analyse the goals today, apart from say that he looked like a midget in the goal when that free kick was taken - he had no leap because he had too far to travel to that site of the goal. He's going go down in the ages as a GK who doesn't make howlers, but also doesn't really make any notable saves.