S-Clarke

Leeds didn't play well tonight, but they just have it about them to stick in and get the job done by whatever means. Whereas we played well tonight, had the lead, but still lost the game. That's why they will win the league and we'll end it stranded in 4th.

Not going to worry about that until we know we are here next year, we probably will be...but let's wait and see after the playoffs.

I don't think we can play on that one anymore. Since last season this is an entirely different club with new players everywhere. new GK, new CB's, new LB's, new RB played today. New CM's. New wide players. All new mentality right there, 80% of the team. Adams, Armstrongs, Bednarek they only remainders of the 'years and years of shit' you'd have to say. I don't think you can put it on 'scar tissue' or mental bollocks anymore, it's down to individual mistakes but also tactical approach and how we play. The counter argument to what you say is why have Leeds and Leicester not suffered the same fate? They couldn't defend for toffee last year, Leeds particularly leaked goals everywhere. They've got a pretty mean defence this season.

THB, Bree, Manning weren't with us last year. Neither was Holgate when he played. Stephens, Badnarek and KWP i'll give you, but not the others.

I think it's a bit of a stretch to say we don't score enough, we've got 76 goals this season (more than Leeds and Leicester). That would be enough if we kept the door a little bit tighter at the other end. I think the amount of goals we score is in some ways an advocate of the style, but the goals we let in at the other end kind of cancel that out - so we have to find a bit more balance somewhere. I wouldn't focus on our 'lack of goals' being an issue at all, we score stacks. Scoring 2 away from home should be enough, scoring 4 at home should be enough. We shouldn't have had to score 5 away at Birmingham etc etc...so for me the prob is clear, it's the goals we let in at the other end.

It could have only been fitness, surely. Wouldn't make any sense otherwise.

That's the thing - it's all nearly goals which make you think ''hmm, could he have done better?'' ''should he have saved that?'' - there's more of those ''hmm'' moments than ''What a save!'' moments that's for sure. If he'd have got to at least one of those goals tonight it would have been a ''what a save moment'', which is kind of what you need your GK to pull out every now and then - but he doesn't seem capable.

What's any of that got to do with Willcox out of interest?

It's a strange one because individually he doesn't play badly, but I do agree that he has unsettled a structure since he's come back. We did see the benefits in transition effect with Stephens role today, but ultimately we did let in 3 goals (again) so questions have to be asked. We do concede a lot of goals when he's on the pitch.

I appreciate that's the chain we're in, but he's only just got the job and you'd think we'd have sounded him out a bit more before giving him the brief of how to develop us over the next 5 years. I'm very sceptical of SR's decisions because none of them have gone right yet, and they've been in charge for quite some time now.

The thing with Bazunu is if we're talking about metrics and the passing of the ball etc, he's right up there. One of the best. But if we're talking about shot stopping metrics, which he really should be judged on before anything else, he's at the bottom of the list by a distance.

Just to put our collapse into some context, this was the table just 9 games ago after we'd beaten Huddersfield 5-3, all on equal games. 9 games later...(or 6 in the context of our games in hand) That's as big a fuck up as Leicester in my opinion. It was in our hands, we had all the momentum and once we got there you thought we'd grab it just like Leeds have done. The GD is the most telling thing, look at how Leeds and Ipswich have charged on and we've meekly surrendered.

They were both similar goals, low shots which trickled in - no massive pace on them, should have been blocked - but even if they weren't, I'd have expected a GK to have got a touch on them.

Shocking that. I do think Brooks has massively unsettled us as an addition. We've got so much worse since we've had him in the side, which is weird to say as he's a PL player. Only Southampton could have done that to Brooks, we have a knack of it.

We played well, I think most people will say that - but we lost, at the end of the day I couldn't give a shit about how well we played...we lost, again. Since February it's not been good enough and we threw our chance in the bin. Nothing to be proud of right now, I just hope we regain some momentum for the playoffs as it all feels a bit stop-start at the moment.

But even in that Swansea away game, in which the first half was stupidly dominant, we still let them back in and in the 2nd half hung on a little bit.

I don't think it's fair to say we've been embarrassed as you put it. That's totally downplaying Ipswich who have been unbelievable this season, their achievements should not be discredited. I'm sure WHU fans said the same about us back in 2011, but it wouldn't have been fair or right. We played well tonight though, so we weren't embarrassed - just the same old issues of having a GK who doesn't save goals.

We're not really having a great deal of luck with these roles are we? Not picking exactly loyal people, Shields first and now this guy. More question marks over SR's decision making for me. God knows what they'll do next.

That unbeaten run was good, but it doesn't really mean anything. Another new record for us though, the only team to go unbeaten for 5 months and not achieve anything. (that kind of suggests there were too many draws mixed in tbf). It's not been a bad season by any stretch, but ultimately we've failed on the number 1 objective which was auto promotion. Winning the playoffs is the second route to it, so that will remain open...but we're incapable of keeping clean sheets against any relatively decent side, so we're going to need to outscore everyone in the playoffs by some margin - not sure it's sustainable or doable. We'll see. The frustration for me this season is that we caught up at Christmas through to the end of Jan - that run brought us right into the mix. We used the window to add PL quality in Brooks to the side, didn't lose anyone (bar Charly) and we looked set to give it a good go to the death. But since February we have absolutely bollocksed it in the worst way I could have ever imagined. I knew we'd lose a game again this season, but we've dropped so many points in the last 8 weeks which has killed our season dead before the run-in had a chance to start. We did all the hard work and then lost the plot. Certainly need to understand WTF happened during February to derail us as badly as we have been.

Shit show from him for a while now, he had a good spell this season and he didn't deserve any criticism, but at the moment it seems as if every shot on target is a goal by default. The game was summed up by the keepers tonight. At 2-1 their keeper made a decent save from Bednarek, not a worldie, but a good save he had to work/move his feet to get to. Our keeper let in their only 3 shots they had on target and didn't look capable of getting to either, where you'd think most keepers would have got something on it. The 2nd goal to make it 2-2 was an absolute howler by him and that killed us.

Those last min wins are coming to bite us hard now, we got them all at the wrong end of the season when they were irrelevant. Played well I thought, but the key thing is that we give up 3 goals a game so we need to score at least 4 or 5 to comfortable win. That's not sustainable. This run is now obviously nothing, more a case of 8 games to keep fitness/maintain fitness for the playoffs. Our form since February has been unacceptable really, we sank when we should have done what Leeds did and grabbed by the scruff of it's neck. Lots and lots of weak characters in this side and there always has been. Playoffs will kill them before they even start.

You're right, I was having a maths brain fuck as usual. We wouldn't be equal with everyone until after we've played our game in hand against them though, we'll only have 2 games left after that - that's what I was clumsily trying to get to.

They have a game in hand too, against us.

Ah didn't realise they'd dropped him, that'll please their fans. He's a decent young keeper to be fair, but similar to what we did to Bazunu we just threw him into the lions den too soon.

Just to put some context on it, 'if' Norwich were to beat Leicester and we won our two games in hand (including against Leicester) we would still be 2 points behind them with a far inferior goal difference and just 2 games to play.