Wes Tender

You're obviously so easy to please. Little things please little minds.

This is just a bit of a wind-up by their assistant manager to attempt to gain some sort of psychological advantage when the cold reality is that they failed to stop us coming away with a half-time advantage in this tie. In reality, it is us who come away with the advantage psychologically, as we don't believe for one second that our celebrations will have stirred their players to double their efforts to ram it down our throats at the rematch. What we discern, is that our celebrations annoyed them intensely. It made us feel better about ourselves for a job well done, but made them angry and bitter. It unsettled them and they are coughing and spluttering with indignation. It's not very dignified is it? Pardew comes out of it looking calm and measured, Robinson comes out of it looking like a sulky little child. One up to us in more ways than one.

Gleeson fouled Morgan by trying to strangle him and Morgan shoved him away to get himself free. Then Gleeson reacted and Morgan raised his arms to shove him away. Gleeson did an excellent job of winding Morgan up and Morgan fell for it. Gleeson is a snide little bastard in the Savage / Bowyer mould and I would be very happy if one of our beefier players manages to cause him a bit of grief in the return match, strictly within the rules, you understand. The incident you speak about with Lallana, was that when he was on the right edge of their penalty area and he tried some fancy dan stuff and lost the ball, when the commentators said that he should have merely centrered the ball instead? It occurred to me that he might have seen Fellaini's dazzling trickery on Saturday's Match of the Day and thought that he ought to copy it for the benefit of the Sky viewers. Unfortunately, he blew it and had egg on his face. Play it simple next time, Adam.

Agree. It is surely a travesty when Randall scythed down Schneiderlin from behind and only got a yellow for it. If the referee was credited with going by the book with his bookings, then he signally failed here, as a tackle from behind like that one, is normally a red card offence. Where it became farcical, is when the referee booked James for effectively wagging his finger at Randall and also booked Kelvin for attempting to get our players away from the ensuing melee that the MK Dons players instigated. Kelvin had been captain and would have been entitled to intervene if he still was, but even then, he only still intervened as one of the experienced senior players, in an attempt to calm things down. How can it be right that because of a serious tackle by them, we end up getting two yellows against their one?

I'm with you on this. Yes, it's good to see some passion from the players, but it seems plain to me that the tw*t Ince has drilled his side to play in this cynical manner and that was undoubtedly their strategy to disrupt our play and to neutralise our better players who would be walking a tightrope on a yellow. Getting our key midfielder sent off proves that the strategy worked, so Ince probably gave their player a pat on the back afterwards. I would be surprised if Pardew didn't realise that this was their strategy and warn the players at half time that they were to be careful not to react or risk being sent off. Passion is commendable in a player, but it requires a great deal of mental strength to take the niggling stick from an opponent without reacting. But they ought to stop and think for a moment and then laugh in that opponent's face. Nothing could be more annoying and it is then possible that they will then take a swing at our player and get themselves sent off. At the very least we have had plenty of warning that this is what we can expect from MK Dons in the return match, but we have home advantage and we can put pressure on the referee to be at least a bit more neutral that the one last night. We have two alternatives; we either play them at their own game, which I would detest as its a form of cheating, (but would be well deserved by MK Dons and that ponce who manages them). Or else we can be a lot more canny and refuse to be baited.

OK, Saint Stevo. You don't like Antonio or Wotton. We get the picture. You have made it crystal clear. Message received and understood. No need to keep on and on about it ad-nauseum.

A Gallic shrug of the shoulders?

I presume that what you meant was that we would be nowhere near the play-offs playing like we did in the second half, as otherwise it is nonsense. If we beat all of the teams above us 1-0 and maybe all of the teams below us by 1-0 or more, then obviously we will reach the play-offs. Furthermore, the team playing tonight, wasn't the team that we will play for the rest of the season. We had two or three players unable to feature because they were cup-tied and Harding was absent through injury, I understand. I agree that we were better in the first half than the second, but MK Dons had to chase our lead and tried to unsettle us as a tactic. It almost worked because we reacted and they got one of our key players sent off. Happily, apart from the ball that came back off the post, we defended doggedly and they didn't have the guile to put the ball in the net. I was pretty pleased with the way that we went about it, apart from responding to their antagonisms. We were very much in their face, won many of the 50/50 balls in midfield, had the majority of the possession and generally looked by far the more capable team. We lead 1-0 at the half way stage, have an away goal and home advantage. Having beaten them before at home this season and winning the match away, we now have a strong psychological advantage over them and by the time we play them next, we could have strengthened the team further.

I take your point, but the same scenario applies. On the one hand, some Burnley fans will think that with Liverpool out of the way, Reading are the easier team to beat. But as I say, they would seriously underestimate Reading if they are capable of beating Liverpool. Then other Burnley fans won't care who they play, as long as they beat them. There would have been more money in the Liverpool match, of course. The psychological aspects that I addressed still hold true, though. Liverpool's confidence will have received a mighty blow having been thrown out of the Cup by a lower division team Other than that, in our case, although we are perceived by many still to be a big fish in this division, it would not be a great shock or humiliation to be beaten by MK Dons, who are above us in the league, or indeed by Carlisle who will have got to the final strictly on merit. That cannot be said of the Liverpool / Reading situation

The Southend local rag says that we are the first to table a bid for Barnard. The Southend official site has a categorical denial that Leeds have signed him and also mentions that three clubs have expressed interest in him.

If we managed to get past MK Dons and if we were playing Carlisle, then your last sentence doesn't make sense logically. If Carlisle have beaten Leeds over two legs, then surely they would be the more difficult team to beat. It would be about current form and determination towards this competition rather than the league table. Having said that, I do personally think that playing Leeds (if we get past MK Dons), would be a better final as a spectacle. However, should Leeds fail to beat Carlisle, it would be good for us, if we get to the final, because psychologically Leeds confidence would receive a bad knock, whereas if we won the Cup, not only would it help our confidence, but also send a few shock waves through the division. If we win the Cup, then we will have beaten Norwich, Charlton, MK Dons and possibly Leeds on the way, thus proving that we are at least their equal. As these are the top teams in the division, we will be considered rightful holders of a play-off place if we can get there.

Disagree. See my post above and tell me which part of it you take issue with. Would you therefore say that we had a realistic chance of winning the Champions League within three years? It is not mathematically impossible, but only an extreme fanstasist would claim that it was a realistic possibility.

Surely they've scraped the barrel dry when it comes to fake sheiks? There can't be any more impoverished Arabs out there, can there?

I've just been reading up on this Section 27 http://www.urban75.org/football/football-section-27.html and it seems like something that would have been imposed by the Gestapo. When used against people who are not causing any kind of problem, it is draconian and using this legislation in such a way is open to abuse by over-zealous officers. The site where I read about it, recommended that if somebody thought that they were being mistreated, they should demand to speak to a senior officer whilst still moving on. If I were in the position that I had made prior arrangements in town to meet somebody at Leicester Square, I'd have been pretty miffed with the Police if they attempted to corral me onto a train I did not wish to board for good reasons. This sort of episode severely oversteps Civil Liberties and somebody needs to take the Police to court or petition the Government to rescind it, if we hope to be considered a civilised society.

Loved the fact that half of the comments on the newspaper article have been removed as being unsuitable. Were they comments from us, or were they from Skate fans cussing their directors/owners? One was obviously from one of ours, as the response mentioned that we were in the third division and had only won one trophy. Well, they'll soon enough be in the third division themselves at this rate. The difference will be that by that time, we might well have switched places with them, but we will still have the good stadium and the wealthy owner, pray God, whereas they will still have the crap stadium and no prospect of them being an attractive investment to anybody with any real wealth and sense.

Well, I also stayed calm and reasoned and as I argue the same point as Vectis, I'm afraid that I must share the moral high ground with you and just accept that our opinions differ.

Anybody who is not able to argue their corner without redress to insults, has probably lost the argument to begin with, as they diminish the opinion of others towards them. If you disagree with the opinion of Vectis and me, then fine; it's a forum of opinions. You think that Wotton couldn't have done anything about it, whereas we believe that he was slow and should have closed down Trotter. Is it pointless debating whether we might have had an extra two points? Again, your opinion. Even the fact that many others saw it differently from us doesn't make them right and us wrong. Again, opinions differ on here about most things.

Did I miss Reading re-instating him as manager?

A bit selective, your memory, isn't it? I seem to recall us beating Charlton 2-1 in the JPT Cup and drawing with them away in the league 1-1. I also seem to recall us beating Nowich in the JPT and drawing with them at home in the league. The league leaders Leeds only won by 1 goal against us away and Premiership Birmingham only scored one goal more than us too. Don't you count draws as matching the top teams?

Perhaps Vectis called that poster a meathead because of the erudite fashion that he expressed his opinion (not), rather than because he didn't agree with Vectis' opinion. I had presumed that the conceded goal came because of an inability to defend the lead tactically, but when Chez pointed out how quickly it had happened, I studied the footage on the League show. IMO it was clear that when the header that Seabourne contested fell to Trotter, Wotton had time at the very least to close the gap between him and Trotter and therefore to cut off the angle for the shot as a minimum. Whether he might have had time to have tackled Trotter is debateable, but if he was at least more in his face, he could have either blocked the shot, or made it off target.

Not really that simple. There could be a position whereby there was a 1% chance of managing the play-offs mathematically, but then one wouldn't say that there was a realistic chance of getting there, or that the people who claimed that we could do it were realists. Under those circumstances, you would more accurately describe them as fantasists. Realistic would be if we had a pattern of results that added some weight to the possibility of success, a reasonable chance of managing it, not some outside chance involving a huge slice of good fortune. There is a reasonably realistic chance at the moment IMO, but if the percentages begin to slip away from us because of matches lost or too many draws, then although it might still remain a possibility until mathematically impossible, it would then become improbable, therefore no longer realistic.

Well, for the reasons I gave, I don't think that the point was well made, not considering Duncan's position. I presume that you accept that it was you who misread his comment? He did indeed say "if" we lose rather than "if not" they will hammer us? But I agree with you and krissyboy anyway. I would be most surprised if they hammered us on Wednesday. No other team has hammered us this season and we have already shown them that we can beat them convincingly, so we have the upper hand psychologically. But there is absolutely no reason to conclude that even if we did lose that our season would somehow fall apart. There might have been precedent for it happening historically, but it has been some considerable amount of time when we were last down here and circumstances now are different to then even now.

I read it better than you did, obviously, John. Here is his quote:- Can you explain therefore why a bad result in one leg of a two-legged fixture should finish our season? As I explained, even if we are tonked away, there is always the possibility of us winning by more on the return fixture. MK Dons have already proved that themselves, that although they are capable of notching up the goals, their defence is equally leaky as the goals conceded in the matches against Charlton (5), Carlisle (4) Exeter (3) and Swindon (4) prove. It is only after both legs have been played that any sort of projection might be guessed at and note the use of the word "guessed", as it is even then pure conjecture as to how the team might react. They might pick themselves up and give the next opponents a thrashing, you never know.

Yes, just a point from Millwall and Colchester, but then we have beaten Charlton and Norwich already, albeit in the JPT Cup and only one goal set us apart from Leeds. Leeds have just been beaten by Exeter, who we beat recently. Colchester got tonked by Norwich who could not beat us in two outings, us shaving it on penalties to put them out of the JPT and we would have beaten Millwall had we not fallen asleep in the last minute. We have beaten MK Dons comfortably and if we do so again this week and again when they come here, we will receive a confidence boost in the JPT Cup that might help us in the league. We are therefore not far off the pace against the leading clubs and we are improving after a poor start and are adding quality to our team and depth in case of injuries. Other teams might lose players in this window, suffer injuries or loss of form and confidence. It is impossible to make projections into the second half of the season, as those factors could change everything. Just imagine how wrong the Sunderland fans would have been a couple of seasons ago had they projected their finishing place from the end of the year or the Cardiff fans who looked to be coasting to promotion but fizzled out in the home straight.

Thanks for the heads up on this Chez, as I usually have respect for your opinions on the play. Merrington's preconceived ideas about players are not exclusive though, as many have their own ideas about players on here too. But I often found when I'm listening to away matches that he does seem to be able to identify fairly accurately where the weaknesses are in the team and where we need to make the changes. With the substitution, I wasn't surprised that Antonio had come on for James, but surprised from what was said on the commentary that it was Antonio who had come on rather than Papa or Connolly and that it was James who had come off rather than Holmes. For myself, it would have made some sense to have had Lallana go to the left wing and to have put Connolly or Papa up front with Lambert. As it turns out reading this thread and the Holmes one, Holmes seemed to have done pretty well and I look forward to seeing him the next home match if he plays. I used to be a fan of his when he played before his injury and thought that it was reasonable to assume that he was still not as match sharp as he could have been I only saw their goal once it had been posted on the internet. As you say, there was not much possible in the way of dealing with it beyond Wotton waking up and closing down their player and Papa might have done better, but he isn't a defender. Had we made the sustitutions earlier and been more adventurous, we might well have scored earlier and had the chance of doing something about their equaliser too. I also noticed your remark that the ball was in the air most of the time. I agree that this is one of the most irritating aspects of our game, when we should be playing the ball across the ground instead of playing head-tennis which is mostly a lottery. Pardew ought to introduce fines for all the players who head the ball in midfield instead of playing it on the ground when there is time and space to do that. I thought that we we supposed to be better than that.