ClaphamFox

It's fair assumption. Every year we stay in the Championship will make it harder to get back up as our revenues decline and the teams coming down from the PL have a bigger advantage. Promotion this season has to be the goal.

Exactly. The reason why this decision is so controversial has nothing to do with it occurring in the age of the internet, and everything to do with the particular circumstances of the fixture. As far as I can tell, there is no precedent in English professional football for a game being abandoned so late with one team having such an advantage and then being replayed in full. A few years ago a game between Rotherham and Cardiff was abandoned with Cardiff winning 1-0 and then replayed in full—but that was in the 47th minute when both teams still had eleven men, so not really comparable to the Blackburn v Ipswich game. The point is that the EFL had three choices here: 1) replay the game in full; 2) let the 1-0 result stand with no further minutes played; or 3) replay the remaining 10mins plus whatever added minutes had accrued at that time. Of these, 3) seems by far the fairest option, followed by 2) and then 3). The reason they chose the least fair option is simply because it hasn't been done before in this country and they didn't want to break with precedent. My point is that given the circumstances of this abandonment were unprecedented, there was an opportunity to come up with an unprecedented solution that would seem fair to the large majority of people. Their failure to do so was cowardly.

Can you cite a previous example of a game being abandoned after 80mins with one side in the lead and with a numerical advantage, and the game being replayed in full?

It may well be that team except for Nelson, who won't be in the squad.

I dunno. A bit of witchcraft might actually do us some good...

Who are we selling/loaning him to next season, then?

Our manager joined midway through preseason, giving us less time to prepare than every other club in the division. The transfer window was also a very uncertain period, with a number of first team players left out because they might be leaving and three outfield players joining on the very last day of the window. Yet despite all this, we're fourth and have made a far better start than Ipswich and Southampton. And we're getting better. I haven't seen anything from any other team to suggest that we can't get promoted this season.

Big step up from League 2 to PL.

Neither is Winks.

1-3 now. Good result for us.

This is the team.

If we’d have played with an actual centre forward (by which I mean Carranza) from the start I think we would have won. Overall it was a decent performance - not perfect, but we were resilient, kept another clean sheet and put together some very nice passages of play. If we carry on improving, which we will, we’ll be in the mix at the top at the end of the season. I’d have taken that before the season started.

The disintegration of this new party before it’s even got started is vintage Corbyn. Say what you like about the bloke, when it comes to this kind of stuff he’s absolutely unplayable. No one else comes close.

Skipp possibly, not Soumare. In fact I don't think we'll see much of Soumare at all from now on.

Coventry are a completely different side to Birmingham and will pose a very different kind of challenge. The Birmingham home game was therefore not a template for how to play against Coventry. The Skipp/Soumare combination was borne of necessity, not choice. Marti stuck with it last weekend but it didn't work and he had to change it at half time. At least one of Winks or James will start in midfield for us tomorrow, and possibly both.

We won't be playing with Skipp and Soumare as the midfield two again this season unless injuries/suspensions force us into it.

It's a huge game because Coventry will be the best team we have played so far and, as you point out, the result has the potential to set the tone for the rest of the season. No disagreement there. I think it's just clear that the 'rivalry' aspect is much more intense for some fans than others, largely depending on where in the county they grew up. As a north Leicestershire boy I can honestly say that Coventry were not on my radar as a rival at all when I was growing up - to me, they were in the same category as Villa and West Brom. It was only when I started regularly following Leicester away and began hanging around supporters from the south of the county that I realised it was a such a big deal for some. These days I've absorbed it to a certain extent vicariously - it matters more to me because I have mates who will really be upset if we lose tomorrow. But as I'm still not personally acquainted with a single Coventry fan I'll be relatively immune from it, so the prospect doesn't scare me as much.

He won’t. 433 with Skipp, Winks and James

Really? She looks like a replicant who has just learned she’s about to be ‘retired’ and isn’t best pleased about it.

If Winks re-establishes himself as a starter and returns to his 23/24 form, it will be interesting to see how many people are still bothered about the fact that he was a bit mardy in August. Hardly anybody, I'd imagine.

I also noticed this. It's amazing what another 45mins of Soumare can do to change a man's mind...

One of the true greats. Sad news.

We're not going to appeal. It was a harsh red - most refs would probably have given a yellow for it and there would have been few complaints. The ref was weak, but the decision wasn't enough of a obvious error for a panel to overrule it. No point wasting our time.

Now that James has had the chance to train with his teammates and Winks seems to have cheered up a bit, we will hopefully never see the Soumare/Skipp combination ever again.

Every year we spend in the Championship it will be harder for us to get back up—the newly-relegated teams will have a massive advantage over us. We won't have the luxury of waiting and picking our time to be promoted again.