funkyrobot

Winks was poor today and his replacements showed how much effort is needed in this division when things aren’t going well. He’ll be dropped for Derby. It’s a shame because he has lots of ability on the ball but he’s not proving to be a player you can rely on when strength, commitment and aggression is needed.

He wouldn’t come back but we wouldn’t want him back. He’s in a league like the Scottish Premier League and he’s got Brondby exactly where they usually are. 3rd.

Winks particularly looked well off it today. He’ll be benched against Derby.

Brilliant today in that second half. Aggressive, running with the ball, skilful, played forwards. Based on that performance he’ll be in the team against the Sheep Shaggers. Unfortunately we have seen this ‘Soumare mirage’ times and times before and he’ll likely be both anonymous and undisciplined next week.

He did well, I’d stick with him against Derby assuming Nelson won’t be ready to come back. He played the ball well and progressively. Defended well and yes he’s not tall but he’s no worse than Faes or Hamza in that role.

It read like a bitter bit of wishful thinking from an ex Toffee tbh.

It was a big ask for Aluko yesterday to come in from the cold and play against a quality and in-form winger in Fellowes. With the state of our fullback options on both sides this season he should’ve been given more time off the bench previously to give him time to adjust to the significantly faster and more physical Championship. Bear in mind also that Aluko is right footed and he’s better on the right or centrally even though he can do a job on the left. I hope he’s back in the squad after his ban.

Great coach. Absolutely out of our reach.

We have the worst striker options in The Championship. We also have the worst fullback options in The Championship. It’s remarkable how poor we really are considering the cost of our shambolic squad.

3 poor decisions on the trot suggests quite correctly that the problem lies with those who have made the poor decisions.

If they are going free I’ll have them👍🏻

One problem is the lack of a huge brickhouse of a forward.

Bear in mind we are watching a relegated team who were able to spend relatively big in the summer to refresh, versus a relegated side who have had to rely on taking 3 outfield free loan transfers - two of which aren’t even in the side. Cifuentes is rightly getting some criticism but make no mistake, this shit show tonight is down to prolonged mismanagement by Rudkin and Top.

What minute we going for for Skippy’s inevitable red card? Not booked yet but with Ward as ref, it’s pretty inevitable.

Genuinely think the first one was accidental. It was in Southampton’s half and there was also plenty of cover. Harsh yellow when you consider Flynn didn’t get a thing for two consecutive fouls in the same move shortly after.

Omfg investigate this guy and suspicious betting.

He saw Manning get a soft foul for exactly that same thing. He’s every right to expect consistency. What he didn’t factor in though is the ref is Gavin ‘fkin’ Ward.

The combination of a notorious diver in Manning and the worst of all biased terrible refs in Gavin Ward is hell.

Those of us ancient enough to remember (ooh aah) Nicky Platnauer would also include him in the worse than Thomas category.

Terrible referee. Biased with his bookings, ensured set pieces took an absolute age. There’s was one Stoke set piece in the second half when the ref almost acted as a set coach for Stoke. He took 2 minutes to line up a wall and lecture the Leicester player marking the guy stood just off our wall. He also stopped play continually to speak to players.

A solid 6/10 for me today. Also Skipp’s best game.

He was outstanding for us when we had a great team playing Marescaball and his main job was to act as the deep lying pivot with the ball at his feet. Even then he kept his distribution usually short and on the floor. It was telling that Maresca didn’t come in for him when he moved to Chelsea. As a keeper Mad’s is vulnerable with corners and crosses in and around his 6 yard box and he isn’t as capable of long ball pinging as Pickford at Everton or Sanchez at Chelsea. With the fashion moving back to more direct football, he’s less suited to how teams now play.

We won’t fall to the lows of David Pleat’s latter years when average home attendance was less than 12k (1990-91.)

Except Hamza is often guilty of not closing down players when defending. Playing for Bangladesh is levels below The Championship.

I genuinely don’t think we’ll be spending money in January. I think it’ll be loans or frees only, such is our issue with PSR. I don’t think we’ll see any money spent until the summer break when a few more of the high earners will leave.