Numero Uno

You can’t go shorter every single time, that’s obvious, but we played out far more than we have recently. Surprised you didn’t notice that.

So with you he can’t win then. Say nothing and he doesn’t give a toss, apologise and he doesn’t give a toss either.

If a player gets so many split second decisions wrong they are in the National League before too long. Refs like the one we had last night will carry on regardless. I know you defend refs but this one had a stinker, no defence at all.

Presumably you must have been doing other things when we played Luton and Forest? Butter fingers and crisp packet hands come to mind. It’s not a dig at Bentley who is entitled to make a mistake more a case of pointing out that you are talking bollocks on this occasion….

We also played our best football of the season with a goalkeeper who wasn’t at fault for either goal and who was prepared to play out rather than launching it aimlessly up the park. However as always you know best and will be soiling your pants wet through when Max throws one in?

Agreed. It’s a slow improvement but we have gone from being distinctly second best in games to now competing and at times like the first 25 minutes last night actually dominating spells of games. The next step is converting dominance into goals. A clinical side would have put QPR to bed last night after half an hour. That’s not being rose tinted either.

A younger version of Maaenpa.

The issue if we sell Bentley is we then need to get another keeper in regardless of how well Max is playing. Because the next question is would you be happy relying on Wiles Richards for six weeks if O’Leary got clattered.

It’s not as simple as that imo because when you look at the game as a whole we played our best football of the season and a big part of that was down to Max playing the ball out when Bentley would have put his foot through it. In that respect he made a significant positive impact. That doesn’t help if he makes handling errors etc. but last night he didn’t.

Yes it was stupid but bear in mind you’ve got a split second to make that decision and his instinct would have been to foul the bloke because 999 times out of 1000 that is the right thing to do in that situation. It’s not a quiz show where you have 10 seconds to think.

So you did want Pearson to throw King under the bus then? King will get fined for getting the dissent booking and it will be kept "in-house". Experienced players do daft things sometimes and always have done since football started. Shouldn't happen but it does. Not everyone can live an error free life like half the pundits on here......and before anyone says getting £10K per week has got **** all to do with it, mistakes happen.

Agreed, should have been 2-0 up after 25 minutes. Some seem to have forgotten how good we were in that first 25 minutes and the usual cry babies who only make themselves heard after a defeat just refuse to acknowledge it anyway. At least one of the second Semenyo chance and the James chance should have been buried.

Only gets a one match ban too, probably one he would have been benched for anyway.

They all look after one another tbh. These Ref's see themselves as a persecuted minority and very rarely go against their own. I can guarantee you that an assessor would have given that clown an 8-9 out of 10 last night.........guaranteed.

Having looked at it again I think you are right.

Adrian Durham Mark II.

We did it superbly well with 10 men because you obviously have to be a bit more selective and it's harder to lay traps. There was no obvious sign in terms of how the game went that we were down to 10 men for so long. We have had far worse spells of possession at home this season with 11 men. My question on last night is was it a one off or a very encouraging sign of things to come? If it's the latter I can see us getting the results we need very soon.

In our position we need players at it every week with the odd bad game thrown in. Longer term dropping of standards won't help us and that is where Bentley currently is imo. This might actually do the lad (and the club) some good in the long run.

That's football and what he has to do. He was performing well overall up to the red and our midfield was functioning which is not something that is often said when talking about us!!

I know two wrongs don't make a right but does Bentley "dominate"? Like you say we need to play the lad and find out.

I would like to see us get a bit more nasty tbh. After last night let the referee make the decisions and bollocks to all this unwritten protocol and giving the ball back. You certainly don't see Liverpool or Man City observing protocols that aren't written in the rules. And if we do put the ball out there needs to be thought about WHERE we kick the bloody thing.

We should but we all know that Nige will get the Mike Jones phone call saying "yeah, looked back at the VT and he was a bit shit to be honest, sorry about that Nige, we'll keep him away from you for a while" and that will be that.

Agreed. Different class of player obviously but imagine Keane and Scholes stood watching some Spurs player giving it the big one in front of the Stretford End for a little bit longer than they should be doing. You would literally be risking getting snapped in half or your nose ending up in a weird position relative to your face. The only problem, in defence of our players, is we had a referee last night who would have loved to brandish that red card if someone had left a bit on Austin.

The thing is he could have said **** all and some smart arse would be accusing him of just being here to pick up a wage and not giving a toss.

It's frustrating that we literally find ways of shooting ourselves in the foot but anyone who has played the game to a decent level will have made the same magnitude of mistake that King made last night and twenty years later still wouldn't be able to explain why they did it. He was a dick who was having a decent game up to that point, he's taken responsibility for it, move on.