Numero Uno

Exactly. If you wanted to cause carnage and get a came called off for terrorism reasons just place yourself right in the middle of 500 people waiting to have their "security scan".....not to mention that if someone in the middle of the "throng" has Covid then that's 10 people around them getting it. As amateur as you can get and whoever came up with that idea needs a good kicking quite honestly.

Yep, easiest way to manage the game is to have the ball at your feet, not whack it back to their Centre Halves to come at us again. That was a massive improvement on Saturday's second half and why we looked far more comfortable with the 1-0 lead.

Also seems to have a bit of attitude about him. When that Stoke player went right through him near the end and couldn't care less that he picked up a yellow you just know that was for a reason!! He's small, carries the ball in tight spaces and has that ability to shield it so you almost have to foul him.

Pearson and Fleming were very busy and vocal in the opening half an hour (shot in the arm for those who want to see him on the touchline) and conversed with/shouted at a number of players. I would suggest it was most definitely tactical. What we did well was making a very good Stoke side who I think will finish top 6 go from looking like Man City on steroids for 15 minutes to pretty ordinary for the rest of the game. We weren't amazing ourselves but it allowed us to be in the game.

I totally understand that on balance we were second best and came out with a win (that won't change for a while to come given the resources at our disposal) but the highlighted bit is my argument in this particular game. It wasn't misfortune on Stoke's part more a case of abysmal finishing and that's their problem not bad luck. Poor finishing is poor play end of story and teams who play poorly often fall on the wrong side of a result. Two free headers and two clean throughs have to be buried not smacked against woodwork and goalkeeper, just as big a mistake as the poor defensive headers blighting Kalas recently that have cost us goals against and nobody says they were "unlucky". One bit of good movement and composure from the much maligned Tyreeq and four pieces of utterly shite finishing from them = 1-0 win to us!! The positive from last night is that for the majority of that game (take out the first 15 minutes where we got battered) we competed again. With our side that's the most you can ask for - we can't dictate games because with the ball at our feet we are pretty mediocre...........make that very mediocre hence 170 odd successful passes in 90 minutes.

It's about balance. Put too many in and all of a sudden you are very lightweight in a bloody tough league. Couldn't agree more on the Senior pro's, there are still one or two shithouses in the building that need moving on, we just need to be careful that we don't "overdo" it with youngsters. That said, these young 'uns give us something to get behind.

Presume you are talking about Conway? The problem is he is not proven yet and if we don't get another forward in and Conway isn't quite up to it we are no better off than we have been for the last few months. Tough call.

We need another forward. The workload on Martin is way over the top (out of necessity at the moment).

Probably too busy kicking the shit out of the dog to post on here tonight.

How did Martin “miss” that header….completely?

They missed chances that should have been buried, their problem not ours??

Back three far more composed second half tonight. Saw the game out nicely.

It’s the lack of fear that’s the key. Noticeable that they both WANT the ball. Tonight will do wonders for their confidence.

Presumably their fans will want Wally to take Gary Neville to court for some reason after last night. Thats the beauty of the Few though - we go as low as you can get getting bummed by 10 men so they just go and concede and throw a simple win away against 9……….and a minority on here wonder why this thread exists. Who said that? Someone who clearly has anger issues….

Playing until the few save their embarrassment……

The nine men have only gone and equalised??

The Danny Simpson thread gets about ten million replies, this will get **** all in comparison. Fair play to Bridges for Communities for giving us the shout out because, as we know from the Simpson experience, these types of organisations are very quick to earn a bit of publicity by slamming football clubs.

Great move for the lad. He's not quite at the equivalent level of Scott (who I can see getting 25-30 games this season regardless of who comes in January) and Benarous yet so get out there, hopefully score a few goals at a decent level and come back a better player. As a forward being able to go on loan to a team that is flying is all you can ask for. Grimsby apparently being a toilet is irrelevant (they play in Cleethorpes anyway), I don't think anyone is expecting the kid to move into Grimsby's roughest Council Estate as some sort of character building exercise. Plenty of nice (albeit very flat) places in Lincolnshire!!

I thought Bruno Fernandez was running it?

After an International Break too..............

Anything and everything they say is bullshit. I just tend to ignore the buck toothed bastards.

......and without that you really are Donald Ducked in the Championship in the central midfield area.

It is strange........and what Nige will say is it has vindicated his decision to dump one or two so called senior players. It goes to show that if you have players simply prepared to "run around a bit" on top of carrying out the technical and tactical stuff at that level you can compete in a game. Go back a couple of weeks when we got obliterated 3-1 in 45 minutes by 10 men and it's hard to have sympathy for anyone left out. It was only composure that cost us today not effort or tactics. That really is an improvement over what we have been seeing lately.

It’s a difficult one. Had we held on today I would have 100% rested him Wednesday. However long term fitness comes before short term points so I would still be tempted to bench him Wednesday.

If that’s the plan why were the same players going short to Williams and Bakinson first half?