Harry

It’s a squad game. Ridiculous that any games were cancelled at all. Seemingly quite a few teams called off due to injuries and suspensions and so have intently flouted the covid situation.

Re your embedded comments. Yes, I agree to an extent that the 3 CB system should allow the wider CB’s to mark the strikers, but I don’t want them running 10 yards into the opposition half to track them. Re your other comment, yes, I’d love to see a true DM holding fort. We are wide wide wide open down the middle - something that never happened when Pack played.

I actually think the complete opposite Dave. I think our CB’s come way too high tracking the strikers. So many of our goals against or chances against seem to stem from one of the CB’s chasing a striker deep into their own half, sometimes 10-15 yards into their own half. With the 2 young wingbacks always looking to play high, the fact the 2 outside CB’s keep chasing upfield just leaves acres in behind. The midfield aren’t blameless though. The level of awareness of danger yesterday was awful and the desire to run back to cover and fill was non existent. Some pics. Pic 1 is the penalty incident. Atkinson has chased into the other half and left a huge hole. James should’ve seen this and covered earlier but he didn’t actually start running until the Hudds player was already running past him and into the hole. Pic 2 is their 1st goal. Vyner has chased his man deep into the opposition half allowing huge space in behind him. Pic 3 is their 2nd goal. Atkinson is intent on chasing the man going deep, allowing a simple ball over his head into the huge space he’s vacated. Pic 4 is their 3rd goal. Atkinson again has attempted to press inside the opposition half, whilst Vyner for some reason is high and beyond the striker - the striker who actually scored because Vyner can’t get back and goal side of him quick enough due to this poor starting position. This 3 CB system is failing. Teams are easily able to bring a striker deep, knowing we’ll press high and then drop easy balls over the top to the onrushing winger or full back. I’d much rather the 3 Cb’s just held their line and allow the midfield to do the closing down in and around the halfway.

There’s another theory that hasn’t been raised here as yet. And one which I’ve done a bit of a fact find on this morning and grabbed some info from a few contacts. Pearson has form for making early substitutions if a player is off their game. Particularly some of the younger players. Pring wasn’t feeling 100% and didn’t think he’d be able to perform to his full potential. Many young players at the club are in fear of performing badly and being hauled off before half time. Perhaps Pearson’s ‘hard line’ that he’s evidenced previously has actually backfired here somewhat, with players not wanting to play if they feel they aren’t fit enough, for fear of being scapegoated if they play poorly as a result.

My eldest has resorted to opening up her science box and making green glowing slime with cornflour and dye. It’s actually got a lot more life to it than our top order.

I’m currently having to endure complaints about watching the cricket on the main tv. “Turn the cricket off daddy, I want to watch cbbc”

Well, they wouldn’t say that, because as I said, I protect them from all that nonsense.

The last few seasons has seen the relegated teams on much lower points than historically. I think this is due to the imbalance of finances, with the top teams able to more easily beat the bottom teams. 2021 - 44 points. 2020 - 49. 2019 - 41. 2018 - 42. 2017 - 51. 2016 - 41. 2015 - 42. This season, particularly with Derby’s deduction, I think we’re going to be looking at the low 40’s again. 45 absolute tops. So that’s 6 wins.

Exactly. Plus, I’ve tried to shield my kids from as much of the covid impact on life as I possibly can. So they know nothing of tests, vaccinations, covid passes, variants, case numbers etc. Whilst I may have wanted to take a moral stance, I don’t want that stance to have to be explained to my innocent kids - “sorry guys, the government have implemented a semi-fascist authoritarian process which means daddy has to prove he’s had a serum injected into his body (twice, for now) in order to be able to enjoy normal life, even though 90% of the country have received their ‘protection’”.

Sid the Vitality dog?

Yep. I covered this earlier in the thread but basically I went against my principles because my kids were pestering me to go. So I caved in to their demands, which, yes, makes me look like a bit of a **** but I just couldn’t let my kids down. My mates who sit around me all had a good laugh, as did I. I’d definitely fail the ‘are you an anarchist’ test. ?

You’d be able to read a separate thread all about that incident, had it not been merged into the final few pages of the match day thread.

If we have around 14k season ticket holders, with around 500 away fans, that means, are you seriously telling me that over 3.5k paid on the day!!!

Lewis O’Brien please.

Agreed. Playing Benarous at LWB was a dreadful decision. I’ve also been one of few who’ve pointed out the flaws of Scott at RWB too. It is so easy for the opposition to exploit the space behind them. And - it’s NOT their fault. They are not, and never will be, wingbacks. Ideally I’d like to see Scott, Benarous and Semenyo as 3 interchanging number 10’s playing behind the sole striker. Whether that’s Martin or Wells I don’t particularly care. Just get our 3 best attacking threats playing in threatening attacking positions. Enough already of playing these 2 novice attacking midfielders as bloody wingbacks.

The steward who checked my pass gave it a cursory glance. He was more interested in searching my bag for “cans”, when it was quite clear that I had 2 young children with me and the bag contained their gloves, scarves, iPads and a couple of snacks. He seemed more afraid of me trying to sneak some “cans” in with my young kids than he did of covid. And I assume the fact I wasn’t subject to a wanded search today means that the terrorist threat level has been reduced? Must have missed that news this week, what with everything else.

Clearly there were quite a lot who didn’t attend today. Not sure what the Lansdown looked like, nor did I hear the attendance, but this looks like a lot less than 10k to me. This was 10 minutes in. So likely the most populated it would be before drinks/toilet breaks etc

I only mentioned it again as KITR brought it up again. And he is someone who is very much of the same opinions as yourself on this. As I said, I’m not gonna go over this again, suffice to say, I think a helluva lot more could and should have been done in this area.

100%. I’ve made this point about a dozen times on here over the last week or so and have been rather viciously shot down. It’s a hugely valid point.

Yep. And that’s been one of my main points. The world should have been throwing everything they could at antivirals rather than just letting that particular science just creep along as normal whilst they instead threw everything at vaccines and lockdowns etc. I’m not gonna go over old ground, but I’m just amazed that more effort and resource wasn’t thrown at this. Yes, there are now some coming to market, but this could’ve been a lot quicker (and thus ahead of this new wave) had they poured the masses of cash, resource and focus on this.

Yep. I just think that, to the ‘layman’ such as myself, the 3rd one does the same as 1 & 2, and is specifically designed to attack the S-Gene, which apparently doesn’t show up on the omicron positive tests. Just seems strange how a vaccine designed to attack the S Gene would work any better given there is no S Gene visible on the test, regardless of when someone received it? That’s not to say that the 3rd one won’t still protect against Delta, but I just can’t see why it would protect against Omicron if it’s the same shot as 1 & 2.

Hi mate. Regarding the 3rd vaccine. You’ve mentioned that the new variant is resistant to the first 2 shots. Now, I will hold my hands up and say I don’t know the ins and outs about how these things work, but from what I read, the first 2 vaccines were specifically designed to be able to attack the spike protein, also known as the S-Gene. With the new variant, they are confirming on the testing that you are positive for it if the test has S-Gene dropout. Basically meaning that the test hasn’t picked up evidence of the Spike Protein but only the other two primers, and that’s what makes it different to testing positive for the Delta variant. As far as I am aware, the 3rd vaccine contains exactly the same code as the previous 2, and is therefore designed to attack the S-Gene. So, given that a positive test for Omicron means there is no S-Gene and that the 3rd vaccine is designed to attack the S-Gene, how does the 3rd vaccine protect against omicron which doesn’t show the S-Gene it is supposed to attack? If there is no S-Gene to attack, what will it do instead? I’m sure there’s a a very good science behind it that I don’t really understand, so it would be good to get comment from anyone on here who knows more about this stuff than myself. Certainly RedRobbo usually has his finger on the trigger with this stuff. *note - This isn’t an anti-vax post. This is a genuine question over how the 3rd shot will work against the new variant when it’s stated that the first and second don’t.

A fair answer. Thank you. And I hope you feel better soon. ?

Forgive me for asking, and I totally appreciate your decision, but. If you had Covid on 17th November, ie a month ago, I can’t see how you would be at any risk whatsoever of catching it again. I’m therefore incredibly intrigued as to how you reach your decision. As I say, this is a genuine question and I appreciate your decision, so I’m not trying to be awkward or anything, just interested as to how the conclusion has been drawn.

It’s called acting. She is playing the part of your local friendly authoritarian. It is intentionally robotic, as that is what she is attempting to imply - ie, robotic compliance to an authoritarian state where you have no choices or freedoms.