Ghost of Clough

Mel panicked when results weren't as smooth as he had hoped, barged into the changing room and undermined Clement, then results spiralled out of control. He then waited until the end of the season before hiring a permanent manager. Hardly the same as sacking a manager for a better manager, is is being implied here.

Or not. It should have been easy to predict Warne bringing a senior CB on when 2 (or more) goals up, rather than trusting more youngsters.

That sub pretty much confirms Weston, Brown and Fapetu will come on in the 94th minute.

4411 Vickers Wilson Bradley Cashin Forsyth Ward Bird Hourihane Barkhuizen Waghorn Collins Brown and Fapetu were brought off at half time yesterday so will play a part tonight. Weston came off after 70 mins, so may be lucky to get a few mins at the end of the game.

It's the mental side which they will often lack. Positioning and movement is a part of it, which is where the 'coached through a game' by a senior player alongside them comes into it. But, an overlooked part is their psychological sense of belonging in the first team picture, which can be a massive hurdle. It's this which allows some players to settle in the first team from a young age (such as Hughes, Huddlestone and Barnes), whereas others aren't ready until they're much older. Short loans, even to non-League, help them adjust.

Mainly a LB, but has been used on the wing quite a bit this season whilst he gets back up to speed after missing a lot of football over the past 3 seasons due to injuries.

Winners of this competition in the last 20 years include: Blackpool, Swansea, Luton, Southampton, Portsmouth, Sunderland and Bolton. All have been in the Premier League since we were last there. It's not exactly a terrible list to be on. Other winners in that time include: Peterborough, Bristol City, Barnsley, Coventry, Rotherham.

To be fair, a number of U21s were missing from the squad. Evans, Cox, DRobinson, Bates. I expect Cox and DRobinson to be in the first team squad tonight. I believe Bardell, Radcliffe, Lindsay and Davidson are currently injured. Johnson too if you want to include him Oduroh, Gibson-Hammond, Nunn and Oseni are out on loan. KRobinson, McAndrew, Allen and Wheeldon are still more U18 than U21, but will have increased game time in the U21s in the 2nd half of the season.

Should be available on a free at the end of the season. However, we'll have Moloney, Gough and Gill looking for regular football in that LB1 spot for the U21s next season. He's also 2 years old, so should be playing regular men's football next season.

A fantastic win! We've climbed 6 places and more than halved our GD deficit. Even more impressive that it was against a side who could have gone up to 4th with a win and had the joint 5th best defence in the league going into the game.

Watch live:

4231 JThompson Perry Bartley KRobinson Jeffcott Fapetu Hawkins McAndrew Weston Moloney DBrown

I assume this would be for the U21 squad, as a winger/CM with only 2 goals in 23 games in the National League this season won't be ready for our first team.

You can go and watch. Adult tickets are only £3. https://tickets.manutd.com/en-GB/categories/home-tickets

I suggest watching the 2nd half again. As I posted the other day "[At the start of the 2nd half] Nyambe still hugging the touchline, with Barkhuizen pushing high up the field. Cashin and Nelson appeared to be equally as central. However, on the left, it was noticeable how much further Sibley was playing and Mendez-Laing was playing as a forward instead of as a winger. It was a clear back 3 when Wilson came on as he is more natural in that position, obviously being better positionally as a result. The back 3 were also more suitably positioned." Like you, I found it difficult to see the shape when watching live on TV. But, I think that was mostly Nyambe and Barkhuizen not quite adjusting to the change in shape. Barkhuizen absolutely was not playing on the left in the 2nd half.

Cashin, Nelson, Nyambe as the back 3. Sibley and Barkhuizen as wing backs.

One to keep an eye on is Ben Wilson - CF playing for Cliftonville in N.Ireland. He's a 21 year old forward who moved from Brighton in the summer, and is on 15 goals in 21 games this season.

It didn't look that way (initially) from my sofa, with Nyambe still hugging the touchline, with Barkhuizen pushing high up the field. Cashin and Nelson appeared to be equally as central. However, on the left, it was noticeable how much further Sibley was playing and Mendez-Laing was playing as a forward instead of as a winger. It was a clear back 3 when Wilson came on as he is more natural in that position, obviously being better positionally as a result. The back 3 were also more suitably positioned.

I see Sharp will be available again soon 😅

Looks like 4231 Evans Bartley Banks Osayande Moloney DRobinson Fapetu Moore Lindsay Richards Weston

Vickers Ward Nelson Bradley Sibley Fornah DRobinson Wilson Waghorn Barkhuizen John-Jules Subs: Loach, Osayande, Cox, Fapetu, Hawkins, Weston, DBrown

Would he have done that if over £50m wasn't wasted on players we either didn't get any money for or made a big loss on? Without wasting that money, we wouldn't have been under P&S pressure or any embargoes. We would have been a better prospect to buy, even if we didn't achieve promotion. Johnson, Butterfield, Shackell, Blackman, Camara, Olsson, Anya, Nugent, Lawrence, Wisdom, Huddlestone, Waghorn, Marriott, Jozefzoon, Malone, Bielik, Jozwiak

When averaged out over the whole league this season, only 3 goals more have been scored than predicted by Opta's xG, better than 99% accuracy when comparing against larger data sets. However, for individual clubs the accuracy is much worse. For example, Wigan have scored 60% more than their xG, and Exeter have scored 35% less. Unsurprisingly, the teams outperforming the xG are those towards thr top of the table and have more clinical forwards than those at the bottom. It's still a useful stat to give a rough indication of whether a club is overperforming or not. For individual players, the margin of error is much wider. I find xG and xA useful in initial player identification, as they are merely pointing out how many goals/assists the average player would make in that situation - them being clinical or wasteful isn't taken into account. The 'raw stats' are much more important in actual player selection.

To be fair, Bris didn't say it was not using xG which resulted in us being where we are, but the lack of statistics in general. If we got recruitment (managere and players) right, we wouldn't have wasted 10s of millions on players who didn't improve us or weren't even suited to our style of play. We wouldn't have had to use unusually practices to avoid P&S punishment, and Mel wouldn't have wasted as much money chasing the PL dream. We would have had a greater chance of promotion and would more likely be where Brighton/Brentford are now than sitting in League 1.