Bris Vegas

Derby’s game plan of score more than the opposition is working a treat. Other than that, I can’t see any pattern in our play whatsoever other than get it wide and swing a hopeful ball in. If we didn’t have better players than the opposition, we’d be much further down the table. We’re winning because of Bird’s moment of Championship level quality.

Exeter are the better side here. They play some nice stuff.

If I haven’t watched a game, I will generally look at the following stats to get an idea of who was the better side. - Final third entries - xG - Shots on goal - Possession With those stats you can pretty much see the overall picture of the game. The Newcastle xG against Forest was low because you only need to see the source of the goals. - Newcastle’s first two goals came from set-pieces. The success rate of goals from corners is something like 2%. - Newcastle’s third goal was a shot from outside the box. The three goals didn’t come from chances created yet xG measures the quality of chance created - hence Newcastle’s overall tally is low. The problem with just using the shots metric is you can’t tell the quality of those chances. You could have 30 shots from outside the box which has a small chance of success. Another example was City’s away defeat to Wolves. They lost 2-1 and the shot count was about 25-4 in their favor. But they didn’t create any quality chances, with City’s only goal coming from an Alvarez free-kick. On paper City were by far the better side with more possession, final third entries and shots. But their xG was low because of their lack of real high quality goal scoring chances created.

I would say we have the third best set of players behind France A and France B. They have ridiculous depth and it seems they push through another two or three top quality players every year. I think in Kane, Saka, Bellingham and Walker we have four world class players. Rice, Stones and Foden are brilliant too, but I feel France A have somebody better in each position and France B somebody just as good. Saying all that, England were the better team against France at the World Cup. And Argentina dominated them for 75 minutes in the final. France have the best set of players, but at times they don’t look like the best team.

I’m not using us as a comparison to Leicester. I’m saying if Leicester are in League One, they aren’t suddenly going to play crap football because of the opposition. Here is a better example. Stockport don’t use League Two as an excuse to play crap football. They play some lovely stuff. Derby have the players to be playing a far better brand of football than what Warne and his coaches are currently serving up. That said, I still feel Warne will get us promoted this season.

This train of thought that we are struggling to play good football because League One football is poor and the opposition drag us down to their level is just a complete cop out for poor coaching. Do you think if Leicester were in League One they’d suddenly struggle to play football too? Or do you think they would just play how they are in the Championship and batter everyone 5-0? You can’t use the opposition as an excuse for playing crap football. That is on our manager and coaches.

I actually think Pep would look at this England team and think he could really take it on. He already has Walker, Stones, Grealish and Foden. He could set us up in his 3-2-4-1 system with a back three of Maguire, Stones and Walker. Rice in the Rodri role alongside Trent. A midfield of Grealish, Foden, Bellingham and Saka with Kane upfront.

I was born in the late 80s so I had no memory of football until 96. Grew up watching Nigerian players like Kanu, Jay Jay Okocha, Finidi George, Babayaro and of course the legendary Taribo West.

Growing up I always considered Ivory Coast and Nigeria to be the two most iconic African footballing nations. It’s sort of fitting that they are in the final.

The thing is, I don’t think the England job has the same sort of prestige as it once did. 10-15 years ago moving from Aston Villa, Newcastle or Spurs to the England job would be a step up. But now it’s a step down as everybody wants to manage in the PL, and even clubs outside the ‘big six’ are attracting top class managers. Who would you have replace Southgate should he leave? Eddie Howe would be mad to leave Newcastle. Could Jurgen Klopp be tempted if he wants a break from club football. There has been talk of potentially Pep Guardiola having an interest after he leaves City (potentially at the end of 2025). But you don’t change managers in the middle of a campaign, only after a major tournament so Southgate either goes after Euros or after World Cup 2026. Get Klopp in 2024 or Pep in 2026. I don’t see any other standout options.

Derby are a dreadful watch but we will get promoted under Warne. Then we will stink out the Championship, and replace Warne with Darren Moore. Then we will be back in League One, wishing we had Paul Warne back in charge.

Luton dropped the ball earlier. Was a big opportunity to put pressure on Forest and Everton.

They have it so good right now that the moment Pep leaves it will probably turn toxic as they fail to have the same success. I imagine Pep will leave at the end of next season, and players like KDB, Bernardo Silva and Kyle Walker will probably seek new adventures. Ruben Dias, Rodri and Haaland may see Barca or Real Madrid as the next target too after winning every trophy at City already. I’m a huge Pep fan, but it feels like the PL needs him and Klopp to move on to create a new era.

A tough one to take after leading with five minutes to play. But it’s a good point nonetheless against a team who are unbeaten against us in over 30 years.

Our recent record against Shrewsbury is poor. I’d take a draw here and move on.

I thought I’d start this thread now as relevant news has come out ahead of the tournament. 1 - Southgate has been over to watch Henderson at Ajax. I can only assume to see if he still has it at the top level. 2 - The FA have announced they would like Southgate to remain on after Euro 2024, regardless of performance. I take this as a confidence-booster and to settle down any thoughts of a potential exit.

Carl Froch wasn't as skilled as some of his opponents, but he could overraw them because you couldn't knock him out. Imagine somebody like Amir Khan, with his ridiculously fast hands, coupled with the chin of Carl Froch. Would almost be unbeatable. Froch's arrogance probably stems from the fact that nobody at 168 or below could knock him out. You could outpoint him, like Ward did, by just outboxing him and having amazing defence, but that's pretty much the only way. All boxers are world beaters until they get knocked out. And Froch never got knocked out. That said, he only stuck at 168 and called out the likes of GGG because he had 10 pounds on him. He would never have challenged Kovalev at 175 unlike Ward who proved he was levels above.

Koeman arguably did a better job at Southampton. And while Poch’s work at Spurs was impressive, they ultimately didn’t win anything and he needed a second go at PSG to win the title. Bizarre Chelsea even went for him.

Still fancy them. They have City (H) and Villa (A) as their hardest games left. City have harder fixtures with trips to Liverpool, Spurs and Brighton. The game at Anfield will be a telling one but no doubt it’s in Liverpool’s hands.

This is why Liverpool will win the league this season. They don’t need to play well and they still pick up results. When Arsenal and City play poorly, they lose. But Liverpool have something extra this season. Also Klopp seems to be able to get fairly decent players playing like top top players. Players like Jota, Gakpo, Gomez, Jones and Gravenbach wouldn’t get games for the best teams but they do for Liverpool, and they play like top players. Similar to how SAF got players like Fletcher, John O’Shea, Wes Brown, Ji Sun Park, Anderson, Nani and Rafael playing like they were top top players. But put them in a midtable side and they barely stand out

Chelsea showing how it doesn’t matter how much you spend, if you spend it poorly, you suffer. Pochettino is also vastly overrated.

Everton have gone off the boil recently after some great form. If either get hit with 10 point penalties and Luton pick up another five wins (possible on current form), then both are in trouble.

The charges only relate up until 2018. Leicester won the league in 15/16, Chelsea won the league in 16/17 and City won the league in 17/18 with Liverpool finishing 4th. You can’t strip City of titles after 17/18 in the same way you can’t punish teams for falling foul of FFP after in the initial penalty. I understand the arguement that City’s titles after 2018 could be built on initial ‘cheating’ but then you can label the same at Leicester’s title too.

Both teams were poor IMO. And we only won thanks to a bit of quality from Bird and NML after their defender played an awful pass out. It’s the sort of game where a promotion team just grinds out the win though. 10 away wins so far is a great record.

Collins is a decent player inside the box. Outside of it, not so much.