Norman

I'd go full Football Manager on the squad and let them all go. 

Put the scouting budget and any transfer budget into the wage budget and sign loads of free agents.

Then ask for a stadium extension and a senior affiliate club that I will loan their best youth players from for free.

All will be well when the team cohesion starts to blend and they get used to my all out attack gegen press tactics.

What am I reading? I know we've all been through some right bottle jobs following Derby, but come on.

Barnsley ruled themselves out yesterday.

Peterborough have a horrifc run of games in 21 days and rely on a high energy game. 

Bolton really struggled to beat a poor Bristol Rovers team and haven't taken any more points than us over the last 5 games - and we've had to navigate Portsmouth, Blackpool, and Bolton themselves in that time.

Wycombe are playing a final this evening....beat them and it leaves 2 home games and Cambridge away. 

Honestly, I can see us winning the next 2, and Bolton drawing against Portsmouth, and it all being all being effectively over. Only 6 days to wait.

22 minutes ago, TigerTedd said:

Man Utd are so s***!! And I heard Ohara on talk sport talking about how they could make a late charge for the too 4. They’re literally closer to 12th than they are to Tottenham. Just cos they’re in 6th doesn’t make them any good. And they’ve scraped through most games to get them the few points that they’ve got. Every time they beat some nothing team like Everton, it’s all ‘oh, this is the turning point for United.’ No it’s not. They’re just crap. One half decent result isn’t going to change the 20 appalling performances. Beating Liverpool in the cup makes no difference when they get dumped out by Coventry and get out played by Brentford in their next game. 

11 points behind 4th with a vastly inferior GD to both Villa and Tottenham, with only the likes of Arsenal, Liverpool and Brighton away left. 

Easy.

They could have easily lost 4-0 last night. SM's face said it all when Mount scored. 

2 wins and a draw will do it. 88 points. Don't think anyone else will get more than 87 points now.

Bolton haven't won away in 8 games and Peterborough and Barnsley won't get more than 5 wins and a draw each in 7 games. 

I'm usually pessimistic in my outlook, generally, but I think we are going to finish top 2 now. 

2 minutes ago, Rich84 said:

Barnsley have only lost once on their travels in the league this season......

And what a team that was who beat them. 

Still very difficult to win 4 and draw 1 away from home. Draws won't do for them anymore. 

16 minutes ago, Bris Vegas said:

It’s pretty much basic math given some of the other teams have to play each other.

It’s hardly a jaw-dropping, know-it-all prediction. With only 7 games remaining the picture is pretty clear.

None of the other teams below are averaging more than 2 points per game.

Let’s be generous and give them better than that for the run in.

Bolton to take 16 from 7 (2.3ppg)

Posh and Barnsley to take 19 from 8 (2.375ppg)

So Derby would need 4 wins, Pompey 3. 

 

Yup, I think Barnsley have 5 away games left. That's a big ask to go at 2.4 points a game average with that many away games. 

Then Bolton have to play Peterborough, so one of those, or both if they draw, are going to have to go at well over 2 points a game average to get to 90 points. 

4 wins should be enough. 

One Curtis Nelson, there's only one Curtis Nelson.

Slightly unrelated, but Bristol City 6 points off the drop as it stands.

Cheeky bid for Knight and Bird on the way past them?

1 million for both?

I've always wanted us to have another crack at the Football League trophy anyway. 

Hopefully we draw someone like Leicester City U23s in the group stage.

Just now, Charliegeorge1962 said:

This is a must win game today.

Bolton already winning and with 2 games in hand too.

We've got ourselves a slow typer.

1 minute ago, Turk Thrust said:

Just shows that you can’t read too much into the match stats. Possession Exeter 70% us 30%;  shots them 13  us 9

What was the xg?

Bellingham, Forden and Rice.

Playing in behind Saka, Kane and Rashford (just jokes) and Grealish.

The best (imo) Right Back in the world in Walker and a decent enough defence.

Please don't waste it, Gareth. I fear you might do, though. 

36 minutes ago, Alph said:

I just finished the Putin interview. 

It's as expected. His contempt for an independent Ukraine is obvious. The first hour is hushed Imperial claims 

I mean it's just the other side of the coin. It's not a lie. It's his truth. As America peddles their truth. Convenient historical facts. Convenient omissions.

Finally. Someone says it. I don't care if it's Tucker Carlson, Jeremy Corbyn or James Collins doing the interview. Why would you not want to listen to his uninterrupted version?

Sure, it might not be new to people who have followed the war closely, but for those that haven't, the platform has been provided, for whatever reasons, a two hour interview with a man you can't usually sit in the same room as unless there is a 200ft table between you.

4 minutes ago, i-Ram said:

Warne really didn’t bring Washington in ‘in desperation’. He bought him previously for Rovrum and he bought him again because he obviously rates him. He was his striker pick. Frankly he was, and always will be, a very poor choice.

There is no point buying a holding midfielder if Warne wants to persist with his tactics. It’s like buying a caravan for a Porsche Boxster.

If we had a decent alternative coach I would be fully behind getting another midfielder in, but not sure it would be a holding type. One who could pass forward and run with some intensity creating in the middle would be ideal.

 

He did have Crooks who did this for him at Rotherham. But I guess trying to find someone like him on our budget would be like trying to find Collins onside. 

2 minutes ago, Barney1991 said:

We can’t scrap the tikki takka stuff as we never played it lol 

That was the joke

Right, we need to score twice quickly. 

Scrap the tikki takka football!!!!

Get it to the full backs and hoof it up the line, then lose it or cross it out of play. Football isn't hard, Derby!!!!

The hold up, imo, is the EFL going through the business plan/forecasts/projections, before approving or rejecting the transfer.

24 minutes ago, duncanjwitham said:

I was certainly discussing it at half time with the guys I sit with - maybe get Sibley or Thompson on for TJJ because he was barely contributing, and we needed an extra body in midfield.  I can understand why you wouldn't make that change then though.  What I don't understand is how they go from 2-0 down to 2-2 without us changing anything. In fact, it's another 7 minutes before we make our first sub, and that's basically a like-for-like change getting Sibley on for Elder.

What they did was push Hugill up much higher than Bennett was playing, so he was almost a second striker.  It wasn't a massive change of formation or anything, but it was enough to start causing us problems.

Yeah, they started pressing our defenders with 2 up front. The last 15 mins including injury time, they reverted back to 1. Wasn't technically a formation change, but a tweak that was causing us problems.

3 minutes ago, Millenniumram said:

It’s a big point for Burton apparently

Not sure why we’ve got the work experience presenter 

Joey Barton Tweet incoming

Nelson and Cashin are a top 10 Championship pairing. 

Wilson, Bird and NML all Championship quality. 

Get Wildsmith back in goal. 

We need a winger, a left back and a very, very athletic central midfielder. The central midfielder is priority to help cover the gaps when games get stretched. At times it looks like we have nobody in there. 

The ref has had a shocker. Step forward @DavesaRam.

You'd have to commit GBH as a Burton player to get a yellow card tonight. 

And if we reach Wembley? We'd make a fortune from ticket sakes, no?

52 minutes ago, Millenniumram said:

Agree that doesn’t help either - Bird and Hourihane as a midfield two is too one paced. Bradley still scares me though when the ball goes near him.

Bird, and Hourihane to a degree, both have too much quality for this league. Both are capable of brilliance in their own ways. But you're right, they are so easy to get at, as well as too easy to have runners going past them when we're being countered. 

But then we don't concede many goals. I think we can cope against anyone outside the top 8 with those 2 in there, but against the other 7, we do get properly overrun in midfield- and concede a disproportionate amount of goals. 

1 hour ago, Foreveram said:

Well there’s currently 61 seats and 450 standing tickets left so no excuses apart from the pathetic “ well I like to sit down at half time one”.😂

Have we got a total of tickets left for general sale for the Wigan away game tomorrow morning?

Any update would be much appreciated.

4 minutes ago, jono said:

So with this XG malarkey, does that mean we should have won by 2.04 to 0.87 ? .. so a bit better than 2-1 ?

3-0 seems to suggest XG is a tad flawed ? .. id est .. we got 50% more than XG and then they got .. errrm zero, no votes at all, not a sausage 

@Andicis

Sort this post out, please.