Galway saint

thought stephens looked tentative in the pass and he obviously suffers in comparison to THB. the way we play you’ve got to be on your game around the 18 year box otherwise it’s calamity time and Stephen’s wasn’t quite on it thought it was the wrong move to break up the CB partnership. we got away with it today and hopefully lessons learnt first half was superb and RM has us playing some great stuff . come a long way in 12 months

he made a positive difference in the second half to the outcome of game today and to date he’s not done that enough for me but fair play to him today. we’ll need more of that when we play ipswich, leicester etc away

can we bring THB back on ?

If anyone has a spare rotherham ticket let me know as managed to miss the rush

i’m no defender of bazanu and he was in an odd position for a conventional keeper but as he’s effectively asked to play the sweeper role he will always be more advanced than he might like and he therefore can get caught in no mans land. see the goal against rotherham for another example. however you cannot him blame for that as it’s the role he’s asked to play

Not sure it’s about creativity more a dominant centre centre to lead the line and create a bit of hovoc in and around the box and get onto crosses ( that are now increasing) . we created lots of openings yesterday. not sure of the stats but after adam armstrong out next highest scorer must be adams with 6 or so. seems to be more of an achilles heel away from home but you will always be vulnerable being only one up as no matter how good the defence you will always concede some goals

today was frustrating but we look a very good team at the moment and that’s without a recognised number 9 to lead the line

10 points from 12 is pretty good going over Xmas and we have managed to put ourselves in contention for 2nd so got to be happy overall even if today was a bit disappointing. the stephens thing is odd

don’t be pathetic

i can’t be bothered to go back through them all but the goal conceded against watford was clearly a ‘howler’

he’s a very very good player and whoever at the club arranged this deserves a huge pat on the back. indeed having him, bednarek and KWP in defence is exceptional really for the championship

i have some difficulty seeing anyone from the premiership is seriously scouting him. since Huddersfield they would be reporting back that saints have only conceded 4 goals but of those two were his fault and one was arguably where he should have done better. mistakes like last night happen to the best keepers so we move on from that but again anyone scouting him over the past 18 months would need their heads examining if they reported back that the club should be signing him. i don’t see we are very fortunate to have him. the converse really. He’s very fortunate to have a club who have stuck by him and continue to do so. we’re doing great at the moment and we are far superior to most teams we play so he doesn’t have much to do but if we do go up Baz would be back centre stage with the ball flying at him from all angles and i have my doubts it would be much different to last time

THB is very very good

these things happen. doesn’t alter my concerns but we move on as he’s earned that by virtue of the way he’s asked to play

great finish

get fraser and stu on too slow

it would be churlish to say he’s not improving( but that’s from a pretty low base last season) but overall the defence is much better. it’s incomparable to those games at sunderland and middlesbrough and so he’s doesn’t have a great deal to do comparatively. he still has that technical deficiency down to his left hand side and before we anyone gets concerned about his leaving he needs to sort that out. if we don’t go up i’d be far more concerned about replacing downes and THB than the keeper. you look at the guy at rotherham and see what you can pick up for say 5 or 6 million. personally if we ever get an offer for more than we paid we will have done well but he certainly seems a more confident presence but so he should as we’ve not lost for 16 games.

still seems a very long time for a hamstring injury but i can’t see what they gain by lying about it

never heard of anyone being out for five/six months with a hamstring injury to be fair you don’t miss what you never had but the lack of a real focal point up front could cost us seemed a real gamble at the time and it hasn’t paid off. see what we do in January but if we don’t properly address it then that will be two years without a decent number 9.

don’t see it personally - we have finally got some resilience at the back so would be daft to tinker with it out of loyalty to the captain

blackmore said on solent they were reset

Watched this in the Coventry end as went with a Coventry fan. Despite being in the ‘executive seats’ there was some bloke shouting fuk and cnt every other word during the match. This followed the Huddersfield game where someone was shouting ‘soft cnt’ the entire game. Who says football isn’t a family sport. Thought the game was ok. Our passing at the back is now a lot more proficient but still ineffective and dull. It’s difficult to know what it’s supposed to achieve. Perhaps grind the opposition down but that doesn’t seem to work as they just let us have the ball whilst we pass it around boring the pants off everyone. It’s so dreary to watch. We were again very reluctant to play the channels. The forward play has to be so intricate to create a chance that it’s no surprise we don’t score more. I can only imagine we don’t play the channels more because we might lose the ball. We are happy to take risks in defence but not in attack. Teams clearly have figured out just to sit back and invite us to play through them and we still remain vulnerable to the counter attack. A better side than Coventry would have punished us. I’m not a fan of this football but we are now a solid side that will likely make the play offs. RM is having to contend with not having a recognised number 9 who can lead the line and that’s down to SR. It beggars belief we still don’t have a recognised centre forward after all this time.

hopefully teams will hit them to his right hand side

it’s a long shot and a routine save down to his left. its his achilles heel. he was winning me round but its a glaring technical deficiency.

we’re not sunderland bad but we are not good. really dire football