TRon

I was actually more gutted than I thought I would be after going out of the FA cup. But yeah, this is the big one, go through tonight and we can put Saturday's loss behind us.

Agree. I don't know why people seem to think we can sell him. The wages alone would put off the sort of clubs who might be interested. Especially if they were watching on Saturday.

Hope he's fit to play tonight. It was a bad game to miss on Saturday when we needed to rest the lads who have been playing so many games recently.

He'll put us out of another cup more likely. Please stay on the bench Chris.

Yeah he looked sharp I thought.

The massive goal he had left in him this season came and went when he ballooned that chance over the bar against Sheffield. Not really that arsed about any massive goals he might have left in the locker, when he trots out in the starting line, my heart always sinks. Kuol's going to be loaned out, but hand on heart, I reckon he'd be much more effective if he was playing right now.

I think we'll probably find someone after today.

It's not asking that much to do something off the bench or against lower division oppositon surely? Pretty hard to perform low with such little expectation, yet he still seems to manage it.

Maybe not, perhaps those fantastic finishes against Liverpool are still lodged in my mind. He looked decent today I thought. His header was weak though, should have gave us the lead with that, but will wait and see what he produces once he's up and running.

I don' know what level this guy has to play at to feel comfortable. Feels like even an U-15 game where he was towering above everyone else would feel like a burden if it was a cup final. He should have ripped them apart today.

Well that was my first impression as well, but I thought maybe there is some new interpretation of the offside rule which I might not be up to date with.

They said in the commentary box it wasn't ruled offside because it came off the keeper.

One thing which might be getting overlooked as well, Sheff W were a pretty impressive outfit for a third divison outfit. After the first 5 mins I'm not going to lie, I was worried. They pressured us all over the pitch, got us missing passes, then attacked with intent when they got the ball. Even more galling, their lad up front Windass, looked far more dangerous than anything we had once Isak went off.

That game on Tuesday is hardly one to get this one out of our system. It's actually the reason why we are out of probably a bigger cup competition. There's even more pressure to win that one now, but these are the decisions you have to make, and it's a juggling act.

Only thing I'd disagree with there is looking at that team and thinking it was strong enough to win. The midfield looked like it lacked energy, and I am always nervous when I see Murphy start. As it turned out, Ritchie was actually better than I thought he might be, but Lewis was worse, and seeing Wood as the sub to be brought on when Isak went off had already set alarm bells ringing. We basically had to be the first ones to score.

Not really. We were chronically weak in front of goal when Wilson was missing prior to this season. Almiron's burst of goals has masked a lot of history. Even last season signing Trippier with his dead ball contributions gave us a massive boost in that department. We don't really have that many natural goal scorers in the side, although hopefully Isak returning to fitness will change that.

All it really shows is how bad our reserves are. People were hyping up Elliott Anderson on the back of some attacking intent in a couple of friendlies, but even in those his football lacked polish.

He made one overlapping run in the first half which was electric, and I thought here we go, he started poorly but now he's in gear. Then he went back into his shell for the rest of the match. He's got the all the physical assets, but no drive or fight in him. He's like a left back version of Murphy.

Saw something about that come up on my YT feed, but I didn't bother watching it as that guy has a habit of clickbait titles. But it was a bad game to miss when him playing would probably have seen us in the next round of the FA cup. I hope he really was ill and not deciding this game was beneath him.

Haven't read through this thread today, but no doubt he'll be getting some shit over picking such a weak team, but there are extenuating circumstances. This game was sandwiched between two other very important games in the space of a week. He was always going to have to juggle his squad so we have to acknowledge that. That said, he put far too much faith in a bunch of proven losers and he has to take responsibility for that. Sheff W looked a hungry and committed side, and we had players like Lewis and Murphy who just got intimidated far too easily, and some of the other stand-ins just couldn't cope with the intensity. At least now he must know that there's some players who have no business still being at this level.

I'm sure I've said it a few times in this thread, but I'm actually shocked how bad a finisher he is. Prior to coming here I had thought he was just a muck and nettles striker who actually put stuff away when he got the chance. Maybe he just scored all his goals against us. In the match thread I said he made Windass look like Messi, and I don't think it's an exaggeration.

It's ironic, just before Chris Wood skied that sitter, I was in the middle of typing out that we were going to need to find a touch of genuine class to score a goal, because Sheff weren't giving us anything.

Well, the best team on the day won. Eddie made a rare mistake of overestimating his reserve players and it's cost us a chance of silverware.

It's called shit finishing.

Some div 1 shooting by our lads today. They should take coaching lessons from Windass.