TRon

We'll need to win away games against the big teams to make up for the points we've dropped against the dross. Points-wise we are still doing ok, but a look at the rest of the fixture list means it's an uphill struggle to qualify for CL again. But we can still make the UEFA/Conference or wahtever they are called now.

The problem with this is we don't play with a no 10. From what I've seen he doesn't have the physical strength or the pace to play as an out and out no.9 either.

Or just play him in any game when we need his skill set. He's at Newcastle now, he needs to be told to go out and make things happen regardless of what any supporters think. If he doesn't make it then that's how the cookie crumbles, but he's not going to grow into the role by not playing.

The only good thing about him being in the commentary box is you don't have to look at his smug face. When he's a studio guest it takes all your self discipline not to put your foot through the tv.

We don't have many good strikers of the ball. That's why we score so few from direct free kicks.

Sick of listening to either biased co commentators, or dull as dishwater ramblings from the likes of Chris Sutton or Alan Smith. I'm partial to a bit of Scottish passion personally. Ally McCoist and dare I say it, Andy Gray were more my cup of tea.

His goals have usually been worldies when they come. He needs to learn to score a few tap ins. But he's never in the right place for those.

I thought we were going to give them a good hiding for the first 15 mins but after we didn't take those early chances they tightened right up and defended well. We just don't have any answers when teams shell up against us.

We need more people arriving in the box as well. You can't always rely on the lone striker to be in exactly the right place every time.

I still think he'll come good, but his general play has been shocking in the last few games. Also needing an extra touch against City when all he had to do was hit it first time. Wtf was that? Any good striker takes the shot when it's on, they don't give the defender a second chance.

But we paid a £20m premium for him because we needed him this season. I agreed with it at the time because I thought we were buying guaranteed goals, but his general play has looked really sloppy so far. Hopefully that's just rust through the injury lay off.

Top 8 is about as much as we could reasonably ask tbh, given the investment in the squad in comparison to our rivals.

And we have fresh players like Ramsey, Elanga and Willock on the bench. Even if you aren't the biggest fan of these players, they were bought to give us depth in the squad, and it would allow us to step up the intensity that our play requires. We still might not win, but at least we couldn't point to fatigue as an excuse.

One thing is for sure, we can't play high intensity football 3 games a week. Or if we want to do that then we need to rotate a lot more ruthlessly.

Too flimsy to hold the ball up against PL defenders as well. He does his best but tends to come off second best.

He tries some fancy flicks which have failed mostly, but if they came off they would open teams up. Might just be his touch is still off after a long lay off. Or maybe it was never that good, I didn't pay that much attention when he was at Brentford tbh.

We were trying to win it all game, just didn't know how.

Unless he pulls his finger out, we might end up selling him back to Italy at break even. Maybe that was the plan all along from his side.

The only good thing about that was we didn't lose. Absolute zilch creativity or fire up front. Even then we could have won it if our forwards hadn't kept hitting fresh air instead of the ball with the goal gaping.

We are a decent functional side with no X factor up front. A low block is enough to make our forwards wave the white flag.

66 mins, right on cue tbh.

We've been decent for two thirds of the pitch. Then absolute shit in the penalty area so far.

Can't complain if we don't win. If you miss open goals then you can't really complain about lack of creativity.

We did create a couple of great chances in the first 15 mins but missed out. Since then they have closed all the gaps very effectively.

Point blank miss.