afar

Free header, should have been 2

Great finish that, not easy from that angle

MITRO !!!

Doesn't look good Still early days though.

Not sure that's a good thing. Brighton are a better team than Norwich IMO. Draw would be ideal from that game.

Surprised he's gone with Yedlin again ahead of Anita. I thought he would have rotated that spot for sure.

20 shots to 3, lol, it's getting better, two games ago it was one shot, last game 2, this one 3. Moyes can point to progress

To rescue survival this season would be their biggest achievement. You just know they will do it though somehow , the bastards !

A big loss could be it for him, losing narrowly to Arsenal could have been expected but this might be it I think.

Wow I just woke up and saw the stats 12 to 2 66% to Arsenal yet it's going to be all square soon, I guess.

Think Judge would be a good call, we need some cover in centre mid/10 and think he could do a job for us there come pretty reasonably priced. I would also definitely put a bid in for Knockaert, make sure that bid is leaked to the press, perhaps have Rafa state his admiration for the player. That way, if he comes great, if not it's sure to unsettle him a little which will be a good thing for us. I do think Will Hughes would be a good option too in January, would be a natural cover for Shelvey and surely he'll be keen to get out of the disaster which is Derby.

Hodgson or Fatso, either would keep them up unfortunately. But they are going to need to be in place before January and have a stellar window, like Fatso did last year, because after the summer I wouldn't trust Moyes with my money if I were the owner, if he thought it was hard to convince players to come in the summer it'll be even harder in January if they haven't picked up their form a little.

At the start if the season, I would have totally agreed with you. I'm not so sure now. What's clear is he's a manager that needs time, he needed it and got it at Everton. He didn't get it at his previous two jobs. Now though starting to think, his methods are just not working in today's game, he may just have been in the perfect situation at Everton, bought the right sort of players. His signings so far with Sunderland have an air of scatter gun desperation about them and seems like no thought has been put into what the team actually needs, just thnakful for getting players over the line. Don't think he's ever been the most inspiring of managers, but the respect he gained at Everton kept the players believing in him. I think that respect is gone now from players that have not grown up under his stewardship. Perhaps Sunderland would be better off getting rid, going for their quick fix, Hodgson here would be an ideal appointment for them. Whoever comes in though will have a tough job, that squad is shocking it really is.

Reading a bit of their forum they seem pretty impressed with their team spirit on the whole like, and are expecting them to come at us full on. They've had some really good results recently and there'll not be many harder games than going away there with the form they're in. We should win, but I think it'll be a hard game. No chance of them lying down after last night. The funny thing is that not one is predicting that we keep a clean sheet, but when you look at our recent results, keeping clean sheets is something we seem pretty good at. I said before the cup game that we would lose one of the two games, but having seen how comfortably our 2nd team dismantled their 2nd team, I may have over estimated them. Unless there is a huge gap in ability between the players who lined up against us yesterday and those that we'll face on Saturday, then we should really be expecting at worst a draw out of this one.

This, if he wanted away there would have been plenty of offers when we got relegated, he knows he's on to something here and he knows he's at a team that will idolise him. He's here for the same reason he stayed at Liverpool so long, he just gets it, it's not about the money, it's about everything else. Returning us to a top team in the country and winning a trophy or two would be his biggest achievement iyam, based on where we've come from. We were simply awful before this man arrived, rotten to the core, he's not just turned around results, he's building a culture and clearly has a long term vision, that goes way beyond the previous "lets buy some potential wonderkids on the cheap and sell them for big money". Appointing and retaining Rafa was the single best decision Ashley has ever made for this football club, if he continues to back him and give him the control he needs,that'll go a long way to redeeming himself for those not so clever decision he's made in the past.

Can we have a poll for how may times Lowes and Ando say "after the Lord Mayor's show" ? In commentary and has anyone actually been to one of these shows and what makes them so special ?

Both in this and the QPR game we have not just got lucky with some good finishing that has run up the score but we've probably been unlucky not to score more. 25 shots at goal to 1 is just crazy stuff. There's a lot of positives to take out of the game.

That is very true. He'll want to complete his CV though at some point, hopefully that point is a way in the future. And I agree with Kimbo, Southgate will get it and it'll be another huge mistake and wasted opportunity, more reason to not give a s*** about the national team.

That is quite incredible, even more so when you factor in the fact they've not been relegated in any of the previous 8, and still have a decent shout at surviving this year. 2013/14 would have been perfect, it it had not been for us.

Not only an awful attitude to have but also unquestionably thick as mince. He's shown he's a useful Championship squad and having a large, fit squad is partly why we're doing well on two fronts. Agree, it's not like we are bulging with options at CM, tbh it's the weakest area of our side right now in terms of squad depth. As Thomas implies no one (with the exception of perhaps Adam Johnson) deserves anything other than best wishes on recovery from spell in hospital, following that challenge.

My biggest concern for our future is some other offer tempting Rafa away. I could see him really fancying the England job (and I think he would be a great appointment for them). It may be in our best interests long term to not get past the 1/4 finals and not do too well in the FA Cup. Klopp doing well at Liverpool is a good thing, Conte needs to be given time at Chelsea, I don't think Man City would turn to him should Pep flop, Jose will get sacked before the end of the season at Manure, I feel but the former Liverpool manager wouldn't be a popular hire. Arsenal could very well turn their sights on him should Wenger get the England job. Spuds are not changing their manager any time soon. No one else in this country worries me, and I don't think Rafa wants to manage outside of England right now.

Rafa's done wonders in the market really: We needed a goalscorer at this level and a bit of pace up top, couldn't have asked for a better fir for need than Gayle. We were losing our left footed right winger who was easily our best player during the run in, he replaces Townsend with a huge amount of quality on Ritchie (left footed , right winger). Lose two centre halves, need to rebuild that group which has very much been a weak point. Brings in Hanley and Clark, two extremely competent replacements and way better than the players they replaced (at that point in their careers). Everyone (including villa fans) said we over paid for Clark, but if he keeps up with his current form 5 million is an absolute snip. Our pacy attacking right goes, replace him with another pacy attacking right back in Yedlin, a player who has done nothing but impress when he's played. Then there is this guy ! FFS we paid 1.5 million for him, that's ridiculous based on what we've seen. How Rafa knew what a gem this guy was based on an average at best season with Hull, I don't know. Hayden is a prime example of why you give the keys to the safe to Rafa, as an owner you just sit back and let him manage the transfer budget. Atsu on loan with the option to buy looks like another piece of great piece of business. Really the only questionable moves have been Gamez, Lazaar and Diame. We didn't pay a lot for Gamez, and he's had some injury issues, got a feeling he may still have a part to play in this but the form of Yedlin and Anita is going to make it tough. Lazaar is a question mark, dunno what is going on there perhaps Rafa has viewed him as a PL player that can't play effectively at this level and is using this season to get him attuned to English football. Diame has been poor up until last night, but if he continues to play and score goals like he did against Preston then it will have been a solid buy, again 5 million is not a lot of money in these days.

As well as Gayle has done, I honestly believe we would be even more of a threat if Mitro was first choice. Gayle's skill set is different it's all about pace and finishing. Mitro doesn't have that pace of course but he has a lot more power and works very hard (I think that's often forgotten). Clearly it's unlikely that Rafa will ever play them both together and even having said that, I'm not advocating a change. Gayle deserves to be first choice right now, it's a system that's working, so why mess with it ? I just hope that we can keep Mitro happy enough, there's huge potential there and long term the guy could be a legend here if Rafa continues to work on him and his game.

The elbow was not the bad part of the challenge, he lead with it then followed through with his head, not even looking at in the direction of the ball. The head is what I suspect did the real damage. It was a ridiculous challenge, that deserves a lot more than the 3 match ban he'll get.

Not great to hear, hope he's ok and this is purely a precaution