afar

“Only 5 points” = 2 wins. They’ve only won 5 in 38 Based on that, it’d take them 15 games to earn those 2 wins. I know but ffs, they should be dead and buried already, last year they would have been. If they win all their games now till the end of the season (which is obviously not going to happen) they will reach 52 points, Blackburn went down last year on 51, they are so lucky that three other teams are just as awful as they are.

Still incredibly only 5 points from safety, Brum winning today though was huge from a momentum perspective, if any of those other 3 teams in the mix with Sunderland are to go on a run and get clear it's Brum and that win will help them greatly. Only 8 games left now.

agree, one more and its done It really is as simple as that I feel now, huge game coming up if we win it we are as good as there. After today's results, Brom won't catch our 32 point current total, since they would have to win 6 of 7 to do that. Stoke would have to perform amazingly in their tough run in to pull back 4 points on us in 7 games. The unknown is how Southampton will fare with their new manager bounce, West Ham are in freefall a little with huge problems off the field, Huddersfield needed the win today or against us otherwise they are really in big trouble and Swansea, Palace and Brighton still very much in the mix.

Southampton will be fine now, he usually does ok at the start of his time with a club, it's when he beds in a people see him for what he is that it all comes unstuck, just like Pardew, maybe like Pardew though this is one too many times on the same journey.

Alfie Mawson is in no way > the Lascelles, but wtf obviously Southgate is a genius otherwise he wouldn't be in the top job in England.

Funny enough, that bloke who posted that hilarious pile of crap, is the one talking the most sense on there at the moment.

If and hopefully when we secure our PL status for next season, wouldn't be surprised in the slightest if the club try to push this through, he fits the profile they like in terms of age and potential, at a good price. There is still a question on whether he will fancy a permanent move however, rafa will have to do some selling.

You're talking insolvency and winding up surely, admin is different no? Aye I think MrM is right insolvency is a little different. Boro for example went into administration and retained there 3rd division league status when the new club was formed, as have other clubs like Southampton and such. In terms of taking the hit this year on the points deduction, they changed the rules apparently to stop teams doing this and if they decalred administration now they still take the points deduction next season (and possibly also this season too).

The guy is such a prick, why bother posting thread like that on there, you know what crap you are going to get

I have a question: If they go into administration , and assuming the usual thing happens and a new club is born. What happens to the players contracts? People like Rodwell and Cattermole are the reason they will never get out of the mess they are in. Do the contracts get ripped up and they effectively free themselves of these leaches and adversely open up the way for their better players to be poached for free to other clubs (not that they have many of the type anyone would want) ?

LOL, we are all deluded man, ftm, 9-1, 6 in a row.

That's the dream isn't it. From a neutrals perspective you are right, it's a hell of a battle down there, even at this stage it's difficult to pick the two that will surely joining WBA in the champo next year. We often say that there is little quality beyond the top 6 in the PL, but I think this year we've got a lot of teams including ourselves that have not really looked like relegation fodder, yet can't escape it. There is still a massive gap to the top 6 of course, but I think generally the quality at the bottom has improved a little, a lot of the reason for that has been that the three teams that came up last year have been competitive, usually at least one of them gets cut a drift, while as this season we've not season Huddersfield, Brighton our ourselves in the relegation zone much at all. Think we spent like a couple of days in total down there, while Huddersfield dropped in there for a week or so but bounced back up and Brighton I don't think have ever been in it.

I don't do this anywhere near enough as I should but thank you so much Dave et al for keeping this forum up and running and to such a high quality. Your efforts are much appreciated.

He's very streaky in form, guess like most wingers, but a big part in our current pick up, adding goals to his game makes a huge difference to his value to us.

I can understand WBA board's stance in keeping him, it's a hopeless case for them now. No manager is going to take that situation on with 8 games left and 8 points to make up. They should be thinking about next season and asking themselves if he's the right man to bring them back up. he's done it once before with West Ham but that was a long time ago.

Being absolutely pessimistic here, say we lose all three games against the top 6 clubs we have remaining and average 1 point per game from the games, that's a return of 5 points from 8 games, well below our current ppg. That would leave us on 37 points, not sure at least 2 of Stoke, Soton or Palace can take 10 points from 8 and overhaul the GD on us. Funny how things change, a few weeks back it looked like you would need at least 40 points this season, now it may be as low as 35.

For the fee, it's a no brainer, assuming we stay up. His age is probably something the owner doesn't like, but he's still a good age for a keeper and perfect really for Woodman to understudy for. There may be other options though in the summer, Hart (please god no), Butland (if Stoke drop, others though will surely be in for him and pay way more than our 5 million , could cause a ripple effect though, making other keepers looking for new homes, and Rena I'm sure will be back on the rumour mill again.

If a rating of 5 is 50/50 to go down, it's got to be less than that now, since we have a 4 point gap to Soton, if Stoke lose tomorrow, we'll be 5 points clear with a much better GD. So got to be at worst a 4, beat Huddersfield and we may well be looking up rather than down for the remainder, if other results fall our way.

Tell you one thing, if the obvious happens and we lose Rafa at the end of the season, this guy at Fulham is the one I would chase, I want to see that kind of football his team is putting out.

Wouldn't be surprised if you need less points in the Champo this year to survive that you will in the PL, crazy how different it is from last year, they are exceptionally fortunate to be in the champo this year, otherwise they really should have been buried by now. Wonder inf they could have avoided this had they not sanctioned loans for the likes of Lens, Khazari and Borini, insist on them staying or sell them for a fee that they could re-invest, having said that they probably told the club they wouldn't play for them again.

The other results are going well for them, but at the end of the day, assuming they don't do one of their little comebacks, it's another game gone and they are still 4 points (effectively 5)away from safety with 10 to play, while their rivals also have a game in hand.

That's also on the somewhat doubtful assumption that the money from the sale will be re-invested in the team.

Funny thing is his PL goals to minutes played must have been pretty good, since he did a decent job in his first season with us and got that goal against West Ham in one of the very few and brief cameos he had for us this season. It's only really last season where he's been somewhat of a disappointment, on fire now with another team while we struggle to score. I love Rafa but never understood a situation where you play Joselu before him. If they get promoted, no way we will not sell him to them for 10 million or something stupid, just hope we are not going in the opposite direction.

Got to hand it to Brighton, they've gotten some huge wins lately and probably pulled themselves clear of the fight. It looks like it's from Swansea in 13th on 30 points down to Stoke on 27 in 19th spot, for the last two places with Brom almost certainly down. If we go down, it'll not be because we've been battered every week but it's the huge amount of games where we've failed to win when we really should have, those dropped points, against Bournemouth (twice), Brighton (twice), Everton (h), Burnely (h), Swansea (h), Leicester (h), Palace (a) and Southampton (a). For large portions of those games we've been well on top but failed to get a goal or a a second or third to ensure the points. I'm still at a 6 right now, really though should be a 2 or 3, I honestly don't think we are one of the worst 3 teams in this division but could easily drop.

Strangely I was more confident of getting something against Manure, than I am in us winning this one. Think it will be a draw which will hurt us, we need to be winning of course.