Pilko

Used to be a good local priest down there. Father Michael O'Flatley, Irish fella, in the holy parish of Wokingham.

Hoddle I'm convinced it's Hughton now. That's been leaked to make him seem like less of yesterday's man in comparison, surely.

Surely at this stage you go for a bold, passionate figurehead related to the club or someone with a consistent track record of grinding out points and being tough to beat. As much as Chris Hughts did a great job for us he's neither of those & has been out of it for years.

Really hard to say what we'll get out of the run-in. You've got two teams we traditionally struggle against, the league leaders away, Palace who are about as unpredictable as we are & then three games which could be dead rubbers or have something riding on them for one or both sides by then. Probably 8-10 points you'd imagine. Win a few, draw a few, lose a few.

Go and get the gilet

Probably. Although I'd imagine the bereavement will have played a part in the delay, PR department surely block them bulleting a manager who's just lost a close family member the same day.

Tactics Tim to come back. Please.

Fucking get in Gateshead. 2-1 win and now 5 clear!

Rashford is absolutely chod.

If they survive this and he stays on I'll be having a bet on them to finish top 7 next year.

Gateshead out of the relegation zone as it stands. What an impact Rob Elliot has had. They play Yeovil next too who are in and around it, win that and they've got a massive chance to secure survival.

This is the main thing for me which goes beyond all the debate on credit in the bank, tactics, mitigating circumstances etc. The rebuild job this summer needs to be big and ruthless and he's gone on record to say he doesn't like turning over too many players, he quite likes a 4-5 in and out summer each time. That means some of the incomings to support the squad underbelly need to be lower priced, educated gambles and he doesn't really like to sign those. There's only really Osula that fits the bill in recent memory and as we've seen it's taken a year and a half for him to be trusted with regular cameos. I get there's times we'll need to bow to PSR to plug a gap for a year by extending someone and prioritise etc when it's not exactly ideal, but I just don't see him wanting to make the wholesale changes to the squad that are needed. Burn and Trippier have been phenomenal for us but I think are also a big reason why we ship loads of goals at the minute. Given their respective wages and influence I doubt they'd want to do the Krafth style 4-5 emergency appearances role, so we either need to let them go or accept they'll be 20-25 appearance minimum contributors next season. I can't predict what Howe is thinking but I'm pretty certain he'd want to keep both and that worries me.

I'm not saying our manager or team is suddenly awful, btw. There's big issues with both and mitigating factors with both, but an ultimate feeling that they could have been much better this year even with that context applied. You're right that there's been more indifferent or dud signings than good ones across the league. And, I understand the logic or the thinking behind every one of our buys, even if I was in favour of them individually or not. For example, at the time I thought Wissa would be a great addition. I also thought Elanga was incredibly underwhelming for the money. All that said, I still don't understand why with the same defensive unit as last season plus Thiaw we can't keep a clean sheet for toffee and routinely concede goals for fun, against a league that everyone agrees is struggling from an attacking perspective.

I don't understand "we've been poor in the league, but so has everyone this year, it's a poor league" as an argument. We're saying the standard of team is lower across the board - so why does that mean we just lower ourselves to that level? If some of these sides are that bad we might occasionally look comfortable and win convincingly, which we hardly ever do.

He'll get about 20 mins in one of the two games, it's as close a break to match action as staying at home but he gets a nice England cap out of it.

3 clean sheets in the league since October and 1 in 17 in all comps. That's nowt to do with Paul Mitchell, the hierarchy, Isak, the summer etc. It's a side that hasn't been set up with the right mentality, tactics or been coached well enough to keep goals out.

One clean sheet in 17 btw. You aren't going to do anything in league or cup with that record.

Aye, that'll definitely happen.

This is the bit I have no confidence in. He doesn't like turning around too many players in one window and I don't think he's that interested in playing good football, I fear he'll want to double down with more athletes, brutes and sprinters.

Best not call him names or you'll have Tindall's daughter to answer to.

Think he's starting to come good and we'll see an even better player next season. Especially if there's a few more players around him who aren't just athletes who can't kick a ball.

Genuinely only think there's Bruno, Hall, Miley and possibly Ramsey I'd be desperate to keep after this season. If the others left I'd vary from indifferent to fucking elated.

Almiron at his worst is infinitely better than the version of Elanga we've seen.

Two absolutely garbage substitute appearances this week. Not sure if unfit, uninterested or unlucky.