Stottie

We've now scored four or more in four out of thirteen league games.

BIG JOW PICK THAT OUT!

If fairness, most of Nick Pope's mistakes are sweeper keeper rushing outside the box. This always carries some risk. He doesn't fluff kicks from the hands, or let many soft ones through his hands. A bad Nick Pope clearance sails out of touch, not 30 yards to one of them.

I have one medal (!) for winning three games in the first round of the Northumbria Police 5-a-side in 1981 or 1982. I was in goal, but scored the winner in a penalty shoot out. We got hammered in the second round. I was basically useless at football, but got stuck in goal enough to get good at angles and stopping shots. That's enough for 5-a-side, where you have the protection of your own area. For an eleven a side, I was too lightweight and just got shoved about. When I played as an adult, I was amazed at how knackering all the sprinting you do as an outfield player is. I've run half marathons and a hilly 20k trail run, but football is a completely different type of fitness.

Perhaps its possible or best to view FFP through different lenses at the top and bottom of the table. At the bottom of the league, it stops any wealthier club just blitzing the transfer windows beyond their means to avoid relegation. Everton's gain is someone else's massive loss. Its not hard to make a case for FFP in this situation. At the top of the league, if you limit spending for less established teams, you prevent them from making a realistic and sustainable assault on the title and the Champions League positions. This is an absolute necessity to increase revenue and reduce the FFP exposure. The equation for us is that if we cannot keep it up, we lose Bruno G. An inabilty to keep going forwards will cause a huge step backwards. This is FFP acting to close the door, just after Chelsea and Man City were allowed to spend what they liked.

It sounds like Chelsea and Man City are being investigated by the FA as well as the Premier League. So yes, having FA-connected people on our staff is probably an advantage.

I'm fifty-five, so my ambition is to become a pensioner. Unfortunately that's almost as far away as being a doctor.

I'm not a doctor, far from it, but I see Murphy and Burn's upper body injuries as freak and nothing to do with stress. Murphy in particular is our Swiss Army Knife covering several positions, useful in injury crises like we have now. It leaves us with our second Swiss Army Knife that is Ritchie, who still has a tooth pick, a fish scaler, and a can opener, but no cutting edge.

Isak featured in 30 plus La Liga games a season three times for Sociedad. I think we've just been unlucky with him.

Just to save someone else counting them, but we play Liverpool at Anfield on Jan 1 and that's the eleventh (!!) game from now, Nov 16th. That's a lot of making do with who we have available. After that, we have an FA Cup tie and Man City home for which Kalvin Phillips would be banned anyway.

It doesn't rank by head to head as the tiebreaker does, but a chance to play with the remaining fixtures and calculate tables here. Only two rounds to go, but many outcomes are still possible. https://www.worldfootball.net/table_calculator/champions-league/ Avoid defeat at PSG and we have the head-to-head tie breaker over them.

Had we beaten Bournemouth, we'd top that Premier League form table. It just shows the shadow cast by the injury crisis and the Dortmund defeats in the CL.

I've been bullish about Top 4/5 but am starting to get concerned now the injuries have piled up and Tonali has been banned. Neither of things could have been predicted. How many teams buy a player and then see him banned for the season for something done at his previous club? The injuries have included freak upper body ones like Murphy and Dan Burn. Regarding the home/away split I thought we looked knackered second half at Wolves and that let them back in. We also looked knackered all game at Dortmund and super knackered at Bournemouth at the weekend. West Ham was just a good recovery and great goal by them. Conversely, we did win at Old Trafford, so I think the timing of some of the games has been a factor, rather than just the home/away factor.

Frustrating to be so uncompetitive in an easier fixture but this is the perfect storm of injuries. Everyone knows we need more players, and the owners would likely pay for them, but FFP says no. The net result is Matt Ritchie and kids.

Need to keep the ball for more than five seconds.

Spurs last season. Games 1-10 = 22 points Games 11-20 (starting with us) = 10 points. With no points in games 11 and 12 and the fixtures Nut mentions, we may see a similar slump this season.

All it takes is six other clubs to vote against or abstain. I can't see Brighton voting against their business model, or a transfer heavy team like Forest. Or teams with lots of loanees like City or Chelsea. There's four already.

Moggy Almiron Robin Van Pussy Tabby Abraham ....

A disappointing performance and result, but perhaps the rubber finally hitting the road with our base level, current injuries, and poor luck with hard-game fixture congestion Dortmund are a physically strong team and play with nous and skill, so no embarrassment in the result, just a little frustration in that we couldn't be at our best and lose to them in a less "what might have been" way. Tonali was a next-step-up signing for us and bought for games like this, so again frustration that we can't play him. None of our injuries so far have proved that costly, the train has continued rolling along fine, and I hope that's also the case for Dan Burn. With Targett already out, it may cost us more than those who do not rate Dan Burn might suspect.

If its Hope, can we shoot the messenger? The guy is a non-stop stream of negativity, much like the paper he works for. Wilson has no problem with ability for where we are in 2023. That goals per minute record is not a fluke. A bit more luck with Isak, injured on international duty FFS, and we'd be able to give Wilson the rest he needs. The backstory about no number three is FFP and years of neglect that will hold us back for still some time to come.

That protest will be anti-FIFA and anti (just announced) Saudi WC, not so much anti NUFC.

Gordon for Wilson, Miggy for Hall

Eight to two in the foul count, but guess who got the yellow. HT. Deserve to be behind, but have come back into it. Need Miggy and Gordon on.

Spurs got 10 points from games 11 to 20 last season, starting with us beating them at their place. They're starting it this time with more points but with suspensions, injuries, and harder fixtures. https://theanalyst.com/eu/2023/11/premier-league-fixture-difficulty-every-team-ranked/

I thought they fully deserved their halftime lead at SJP but were lucky to hang on to win the match. They sat on the lead and let us hit the bar twice on top of the Wilson chance. fwiw, the weather forecast I saw for tomorrow in Dortmund said dry. I think that'll suit us better than the rain in the home fixture.