Stottie

I'm still waiting for Johnny to play Longstaff as a false nine. Release his inner Fabregas!

We always seem to concede at home. They've let in two a game for three in a row and have worse form even going back twelve games. So I predict a 2-1 win.

For your viewing pleasure, here's his results this season. I've included the goals for and after in the final 30 minutes, an indicator of fitness, in-game management, use of subs etc. and points lost when winning at some point in the game. Incidentally, the two goals scored in the final 30 were an ASM special vs. Soton and that crazy Eric Dier own goal. That's in 390 minutes plus stoppages against potentially tired opposition. His overall record over 90 minutes is 4 points from 13 games. His teams have protected a lead zero times out of five.

We also had 3 bits of terrible refereeing in Man City, Arsenal and Liverpool games. Should have had 3 penalties IIRC. The Leicester defeat hurt a lot because it immediately destroyed the momentum from finally getting the first win against Burnley. However, it too started with a terrible decision, the pen for that blatant dive by Madison. A couple of individual errors second half gave them a 4-0 that flattered them. The other big "panic stations" moment under Howe was the Watford equalizer. In hindsight, it was a well-taken goal and well played by them, just one of those things, but at the time it felt like yet more points dropped and symbolic of us being incapable of winning. I don't think anyone could have foreseen the complete turn around we've had since, so credit to Howe and everyone, because it felt very dark at the final whistle. That was Jan 16, so just six weeks ago. Our record after that game was P20 W1 D9 L10 F20 A43 Pts 12

Those sounds tasty odds to me. Realistically, it means finishing about Brighton, Villa, and Southampton, assuming Leicester wake up/win games in hand. Or two of those plus Leicester. Our average of (seasonal form) and (last eight games) is 1.44 points per game, which would take us up to 44. That should be good enough for 11th or 12th. We've also got 19pts off our last 12 games, which if extended would get us to 46 points. Callum Wilson said the other day he'll be back for a "good chunk of games". Add goals to what our midfield and defence are doing and we'll win games.

The one I'd like to see is points lost from winning positions. Many of ours were with Bruce, even his last game against Spurs, and WBA lost from ahead last week. Given that you hear the expression "win from behind" so much in football, it's funny how weird its opposite "lose from ahead" sounds.

We've not conceded in the second half for five games in a row. The Villa pinball offside goal aside, it hasn't even looked like happening. In our first 20 games of 21/22, we conceded 22 in the final 30 minutes alone, blowing out of our arse every week. That's why we lost all those points from winning positions.

Villa were W5 D2 L4, 17 points from 11 games, before we beat them. Most pundits saw that game as an away win and were hyping Stevie G. Leeds were coming off straight wins against West Ham and Burnley, scoring three in each. Their form since we beat them? P6 W0 D1 L5. We have had a run of easy fixtures, but its been with relegation pressure. As everyone said on January 1st, the fixtures meant any players bought in the window would have to slot in immediately for would be our best remaining chances to accumulate points. Howe and the club deserve massive credit for the way this has happened so smoothly. It was not a given! Now the relegation pressure has waned, it'll be good to see us play Southampton, a proper form team, to see how far we have come. My thoughts are definitely turning to next season.

Yeah, at least 30 minutes. The game is won. Just keep Wood on, because it'll be a nightmare if Gayle came on and scored.

Fantastic so far. Workmanlike, professional, methodical, whatever your favourite word is. We have an advantage and we pressed it. Some great center forward play too, albeit from Joelinton and Fabien Schar....err cough cough. We're staying up!

I like JLA but a game against Liverpool or Citeh is not minus three points. An empty fixture perhaps, meaning one less chance to get points, but not something that subtracts three from your total. The worst it can do is make your goal difference worse than someone else's, the equivalent of minus 0.5 points. Interesting analysis of Brentford, who do sound like they've had difficult fixtures of late. This and the xG suggest they are not quite as bad as their form would suggest. xGA suggests their keeper isn't very good and is costing them points. Burnley may be saved by Pope, who is having a great season.

JoeJonJow? I can't see Eriksen doing much from open play. He might have against a Bruce stand-off and watch passive midfield, but not now with the possession and time on the ball we're likely to give them. He might still do something from a free kick though. The two goals we conceded in the last 360 minutes were both free kicks, both off reckless attempts at tackles.

I feel sorry for the WBA fans, but I shall revel in his every failing. The bloke let himself be a stick the media used to beat NUFC fans with, and put a few sneaky blows in himself.

I would have agreed with this based on watching our matches, but TheOther14 on Twitter put up a chart showing we had 13 different scorers. That was before Willock's first of the season, which puts us second top in their chart.

A win, I hope! fwiw, it would put us on 25 points from 25 games, the same as last season. Pretty good given where we were six weeks ago.

Everton zero shots on target today.

Over in League 1, the live scores have the Mackems falling out of the playoff positions.

Back to his best and easily MoM. Great to see him break the long duck and hope there are more goals to come. He looked far more like an England international than Declan Rice.

Great performance, he's really solid as a defender. What a great block against Antonio in the first half. He gets forward too and makes himself pretty useful, much more than was advertised when he came. If there is a point off, its for his delivery, which wasn't good today. I'd rather Shelvey took the corners. We need better delivery when we're playing Wood.

It's not worth risking ASM today if there's a decent chance of him playing in the more important game next week against Brentford. As for the lineup, we've been playing well, so its not worth changing the system from kickoff. That can be done in game as needed.

A lot can still happen but we are by far the best placed. A purple patch for any of the other three teams could happen as mid-table opposition enters beach mode and/or pile up the injuries like Leeds, but the net result will be to drag other teams into it. Its only been a four-team league due to terrible half seasons by the four teams, not great form from everyone else.

That doesn't sound like ideal preparation for this, but I hope JT got the lads got a stottie each on the bus. Terry Mac would have.

Four of our last five have been at home, so it'll be interesting to see what the lads can do without Trippier and the home fans pushing the team on. Leeds aside, our previous away game was the 0-4 at Citeh, a full two months ago. So long as we compete and don't look easy to beat, I'll be happy. The away game to target is next week at Brentford.

I don't know where to put this, but the club have announced a partnership with the analysis people Statsbomb. They've talked about helping Brentford in the past in their podcasts, and that club certainly has done well in the transfer market with their limited resources. Starting this now potentially means the club can use the rest of the season to start identifying targets for the summer.

Just my opinion, I've seen positives in all our Howe games bar two. The first was Leicester. They got a free headstart with that pen off the Madison dive (albeit with some dicking about beforeheand by us), but we capitulated second half and gifted them goals with pretty bad errors. The other was Watford, where we threw away two points with that annoying goal. The cross should have been stopped but once it came in, Trippier failed to block his man and he got a clear run at it above Lascelles, who initially looked at fault but was probably taken out by his own man. If you check the Relegationometer thread, there will have been lots of bumps around that Watford game. We just looked incapable of winning. It took the Leeds game to get that monkey off our back. Every other game has been great, with our midfielders completely transformed and us now racking up wins without Callum Wilson, which would have been unthinkable. The signings we've made look like they've been very astute, and I think we'll only get better.