Matt1892

I think teams make adjustments at half time when we are on top and we struggle to make a counter adjustment when the game is underway, when you mix that in with having players that do not excel at possession based football then you are going to give the ball away a lot and face wave after wave of attacks. We used to have Pope go down with a fake injury so we could get the rest of the players together to make adjustments but we don’t do that any more either. The other issue is our midfield shape and nobody playing in the #10 position, which means when we are pinned back that Isak drops in to this position and we have no outlet on the last man, which again results in us giving the ball away.

I can’t say I noticed us looking any more comfortable when Tonali came on.

Must win is an overused statement but if we had lost today then I don’t think we would have caught Forest, so the result was what mattered. If 5th is going to get Champions League and Man Utd and Spurs have imploded, then there is no better opportunity to qualify, we just need some consistency to be the best of a pretty average bunch. Such a strange season.

Bournemouth playing well with 10 men, the more they push the more space for Wolves on the counter.

Man City will aim higher than Trafford.

Dubs is only signing a contract so we can get a fee from Saudi in the summer. Probably the same terms as January.

Our short term aim over the next few years should be to constantly finish inside the top six, which isn’t an unreasonable aim. Then once we have done that we are in a position where the profile of the club globally should be raised and the commercial gap should close. Catching Arsenal in terms of commercial revenue is pie in the sky stuff unless we can either manoeuvre related party deals or we can grow the club to match their global appeal, which will be done on the pitch over a number of years. If Chelsea qualify for the Champions League next season then their figures will jump up a similar amount, there isn’t any point in beating yourself up over it.

£45 million minimum I would have thought.

More likely to sign Zabarnyi than Huijsen if we do look at a centre back from Bournemouth.

Burnley keeper James Trafford has only faced 21 shots on target in achieving his 11 successive clean sheets - including saving two penalties from Sunderland's Wilson Isidor. No team has had more than three shots on target against them in any of those games. https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/articles/cq8kle2x81do

If we don’t leave ourselves high up the pitch exposed for counter attacks then we should win this one quite comfortably.

I had us finishing 6th on 66 points, but there was only 2 points separating us, Chelsea, Bournemouth and Forest in the 4th - 7th positions. My first attempt had us at 5th on 66 points, but randomly Villa only had 55 points so did it again.

I’ve just looked at Bournemouth’s run in and of the 7 home league games they have left, Fulham are the highest in the league out of the opposition. They are 5 points off last seasons total, which was the most points they have earned in a Premier League I believe. Iraola is another level.

Could be ahead of us in the league before we play Forest.

At the beginning of the season I thought he needed to get European football as a minimum to be here next season, but I’m not sure how the decision makers will view it if we finish below Bournemouth or Forest, as we can rightfully blame FFP for not being able to compete with City and Liverpool but they won’t see any excuse to be behind those clubs. Today is only one game but our league performances are patchy at best, throw in the cup final and it feels quite Ten Hag-esque this season.

Rutter had a buy out clause I believe.

Even if we didn’t put any deals forward between that time, surely we put some forward now, knowing the new rules that were introduced will likely be challenged too.

If we can claim damaging amounts of compensation from the league, we could potentially use that to leverage the rules going forward.

When Willock has played on a regular basis he doesn’t look out of place at all, the problem for him and others is that when they are given bit part roles, usually after a period of injury, they look miles off the pace. Hopefully we get European football and that will allow us to rotate and give the squad adequate game time, but as much as Willock looks like he needs games to get up to speed, you have Joelinton who looked like he could do with a rest, playing every week until injury. We need to get the balance right.

What I like is that once we realised he wasn’t the right fit for the club, we moved him on quickly, which will be the best thing for all parties. Good luck to him at Juventus, a great experience for him.

If the flexibility to spend isn’t there then we have to suck it up, it seems like the whole market is stagnant at the moment and will kick in to life in the summer. We are in a decent place squad wise at the moment, we have few injuries and no European football to wear us down, so the expectations for Europe are still there. In fact, there will be people within the club thinking we should qualify for the Champions League in the league gets a fifth spot, what with the capitulation of Man Utd and Spurs this season. No reason why we should be finishing behind Forest, Bournemouth and Villa since they have Champions League. People talk about selling purples and whilst you would want the likes of Barnes, Willock and Joelinton to go first, I’m not against selling one of our top assets knowing the money will be reinvested in to signings another 2 top players. Isak would be the last one I would want to go. Goes without saying.

Poor second half from us, instead of being ruthless we took our foot off the peddle and dropped to their level.

We are letting them build momentum.

We need to be professional here and put this game to bed.