tom_avfc

It was just a poor first save for me. Could probably have held it but if he was going to parry it he had to ensure that it went out for a corner. He was always going to be out of position for the return cross and with 2 vs 1 at the far post the goal was inevitable. Just a bad mistake but he hasn't made many this season and has won us a decent number of points so I wouldn't want to make too big a deal out of it.

I don’t think it was a booking but he’s done so many fouls he would probably have been due one for the number of fouls alone.

Although 7 of those draws were under RDM last season who definitely didn’t ‘play it safe’. Im not sure I get the obsession with 1 up front being negative either. When we play well we look far more effective with a front 3 than 2 out and our strikers for me.

I don't think our away form has been disastrous this season to be honest: Cardiff (L) - Cardiff are currently unbeaten at home (4 wins and 2 draws) with the 4th best home record in the league Reading (L) - This ones a bad result - probably our worst of the season Bristol (D) - Decent point - Bristol currently have 3 wins, 3 draws and 1 loss at home Barnsley (W) - As expected - Barnsley have lost 3 out of 7 at home this season Burton (W) - Again as expected - Burton have lost 3 out of 6 Wolves (L) - Wolves have lost 1 out of 7 and have the second best home record in the league So in total we've taken 7 points from 6 games leaving us 9th in the away table having played a game fewer away than a lot of the sides above us. Considering that 2 of those games are against the current top 2 in the league who have 1 home defeat between them I'm not sure we've done too badly.

This isn't even true. We've played 5 out of the top 10 (Cardiff, Wolves, Norwich, Bristol and Fulham) and we are also one of the teams in the top 10. Considering we've played 13 games you'd expect us to have played around 5. So in the remaining 10 games up to half way through the season we face 4 top 10 teams. If you then factor in that we've played the teams in 12th, 13th and 14th I don't think you can argue that we've had easier fixtures than other teams in the league up to this point. Additionally, the highest team we've beaten at home are Norwich who sit in 6th in the table and are also the highest team in the league who we have played at home. The next highest team we have played at home are Fulham in 10th and again we beat them. I'd agree with you that winning some more away games would be nice although with two of our away games this season being against the top two and with the recent upturn in away results I'm slightly more confident.

And was the only player to score a penalty for them in the shootout!

Their qualification campaign never really got going did it? They drew too many of their first games (with Bale playing in most of them) and then were always playing catch up from then on.

I’m not being funny but with teams like Millwall and Blues the reputation of their fans is going to go against them. If I was a policeman and with the knowledge of previous games between them I wouldn’t be taking any chances when fans start acting like idiots either. The police don’t just get involved for the sake of it. If I was a fan of one of these teams I wouldn’t go around looking like causing trouble as it’s inevitable what will happen.

Yeah I think this was kind of my point! If Whelan was more mobile, he wouldn’t be playing in the Championship!

I think Onomah could do that role against the weaker teams but I’d worry we’d be far too open against the better teams as he’d want to get forward also. With Whelan he’s got the discipline to play that defensive midfield role and the experience to know when and where he should be. I’d argue that was Fulham’s issue yesterday. They pushed too far forward and had nobody protecting when we broke at them. I think Whelan’s importance to that second half yesterday is being seriously under appreciated by many.

I’d agree with this. I actually thought he was one of our better players second half yesterday. He’s one of our better passers of the ball and was a large part of how solid we looked defensively. The only issue I have with Whelan (and also Jedinak) is their lack of mobility. For me Whelan edges out jedinak as he can move slightly better and pass a lot better. Ideally I’d like a more mobile version of Whelan but I can’t think of many players like that to be honest.

Their second shot on target was actually in the second half - the Johnstone save from point blank range. I agree with your point though. We rarely looked troubled and saw the game out fairly comfortably.

He’s got a wall there to protect the opposite side of the goal. He simply cannot be beaten his side. If the player gets it up and down over the wall then you say fair enough - great fee kick. But by creeping across to his left he’s given the taker a free shot into the corner of the goal he should be protecting. It’s one of the most frustrating goals to concede because it’s so avoidable. That said, I thought he was very good and harshly criticised towards the end of last season and he has been outstanding this season for the most part. Every keeper will make mistakes. Sam did today but his save in the second half more than made up for it.

He’s had a good season but Johnstone has to save that. Keepers side. If he’d put it over the wall and in then fair enough but you can’t get beaten there

Not sure about your Bruce comments here. As you said it was nice to see an unchanged 11 which did reasonably well in the first half. When we came under a little more pressure he brought on Onomah and Hogan for the tiring Kodjia and Davis and moved to a 4-4-1-1 which then sparked our best spell of play where Snodgrass particularly impressed. His final sub was a good defensive sub to counter Bolton's tactic of hitting it up to their big men and played a large part in us winning the game. I don't think Bruce can be particularly criticised today. For me the real negative was the lack of end product from a number of players. Snodgrass and Elmo had a lot of chances to put decent balls into the box but never really threatened. I think a lot of it was down to the numbers that Bolton had back in defence but we just didn't seem to flow particularly well and it looked like a bit of an off day offensively.

Was the perfect player to bring on for the last few minutes today so full credit to Bruce. Made a number of headed clearances and then that last header which was as good as a goal. Much better than when we were bringing him on at the other end of the pitch desperate for a goal!

Fair enough - I was the other side of the pitch from him and I must have just assumed he mishit it as there was never a shot on!!

This times a million. The one thing which disgusted me was the tackled player's reaction. He rolled around for the 10 seconds it took for the ref to get across there and then once he saw the red card he was up and running immediately. Like many have said, its a yellow card 9 times out of 10 but its not one that'll be rescinded.

Was that actually a shot? It looked to me like he was trying to hit the ball hard across the box and just hit it completely wrong. He didn't seem to shape as if to shoot. That may be me giving him the benefit of the doubt though and I haven't seen any replays of it. His decision making can be very poor at times though (as seen with the Adomah one). He seemed to take the ball forwards as if he was going to pass it so narrowed his own angle and then still took the shot on. One of the worst pieces of play I've ever seen at Villa and then he goes and wins a penalty from nothing from the corner.

I agree with the give everyone the option but the sandwich from Tesco is one of the few things that I might actually want a receipt for to stick on the expenses. Completely agree that 99% of the time I don't need a receipt though. Some self service kiosks seem to give the option now to be fair.

I think the kind of player he is means that he's got a better chance than Delfouneso of making it. He's a proper target man which means there is more to his game than simply scoring goals. For me it's much harder for a player like Delfouneso or Hepburn-Murphy to cement a place in a team because if they're not scoring goals then they don't tend to impact a match. He's made an extremely promising start and is a large part of our mini revival due to how he holds the ball up and brings those around him into the game. Hopefully he keeps it up for as long as possible. My only worry would be fatigue as he can't be used to playing games as regularly as he has, especially at the higher level.

I thought Foster had retired from international football but may be wrong. I don't really see the need for having 4 keepers in the squad to be honest so you could just remove Hart from that squad really. Antonio hasn't had a great start to the season (who has at West Ham to be fair). Again I'd have no issue if he was in the squad rather than Oxlade-Chamberlain but I don't see a great deal of difference between them. Similar could be said for Dawson in for Smalling. Livermore and Delph are the two who most have been critical of but there's been no alternative suggested for central midfield. Picking on form is all well and good but if you have a lack of on form English players of even average Premier League quality then there's not a great deal you can do. Henderson has also had a pretty poor start to the season but its reached the point where nobody even questions his inclusion. That sums up how far the England squad has declined to me.

I largely agree with your assessment of the players. However, I can't think of many players you could really replace them with and that's why they're in the squad. It's all well and good saying players in the squad aren't very good but if we have no alternatives then I don't know what Southgate is really supposed to do.

Has been excellent since he came back. I think Saturday is a great chance for him to get off the mark for the season. If he can start banging in the goals like last year we'll be a real force to reckon with given the improvement of the squad around him.

I think this is a bit of a generous summing up of the goal. Real had pretty much 8 players up front for the last 20 minutes which left them open to a counter attacking goal. The goal came from a nice cross to an unmarked player at the far post due to this. I’m sure there’d be examples of this happening in the premier league when a big team is so desperate for a win that they completely neglect defending as an idea. Betis could have had a couple before their goal on the breakaway but on most days real would have scored 3 or 4 with the chances they had.