tom_avfc

I thought he looked like a Grealish type player. Lots of potential but how long do you keep saying that for when his overall impact is minimal. Both still have time to make it but both seem to need a kick up the backside to really get them going.

Great summary of the game as usual but a few things I disagree on. The challenge by bent on Johnstone was a blatant foul and Johnstone did nothing wrong in that instance. More worrying for me were the couple of times he didn't come for balls that he should have. The decision before Bacuna's red card was possibly the worst decision I've seen live at a game. The linesman was directly on top of the incident and still couldn't see the most blatant of touches. Given that the long throw ins were looking fairly dangerous I can see why Bacuna got annoyed and if he's not back in the team when available I'd be concerned at the management. i also don't think we were crap. We were dogged and did what needed to be done. Probably worth noting that other than the goal, Green's header was the closest either team came to scoring.

I thought Hughes was ineffective today to be honest. Has always seemed like a bit of a luxury player to me and the derby fans I spoke to were eager for him to get his big money move to a big club's bench. The overhyping of young English players is strange to me. Thought Bacuna and Lansbury looked better players than him today.

Who were the four full backs? Bjarnasson suddenly a right back now? Or are we classing Bacuna as a full back even though he was up front? I get that Bruce has been negative but let's not make things up!

What an odd post! Only Villa could go on a 13 game winning run! A run that would leave us with 78 points and in the playoffs. I think I'm watching a different football team to you but I don't doubt that if this happened you'd still be complaining that the football wasn't good enough!!

So Alan Hutton can go wandering where he wants and it's Adomah's fault if that causes a goal. I actually thought Hutton, Adomah and everyone else did a great job defensively today. Was probably Adomah's worst game for us going forward but that can happen for a winger. He'll have good and bad days and has done this season.

I genuinely don't think he meant to touch the linesman at all. Call me naive but that twitter video doesn't look to me like he's deliberately touched him. I think he made a huge difference today. Having someone mobile who can get around the pitch has won us a game we'd have lost otherwise imo. Shame he'll miss the next few but as soon as he's available I'd have him straight back in the team. As an aside, the attitude shown by him, Gardner(albeit for 5 minutes) and Hutton today is exactly what we need to achieve anything. I've had enough of nothing players who show as much fight as Audley Harrison on his worst day.

Bruce set up a 4-4-1 with adomah up front. That's not an opinion it's fact. He wasn't starting from the right he was playing up front! I don't particularly agree with him having adomah up front but that's definitely where he was playing.

I don't get this. By far the best midfielder we've been linked with and far too good for us. Is it sarcastic or do people really think we could do better?

I was there and agree with your assessment mostly. I think he's been decent when he's come on at the end of games as he does look to put the opposition under a bit of pressure. I don't think he should be starting games but I do see why SB considers him an option from the bench. In fact I see him pretty similarly to Rudy at the moment. They are both decent options (for differing reasons) for the last 20 minutes of a game or so but I'd be disappointed to see either of them start. I suppose the real issue with both Gabby and Rudy is the lack of a goal scoring threat but as you said they're good at harrying and at creating space/opportunities for others.

I don't get this attitude at all. He came on in the last game and a good flick from him started the move from which we got the winning goal. Yes he's acted stupidly in the last season or two but for me if he can help the team then we use him. As an aside I like the response he's been getting from the crowd recently and I like the fact that he's acknowledging the support and genuinely seems to be trying his hardest. This good run has massively helped the atmosphere around the club and has worked well for Bruce bringing Gabby back in.

A good post with some good points made. However, I don't see how the highlighted part can be realistic without Trump hiding himself under a huge rock. A lot of what he has said has been racist and sexist and a lot of what he stands for seems to be also This is where the similarities to Brexit/Farage are. It legitimises those "I'm not racist but" opinions held by more people than you would imagine. For me both this election and the EU referendum were won by targetting these tendencies in people.

It's interesting that the 2 teams we have beaten over those four matches sit in 4th and 6th on the form table. This suggests that we're beating teams that are on good form themselves. It also backs up the theory that anyone can beat anyone in the league as does the league position of the teams who are doing well at the moment.

I think Gil had a lot of talent but at the time we were horribly disorganised and were introducing far too many new players at one time. I think if you added Carles Gil to a better drilled and organised side like we are now you'd see a very different player. Additionally, this league looks considerably poorer than the Premier League from what I've seen. For me, if he does come back at some point this season, I wouldn't be against him being given a chance and could see him offering similar to a player like Forestieri at Wednesday. He's still young at 23 and seemed to have a good connection with Grealish on the rare occasions they played together. He could be the difference maker in games such as the ones which we have been drawing up to this point. Having said that he was largely inconsistent and he was probably more suited to the style of football we played under RDM rather than the new functional look of Bruce's team. I don't see the harm in trying him at some point, particularly when a few of our attacking players disappear for the AFCON in January.

The areas of the pitch where Fulham had their possession were never threatening though. They barely tried to put an attacking move together in the match. We also lack any kind of creativity in the middle of the park so our best option is to get the ball forward to Ayew/Kodjia/Adomah and play a direct game. I'd almost say that at the moment if we're passing the ball around we're only slowing down attacks for our pacey players up top. In a strange way I think having a lot of possession wouldn't really be playing to our strengths as a team.

But if teams come to play the way Fulham did yesterday I'd be fairly comfortable conceding a large amount of possession. For me it only becomes an issue when we're not creating chances and are conceding chances. Football is about a lot more than just possession. Ask Fulham fans if they were happy with their 65% possession which got them 4 shots in an entire match. If we have close to 20 shots on goal every game we won't be going far wrong particularly if our keeper isn't even having to make a meaningful save.

I don't think the 34% possession did particularly limit our chances to create something. In reality we got the ball forward as quickly as possible to our creative players. If we'd have passed the ball around the back and midfield for a bit we'd have been no more likely to create chances. The natural instinct of players such as Ayew, Kodjia and Adomah is to get the ball and run at players to make things happen. This will limit our time on the ball and they will concede possession a fair few times. I didn't think they played particularly well yesterday but we still had 17 shots on goal. For me it's important to look at the overall game rather than just the stats.

We had 17 shots and 7 on target. That's more than enough to win a game of football. Fulham were pretty good at playing no risk possession football so dominated possession. They had 4 shots with 0 on target. We could have evened up possession by passing the ball around in areas where Fulham didn't want to press but we'd have been less likely to score. If anything, our more direct, less posession based game helped us win that game.

I would love Gabby to get back in the team to be honest. If he manages this he'd have to be better than kodjia, McCormack, gestede and ayew up front or better than Adomah, ayew and Grealish out wide. For me that would be a huge asset.

I'm not sure Pegasus names many things that would be relevant in the context used! To be fair I'm not usually pedantic but its not often you get chance to use anything learnt from a classics degree!!

Pedantic I know, but Pegasus is the name of a particular winged horse rather than a species so their dad would have to be Pegasus rather than "a Pegasus".

We've had a horrible amount of yellow cards for dissent this year. Is really frustrating that we keep picking up unnecessary yellows for it but it's a sign we're up for the fight I suppose.

Maybe the last time we won? As comfortable a 3-0 win as you can see. Rotherham were dreadful though!

Also in Vienna in the first week of December so would definitely appreciate any tips from people who have been.

Completely agree with this. We get these games every qualifying campaign when teams show no intent to do anything against us. It's impossible to judge anything on them and it's just a case of winning them and moving on.