useless

Oliver Arblaster who we have been linked to is a similar style of player to Gallagher, might be difficult to get though as is a big Sheffield United fan, Wilder has just made him captain, and called him their best player, will inevitably leave eventually, but will maybe give them another season, it's only really been this season that he's had his breakthrough.

I've previously mentioned Angel Gomes, but have doubted we would go for him as he's not really a traditional DM, but now Percy has said we want a box-to-box midfielder, I wouldn't be surprised if we're one of the clubs looking at him, started as more of No.10, then became a deep-lying-playmaker, where he developed some DM qualities, and can play as a 'eight', basically an all rounder, but technically very good, reads the game well and has good vision, I guess similar kind of player to Luiz

Hayden Hackney is another potential target who I had doubted we would go for as not a DM in Kamara sense, but again if w want more of an eight style he could be an intereting option

From what Ward has been saying I don't think she's expecting to get the sack, or that she's going to resign. 

I guess her getting the sack is more of a possibility in the summer than it has been at any point during the season, I wouldn't rule it out, but I think she will more likely stay than leave

She might just get away with the poor season we've had because of mitigating circumstances - injuries and so on, not helped by the club in January, and wlll still have some credit for the overall good job she's done since being appointed

I guess we will see, big summer coming up regardless of what happens with Ward

West Ham with injury time equalizer, Sophia Poor could have done better, but the rest of the team should take a huge amount of responsibility, as could have kept it away from our goal but gave it away ridiculously cheaply by just kicking it straight out for a goalkick which lead to the attack for their goal, Poor had been excellent until that point

Three points from Everton, Leicester, Bristol City, and West Ham at home is a dreadful return, it's results like that that have killed our season, not the losing to top four clubs which seem to attract a lot more negativity.

Just need the season to end now and hope we've got a good plan for the summer and next season

Well done Lehmann, slightly better this half, but still not great, hopefully we can hang on now

That was a pretty poor half from us to say the least, inviting so much pressure onto ourselves, which I thought would be the last thing we would do considering we have an inexperienced seventeen year old in goal, would be avoidable if we kept the ball better and actually mounted some consistent pressure on their goal rather than the few sporadic attacks we've had. Sophia Poor at least has done well when she's been called upon, hopefully the rest of the team help her out better second half

This has been a really strange performance so far, must be into double figures the amount of times we've given it away cheaply either by passing straight to them or straight out of play, playing like the ball is an hot potato, need more composure. They're the better team so far, having more attacks, which is diappointing, they're easily the seond worst team in the division other than Bristol City

Gomes probably would be expensive, very highly rated, and I think been linked to some big clubs because of his good form this season

He's only played about three and half worth of games for us in total since he joined the club, and most of that has come in dribs and drabs, he's not going to look like world beater, or Champions League quality player in that small amount of game time, no young players do unless they're extreme outliers, in general if they get a run of games and don't look out of place then that's a promising sign by itself.

It would be wrong to presume just because he isn't being used much Emery doesn't rate him, could just be that he doesn't think he's ready, or that he thinks it's too much of a risk to play a youngster as a DM in the situation we're in with so much at stake, also have to remember he missed pre-season, and was hardly fit for the first half of the season, all that said I think there's a chance he could be sold with buy back in the summer, but don't be surprised if has a Philogene type season next season and people are asking for us to resign him, because he will no doubt do well at Championship level if used right and in a half decent team

The key really for whoever he's playing for is to give him a role where he has license to get forward, I watched him for QPR a lot and he was unquestionably much much better when they played him as a box-to-box midfielder, ask him to play purely as a DM and you're restricting some of his best qualities

If he has a problem as it stands it's probably in both final thirds, defensively and attacking, defensively he can be prone to giving away cheap free-kicks, his passing in general is good, but can also have the odd lapse in concentration and end up giving the ball away cheap, which again is a big problem in the defensive third, and then at the other end he's not going to score a lot of goals or get many assists, although I'm sure he can improve both,  a lot of his good play for QPR was carrying the ball forward and then giving it to someone else to something with it, he's a pretty good forward passer too

If Martinez was on the pitch Gallagher wouldn't have even had the chance to score that goal, because the chance wouldn't have arrived, the game would have followed a completely different trajectory, as Martinez would made completey different passes to those which Olsen made and from that the game would have followed a different course. We still might have lost the lead, but if had have done with Martinez on the pitch it would have happened in a different way

The better news regarding Norwich's position in the away league table is that much of it's down to poor form in the first half of the season, in 2024 the only teams to have beat them on their travels have been Middlesbrough, Leicester, and Leeds, and in the Middlesbrough game Middlesbrough were down to ten men for the last sixty minutes.

Norwich have to go for the win, they can't afford to take anything for granted, all it would take is for them to take it easy, get beat by three goals, and Hull to thrash Plymouth by five and they would fall out of the play-off places, or for them to lose by four and Hull to win by four.

Three or four season's back Nottingham Forest were in a similar position, lost big on the last day and ended up missing out on the play-offs on goal difference when they had looked guaranteed to finish top six.

These beat Coventry 3-0 recently, they're actually not that bad at home, and as it happens Norwich are very poor away from home for a team in the top six, only Huddersfield, Sheffield Wednesday, Plymouth, small heath, and Rotherham have worse away recods this season, so they wlll know that they will have to put in a good performance to make sure

I've said it a gazillion times but he's not a specialist DM, previous to him being asked to play there for us recently, he had only ever played as a DM when he had another specialist beside him, this was true of his time at West Brom, our U21s, and at QPR.

His best qualities are his ability to drive forward with the ball and his passing, if he's sold in the summer and the buying team has any sense they will play him as a box-to-box midfielder and he will do well, very well, if we've got any sense we will insist on a buyback clause

I watched him recently for England U20s and he did play as a DM in that game - England age group teams often play non DMs in the DM position, I've seen them play both Aaron Ramsey ad Jimoh-Aloba there - and he wasn't great in that game... except when he got forward, in those moments he was very good

We've got one of our biggest games in recent history coming up in the week, our first European Semi-Final since 1982, I'm surprised it's being talked about so little

Would have been okay with a point beforehand, we had three brilliant wins previously in quick succession and not easy to keep that up, plus there was always going to be a reaction from Chelsea after what happened to them against Arsenal, I think they've only lost one in ten, so they've been good at grinding out results. We're seven points ahead of Spurs, so they've still got to win all three games in hand to go above us, if Arsenal can beat them tomorrow then today's point will be looking even better

Norwich can't rest their entire team on the last day, rules were introduced after Huddersfield did it, to stop it happening again. Besides Norwich have a much stronger squad than Huddersfield had, so them resting a few shouldn't make much of a difference, the players that come in will be decent, and will be wanting to force their way into the starting eleven for the play-offs

And now Wednesday have a second goal

Huddersfield equalize

I think West Brom will probably beat Wednesday, but also Albion don't have a great away record, and I think it has got worse of late, so that one might be closer than might be expected. The thing working against Wednesday is that West Brom stll need another win to confirm their play-off place, so they will make it difficult

Ipswich could be promoted before they play Huddersfield on the last day if they win their next two

The Cross and the Axe (Bogdan Dziworski)

Elegiac documentary about Krzyżtopór Castle in the village of Ujazd, southern Poland. Built between ca. 1627 and 1644 by Krzysztof Ossoliński, it was occupied until 1770 when it was destroyed by the Russian army during the military actions against the army of the Bar Confederation. Nowadays, the castle is classified as a permanent ruin. The film is a powerful meditation on vanity and historical decline whose ghosts inhabit the ancient ruins. Modern times are really ridiculous compared to the magnificence of the destroyed fortress.

Very great, visually stunning, and good soundtrack which I think is some sort folk choral thing, and sound design is good too, I didn't even know what it was about as I watching, I just knew people rave about Bogdan Dziworski documentaries as being hidden gems, and this was definitely good, some of the cinematography was like watching Tarkovsky film or something, this one about Ice Hockey from the same director also looks interesting

Young is a box of tricks type winger similar to Philogene, I think he has a lot more to his game as a winger than just going past players with his pace, but when he's playing on the right hand side that's his main asset, and since he came from injury I've noticed his crossing has improved a lot, so I think he's going on he outside a lot to take advantage of that, when he's on the left he cuts inside and his play is more about linking up with others around him, I actually think he's improved a lot since his injury, previously he was obviously very talented, but seemed like he was waiting for the game to come to him rather than taking control of it himself, but now gets a lot more involved, I actually wouldn't be surprised to see him back on the first team bench before the end of the season

Jimoh-Aloba has some very good games, and even in games where he's not as good he has some moments of technical brilliance, kind of how Kadan Young was last season, which I think is normal for a player his age, Kellyman was similar last season as well

Good to see Broggio back as well, another top young attacking prospect, actually came into the U21s before Borland and Jimoh as a first year scholar, but has been injured since Decemeber

Unless Leeds turn this around I think they've pretty much handed automatic promotion to Ipswich, they Ipswich will only need four points from their final three games if it stays like this. QPR had nothing to play for, so was expecting a routine Leeds win