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WBA and Boro did try and play a low block against us, we just scored early in the match. Both teams needed a goal and that’s when the game opened up and we get the 2nd goal. This conversation wouldn’t be happening like this if MVE doesn’t make a v basic error. It was the same v Plymouth to go...

It was a question, not an instruction. The essence of being a football fan is maintaining the belief that our team can get a result no matter how unlikely the odds. As it happens, the stats in the game on Friday and the league table since November has shown we are a better team than Sunderland...

Strongly agree on the Sakamoto point. He’s a quality player but does lack the consistency to be a top end Championship winger. Let’s assume we keep Rudoni and Wright into next season, you need a 3rd goal threat who can get 10+ goals in a season. Perhaps EMC can elevate his game next season but...

With a heavy insinuation that it won’t be done again. I find a lot of naysaying odd, we’ve been the better team than them for quite a long now and one freakish result doesn’t change that. ‘Always the victim, it’s never your fault’

If that’s the attitude, why bother turning up to the game or tuning in on the TV? To be frank, the odds are against us but they were against us in the previous playoff seasons and that didn’t stop us.

If MVE doesn’t do two pretty significant mistakes, we probably nick a win or be taking a draw to SoL. All too often this season we’ve been on hand to hand teams easy chances. That’s the weak underbelly. Looking at how we play, Lampard will be looking to add an athletic CB to this group...

I’m confident we’ll win the tie, two fortunate goals doesn’t change anything for me. They’ll try and replicate the 1st leg and it’ll backfire because their fans will get on their back. The alternative works for me, they come at us and we have more space to operate in. Lampard’s Derby pulled...

Weren’t we close to maxing the loan limit in each of seasons? The contract length of the team was also shorter in the L1 and L2 days too, around 2 years average. The squad is fully contracted to 2027 and in terms of total headcount, we probably only need 3-5 players. Any additional signings...

The intention is play Haji upfront as far as I can tell. We were after wingers in Jan which indicates that’s the recruitment priority. It’s a shame we haven’t really got to see EMC and Wright play too often together.

I’m willing to take pelters for this opinion, but I believe Simms will come good under Lampard. Looking at some of his goals last season, we need to put the ball into space for not just him but all our strikers. There’s also a credible long range threat that’s been present in his professional...

Keiffer Moore at 32/33 isn’t going to be high up the shortlist. There’s £15-16 million invested in strikers so the challenge for Lampard is getting the most out of them and any signings would be subject to outgoings. Torp has been a big miss in the games that the opposition plays the low block...

It’s these threads that expose how narrow our knowledge is on players. Players like Dolan and Darling are good players who are roughly the ‘right’ profile. I’d like us to utilise free agency and pick up some smart signings to bolster the squad. There will be players all over Europe who will be...

That assumes that was the plan. From the Sunderland perspective, they will be concerned that they couldn’t really get dangerous counter attacks on the go. Waiting for the opposition to make a catastrophic mistakes isn’t a plan. They know that they nicked the win and it really is as simple as...

This is a knee jerk response. To say they executed the perfect game plan is giving them too much credit. MVE’s suicidal back pass gave them a last gasp winner and even then Haji was prevented scoring an equaliser with a genuinely top class tackle from Jobe. They defended well and that’s the...

The relationship between the referee and VAR is all wrong imo. VAR shouldn’t refer the referee to incidents but the referee should refer an incident to VAR themself to ‘check their homework’. That way, the incidents that aren’t referred to VAR is down to the referee. As things stand, it’s...

Nonetheless, we lost and Notts County had only lost 2 games at home all season. I’m sure many people on this forum wrote us off back in 2018. My own view was that we needed to win at home. In reality, these nights are the big games where true heroes emerge.

That’s a given… I’m sure if you went back to the relevant threads covering the playoff years there would be a lot of similar opinions viewed then as there is now. I remember thinking we needed to beat Boro to go through in 2023 because we hadn’t won at the Riverside. We also got beat 3-1 by...

More of this optimism! No surrender up north!

It’s hard when a team puts 8 players behind the ball but I’d like to see us take more ranged shots because it can force defences to presses potential shooters and or a parried save causes chaos in the box.

How did Rudoni score his goal again?