bluebruce

That's mind-boggling to even consider. I knew he wasn't rated enough at Liverpool of course, but error-prone? I've never seen a less error-prone keeper in my life, the absolute model of consistency. And if I remember rightly they offloaded him because they had Calamity James to rely on? Madness.

Interested enough to pay for it? Not in the slightest.

Did TK give this absolutely superb BJ during the game? I know he only had 4 saves to make but doing that between saves is really disrespecting the opposition. And what about the social distancing rules? No wonder covid is spreading through the camp if this is what we get up to...

I'm absolutely certain I heard them mention his hamstring. I wasnt really paying attention myself to what he had done, as I was busy cursing us, and him, getting another injury so soon, so their commentary is the only reason I knew it was his hammy. Maybe they said knee at first, dunno, but they definitely said hamstring at some point. It's been a good day when all we are arguing about is the commentary though!

Shearer for me. When he went one on one I was almost already celebrating. When he missed it came as a shock.

True potentially but I don't think 'not losing anyone' is remotely on the cards. The last few weeks have shown that. Whether it's the training, the intensity of the playing style, the innate injury proneness of the players, the covid, bad luck, or a combination, it's apparent we are going to have injuries throughout the season. You don't have 11 first team players out as a sheer fluke and go back to having nobody out once it calms down. The question is more about how many we will have, whether they're to key players, or build up in specific areas of the pitch, and whether we can cope with the knocks and setbacks along the way. And of course whether we can start to consistently beat the defensive and organised sides that have been turning us over or getting draws.

I think it was just a throwaway comment by one poster until you took them to task on it though? You've magnified the discussion of the thing you didn't want discussing. Anyway very happy with that, was worried for spells but I think I'm almost happier with a ground out win than another boom and bust 4-0 at the moment. Got to be able to get these inbetweeny wins too.

Won't stop a small handful criticising him, which frankly is starting to piss me off. I get having scapegoats of our worst players all the time, there's always a weak link in a side to be improved. But for a long time now there have consistently been a tiny bunch who slag off whoever our best player is. Rhodes, then Dack, now Armstrong. I know they're not beyond reproach, but some seem to expect them to be perfect. Arma has 11 league goals and we are only a week into November. If he misses the odd chance or does something 'greedy' as someone said earlier, so fucking be it. He has more goals than 9 of the teams in this league have. None of our other players have more than 3 (and that's a central midfielder). He knows he is our best hope of goals so of course he is going to look to score as his first instinct.

Shite penalty decision. But whatever happens I'm not accepting any excuses for not winning this, as it's been going on too long.

Yeh remembered when they showed it again at half time. Tbh that was a fairly standard save for me, Arma didn't get enough power or placement on it. You get annoyed with your keeper if they miss that. But ok yeh it was another good chance.

Go on Ben! Tricky finish that, especially under pressure from the lad behind him

Two long punts up to QPR defenders with none of our players anywhere near. On the first one, Elliott was on for a nice easy throw and break.

Only remembering one, from the Wharton header. When was the other?

QPR don't convince the commentators defensively at all apparently. But that was only the second time we have actually troubled the keeper I believe, and it was straight at him.

What happened to Kaminski's good distribution?

21 years since they've beaten us at Ewood, the LT decided to announce... I think we have all followed Rovers long enough to know what happens next.

Stirgiakis is just a goalie. I'm sure he can play 90 minutes then sit on a bench for 90 minutes the next day. Tbh I'm sure he could play 90 minutes the next day if Pears suddenly pulled up. I wouldn't read too much into it.

Well...that unbeaten start ended rather spectacularly... 6-0 to Arsenal, and we were the home side. Included a Pike own goal, which is probably how they got that score with only 5 shots on target. Guess the Greek might not be the answer to our current keeping issue.

As someone else said, injured when EFL clubs could loan players. It's only a 2 month loan I believe it was, so a couple of months playing regularly against men is something he hasn't had yet and will be a brief but possibly helpful education, which doesnt suck up too much of his time. I don't mind this move, my first instinct was annoyance too though.

And you had canvassed them all by the time you posted had you? And they all agreed? Impressive. Devil's advocate but you believe it. Tying yourself in knots now Mani. You might not care what I think (although you did care enough about it to reply) but I've seen the mods ask you to stop talking that way before. Look, just try civility and balance, it won't hurt you.

Theres definitely irony that he removed the context... Was still an awful performance we got lucky with though.

We were utter dogdick tonight. That said I have a funny feeling that if we had Arma we might have sneaked it on the break. Wharton is my secret man of the match. Twice near the end he very cleverly positioned himself and held the Boro players to stop them scoring easy chances.

He doesnt impress me, but tbf, if he was all-round terrible tonight we would have lost. He won Peter Jackson motm. Think that's more because we took on too much pressure, and I'd have backed Kaminski to save all of those, but 'terrible' is harsh. Terrible is Fettis letting every shot fly past him.

Nah there was one drilled at him through some bodies, quite short range and straight at him, but he clutched it first time and held it well.

Yes, he nearly gave a goal away with his first touches.