bluebruce

Positives: We have shown we can actually come back from 2 down, and score a couple at home, albeit against poor opposition. Baradji is starting to show his class. The two goals will give him oodles of confidence. If he came off with cramp as stated then it shouldn't keep him out of any games, although it's a sign he might not be fit enough yet. We have a really promising clutch of young defenders coming through. Two of them, Litherland and Atcheson, are good ballers too. Shame about Atcheson's injury, although it does seem to have helped Atcheson get his opportunity. Need to see a bit more of O'Riordan to make a judgement. And of course we've got Pratt who has been really solid since coming in. With the numbers, and the potential to develop some fine young players of our own, it seems crazy to suggest we should still sign another CB...except that McLoughlin (who was good today tbf) shouldn't be our best seasoned defender. You could say we have Wharton and Carter coming back eventually, but we all know how that ends. Selling Hyam without a replacement was stupid. 3 ex-Rovers on the pitch, and none of them scored, assisted, or pulled off a remarkable save. The immutable law of the ex was muted. I won a decent bundle betting on the game 😂 about 40 quid up I think Negatives: Pretty obvious. This was a must-win game really. We can't keep failing to take 3 points against bottom-end sides, especially the ones we are in a relegation dogfight with. This was a missed opportunity. Some of the subs near the end continued Ismael's bizarre tendency to seemingly make subs for the sake of it and mess with our flow, though it sounds like the Baradji one was enforced. De Neve being on the pitch gives me kittens. If there had been one more corner in the game I'd have won another 23 quid 😂

We need to get ahead of Charlton first to keep ahead of them. This was the chance, spurned.

Don't think there are rules to retroactively punish players for diving are there?

De Neve is fucking stupid. Dangerous Charlton counter, your options are clean him out and take the card, or use his superior pace to get in front of him and tackle him properly. Instead he had two or three half assed attempts to tackle and kept having to overtake him again after them.

Player turned fully away from it and it was blasted at him. At best it hit the side of his arm as he was turning away. Did what he could to avoid it. I want it, but it's no penalty for me.

'Baradji going off...he's just ran out of steam' Eh? Just scored a fine equaliser minutes ago. Do we want to win this?

It's not like that at all. They've had tons of success in the last 15 years, we have been a failing basketcase year in year out.

Unlucky Atcheson, that was sick!

Says everything about my apathy that I'm worrying more about some players getting some bookings so my bets can come in, than I am about us scoring again.

Just seen it on a clearer image, Pickering definitely didn't touch him.

Last angle is more revealing, you are probably right actually. Could do with a clearer image and slow mo to be 100% though. The player reacts like he felt something, when he probably didn't see enough to feel confident in the dive. But yeh looks like he pulls short of making contact to me. Charlton player likely just gambled because he saw a body coming in a little recklessly. Edit - clearer image confirms, definitely didn't touch him. A well chosen dive tbf, but I do hate cheating bastards.

Option to buy. You'd have to hope the player terms are already agreed and binding or it just won't happen.

I watched it too. Definitely contact. Pulled out of giving it full force but he caught him and it was a bit high. Easily a penalty. So was the one we didn't get. Edit - seen the best replay of it now, retract my comment, Picks definitely avoided catching him. Dive.

I've long since stopped wondering why the horrendous officials in this league do what they do.

Celtic may be overdoing it, things can't be that bad there, but you don't think we should be giving our board and ownership a torrent of shit?

Nice goal that. Ohashi, Cantwell and Baradji all did well. Still gonna lose.

Got kicked. Threw himself down when he felt it, but he was kicked. Ismael out. Rudy out. Pasha out. Venkys fucking out.

Nah I saw the replay, he dragged him down. On the other hand we shouldn't have had that free kick just then. Charlton won the ball.

And instead we're losing out of nothing.

Should have been a penalty.

That highly speculative effort from Charlton there tells me that they have been told to work Pears, knowing he has a cockup in him (not literally).

This ref isn't for giving fouls off the ball.

I can already see this isn't going to be a game of fine football. It's going to be a battle. We will see if our lads have the fight in them to come out of it... Lose today and I think we'll go down. The kind of dogfight you have to be able to get at least something from.

Seems a lot for a player who was out of contract. But WBA did offer him a new deal, so they'd have been due compo. Presumably they agreed to waive most of it for a cash-poor Barnsley in exchange for the very high sell on.

Aren't we likely to lose 1 or 2 ESC slots in the summer though due to not giving enough minutes to English trained players? We can't be far from that point. We were very British in composition a couple of years ago, but now we are regularly playing a couple of Japanese lads, an Icelander, a Hungarian, an Aussie, all the Rudy randoms.