Mason 47

At least this puts away the old Cantwell-esque argument that 'he's got a long exotic name and isn't a local lad, so he'll be given unlimited chances'.

10 years ago, this would have been one of the greatest FA cup ties of all time. It's ended up just being the precursor to yet another Manchester v Manchester tie. Be still, my beating heart

Ugly decision. I completely believe the other way round the goal is given. The magic of The Decision We Wanted

Joke decision that is.

Hard to criticise him still, so few minutes. Fact of the matter is that Sargent is so important that if we need goals I think he had to stay on.

Bristol came in wanting a result and we came in hoping for it, IMO. We just looked a bit less determined. If you can't win, don't lose. Hopefully we are more focused for Swansea.

Hwang went out on loan again to Turkey, played in early Feb but seems this was too soon and re-injured the hamstring so has only played 3 games. I think it a combination of his fitness, Sargents return and the shadow of the legal stuff that brought us to cancel his deal.

Kenny McLean vs Barnsley on the final day of the season several years ago springs to mind as a cautionary tale. Halved by Helik in a nothing game, missed out on Scotland squad for the Euros as a result.

He does, more a comment on Hwangs age & experience. As quite a few have said about Idah, you'd expect him at, say, 29 to be much more capable AKA the Carlton Morris paradigm.

For questions of Idah v SvH, I've been trying to look at it in terms of 'would X have scored Y goal'. Concluded most likely that the latter would be at least on a similar sort of goal return, had he been here since the start instead. In terms of Hwang, I don't think Idah would have found the net as much with the exact same chances. Neither SvH, perhaps an argument for Sunderland A. Personally I think Hwang is clear of both, however, one should probably expect that from a 30+ international striker

In fairness, they've always been the loud ones. I've heard barely a peep from Ipswich supporting people in my circle since the derby until Plymouth beat Leicester and the 'Green Army!' gifs came flooding in

On the bright side however we have a 100% record against teams playing in brown. You have to focus on the positives sometimes.

Ipswich being in consecutive promotion races where their direct competition have chucked their form off a cliff during the run-in is very irritating.

We've played two games each in the green & purple kits I believe. WBA loss and Blackburn draw in the green, Rotherham and Watford losses in the purple. 1 point from 12 out of yellow doesn't bode especially well.

Speaking cynically, I think Knapper saw an opportunity to add some value onto Idah for a summer sale. I don't think the player much wants to be at Norwich and we're having to be 'creative' (to use a Webberism) to generate funds for what is likely a large-scale rebuild in summer. The SvH situation has me stumped though. I thought maybe he was a Hernandez-style signing, brought in 6 months early as we had an opportunity and he'd be settled by pre-season. But can he really be so bad currently that Wagner won't even risk half an hour at 2-0 up? Or Aboh, who though young, is probably a better fit for Sargents profile than putting Barnes up front for sufferball. The selection will be awfully telling today. FWIW I think it'll be Barnes and Sara in the forward positions.

I wasn't a fan of Hanley when he first came in, and I've always thought his injury in Farkes second season was pivotal in getting ball-players in the CB slots to help us play. An expensive blocker who happened to be captain. However, as time has gone on, I've been able to see his value. He's even improved his ability on the ball- not to a high standard but way above the level he joined- and could probably have left to sit on a PL bench a few years ago. When he got injured I said I didn't think he'd play any serious football for us again, given the nature of the injury and his age. I think that still holds- I think he will end up at a Hearts/ Hibs level team and see out the last few years of playing. Fact of the matter is he's probably 4th choice already and that won't improve unless the squad gets worse. A real shame but a great servant 👏

Interesting line from Connor's post-match- admittedly I'd only just clicked on so not sure on context, but he was saying how Wagner didn't want Forshaw or Placheta to leave and those were very much Knapper decisions. Certainly, it seems to be implied that Wagner doesn't trust the youth brigade or SvH enough at the moment, but I think it's a bit of a reach to be suggesting that Placheta would have been a genuine option instead. Much less Adam Forshaw who was only matchday fit every 20 games. I can't believe they're all of such poor calibre that there's no point even trying them.

I think we're generally average at defending. What we aren't OK with is defending for 30-40 minutes, but there aren't many teams who are. The best defenders around will concede under near constant pressure. It's been a continuing habit in our away games to sit off and let teams get momentum though. Wednesday looked a level below and were booed off at half time by their home fans- with a 2-goal cushion I don't believe it's unfair to expect us to be able to handle that situation better.

I can't agree. If I had ignored the game and looked at the scores on Teletext, objectively, I'd probably have said 'that's why teams in relegation battles can be tough, these games happen, gee whiz'. Subjectively we've surrendered 2 goals and 2 points to a team likely to be relegated who we were battering. Made enough clear-cut chances to win two games. Massive fumble IMO

He's also very good at dropping deep and giving an option, which creates passing angles in our forward play. Unfortunately when he plays as a single striker it means CBs can push up as faaaaar as they want, he isn't running in behind and will usually be up against 2 CBs. We should have dropped Aboh in for Sargent to keep the pace element of the forwards, leave Barnes where he was. Even if all the lad did was run around and hassle. And at this point, despite having tried to give as much benefit of the doubt to the SvH transfer as possible, I have to wonder what the point is. Surely he can't be so bad that he isn't considered worth a go at 2-0 up??

For a long time I thought the message was 'Barnes elevates Sargent' but I've come to see it's the other way around. Barnes needs Sarge in order to be effective, whenever the former is playing up front alone we just get shut down. We should have won the game under our own initiative with the chances we made; we don't have a very deep squad so I get that it's difficult. Even seeing the first sub instantly get injured, horrible turn of luck. However this is a very familiar away game pattern which can't just be unlucky again and again. The two headers were practically on the same spot too. Result has really **** on my sandcastle tbh.

Really annoyed at that result. One of those not-uncommon away days where we get ourselves in a decent position, then change things up and get locked in our own half for 45 minutes. Barnes going up front on his own is usually the signal. What a stupid result.

Only because I don't think we would ever voluntarily leave Kenny out whilst points are at stake, and it would mean less hard miles. Nothing against Gibson. Was wrong anyway 🤷‍♂️

In an ideal world, Norwich, Southampton, Leeds wins and any sort of dropped points for Preston. Maybe too much to ask after the gift of last weekend but here's hoping

'Neither team was playing well' and 'the referee kept punishing Ipswich players for making fouls'