Canary73

So yet another derby can take place in the evening presumably on consultation or police advice yet ours is always a Noon kick off or thereabouts. About time East Anglia's constabularies got up to speed.

Meanwhile the Finns have drawn a group with a couple of local derbies against Russia in St Petersburg and Denmark in Copenhagen. Yes there is the small matter of Belgium but Nordic interest also exists with Sweden already there and Norway potentially there via the playoffs.

Two home games coming up: v Armenia on Weds 15 October then Lichtenstein on 15 November which should see them over the line. Final game is away in Greece on 18 November. It would be good to have it settled before them so hopefully they can try out other formations. Armenia dropped points last night so beating them could take them out of it.

Freeloading parasites. Should have been kicked out.

Pukki pen makes it 1-1!

Some other things I noticed was the absolute state of the Queen Elizabeth Park gardens which resemble more of a wasteland fit for a boot fair. Inside the ground it was noticeable how third rate their advertising was - double glazing firms no one had heard of and other dubious activities. This is a club that has been given a ground for free and whose fans have delusions of grandeur thinking the game owes the great West Ham air time. There they were in their Bobby Moore shirts living in the past as usual. That side is really ragbag which befits the team and its supporters.

It was a shocking performance from the ref and from a game we really could have got something from given their line up isn't anything great and the ground lacked any atmosphere so had we taken the lead it would be interesting to see how they reacted. I do think we need to offer a different dimension to our play or have an alternative outlet on the bench as the midfield is all pretty samey and without Hernandez to run the channel we are lacking any sheer pace. I noticed that Lewis and a couple of others were criticised for not chasing back but this was a little harsh in Lewis' case as he was the full back and winger in one go with no one covering him. The stadium is not fit for football given the facilities and set up. I decided to walk the long way round back to Straford to avoid the queues. Even getting the train back to Chelmsford at 2000 there were still loads of WH fans getting on the train so they may have decided to avoid the queues and travel back later. I think the decision to start the season to broadly go with what we had given the defensive attacking areas being a little sparse for this level might be our undoing. We would need some sort of miracle to get something from Man City etc, but it is on the road where we are going to have to target games to get a big enough haul of points to keep us in the hunt. I think it is really important that we get the first goal as heads will start to drop if we start well and the concede the first goal.

Here's a map if needed.

Elvis Hammond

Back in Helsinki at the end of October. Hopefully he'll still be flying

Its the same with many pundits across many media forms. Many: have been out of the game for some time have no little or no knowledge outside the top six or division Could not talk about us or Sheff U in any detail - witness 'pundit' Ian Wright's 'he passes it to him who gives it to him' on MoTD a few seasons ago have a pre determined philosophy e.g you have to spend, aren't going to get anything against the top six, are in a relegation mini league and are written off from the start have their favourites e.g. yesterday Dion Dublin described Spurs v Villa as a proper premier league fixture. Does that mean only the perceived bigger clubs should be in the top 20? If you took a stopwatch to watch features online, on tv or listen to radio discussions etc. or column lengths for the Liverpool game we hardly got a mention. It shouldn't be much to ask for a pundit/correspondent to be credible and have some in depth knowledge rather than their tried n trusted soundbites. Sky are one of the worst offenders for this in their Soccer Specials and Sunday Supplement. It all needs freshening up. Although I'm not in favour of needing to purchase several different packages to watch football I hope that Amazon offer something refreshing as the current model is ripe for change.

As ever, Sky having Carragher commentating on a Liverpool game is in effect Liverpool TV. Very little research or balance amongst the pundits across many formats.

More Binner News from the hot desk: https://www.ipswichstar.co.uk/news/ipswich-bin-collection-summer-heatwave-1-6177100

Frankly its a load of tripe. What are these two teams champions of? It needs to revert back to how it was with only the champions of each nation getting through with a straight knock out format. If you are good enough you get through. If the big teams want a break away, fine - the condition is you never return to your domestic league, cup competitions - I could go further but this format is so boring with the same teams getting through - give me Viking Stavanger v Trabsonspor or HJK Helsinki v Metalurgs any day....

Despite the clamour from so called pundits/experts that you need experience even if that includes a relegation, I think that is wrong. Cardiff have battled but not scored enough nor defended stoutly which is why they will probably go. Lets go with the younger and hungrier players and hope that Wenger and Farke can unearth some more nuggets. There's gold in them unfashionable leagues....

WBA to deny them both then Brizzle.

I get really tired of this 'wouldn't it be great to see X,Y or Z back in the division, proper club great fans big gates and history' tosh. Clubs go up and down on on merit and if the top league was filled with Exeter, Mansfield, York and Liverpool, Man Utd and Everton etc. were in the fourth tier it would simply represent where clubs are. No one has a divine right to be in the top tier.

Always good to dig these out....

Sky have assisted in additional pressures with their desire for cat and mouse style fixtures with six of these 7 games being outside the traditional Saturday 1500 slot. Add two European Championship fixtures during the break and you can see how much workload our players have to get through, notably Pukki. Using the squad is going to be crucial to get us over the line. We've shown that we can compete at home or on the road so there is no one to fear.

It is far too long - gave up after page 76

Exiting these fixtures with a 3pt plus gap over Sheff U and WBA has the be the goal. A quick peep at WBA's fixtures shows that they've some very tricky fixtures, with Middlesbrough, Forest and Sheff U away and trips to Stoke, Villa and QPR all in Feb plus they are still in the cup.

My worry is that cynical sides like Wilder's Blades will try and do a number on our lot not just in the game but to dent our chances for the rest of the season. We need to be savvy there and move the ball quicker. I recall a game earlier where QPR were accused of sharing fouls amongst players to do a job on key players - its harder for ref's to take action against this unless they are particularly strong - be interesting to see what refs we get in the next three games.

It is also about confidence and spirit though. We have had a mini wobble of late by our standards but it is the resolve we have shown to score late or win matches from conceding first that has got us where we are. The sooner we get a win and another run going the better the better.

Thing is they are in a mini spell of games against teams they need to make ground on: Millwall (L 0-3), PNE (Scraped 1-1 playing against 10 men and no keeper) with Reading away to come. Lose that and Reading go 8 clear of them with a much superior GD. As someone else has posted, their pre Xmas fixtures are amongst the toughest run of fixtures. Maybe we should resurrect the relegation countdown clock - for them....

Given his age, nationality, the sell ons that Coventry negotiated and the number of clubs reportedly interested then anything less than £30m would be poor business. This is our best saleable asset and we need to get this right - if those clubs are so interested then they can flash the cash so to speak. How much Farke would get to spend of it remains to be seen however.