theAnticlough

Anyone else watching Cambridge Swindon? Cambridge have been very impressive - play with so much pace and physicality. They should be more than 1 up. Swindon aren't out of it and there's still a chance we could see the draw that we want.

Yes, I'd take a draw too right now@menzinho Jatta's been involved in a couple of the recent losses and I hope he's really motivated to put things right. He had a 1-on-1 a theirs last season but missed, that might've changed the course of the game In the reverse fixture, he was totally out-psyched by Tilt (now Bradford). AJ started well then Tilt elbowed him and he was playing like a man possessed for a while. Then came Tilt's 'heartfelt apology', hugs and make-up. AJ fell for it and he went from lion to lamb - it seemed to drain all aggression and purpose out of him. Very clever, but boy do we owe them one. These games have been a horror show of gamesmanship and cheating from them.

Massive game MP will need performances from all his players if we're to get a positive result Anyone else feel that JJ is kind of a barometer for our performances. When he's bad we tend to struggle, when he's on song we don't. He'll need to be on his game, but so will everyone else. At Shrewsbury, he let a difficult direct opponent put him off his game. We can't afford any player to let that happen, they all have to find a way to make an impact. Big game for Palmer as captain. The whole team and the bench have to let the ref (and lets hope its a strong one) know about their rough house tactics. They need to let the ref know that kicking players at this stage of the season can decide a promotion. But not to overdo it, we can't let the game descend into a war (their game). We have to concentrate on our play, but be ready to let the ref know when needed.

Congratulations to @Fan of Big Tone &@Michael D Pie. on those different milestones. Good luck with what comes next

When you ahve time, how did you come to be a Notts County fan @UfkuAcik35 ?

Hi @UfkuAcik35 and welcome to the community, hope you canjoin in and enjoy The request you made looks like a long shot and difficult. I've passed through Turkey but have no plans coming up, but hope you can figure out a way to get the jacket

They're in. We'll have 'em But I just played House of the Rising Sun by hand farts, note perfect. Pity I can't upload an audio file

Yeah, ideally Norburn doesn't get back in. It was encouraging what MP said about Robertson. The Palmer-Robbo pairing is a lot better and isn't just duplication. Robbo gets about the pitch a lot more and can pop up a lot more in the final third. Regarding the Salford game, do we have the grinding option? I can't imagine MP adding Browne to the team. If you meant by grinding just withstanding whatever they throw at us and get a positive result in whatever way we can, then yes sign me up for that please.

Good analysis @Robbie I think I'm in a slightly different place. I'd put 'at least play-offs' at 95%, as even just a win against Newport could secure that. The overall chances, across the 3 outcomes... i'd say Autos (back to) 30%, Play-offs 65%, neither 5% Why only 30%? Well there's the loss of both Platt & McDonald and the difficult away fixtures we have left. But there's also the impression i have that MP is too late a convert (and only through necessity) of a positive, all-out, attacking game. And that he doesn't really believe in it. I think he should have been enpowering our excellent, ball-playing technicians like Macari and Tangan and that overall style instead of a gnarly journeyman like Norburn, who ended up letting us down anyway. The selection for the Chesterfield game showed me that he had a mind to try and grind our way to promotion. So we don't have the reps and the benefits of singing from the right hymn sheet (free flowing attacking football) all season long. This is my own, personal take on things. I don't expect others to agree but it is one of the main reasons I'm still pessimistic about autos.

2 of our next three are the big ones @Chris away to Salford and Cambridge in the space of 8 days... If, say, we take 1pt out of 6 there, but beat Newport, then it's 100% play-offs At Salford, MP won't be able to add an extra CB or defensive CM, he's going to have to commit to another attacking team and outplay them. We're capable, we just need to commit to it and have confidence. Massive game coming up this Easter Friday

What a day! It's in our hands again

I really want to say Palmer or Macari, both were so good with the ball and in their positioning. Macari really should get more recognition. A brace in a 0-2 away win though, plus decent hold-up and defensive play...I"m voting for Jatta in the end.

It's madness, isn't it? As Stall said 'anywhere else on the pitch....' Can't refs have more awareness that they're making decisions not based on the incident, but the area of the pitch, and that there's nothing in the rules that should make them do that. Football should get on top of this and solve it - it's a unnecessary distortion of the rules of the game. On top from the start. We used our attacking line-up correctly to dominate the game and we have to continue to do the same for every game. We've got a lot of good creative players and lovely technicians. It's our strength and we've got to play to it.

Blackpool 1-0 Burton Albion Exeter City 1-2 Leyton Orient Bristol Rovers 2-0 Accrington Stanley Joker Crewe Alexandra 2-1 Oldham Newport 1-1 Shrewsbury Gateshead 2-0 Yeovil Town Halifax 2-1 Scunthorpe United Morecambe 2-0 Aldershot

Despite tough conditions, our technical players have been great - Palmer, Iorpenda, Macari, Tangan (pity he had to go off) We've played some lovely stuff. Let's hope we can get some more goals with the wind behind us in the 2nd half.

Interesting team selected just now... Tsaroulla out with an injury...he might've needed the rest anyway. It's a team that should have a lot of attacking potency. Jatta, Dennis, Jones, Tangan, Iorpenda, with lots of good ball-players behind and around them. And a very attacking bench. Really looking forward to it now.

Me too. He's done so much to correct our flaws from last season. The pressure cranks up at this time of year, and I keep returning to the fateful decision to pick Platt out wide for the Chesterfield game, leading to his gym-style 'suicides' running on the 57min when he did his ACL. Macari had done nothing wrong and should've started that game. Did he consult his boss on this pick, our Director of Football, who does have a promotion behind him? It's impossible to please everyone, it's all about opinions, but he's been doing my head in with too much Norburn and too little Iorpenda in centre midfield. I doubt anyone will like this post and it won't get any thumbs up. I am happy overall with Martin Paterson, but he's still an inexperienced 38-year old coach and we shouldn't expect him to be perfect or expect him to run the whole club, god forbid.

Good summary Chris, Our odds must be at something like 20% auto, 75% play-offs 5% nothing. 20 might be generous considering the McDonald news. In other posts I mentioned what the only formula might be. All I ask is that the run-in/play-offs have a different character to last year's.... ...Losing vital, clutch games because of a lack of bottle and fight ...Going out with a pathetic whimper I don't think MP's team will behave the same way. Hope not, anyway.

I don't think the Bros were ready for Montague leaving. I'm glad we didn't have more than one transfer window with Gagliardi. There's Iorpenda, but Cotter, Roos, Aljofree, Norburn were also his work. I want to see what Montague does with a summer window, combining his knowledge of L2 now with whatever he picked up at Swansea

Hope she can shake it off quickly@Fan of Big Tone now she's back home

Good morning all, We've taken some heavy blows, but it's a great opportunity to go back to what we did at Accrington. I hope MP remains super positive and there's no hint of using the injuries and the suspensions as an excuse. He's lost the extra insurance options he tends to edge towards (mistakes anyway, IMO) - extra height, an extra CM pivot, more experience/nastiness... None of those help the football you play...you can still try to do what you practiced all year on the training ground, pass and move, create overloads, continue the better final 1/3 execution we've seen recently, key passes for assists, cool and accurate finishing. Dunno about the team, but it could be something like... Belshaw Macari, Bedeau, Bennetts, Tsaroulla, Palmer, Iorpenda, Jones Grant, Dennis Jatta No problem at all with Ness though. He's at least as good a passer as Platt (but not as nice as McDonald). If the focus is on playing positively and fluently, as it always should be IMO, then we'll be OK in games like this.

I was posting to do this on the match thread 😎 @menzinho I saw it a mile off. It would have occurred to MP too, he botched that one. Norburn wasn't playing well either and we weren't making an impact either, despite chasing the game from very early on. Two other reasons to make that particular change. Palmer was superb against Accy and Cheltenham. Let him run the show and put a true box-to-box player next to him (we certainly have one)

It's a terrible blow. Ness is a decent footballer though - he needs confidence and to find the leader inside of him. MP likes his extra insurance, but without Norburn for the next two games (could be a blessing) he has no other option but to copy what he did at Accy. Palmer running the show, the threat of Iorpenda surging from deep, 2 dangerous WBs, 2 players around Jatta. Let's take it to the opposition starting at Harrogate. It's the only way now, we don't want to invite teams on to us.

It is a great opportunity, Stark. And we have no option but to trust in him. But maybe it'll need a quick adjustment of his attitude and demeanour. He's got to be a leader now. If ever he gets crocked, Macari-Bedeau-Bennetts might be another backline we can throw out there in an emergency

My take away is a question... How do we unlock Ness? Lucas did Ok last night but has got to step up as a leader now he's our CB for the run-in. And we've got to hope MP can inspire him to do it.