rogerbarton

I think there was some conversation a few days ago about Chelsea fans giving Mourinho stick... definitely don't remember us giving it to King Kev like.

I'm also adamant teams turn up to SJP with more purpose and guile than the likes of WBA, Stoke and the like often do in the PL. That clearance by Dummett for the second goal, though. Woeful.

Quite remarkable to sack him five months in given what they knew when they appointed him. He'd already led them on a horrendous losing streak in his first spell there, and followed that up with a disastrous tenure here. He gets them from the relegation places to tenth, and they get shot of him? Surely when he took over they weren't really entertaining the notion of the play-offs? Either way he's an absolute fraud, just seems like a really weird turn of events. Remember these guys sacked Paul Clement after 9 months with them safely in the play-offs last season. Look at the job he's doing at Swansea.

Well not really - that rule change is just that PL teams will be able to sport a secondary sponsor on their sleeves. Since this would be likely to raise a relatively insignificant amount of money, it's likely Ashley could see it as a way to flog it like he has done around the stadium.

It can't get any worse than Wonga, let's be honest, unless it's another payday loans lender who charge an even more obscene amount of interest. Ashley will just flog it to anyone willing to line his pockets though. I'd be surprised if it were with any kind of positive brand.

I think Pep clearly is a bit of a twat and I'd love to hear how he dealt with Joe Hart (not that I'm his biggest fan or anything). It seems like he decides on some players before he even arrives at the club. But Eto'o seems like a bit of a troublemaker anyway there - he's moaning about Riijkard and Ronaldinho at the start of that segment. He jumped about quite a lot in the interview too, which made it hard to grasp exactly what he was trying to put across.

From my mates who were at the game it sounds like we were absolutely fucking woeful today. Luckily we have some absolutely shite teams to play in the next few. One thing I will say is we have bounced back from results like this all season.

BTW, we've gone from 13 goals better off than Brighton to 5 in the space of 4 days...

Apparently Fulham have targeted Anita and torn us apart down our right. Let's hope we don't fuck up and finish 3rd, or they'll smash us in the play-offs as well.

Fucking hell!!! What the fuck is going on? This could be the start of a colossal fuck up if we don't buck our ideas up.

Full on bed wetter mode now, surely? So frustrating to lose the almost unassailable position we had a few days ago.

I knew this would be a difficult game, and it sounds like we've been absolutely schooled in the first half. I'd take a draw from it now. Just a shame we're undoing all the work from the Brighton and Huddersfield games.

Although the 3rd place play-off side usually fails, I'd fancy Huddersfield there anyway. They're set up well to nick results and are difficult to break down.

I really do think this is going to be difficult. Fulham are a good side. I just wonder if, as Rafa alluded to yesterday, they might come here and attack us a bit more than other sides have. That would play into our hands. Hopefully the crowd will be patient if needed (a bit like in the Derby game). Apparently not on TV anywhere in the world so no streams. It seems we're only shown abroad if we're playing Rotherham. I'd love to know which games the broadcasters pick for the Championship each week.

More his level, but why they'd choose him over Gary Rowett I can't fathom.

Thanks! Get past Fulham and I reckon we'll probably beat it.

That's 11 games unbeaten now. What's our record for league games unbeaten? I know we edged close to our record games won in a row earlier this season, but can't find anything online on unbeaten league games sequence.

Let's look forward to a very tricky game against Fulham at the weekend now. Defeat there & the hard work is undone (well, sort of). I wonder how Rafa will set the team up - it's fair to say we've been pragmatic in these three games which won't fly in that one. All in all, we'd have taken 7 points & if we'd had to choose one draw it'd have been this match.

We *should* win it. I think it'll be another counter-attacking performance and we'll pick them off. We managed to get 4 against them at SJP without playing too well.

Haven't actually read the minutes, so that's interesting to know. I suppose we'll just have to wait and see. Rafa has leverage in terms of proving to Ashley he's able to 'run' the club efficiently (without risk of relegation).

Beginning to look forward to next season now. It's not over, of course, but it would need quite a spectacular loss of form compared to anything else we've seen this season for us to fall out of the top two. After seeing what was said at the fans' forum, it does look like Ashley might not be quite as daft as we feared in Jan. I genuinely think he will invest - like he did in McClaren's first season - to get us midtable in the PL. It'll be the first season we can enjoy in years. I expect us to avoid relegation fairly comfortably with Rafa at the helm, but would be more than happy with a bottom half finish for the first season. Realistically, though, with the right signings, why couldn't we be where West Brom are this season (last result aside)?

I think BT's strategy is sound - and they have the cash to take Sky on. I do wonder if shareholders might begin to get a little antsy though, given the recent Italian accounting scandal, that they are ploughing so much into this. It's interesting that viewing figures seem to be declining for both the PL and Champions League (though I think lower TV uptake of BT is certainly responsible for latter) yet the cot keeps going up. At the end of the day, Sky and BT are both going to be counting their subscribers rather than actual viewers, though, and all the evidence shows that live football rights are a winner. There's talk that BT might sub-lease some of the CL games, possibly to Channel 4, which I think would be good.

Just to confirm I don't actually believe a word this guy says. Forgot to add the best part though - he was pissed off that we'd beaten Brighton because he wants to see us go up through the play-offs. "More of an event if it's at Wembley"

I think the Preston one probably was a penalty in stoppage time, but that's pretty much the only one. Both penalties yesterday were fairly soft and the Murphy goal was completely fair by any interpretation of the laws. Still got another two tricky games to come - Reading away and then Fulham, who are a decent team, at home where we look a lot weaker.

I thought we defended superbly tonight. Did what we had to do, and would've been a clean sheet if not for the bizarre penalty decision. It's all over now surely?!