The mangy old Belgian dog refuses to be euthanised just yet. Saturday's very welcome 3 points gives us a 10-20% chance of staying up, I reckon. It is hard to see us getting much if anything from Brighton and Burnley, so we need to win our other 5 remaining games, starting with Ipswich tomorrow night. I would make just two changes to Saturday's starting line up, with fit again Chris Solly coming in for Morgan Fox [better on his wrong foot]. I would also drop that useless Korean lump Player-Sucks, he isn't a full back and he isn't a winger ..so what is the point? I have yet to see Suk have a good game Drop Harriott back into midfield alongside Cousins, Diarra and JBG, and play Vetekole and Lookman up front. Pope in goal, with Henderson clearly on the way out, and a back 4 of Solly, Fanni, Teixera and Motta. It is time to stop p1ssing about with Lookman now, particularly when the alternatives are Makienok and Reza. I think we can beat Ipswich, a draw is not good enough so Riga needs to go for it.
If we give a rogue crisp packet a jersey, it will do just as good a job as the useless Korean. I've seen malnourished children stronger than him.
Our record against Mick McCarthy's teams is poor, but Lookman and Igor up front could be a real handful, and would give us a glimmer of hope if selected. If Lookman starts on the bench there will be considerable unrest among the travelling hordes.
A very big and physical side, it was men against boys when they beat us earlier in the season. I think a repeat of that is likely.
Our record is decent enough at Portman Road I think - in recent times anyway if memory serves. As Nick says though, a point isn't good enough. Last time Riga managed to keep us up it was done with the home games taking precedence during this period (with those games in hand also a huge advantage). He isn't able to do that now - every game has to be approached with 3 points being the aim. I'll hold off on a prediction until I see the line ups. I fear 4-5-1 with big Mak returning.
Let's hope not. Big Mak had a total nightmeire against Ipswich last time, although Riga wasn't manager then. There's always Sanogo now, which gives us the luxury of 3 decent strikers. I liked the way we attacked on the floor against Brum, especially second half, it caused them problems, and we don't have the capability to fight fire with fire against big physical teams.
In a normal Club, Sanogo should never play for Charlton again after what he did. Strange that the police have got time to investigate stress balls, but miss a blatant GBH
God, that Korean really is sh!t. Dare I say whoever signed him [Meire] made a real dog's dinner of that transfer?
Riga can't resist the need to tinker. The pro in that is it usually represents a managers dedication - professionals have mentioned it display's their constant obsessing with wanting to get things right. The downside is it doesn't necessarily represent success. It can also lead to a hurting the dressing room if players aren't given a run of games. The further downside for us is we need to find a settled 11 who Riga trusts to go in to every game thinking they can win but time doesn't really allow for him to experiment. As mentioned the other day - those games we wasted on Carol probably would have provided it.
Guess this one was out of our hands @ForestHillBilly. I got a funny feeling that we are going to play 4 - 5 - 1, which given our last few games, and actually picking up some useful points, I'd have stuck with the same team that we played against Birmingham. I still believe that the regime have a lot to answer for, for Karel Fraeye's appointment... Don't think this is going to be a well attended game.
Only a few hundred sold so far apparently. Easy enough journey so guess might more decide to go on the day.
Tickets are £35 on the day, which is steep if you ask me. I reckon that they should do like a StockMarket pricing (that's what I'd do at the Valley). You start off at minimum pricing, say £1 per seat, because operating costs would be the same irrespective if you sell out or not, and then the more and more demand that you get, the prices increase. Pricing would vary depending on the availability of the stand as well. So if someone who has a family of four books up early enough, they could theoretically watch a match for £4, versus a city worker who booked last minute, would have to pay say, £32 due to less availability of seats. Season tickets would be priced at the average cost, on last seasons but pay a premium for the same seat, but you'd get a rebate or points which can be redeemed to away tickets or merchandise, if there is a difference between average costing vs. last season. Very radical ticket pricing system, and I think that it can be very effective in attracting crowds. And is much better concept than anything I've heard from Target20K
Ipswich is a massive rip off - i think their tickets are the most expensive in the Championship & the view from the corner side of the pitch isn't great. Talking of rip offs, I bough QPR tickets for this Saturday - a very generous £32 with the guarantee of an obscured view.
One change I would have liked in the second half whilst we were pushing against Birmingham would have been Solly on for Diarra and Motta pushed forward with Gudmundsson moved central; we had no one collecting the ball in the middle and moving it on and in that scenario you notice that Cousins, for all his effort and tenacity, is technically lacking. But against Ipswich the Diarra and Cousins partnership will be crucial; I think we'll end up going 451 with Jackson in the midfield at the expense of the Harriots.
