Eddie

That angle makes it look like nothing. Look at the one above - his elbow is in the guy’s face and look where the ball is (red circle). It’s inexplicably stupid. He’s jumped into and taken the player out with his arm (how much force can be questioned) before the ball is even close to being in a position to challenge for it. What SS has said about it and his own reaction tell you that neither of them think it was harsh decision. It’s all on him this one.

Why aren’t EFL highlights on ITV4? It was the same a few weeks ago - is it because it’s an FA cup weekend? Seems daft considering there’s basically a full EFL fixture list. FWIW it’s a shite show in terms of production and I know all of them are on the sky sports app etc. - it’s just an easy way to watch them all in one place.

Couldn’t disagree more - he’s wank and we have plenty more options that I’d see ahead of him up front or wherever the fuck he was meant to be playing today.

Yep, agree as well. No doubt it’s in the ‘soft’ pile, when you actually look at what happened. He’s still a tit though

It’s not about the actual impact IMO - Forino took one just as bad late in the second half and ref had no interest in thinking about a card - it was the pure stupidity of never once making it look like a normal challenge for the ball where he’s using his body to make it difficult and has accidentally caught the defender. The ball goes in the air, he turns, looks backwards, runs backwards in the direction of the defender and jumps backwards into him. @Stig has said it but he ended up a few yards away from where the ball actually landed because he was more interested in the defender and never looked back at the ball. It’s a ‘professional foul’ in the sense that he was never actually challenging for the ball - the fact he caught the lad in the face probably turned it from a free kick / yellow card into a red.

Lincoln all but promoted (taking into account goal difference) - some season to have wrapped it up with 6 games to go. Their 2nd half of the season is unbelievable, fair play to them.

What a result that is, what a performance that is, and I’m massively jealous because I can only imagine what an away that is! First half was alright, it was all going ok as an away game against a good team until McAtee had a brain fart. For the record, I don’t think it was a red card, his arm is relatively by his side and I think @gonzo said it but their fella didn’t jump so took one in the face and made the most of it. However, rather than watching the ball and challenging for the header, the shithouse runs away from it, looking backwards for more than a split second and jumps straight into the defender without ever looking back at the flight of the ball. He gave the ref a decision, was it soft, yes, was it completely uncalled for and basically shitting out of just a straight challenge for a header, yes. Add to that he’d had a poor first half and it’s just another example of why he can clear off in the summer. Second half was brilliant. Great from SS - switch to the back 5 and bypass the midfield, then have to bring a right back into midfield, then spot that was getting overrun so switch back to a back 4 and put Max into a 3 man midfield. It reminded me of his early days, reacting in match and really affecting the game. We won with a midfield of Sheehan, Christie and Conway for the last 15 mins! Great performances all over the place (Tutu and Bonham rightly called out already) - I’d also give GJ a lot of credit, I thought he was at his best today. Dalby grafted, Burstow made an impact and Kenny ran the channels well. It was a proper collective effort and managed to keep them to very few clear cut chances when a man down. With the way other results were going, I thought we were in for a shocking day when we went down to 10 and would be really looking over our shoulder come 5pm. As it is, I think that pretty much does it (there’s going to be mad rush for 6th), and is a huge confidence boost as well after a ropey few games. Up the whites, and well done all that travelled down - 2 top away days down that way this season, gutted I’ve not been able to do one of them!

Braindead. Might not be a red, but he couldn’t have done more to give the ref the option. Hopefully last time he’s seen in a Bolton shirt.

4222

Looks about as weak as we could be. Has to be injuries to midfielders to not have EE or Simons on the bench - if that’s the case though, I don’t understand why you don’t put the extra centre back in and make it more solid there. 5 at the back with Sheehan and RR in front would look a lot less fragile. Let’s see if we can outscore them

Stick it towards my CPD hours 👍🏼

I’d be delighted to see that starting 11. Square pegs in square holes, reinforced centre backs, solid midfield, less reliance on underperforming wingers, option to go long and get up the pitch with Kenny actually alongside Dalby and Dempsey buzzing around to support. As ever, @Johnnyrotten‘s rule of it all depending on the inconsistency on the day applies - but it does feel like giving us the best chance in a very very tough game.

Yeah I was glad I actually had a look into it because I was completely wrong in how material the jump was. I suppose when you’re coming down from the prem, the difference between the Champ and L1 seems pretty immaterial when compared to Prem to Champ - but then when you’re looking upwards and are starting from a £20m revenue base, it’s massive (sounds like the difference might have changed last year from your post so maybe I wasn’t always wrong).

Interestingly, the step up in revenue from the league is actually bigger than I had assumed, you go from £2m in L1 to about £11m in the Championship. On top of that you’d increase advertising revenue and matchday revenue from bigger away followings etc. and so I reckon you could safely call that an extra £3m based on our current levels. That’s £12m of additional revenue and basically bridges the current loss (although remember the quoted wage bill reflects last season, so it’s likely slightly different). We would increase the wage bill because you’d have to to be competitive. In the short term you’d likely see a much better financial profile because you wouldn’t go and spunk the £12m on additional player wages (our player wage bill is about £12m so it would be doubling it). The problem comes a couple of years later when the fans are bored and want to push for the prem, revenue isn’t increasing but every year you push more and more to improve the squad and grow a bigger and bigger loss. It has made me slightly more positive that at least in the short term a promotion would actually be massively beneficial financially - we just need to fucking get there now!

2 reasons 1 - clubs relegated from the prem lose a ridiculous amount of revenue overnight whilst the cost base (players wages) is generally fixed over a longer term and therefore can’t be aligned to the revenue loss. Parachute payments help but there’s still a massive drop. 2 - you’re 1 season away from the value of your business increasing 10 fold (ie promotion to the prem). It means owners will take bigger risks and be willing to throw more at it because the promised land is in touching distance. We will lose more money in the Championship - excluding player sales. But, we’re a more attractive and valuable proposition just by being 1 step further up the ladder.

Ouch - not pretty reading. But, we lost shed loads of money just from the normal day to day running of the business and the powers that be still decided to throw £3.7m at new players (we did recoup £1.4m so net £2.3m outlay) - tells you something. Anyone that thinks us going up solves it is unfortunately wrong. @Cheese is spot on with the golden egg analogy and @gonzo is right that we’re no different to 95% of other clubs in that we’re not sustainable. If we were to go up then we’d have a bit more revenue from tv and probably a 10-15% increase on revenue from everything match day related (£2m ish) - that would all get swallowed by higher wages, and probably more so. But we’d be more attractive because we’re only 1 lucky season away from the pot of gold. The only way we will ever be sustainably run is to trade players well. Either buy low and sell high or develop saleable assets through the academy - and that needs to be to the tune of £10-12m profit every year to be considered sustainable. We’ve proven over decades that we’re shit at that, so the chance of it changing to that degree is unbelievably low. Even if we did, constantly selling our best talent to generate those profits and just keep the lights on would be hated by the fan base. Football makes zero financial sense. It’s an industry built off irrationality, hope and ego - some win but the majority lose but there seems to be plenty of daft bastards that are willing to swap in for those losing to see if they can make it work.

I’ll have plenty of them Simons was the best midfielder in the league Dalby was a cart horse We were going to win the league Lincoln would definitely slip up and come back to the pack And that’s just off the top of my head. Sure I’ve called a few things right as well but it’s all the fun of being a football fan isn’t it.

What kind of an allocation do we get at Bradford? Trying to figure out how much of a fastest finger it’s going to be to get them

God our run in is tough. Looking at the chasing packs’ fixtures, I don’t think any of Reading, Stevenage or Wycombe will get enough points to overtake and get a play off spot. I do think Plymouth will though and expect them to take Huddersfield’s spot - I could also see us finishing 5th.

So would I, but I’m not sure it’s been the case much since. Outfield - could you say Sarce? Gary O’Neil and Karl Henry are the two that come to mind first but I’m sure there are some post that. Lowe, MJ Williams possibly

Gilks

Sanchez is fucking rubbish.

You’re the last team I’d want to get in the play offs. Weirdly not as concerned if we were to meet in the final, but I’d hate to be playing you over 2 legs.

It’s a lot to ask of young Bobby

The expectation of Bolton Wanderers being in the 3rd tier, whether people like it or not “credit in the bank” is gone - whether that’s players, manager, ownership. It’s exactly why we need a captain that’s been there, seen it, not phased by it, knows how to deal with it and settle the rest of the squad down. Toal and Johnston are as far from the leader that we need with those heightened expectations - if there’s one player from our relatively recent past that I would love in this team it would be Karl Henry. The absolute mentality that is needed to lead a Bolton team spending its 7th season below the Championship.