Pulcinella

At the beginning of the season I would’ve been totally happy to be mid-table with all the shenanigans that went on over summer. We’re in a great position, far exceeding where I thought we’d be. The fact that not only are we not as far off the pace as I thought we’d be, but also that we could’ve won last night is amazing.

Utd are so annoying. Can’t they follow the script and lose games?

Well that put an end to the conversation.

If the table stays like this, what’s remarkable is that no team is running away with it. Currently 5 teams on 14 points. 2 points a game.

Lived in Mosborough for three years as a toddler (born in Manchester) - does that count? I'm a Wednesday fan because my brother is. He was born in Sheffield. We're both born on a Wednesday! But my son follows recent family tradition (of not being Forest fans) by supporting Wednesday. He's a Londoner and 10 years old.

Keep the curry away from the fish, but chips n curry sauce is right nice.

Off topic this, but I was chatting to a friend who’s a Spurs fan today... told me they think very highly of Onomah. Reckons he could become as big a talent as Harry Kane - except the seniors are currently keeping him out of the team. Whelm factor is climbing now.

Tom Lees won 9 tackles last season?

It's all about expectations for me. We're in a transition year and are blooding our development squad. They will make mistakes, but they'll also show promise. So long as we're out of the danger zone it's all fine - we'll have a younger, fresher, more valuable squad. Older players = little or no sell-on value. Young players = potential sell-on value. As fans, we need to keep an appropriate level of pressure on JL, the players & DC - but not berate them so hard every time they have a poor performance. Bad games will happen when you're building a new team. What I like about JL is that he does seem to learn by his mistakes - which is something I can't hand on hear say for CC. We need to be realistic, pay each and every opposition due respect, encourage great play and enjoy the ups and downs.

Maybe it's time we stopped talking of 'lesser' clubs. We haven't been in the premier league since 2000. Perhaps we need to put our ego away and treat other teams with respect. I agree, that as Philb125 said, anyone can beat anyone in this league... but some are harder than others. There are plenty in this league that are either having or have had the benefit of parachute payments - unlike us. We're one of the worst off in that respect - which is a leveller in itself. We need to get behind the team, and hope that we manage to build a squad that can challenge for promotion... at some stage.

Playing them makes them valuable though. Even if the fee is low, it's better that they're worth something. Or at least that's my tactic to raise money in Championship Manager when I take over in the first season.

Unless we get loans in, we've got what we've got. We've got to trust that JL chooses the quality of the players he currently has for the team. Thus far, this season, pretty much everyone has been slammed on OwlsTalk. The manager, the chairman, the senior players, the youth players. We have what we have and we have to live with it. Moving on... I have no idea whether it's better to include Boyd, Jones, Fox, Palmer in the squad or play youth. I just have to trust JL has a better idea than me - because he's the manager and he assesses them in training. When JL started with SWFC, he first stabilised the results (nothing spectacular but we stopped losing), then as players came back the results improved immensely. That suggests to me that he's no idiot - he identifies issues and seeks to fix them. Sometimes the fixes work, sometime they don't. But you can't blame someone for trying to fix things. The youth are being thrown into the deep end. Fair enough. Those that can will swim. Our squad is woefully thin - most so in defence, though also in midfield. We need some of those youth players to come good. They can only do so if they get opportunities. Best thing we can do is get behind the team. Give them confidence even when they don't deserve it. We don't have an option. Well we do... we don't get behind the team, complain a lot, make them worse, get relegated. It's backs against the walls time. Above I said that everyone has been slammed on OwlsTalk. We should be complaining about our own attitude. I don't think we're helping the club at the moment. We're kicking the team when they're down. If we had resources it'd be a different thing. But we're not even in a transfer window now. Just a loans window. And none of us truly know how much money we have without going back into embargo mode. Just get behind the team.

Rhodes for instance

Boyd hasn't been gash over the past few years. Average, yes. But not gash. We don't have a big squad so we need to give him another chance if Jos thinks it's appropriate. Let's not prejudge this quite yet.

You can't put the blame on Jos for our defensive frailties. He's been given a hand of cards that few would desire. Carlos had much greater resources in terms of defence - and even then we still cried out for better quality defensive signings. We had Sasso on loan - whom we should've signed as he'd walk into the current set up. We had Venancio on loan - whom it's a great shame we weren't allowed to sign. We had a younger, better Loovens and a younger (still one of the better ones) Pudil. Oh and Jack Hunt as well. I'm totally for the young ones to be blooded into the team. It's been a long time since we've been giving them the opportunity. It makes them work harder in training. They now know if they improve enough they can get in the team. If we are not able to sign loans during this window, then I wonder whether there's a back door whereby we sign them for the development squad. We've managed to gain a goalkeeper that way. We have to cut our cloth and diet. So long as we're safe this season, it really doesn't matter. Next summer we'll lose a load of players because contracts will end. No doubt that'll free up some money at least. Just hope we're safe, extend the better players' contracts and finish above rivals... though I think I have to exclude Leeds from rivals this year because that's probably a step too far!