Gallowgate Toon

We definitely shouldn't be sleeping on Championship players. Twitter knobs demand 'CL quality only', whatever that means, but you can get some really fantastic buys there. Especially pathway players who you can develop over 1/2 years when you know first teamers are likely to be on the way then.

That first goal is a tough watch. Krafth has the ball and evidently needs a clear option - Murphy behind him, Gordon is tucked 10 yards inside where it's already congested rather than wide, and nobody else is there to show for it so it ends up with a rubbish punt while Murphy is out of position. Palace's pressing in that moment was hardly amazing either, we just abandoned basics and then made a series of defensive brainfarts.

I wasn't that impressed with Wharton. Good, snappy work off the ball but I thought he misplaced quite a few easy passes.

Wilson aside, we don't have a good knock it up for a tussle option either. Was hoping we'd see Isak drop in more today at times to help us progress the ball or get a grip. Felt like he was always looking for the chase.

Weirdly for him that felt quite a scared set up. Back 5 hybrid, sit deep, ping long counters. In a way I get it in that their real talent is up top but it seemed we needed to get a grip of midfield & spread the pitch out more once the counters weren't working, especially as they play 2 in midfield.

Absolutely wank. Some dreadful individual performances but Howe has had one of his worst games of the season tonight, imo. Was clear from minute 20 that the shape wasn't working. It's a strange choice against a side who have average fullbacks & a light central midfield. How Krafth stayed on is beyond me.

Feel like 4-3-3 is a better bet here to hold the midfield.

They do look to be playing some pretty great stuff at the moment with some really talented players so this'll be a tricky game. I think they're a bit soft in the middle though and lack a good striker so if we can win the midfield battle then I reckon we can style it out. 3-1 win. Notorious BIG with 1 each.

Love Oscar Bobb.

Massively needed and has been a role at quite a few other PL clubs for a long time above ticket office management. Digital ticketing balls-ups have refocused how important it is to have someone specialise there even for the short/medium term. The club are apparently going on a bit of a hiring spree this summer. If you're in product and 'tech', keep an eye out.

The club's budget for this work was surprisingly low as of last Autumn. Make of that what you will. Bigger clubs are notoriously worky tickets for this though as they tend to expect heavily-discounted work due to their brand with the promise of case studies and company boxes etc.

They were slated to release a new site last month with an app not massively far behind.

At the very least, he's shown this season he can be a Longstaff (with a far higher technical ceiling). He can be a lot more than that but his tactical discipline whenever he's played this year has been fairly impressive for an attack-minded player imo. Howe must love it, especially as he's a good athlete with a decent engine too. Let's just hope he can stay relatively injury free from now on.

Howe explicitly said early this season that he thought we had 3 players capable of playing the DM role, including Bruno. I'm assuming he was considering Tonali and Longstaff as this was a presser comment pre-Miley. Maybe he meant Joelinton over Longstaff though. Bruno Tonali Joelinton Longstaff Anderson Willock Miley + a couple of stand-in options. That's a decent number of players for 3 spots, and I also think we'll see some more variations of 2 men midfields next year as well. Personally, I think we need another reliable, quality addition in there but something has to give while we have to be efficient squad builders, imo.

I can't see anyone gambling on Wilson this window after such a bad run of injuries this season so if we bring in another forward it'll probs have to be another versatile one who can play across the frontline to a good level. I'm expecting one of Miggy/Murphy to go (probably the former), Minteh stays if we're in Europe + said versatile forward. We have to find more solutions to protect Isak if we're in for another busy schedule. I'm hoping we at least get one of Tosin/Kelly in to bolster defence for a relatively modest outlay. Tosin ticks a lot of boxes, Kelly looks a bit of a risk with his injuries. Hall will be much more in the first XI frame next season imo. That then leaves CM and GK. I feel like we've seen this season how important another strong goalie is. Pope has dislocated his shoulder more than once now iirc so it's a concern. CM feels relatively well stacked in terms of numbers, like, especially with Tonali back. Just can't see us getting another one in until someone else goes. Maybe Miley going on loan would trigger something, or someone going for Longstaff/Willock - this feels unlikely. Alternatively, we sign someone like MGW who can play in midfield or on the wing, should we need to move Gordon in the middle to help rotate Isak, but that feels far from ideal really.