Back from the game - Derby

[FiNeRaIn]

Southampton are top because they have momentum, just like norwich did. Their squad isn't spectacular other than lallana and lambert, we should be looking to beat them at home. Its 12 games gone and they are far from runaway champions. 6 points out of a possible 18 at home is abysmal, how does that rank in the home form table anyone know?

[Whore Jackie]

Not writing Mills off, but we really don't seem much tighter than when Harte was playing. As much as Griffin is likeable, we've really benefitted from having at least one pacy full-back in Cummings. Personally I'd jettison Mills and give Harte another go. That freekick in stoppage time was crying out for a bit of quality, that frankly doesn't exist anywhere else in the squad.

[royalsroyalsroyals92]

Re: Mills - as much as there is a huge question mark over him, I would add that 2 years ago Cummings looked just as bad, if not worse. These days he looks more than half decent at right back and performed very well again today. Guess what I am saying is that BMc seems to have a habit of getting the best out of players - Kebe's best form has come under BMc, for instance.

as far as mills goes i think we are better off sticking by him and letting him adjust and grow in confidence. he is fast, and we have seen flashes of ability from dead balls and going forward. People seem to forget he is young and will almost definitely improve over time. He is not the best in the team at the minute, but that doesn't make him a bad player for this league and he will get a lot better. Better alternative than harte for me.

[If you still hate Futcher]

Must say I can't understand why Mills is being singled out - more often than not he's the one giving Federici the option to throw rather than kick and looks to play to feet if possible when he's got it. Yes he was muscled out too easily for the 2nd but I wouldn't swap him just because of that now that the back 4 seems to be settled. And how anyone can have a go at Church is also beyond me - he never got any service but hassled and harried their centrebacks all the time before being subbed.

I'm really surprised no-one's said anything about how poor Derby were - was really expecting more from them but their fans called it right. They reminded me of us about 8 games ago - treating the ball like a hot potato and getting rid as soon as possible.

If we'd managed to get in the lead I don't think they had the nouse or bottle to come back.

Was very pleased to see Leigertwood have the best game I've seen so far this season and hope he continues the improvement as we've really missed him. I just wish he could shoot.

Lastly, why do we always seem to overhit the crosses (HRK for Le Fondre aside of course) and underhit the through balls

[manny96]

Mills wasn't atrocious, you just sense a nervousness when he gets near the ball which, I guess, comes with his age. There's definitely some promise with him though. That said Brian needs to know when to maintain confidence and when to drop for the good of the team.

Otherwise a decent point i'd have taken from a well-organised (euphemism for uncreative?) Derby. Poor goals to concede on our part and even more frustrating as they really were against the run of play. The first was a very questionable free kick, if not a Derby handball. Probably deserved a bit more.

Pleased to hear the Le Fondre chant. I was the only one at the front of Y25 singing it. Savage was a bit of a tragi-comedy.

[FiNeRaIn]

Sigh, the good old days

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qxOBq48ySsU

[grey_squirrel]

Lightening the load a bit, who was the bloke at the front of Y24 who TWICE headed the ball back into "play"? Anyone know?

Must be a first, surely? Stattos?

[Woodcote Royal]

And there was me thinking that Mills had quite a good game tonight -

You are right, he did. The fools above were either not there or are just plain stupid.

You have no idea about football so I'm not sure why you are calling other people stupid.

Possibly because he knows considerably more than you, especially if you really felt Mills had a poor game tonight.

Also, I watched the Burnley match on Reading World and they thought he was our best player.

Had Shorey had an identical performance (and he had hundreds that were worse) most of the East Stand would have been w@nking themselves blind over it

At the third time of asking, well done Brian for finding a very decent young left back who is only going to get better.

And, should he wish to make a few quid on the side, he could always offer Nicky Shorey some extra coaching in the art of taking a decent corner.

[FiNeRaIn]

I didn't " feel" mills had a poor game, most people with common sense accept he did. BOTH goals came from his side at the far post, the second was NAILED on his fault, the first probably was also. I mean, are you actually for real? Or are you trolling. Its like not even a close decision ffs, several people have said on this thread that he's a liability. Some people are so hell bent on hating Ian Harte you are building this guy up to be something he is not. He's not the worst player we've ever had and he may well improve, however ive felt for some time that he has average at best and tonight he was well below average, it was not a good performance and frankly anyone suggesting it was needs to watch the game again. If someone can upload the full game on youtube I will more than happily go through and pick out all the useless things he did and provide you with times they occurred. Can't stay fairer than that to back up my point.

[Woodcote Royal]

Most people with your brand of "common sense" thought he had a poor game at Burnley.

Yes, it was his man who scored the 2nd but no one could have been tighter to him than Mills was (which is a lot more than can be said for many of the goals we've conceded to unmarked players) Unless he was fouled in the process (and it certainly looked as though he might have been) it was more a case of good play by the striker rather than poor play by Mills. Apart from that, go ahead and list his other errors in a match in which I saw him as one of our better performers, as did Burnley's commentary team at Turf Moor.


Mills is part of an improving defence and one that would take a huge backward step if the ageing Harte was re-instated.

If it's culpability that floats your boat, cast your mind back to the play-off final when errors from the hugely more experienced Harte, Federici, Kish and Griffin cost us a place in the Premiership.

Your blinkered observations are so reminiscent of all the drivel posted about Long (just months before West Brom spent millions on him) and the reams of guff on Cummings being one of the worst full backs on the planet.

In 12 months time, our "know nothings" will be heaping the same praise on Mills as they are Cummings now and this will have as much to do with their inability to spot quality when it's staring them in the face as the improving performances of a young up and coming player.

[Libertine]

All I know is we are undefeated in our last 6. This coincides with Mills, and many others, inclusion in the starting 11. I am not saying that Mills deserves all the credit by a far cry. But this line-up has provided stability especially to the back 4 (and we all know how shite we looked in the back for a few games there, and I mean really shite, until the changes were made), and has suffered no losses since it was originally tried. Mills has made his share of mistakes, I'm sure that Harte and Griff will see many minutes yet this year and make contributions, but right now I say if it ain't broke don't fix it...

[seahawk10]

+1 to most of Bob Bottler's post.

Tbh, we're a midtable side on the evidence of our defending for the first goal and - despite Alfie's sharpness in front of goal - you wonder where else a steady supply of goals might come from because Church has all the killer instinct of Winnie the Pooh.

S'up Floyd?

[seahawk10]

Sigh, the good old days

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qxOBq48ySsU

My favourite home kit...

[The Real Sandhurst Royal]

We fired another blank in the first half of game simply not good enough McDermott your tactics are not right.

Mills is not good we still have a left back problem.

Hal Robson Kanu had a great chance to show what he was about with McAuff injured he failed to impress.

Le Fondre put in great performance working hard for the 90 minutes capped by scoring two goals, more the come from this lad.

[bigmike]

Church looks 100x the player he was before with Alf. He's done a lot better this season, but imo he'll never score more than 15 in a Championship season.

Things are ticking along nicely though and our heads never dropped.

Give me one positive thing church did tonight?

he was subbed..

I kinda wish that they left the Chair on the pitch instead of Church oxf*rd usless

as for the people saying Mills was poor and hes worse than Ian Harte.. What the hell??

Mills wasnt fantastic however he certainly wasnt as bad as your making out.. He was blatently being pulled back for Derbys 2nd goal however you probably see that as him being at fault for the goal. How dare he be fouled. All in all Mills is getting better every game. I am starting to remember what its like to have a left back who has a bit of pace.. Remember Harte was being skinned at will by all the oposition who have been against him this season and I dont think he got forward once in any of the games he played this season. Not including the piss poor penalty he missed.

[CayeneMatt]

Church looks 100x the player he was before with Alf. He's done a lot better this season, but imo he'll never score more than 15 in a Championship season.

Things are ticking along nicely though and our heads never dropped.

Give me one positive thing church did tonight?

Chased everything and put in a quality cross for the first goal.

There's 2.

[bigmike]

Church looks 100x the player he was before with Alf. He's done a lot better this season, but imo he'll never score more than 15 in a Championship season.

Things are ticking along nicely though and our heads never dropped.

Give me one positive thing church did tonight?

Chased everything and put in a quality cross for the first goal.

There's 2.

Quality cross for the first goal???? Is that the goal that was scored By Le Fondre from OUTSIDE the box.. Church did not set this up.. Also if you can only pick out 2 good things about a player from last night theres obvioulsly something up. Mansett did more in the time he was on last night than Church did. How many shots did Church have in his time on the pitch??? I cant remember 1 of note

[Svlad Cjelli]

A few random observations :

- thought Mills was OK, and wasn't muscled off the ball for the second Derby goal. It was much more that he was manhandled off the ball, Cywka had both his arms around him - a clear foul to me, but the lino ignored it. That was the same lino who 3 minutes later flagged a foul against Mills when he clearly won the ball at a sliding tackle.

- Interesting seeing Leigertwood playing further forward, with Karacan as the defensive one of the CM pair. Has this happened before this season?

- Kebe nearly cost us the match. When he dived to try and get to Alf's first goal as it was going over the line, I'm sure he would have been off-side if he'd touched it. Can someone in line at that end confirm is he was off-side and how close he got to getting to it?

- This "can't score in the first half" thing doesn't properly describe the problem. The real problem is that unless we're behind and chasing a game, or the game is about to end, we don't play directly enough or with enough urgency to score. Much of yesterday's first half we were too Arsenal-esque, trying to score a "perfect goal" - with us always trying to get into a position where we were sure to score, instead of trying to take whatever chances we had. Go behind and we're more direct which suits us a lot better.

[Ferris]

Give me one positive thing church did tonight?

Chased everything and put in a quality cross for the first goal.

There's 2.

Quality cross for the first goal???? Is that the goal that was scored By Le Fondre from OUTSIDE the box.. Church did not set this up.. Also if you can only pick out 2 good things about a player from last night theres obvioulsly something up. Mansett did more in the time he was on last night than Church did. How many shots did Church have in his time on the pitch??? I cant remember 1 of note

He showed some quality touches throughout the game and never stopped running. Can't remember the build up to the first goal, but he definitely had a hand in the second, brought the ball forward well, laid it off to Jem who knocked it to HRK.

Can't believe he's being knocked.

[CayeneMatt]

Maybe if McD sticks with Mills on Saturday, he will be able to show Adkins that he was wrong to think of him as only their third choice left back!......but still good enough for our first 11 !!!..... but I doubt it.

I doubt it too. I've been slated in the past for backing Harte, and whilst I admit he had a shocking start to the season, its obvious why Southampton let Mills go.

Now all the furore has died down about having a lightening quick LB, I'm glad to see some have realised that we actually need one that can play.

He could well have potential, but he's a liability at the moment.