We looked like a team playing under pressure and they looked like a top 6 team.
Saying all that we should have had a penalty, Piroe missed 2 sitters, Solomon should have hit it first time and James also bombed a chance.
Meslier too hesitant for their goal but did ok up until that goal.
Aaronsson a waste of a jersey, Bogle off it and Joseph fast becoming the new Bamford.
Tanaka his worse game of the season and I don`t get why he insists on playing Gruev away from home against a team we should be beating.
I got slated by my mates for saying we will probably end up 3rd but it would not surprise me.
All to be forgotten when we muller Millwall and QPR and Sheff Utd lose to Sheff Weds.

I thought gruev was good today.  possibly one of our better players as he had very little help in there.
Portsmouth, as expected, played it like a cup final but even though we were off it should still have won.
long way to go yet, but we need 3 points on Wednesday.
not getting a striker in is proving, as we on here thought, a big error.
I know piroe had a mare today but he gets injured we are really in trouble

also that tiny pitch helped them hugely. our full backs and wingers had next to nothing to work with and got crowded out

I agree. Glad you’re here to moderate. Cheers.

One of those games where nothing went right and we got no luck.


Another game where we should have had a penalty, and you’d expect Piroe to slot those two chances. 


I also thought James could have given it to Solomon earlier but Solomon’s touch let him down. 


We made a lot of bad choices and sloppy passes.


Probably Tanakas worse game for us, and as usual Meslier should have done better for their goal. 

agree with all that. another day we score 4 or 5 easily

It’s easy to say when you’re way up in the stands or sat watching on telly , but the point is James played the percentage pass. The defender that was in between James and Solomon was not a hologram, it was an actual human being that you cannot pass a ball through. If James played the ball early to Solomon on the deck it would have been behind the defender and consequently slightly behind Solomon slowing him down. Ideally James could have played the ball over the top of the defender early, but then Solomon was controlling a ball with possibly his head, his chest or an awkward bouncing ball slowing him down. It’s also a lot harder pass to execute at speed. James eventually played the percentage ball, one on the deck, easier to control and not behind his team mate, right in front of the goal. The point is Solomon made a mess of it, and when he pulled it back to Piroe he missed the easiest chance of the season.  If either Solomon or Piroe had shown anything like the competence of James the ball would have been in the back of the net.  The ball ultimately ended up in the perfect and almost unmissable position, 6 yards out in front of an empty goal, so James part in it becomes absolutely irrelevant

Agree mate. But I did think Gruev was ok but him and Tanaka don’t seem to gel. We got bossed in midfield second half which was a real shock. It’s now 19 points dropped on early kickoff times… Farke needs to sort that fast as both next 2 away are early too and in London!! 

Aaronson is burnt out, he’s played far too many minutes, that’s why we needed a 10 in Jan. we also have nobody to step in for Piroe when he has a rare off day in front the of goal. 

But to put things in perspective it’s only first loss since November, we wouldn’t have gone on unbeaten. 

I still think we go up as champs but because of the owners big gamble in Jan it’s closer than it should be.. on their heads be it. 

Some good points Trebor, it’s time for us all to take a deep breath. The cold hard fact is that we will be basically going with that team, give or take a player, every week. There’s no real game changer coming from the bench or outside the current squad. Like you say, the owners have gambled that the majority of this squad will be good enough to take us to the promised land,  and then will be discarded for players fit for the top level. Having seen us struggle in the last couple of games, I don’t think there’s even a handful that would thrive at Premier League level. At the moment it feels like we’re running an old car into the ground before taking it to the scrappers to be replaced by something new and shiny. Aaronson is a case in point. He’s never stopped running or trying, but from looking lightweight for most of the season,  he now looks beyond  flimsy and broken, both mentally and physically. There are other players currently struggling in different ways. The point I made about Solomon only ever hurting teams from central positions is looking more and more the case, his one moment of real quality came when he received the ball in the box and fired a shot off. The left side offensively has looked like a cul de sac the last couple of games. There’s nothing dynamic coming from midfield and we are relying solely on Dan James on the right for any kind of penetration. I still think there were 3 massive moments at 0-0 that ultimately changed the course of the game, the ridiculous decision by the ref not to award the penalty and obviously the 2 glaring misses from Piroe. On any other day you expect at least one of those to go our way and it’s a different game. Having said that, Piroe scores either of those chances and were not even talking about how bad the ref was.

Yeah we should have been 3 up before they scored... even if one goes in i think we win.. i'd like to see Gnonto given some good game time Weds.. he's looked decent when he's come on lately. We might just need a freshening up. 


Burnley have a tough one tomorrow at home to West Brom, I expect Sheff U to beat Bristol C but then they travel to Weds at the weekend... if we get 2 wins that would be huge and we may get a gap again.. it's a bit Leedsy though having 3 teams all on 74/76 points at this stage... doesn't happen often but has in last 2 seasons... 

It could argued without a degree of good fortune against Sunderland and Sheffield Utd Leeds would now be in 3rd position.

it could, and i have thought that myself, however if you went down that line of thought you could pick up and drop points left right and centre... same for Sheff U and Burnley..