By Order of The Peaky Blinders. Away to Brum Tues Oct 22nd 19-45.

[BWFC_Insane]

#Evattout

[BorsdaneWhite]

Thank you for the couch, Blu. This season, I think we’ll find lots has fallen behind the cushions.

[DJBlu]

2 individual errors have lost the game. McAtee could easily have gotten us a point. Game plan was clear to see, keep it tight and have a go in the second. We did and had it been 0-0 maybe Birmingham might've been a bit nervy. Not going to lose any sleep over it as most thought we'd get humped 5 or 6 nil. We didn't. Saturday will matter though.

John McGinlay says "Too much respect". Sadly Ian, you can't defend as your comments in the pre match conference showed this.

[Dave Sutton's barnet]

#Evattout

Won't happen after that, but Saturday might be different. As I say, if we lose and look hopeless, enough of the crowd might turn to persuade Sharon etc.

Obviously I hope we don't lose, and tonight's fixture was always a difficult one. But we can't go on Not Winning.

[Mar]

Apparently this was meant to be a good time to play Birmingham given their injuries.

They've not looked THAT good a side. Better than us, but we've been crap this season and it's indicative of our own failings rather than Birmingham being a step above.

We're playing catchup and need to be delivering competitive performances against sides like this. We're not doing that. Birmingham comfortable.

Handicapping ourselves playing the likes of Arfield from the off doesn't help. Crap night of football as expected. We're not going to get promoted if we're playing catchup and failing to be competitive.

We're 2 points off 5th in the league with a game in hand, so all is not lost, but deary me does it feel bad.


Welcome back Forrester, but less of that crap defending otherwise we'll be hoping for another staircase job.

[BWFC_Insane]

#Evattout

Won't happen after that, but Saturday might be different. As I say, if we lose and look hopeless, enough of the crowd might turn to persuade Sharon etc.

Obviously I hope we don't lose, and tonight's fixture was always a difficult one. But we can't go on Not Winning.

It’s not going to happen. There is a distinct lack of leadership, bottle and desire from the entire club.

Evatt should have gone in the summer but now we are suffering. It’s years in this league unless someone intervenes or Evatt stops stealing a living and resigns.

[officer_dibble]

The only thing I’m thinking now is whether we have spent money in the right areas here? Four strikers, bulk of our budget and we leak sloppy goals and are not clinical enough. If we hadn’t signed one of Collins or McAtee, or sold Vic, could we have signed a better centre mid or wing back for this level? And what’s the point in Lolos? How much have we wasted on him that could have gone on a proper midfielder?

So when we get a new manager and he comes in what does he need? Birmingham weren’t all that but being able to play with only two centre halves helped them tonight - we lose a player up the pitch because we carry the extra centre half. We don’t have a left back of course…

[Mar]

2 individual errors have lost the game. McAtee could easily have gotten us a point. Game plan was clear to see, keep it tight and have a go in the second. We did and had it been 0-0 maybe Birmingham might've been a bit nervy. Not going to lose any sleep over it as most thought we'd get humped 5 or 6 nil. We didn't. Saturday will matter though.

We were one of the favourites to get promoted IIRC.

Now the benchmark is lets hope we don't get dicked 5 or 6 nil. Shocking how we've failed to make up the gap with where we need to be.

This season's fast becoming a write off. Like this match.

[truewhite15]

If you're trying to be positive about that: it's a game of limited chances for either side, where the team that cost £30m to put together took theirs and the team that cost less than £5m didn't.

Realistically, though, you look at the performances. We were miles off. I don't think the starting line up gave us much of a chance. The midfield looks paper thin and about as strong without Tomo. But we spent the entire game worrying about what Birmingham could do to us rather than what we could do to them.

That was not the performance of a side that thinks they're competing for promotion this season.

[Dave Sutton's barnet]

#Evattout

Won't happen after that, but Saturday might be different. As I say, if we lose and look hopeless, enough of the crowd might turn to persuade Sharon etc.

Obviously I hope we don't lose, and tonight's fixture was always a difficult one. But we can't go on Not Winning.

It’s not going to happen. There is a distinct lack of leadership, bottle and desire from the entire club.

Evatt should have gone in the summer but now we are suffering. It’s years in this league unless someone intervenes or Evatt stops stealing a living and resigns.

If we're not even in a single-figure league position, it has to happen sooner or later. Question is beginning to be whether it's so late it rules out promotion this season.

[BWFC_Insane]

#Evattout

Won't happen after that, but Saturday might be different. As I say, if we lose and look hopeless, enough of the crowd might turn to persuade Sharon etc.

Obviously I hope we don't lose, and tonight's fixture was always a difficult one. But we can't go on Not Winning.

It’s not going to happen. There is a distinct lack of leadership, bottle and desire from the entire club.

Evatt should have gone in the summer but now we are suffering. It’s years in this league unless someone intervenes or Evatt stops stealing a living and resigns.

If we're not even in a single-figure league position, it has to happen sooner or later. Question is beginning to be whether it's so late it rules out promotion this season.

We are not in the top half of league one having spent an incredible amount of money.

But let’s be honest nobody expects Sharon or the board to act because the time to do so was Wembley, or failing that after Huddersfield. Two times we had a manager effectively saying they had no answers and begging to be sacked. Didn’t happen. I find it incredible but I also think it shows the club has problems from the top.

[officer_dibble]

I’m sort of in agreement with bwfci… I can’t believe after Evatt said what he said after Huddersfield (after Wembley!) we’re still here with him. It’s clear he’s got some kind of hold on Sharon. Might take Sharon to have her hand forced by the other investors.

[Spartan2]

#Evattout

Won't happen after that, but Saturday might be different. As I say, if we lose and look hopeless, enough of the crowd might turn to persuade Sharon etc.

Obviously I hope we don't lose, and tonight's fixture was always a difficult one. But we can't go on Not Winning.

It’s not going to happen. There is a distinct lack of leadership, bottle and desire from the entire club.

Evatt should have gone in the summer but now we are suffering. It’s years in this league unless someone intervenes or Evatt stops stealing a living and resigns.

If we're not even in a single-figure league position, it has to happen sooner or later. Question is beginning to be whether it's so late it rules out promotion this season.

We are not in the top half of league one having spent an incredible amount of money.

But let’s be honest nobody expects Sharon or the board to act because the time to do so was Wembley, or failing that after Huddersfield. Two times we had a manager effectively saying they had no answers and begging to be sacked. Didn’t happen. I find it incredible but I also think it shows the club has problems from the top.

Maybe that's what is happening now, Evatt wants to be sacked and Sharon wants him to walk, who knows. One way or another just fecking go.

[BWFC_Insane]

Could someone justify why anyone would tolerate Sheehan? There is for me a bare minimum to deserve pulling on a Bolton shirt. You may not be the best player but you always leave everything out on the pitch.

I honestly can’t think of a player who has continually shirked the basics like he has and got away with it.

To carry a player like that you’d need them to be scoring 20 a season not making the odd tidy pass and scoring a screamer every now and then.

[TANGODANCER]

#Evattout

And which manager would you have liked to manage this lot tonight? Even Pep Guardiola would have gone home at half-time.
And are we actually talking football or stock exchange? See it doesn't seem so long ago the club was in dire straits and we were grabbing at any straws we could find. We rode the bumps and whilst we may never be a Birmingham, we're a damn site healthier than we were. Management don't lose games, players do.

I made the point pre-game about touch and hit, but I was referring to Brum attack, not out defence. We're too slow to react, spend more time ball-watching than Rory McIlroy and have the touch finesse of a blacksmiths reunion. At least "Bolton Wanderers nil" now know where we stand now against the big-spenders, and can get on with it amongst the also-rans..

Long time since I've been so despondent being a Whites fan, but Que Sera. Thanks J.J.B. for the game.

[Worthy4England]

2 ppg, I pretty much wrote off after 5 games. I still think we're a top 6 squad and Sharon's comment was something akin to us having a competitive comparative budget (last season) with new investment this.

I agree with Mar, our obsession with collecting forwards looks like a poor strategy right now. We did well with Maghoma last year and initially I think mist felt we could use him back and another class MFer. We got Matete. He has some promise for me and had we got Maghoma back then that might have shaded it. But on his own he's not quite either of the two.

We've sunk another 2 goals. It's criminally poor. As a one off you let it pass, but some teams we've put goals past have also scored 2. Barrow? Reading? Northampton? Shrewsbury? They're a problem.

7 points off relegation, 11 off top. This shouldn't be a free hit or "outlier" although with a good season start you might gloss over a tricky away.

Peterborough also iffy form donked 5 past Blackpool tonight. I don't really wanna get to the stage of hoping they help him to the taxi.

[Harry Genshaw]

If you're trying to be positive about that: it's a game of limited chances for either side, where the team that cost £30m to put together took theirs and the team that cost less than £5m didn't.

Realistically, though, you look at the performances. We were miles off. I don't think the starting line up gave us much of a chance. The midfield looks paper thin and about as strong without Tomo. But we spent the entire game worrying about what Birmingham could do to us rather than what we could do to them.

That was not the performance of a side that thinks they're competing for promotion this season.

Excellent post TW.

Feels like we failed to turn up, again. Brum fans on Twitter saying we're the worst team to visit St Andrews this season, yet bizarrely we could have robbed a thoroughly undeserved point with better decisions in both boxes at the end.

It won't define Evatts future but I reckon it added another nail.

[officer_dibble]

If your a Birmingham fan who were told we would be a challenger you probably would be in the camp of ‘worst team to visit at Andrews’. On the basis of actual performance v what you thought when the fixtures came out. They walked it in reality. Without some change in management and personnel we won’t do anything different to most play off final losers - mid table.

I’ve just seen a description of santos as being like a labrador coming round from an anaesthetic which made me laugh.

[truewhite15]

I genuinely don't understand why we haven't seen Evatt switch up the formation. We know he's not, historically, been averse to it; just in his time here, he's switched from a back three to a back four and back again, usually with a great deal of immediate success.

So in this, perhaps the trickiest spell of his management career so far, why hasn't he seen whether the trick works again? Collins and McAtee can both work as wide attackers, as can Vic, as could Williams. Yes, it means one of Toal, Rico or Johnston needs to get used to sitting on the bench more often, but that's surely a small price to pay.

Maybe that's the final Hail Mary play in his playbook. Quite how long until he feels forced to use it is anyone's guess...

[Dave Sutton's barnet]

I genuinely don't understand why we haven't seen Evatt switch up the formation. We know he's not, historically, been averse to it; just in his time here, he's switched from a back three to a back four and back again, usually with a great deal of immediate success.

So in this, perhaps the trickiest spell of his management career so far, why hasn't he seen whether the trick works again? Collins and McAtee can both work as wide attackers, as can Vic, as could Williams. Yes, it means one of Toal, Rico or Johnston needs to get used to sitting on the bench more often, but that's surely a small price to pay.

Maybe that's the final Hail Mary play in his playbook. Quite how long until he feels forced to use it is anyone's guess...

This got me looking back at previous formation changes. For all his talk of needing "time on the grass", we've switched in short order before.

Tue 11 Jan 2022: lost 0-2 at home to Wycombe with a back four
Sat 15 Jan 2022: beat Ipwich 2-0 at home with a back three

Sat 11 Mar 2023: lost 0-2 at home to Ipswich with a "10 and two 6s"
Fri 17 Mar 2023: drew at Wednesday with "6 behind two 8s", won cup week after, reached playoffs

(The Jan 2021 switch from back three to four happened in a 10-day gap)