theAnticlough

As a complement to the other thread, I thought I'd ask who you have as the best performers so far at the quarter season mark... Here's my Top 5 to kick things off 1) Lucas Ness The obvious choice I think. Ever-present in the league and has hardly put a foot wrong. The display at Huddersfield has to be the best individual performance in a single game so far. His best position is in the centre, but to accommodate mcDonald he's done really well at RCB. We shouldn't forget he played in the play-offs there and pushed JJ for MoM in the Wembley final from RCB. His 1-on-1 defending is consistently strong and it's a bonus to have his aerial prowess as a wide defender. His passing and ball control is absolutely fine and under-rated I think. It'll be interesting to see what interest there is in the January window. If he stays fit, I can't see his form dropping as he's just a class act - teams in the Championship and top of L1 with defensive weaknesses are bound to be interested. 2) Jacob Bedeau He's playing better in L1 than he did in L2 last season (although his first season was better than that). He looks completely at home at this level and could easily play for a team around the top. I'd say he's gotten better and better over these 12 games as well and is even catching up with Ness. Nobody's gotten the better of him and that includes the Fernandez guy at Huddersfield who's said to be the best player in the league. I bet Bedeau has been the toughest opponent he's faced so far. JB has also gotten off the mark with his first goal for the club. It looks like he'll add a few more in the league because his confidence is growing all the time. 3) Nick Tsaroulla Another who looks perfectly at home at the higher level. I'd say he's been much more consistent this season than last year and puts in a strong performance week and after week. He's been good in all three thirds of the pitch, especially in the middle third where he's shown that he can retain and use the ball well even when tightly marked and harried. 4) Ishe Samuels-Smith Played fewer league games (8 with 4 as sub) but it's not just the stellar showing at Mansfield, he's been good in most of his games. Maybe if he was a Tottenham loanee instead of Chelsea, more fans would have positive from the start. What a combination of talents he has - can surge forward all game long but is a superb one-on-one defender as well. Enjoy him while we can, he's going to go far 5) Ollie Cooper Showed the way in our first 8 games. Great pressing, tidy on the ball and got 4 goals. honorable mentions - Connor Grant, his best season at Notts so far. Mr. Belshaw pretty steady as well Very interested to see who others pick out and in what order....

Yes and another positive development is the health of the goalkeepers. It was a real concern to us fans that the rigours of modern football had become too much for them, so often they were going down with mysterious injuries. And the most worrying injuries of all - non-contact, suggesting something much more serious than a knock. The game had become so strenuous for them and they needed medical attention every single game. A career-threatening state of affairs, obviously. Thankfully, new training methods, preventative treatments, dietary advances...whatever it is that's been employed, the issue has seemingly gone away and we can sleep easier knowing that these brave players might have long careers after all. ;)

Nice topic. I'd say many of the players have taken to L1 like ducks to water - some have been outstanding, most have shown really well, many have improved, none have been embarrassed. The 4 game slide seems to have come from MP overthinking during the international break and going against the club's DNA to set up much more defensively. I'm sure we're cured of that, because you don't only lose, you lose miserably. Our goal difference after 12 games of playing mainly top L1 teams is only -1 and that tells us a lot. Hopefully, the fantastic form of Nees, Bedeau, RodMac, Robbo, Finneran, ISS, Tsaroulla and co can put us firmly mid-table over the next 10 games and we'll take it from there.

Some great candidates today, @Robbie Robertson was immense. Bedeau started and ended the game tremendously, but I'll vote for Samuels-Smith. He's an unbelievable athlete. The rest of the team better get ready, and make the right runs, because it looks like he can get up and down the line all game long.

I'll look for myself behind that goal - great memories. I've seen some rubbish at Field Mill, but this game is always the first I remember Tommy Johnson was a real ex-factor at that level, before he went on to play top-flight football

Yeah Lipsiuc is ahead of him on both sides. And he did what Maz hasn't done in over a season, score a goal

Bolton Wanderers 1-1 Bristol C WHU 2-0 West Bromwich Albion Wigan Athletic 2-0 Bromley Wycombe 2-0 Burton Albion Fleetwood Town 0-2 Bristol Rovers Joker Shrewsbury 1-1 Gillingham Barrow 2-1 Eastleigh Tamworth 2-1 Woking

A point Pato made in his post-match was how the ball stuck with Wootton - something we've been badly lacking. Kanu did well v Wednesday and Smyth should be capable, but I thought he had a low-energy game v Stockport. We need the hold-up play to improve fast to get a better foothold in these kinds of game.

You might be more optimistic than the average Notts fan @nottsnutter Rather than the home games, this one will show us whether we can do better than the awful Reading and Wycombe games. Battling wasn't the problem there, it was the lack of positivity coming out of the game plan and team selection

Branston will take some beating. So many others over the years. A fairly recent one for me would be Connor Lemonheigh-Evans, who maybe never found a Notts shirt with a pass in the few games he played for us.

They have the transfer in common! They were practically traded for each other, US sports style.

Nice one and why not, we need it

Well @Fan of Big Tone, it was certainly lopsided in all the key stats and that matched what many saw with their own eyes, as MrWillow said. It was pretty uncomfortable seeing us dominated on our own pitch and ground like that. And you get the feeling that if the game was played again 10 more times, they'd win 8, and maybe 2 would be a draw. Sure we battled really hard, had our moments, and deserve the point because of that - but they certainly displayed their superiority over 90 mins. This is no surprise though, Stockport have always been a couple of years ahead of us in recent years. They were a L1 play-off finalist last season and look like at least matching that this year. We on the other hand, look likely to be a bottom third side hoping to build on our first season back I'll stick with 'mauling', although it was only meant figuratively anyway, and didn't expect an exchange of posts on it

Yeah Evans and Lipsiuc were the pick of the subs by far. I'm a Mustapha fan but coming on cold like that he almost cost us the game losing it cheaply a few times.

I'll go for Bedeau again, he's in a terrific run of form. He was there, but I don't see why he's to blame for a goal that cut right through our centre. Belshaw must be in the running today. Ness as usual. Finneran and Samuels-Smith were good Our front 3 did fine, but we needed more hold up and build up from them to get a better foothold in the game. Ditto for Ndlovu and Mustapha when they came on.

We took a mauling really. Our excuse has to be that the team still isn't familiar with each other....because there's a long way to go to be as good as them. That said, we battled hard, defended well and were the strongest side in stoppage time. Great guts shown and for that we are worth the point.

A 2nd goal aginst the run of play could knock the stuffing out of them

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Yeah, good to be reminded of that. Ness ran JJ a close second for MoM that day. McDonald and Ness maximise our quality across the backline. Hope that when Gibbons comes back and has another shot at it, he'll have worked on his game.

Kanu was a player transformed against Weds and I'm expecting him to play with a new level of confidence today Smyth should be better too after shaking off his mystery injury Wootton will get a great reception I think, but RodMac can do a good job on him It's going to be a cracking game of football. Can't wait

Tuesday was such a relief. I think we've seen the last of MP's defensive experiments and he won't be handicapping us with team selection again. We can look forward to watching good football matches with positive play. If we play anything like we did against Sfeff Weds, there's no reason we can't bag another 3pts.

So many great performances to choose from today Tsaroulla and Finneran were class Kanu was unrecognisable today, by far and away his best game in a Notts shirt. But I'll give my vote to Jacob Bedeau, I thought he was awesome. Turned defence into attack all game long and hardly put a foot wrong.

What a breath of fresh air - night and day in terms of positivity and team balance Lessons of October, don't ovethink it Pato, stay positive and true to the club's winning formula and we'll be fine (and entertained in the process) This should be the starting XI now. Reward these players and make others have to earn it

So much better. We can see our potential, and true level hopefully, against a really good L1 side. Pato must be kicking himself. We've picked balanced sides for the past 6 years, why did he think we needed to go so much on the defensive

Well done, Pato. First team selection in a while that makes sense. Gibbons and Roberts definitely had to step down after Saturday. Robertson will be key to giving Wednesday a game I think, his form has a big range from very poor to excellent