theAnticlough

Toby Adebayo-Rowling is an ex-player who seems to be really coming into his own this season and is a regular assister for top-of-the-table Dale. It looks like he'll be an EFL player again next season, aged 29, either for Dale or another L2 that will be watching

Great to see an unchanged team again following a win. Small detail...McDonald doesn't make the squad today. I know Ness has done well coming on lately, but I hope RodMac has a cold or something because he still might be a contender for our POTY so far, and should be ahead of Ness in the pecking order. COYP - let's go top and stay there 😛

I agree @Robbie 1) The January window isn't the summer window in that it's more difficult to bring in players who will lead and transform your team and 2) that's the way MP manages his team anyway and we love him for it, based on performance and merit. It's surprising actually how operating on these basic, old-fashioned principles, helps the squad come together. Everyone knows where they stand. Compared to favouritism or the coach thinking they're the important one and can win games thru their schemes and chopping and changing.

Good to see the Analyst's Bar crew still active. I've always enjoyed anything they put out there.

Yet another unchanged line up? Keys to victory? If Roos is Jekyll and Hyde, may Mr.Jekyll turn up again on Saturday. Apart from that, the same as always. As MP says, performance is the player's responsibility. If 11 show up well, we'll be top by 2:30. I can't say I'm confident though. The fixture in Dec '23 still brings back bad memories. Baldwin put us ahead but they totally bossed it in the second half. And 1-2 again on New year's Day. They have about a half dozen players left from then, including Barrett, Weir, Jamille Matt. I think we'll prevent them making it a hat-trick of festive Meadow Lane wins by drawing 1-1.

being Grimsby, just cod and chips

They'll be scared shitless at this point. I know we're supposed to hate them but can't Harrogate go down instead, please?

BBC Radio picked out the right quote. It seems to be true. In the past we haven't had that and sometimes didn't realise. MP has done a tremendous job so far of instilling the right culture at the club. He's turning out to be much more than a Head Coach and is what we were crying out for - a real leader.

For me, it's a tough choice between Dennis and Bedeau. Bedeau was immense today and it was his usual speciality that caught the eye - what an awesome one-on-one defender he is. I voted Dennis though. That's two away wins on the bounce he's won for us now. I thought he ran Roos close for MoM at Bristol Rovers. But I'll vote for him this time. His all round game as an AM was solid, but the goal was spectacular. Freeze the film at when he received it - he had so much to do, scoring would have been a 1% chance. And we wouldn't have got the second if Grimsby hadn't risked all and left just 1 at the back. Matty Dennis has bagged us so many points this season with his goals.

In three months MP must have passed Maynard's total of unchanged teams across his 1.5 seasons. COYP

Portsmouth 1-0 Blackburn Wrexham 2-1 Watford Burton Albion 1-2 Wycombe Peterborough 1-1 Northampton Stockport County 2-0 Stevenage Joker Cheltenham 2- 0 Harrogate Chesterfield 1-1 Barnet Crawley 1-1 Oldham Athletic

Yes, feel better soon Super Ram... But basically what the news is saying is true - there's an epidemic out there, maybe multiple, of flu-like illnesses. My eldest daughter came down hard straight after the Bristol Rovers game and is still dealing with the aftermath of it. I took my flu jab early this year, and I was really annoyed to get a cold about 10 days after. But that was all it was, classic cold symptoms, never once had a fever or felt weak. I was then in the same car/rooms/spaces as my daughter and the friend who passed on the bug. I've been fine though, which I attribute to the jab. I'm sure it'll be all gone by Xmas Super Ram and you'll be stronger for going thru it. It's the turkey that should start worrying.

Agree about Dennis. He showed that he can play that inside-forward role very well. That’s a great bonus cos we know he’s a goal scorer. Him, Jatta, Grant, progressive wing-backs and the threat of Iorpenda arriving from deep is more than enough to threaten the haddocks tomorrow. One thought looking ahead, Dennis and Hall have turned out to be pretty similar players - primarily smallish skillful strikers who can feature as AMs as well. I wonder if they’ll be competing for the same spot in the second half of the season. Or can we regularly play them both?

6 weeks! Ouch that’s a real blow. Ollie Norburn suddenly becomes very important and Hinchy will have to cover from the bench Great time then for Iorpenda to get that tremendous confidence boost, we’re going to need him to be right on top of his game this month, including when Palmer comes back

and there's confirmation that Robbo is injured. If it was flu it would read 'unavailable'

You could be right @menzinho but the OS says Jack Hinchy has been recalled from his loan spell at Altrincham. The midfielder returns to bolster our midfield ranks at a time when both Matt Palmer and Scott Robertson are unavailable due to injury.

Maybe, but he played quite a lot last season - that still counts as a great bounceback from his NL days. A different case entirely, but it's fun keeping an eye on one of my favourites Aden Baldwin - playing CB for the 2nd place team in L1 currently on track to become a Championship player.

That's reason enough to recall him. Hopefully, Robbo will be back very soon. But it was noticeable that there was no CM on the subs bench v MK for the first time in weeks. MP needs the option of being able to cover that area.

Robbo back it if he's shaken off the flu or whatever it is. Apart from that unchanged I think. MP tends to give winning teams another go, so JJ and co would have to wait in line. They're at least 6 games without a league win. We might put in a classic away perfroamnce and come away 2 0r 3 goal winners.

Excellent move to cut that one short. He'll be another Francis - fail to get regular pitch time in the NL, and then pop up some time afterwards on a L1 squad. Do we know what Robbo's problem is? There might be more need for cover than has been disclosed.

I see Walsall win to go 4 pts clear at the top. No worries, they come down with the Christmas decoarations anyway. In other news, Crewe lose points to a 90+3 mins equaliser by bottom club, Nweport. What a shame for Crewe ;)

Nice strip Flint is wearing there, I wouldn't mind that coming back as a home or away shirt one season.

Spot on about the ref and also the midfield. Everyone's elated last night and today, and rightly so, but we shouldn't kid ourselves that being outplayed in our own stadium by a promotion rival doesn't matter. Warne was one-sided in his post-match interview, but he was onto to something when he said that MK would win that one if it was replayed 9 times out of ten. That doesn't account for being gifted a pen and spared an obvious red card. If those decisions were given correctly, we'd have run out easy 2 or 3-1 winners of the game. But in terms of general play, territorial dominance and chances (they were very wasteful) he has a point I think. Most times that will translate into wins. We do need to have our first choice midfielders available for other top 6 or 7 battles this season or we might not enjoy too many other victories in them.

I don't think you can underestimate the desperation to get out of the division at that point @DangerousSausage. Scott and Maca were both in the first years of their contracts, so of course Morais was cover for those two, who had both proven themselves. Wasn't Scott injured for a while? And we had nobody else at all in terms of strikers. So no forward on the bench and if Maca was injured nobody at all? We just had to sign someone as insurance against an epic season and a chance of promotion going down the drain. The length of the contract suggests Montague and the club thought he could be a squad player for multiple seasons. If they did they were wrong, you win some you lose some.

Warne saying in his post-match that he took Nemane off because he was on 'a strong orange'. Well there isn't an orange card so you mean red. That says it all. They should've been playing with 10 from that point in the first half