MK Dons v The Mighty Gas. Official match day thread .

Couldn’t disagree more - what you’re describing there is a million miles away from what the players require to maintain their sharpness & fitness and prepare physically & mentally for a competitive game.

I agree with what you say but these are professional footballers. You don’t learn your skills overnight and you don’t lose them overnight as well. It becomes a part of you? To be honest, apart from Koiki maybe, the performances our players put in yesterday, individually and as a team, without being disrespectful to any individual, you could get on any Sunday in a park in any city?
The difference between our team and MK, our players and theirs, was immense.
And I am sure they have had similar issues around practice, etc.

OK. I hear what you say. Let’s see what we do when our players are fit?
Personally, from what I have seen so far, most of our players lack the skills that other L1 teams show. But we can get past that and get results if those individuals play together as a team.
Yesterday, 1st half, we kept our social distance from their players! It wasn’t a good watch.

I hope I am wrong. Maybe it takes time to build a team to play a certain way. But you still need the basic skills! As an example, our throw ins must be the most suspect in the league? Don’t players know how to throw a ball legally? If not, they should be trained by the coaching staff. Tutonda has the worst throw I have seen in years and yes, he plays along the touchline and takes a lot of throw ins.

Personally I think Garner signed a lot of players who are not good enough, and never will be. Another season wasted on some potty idea that a coach can be a mananger overnight. Our problem is there are no leaders out on the pitch, no one to keep discipline on the pitch. Our midfield is poor defensively, and there is little in going forward. I would say we need and experienced defensive midfielder and an experienced forward that can hold the ball up.

Bit of an over exaggeration, I work with people who've had a mild case of COVID, but we've all just carried on working normally.

You do realise everyone in the world isn’t the same?

Yes and i have friends and family who have had Covid in varying degrees and every one was a concern for those who knew them, sad to say not all recovered.  Having concern for friends and colleagues who have Covid   is not an exaggeration ,you are making light of what is potentially a very serious  condition, it may have escaped your notice that thousands of people have lost there lives or have suffered long term damage to covid, long may you and those you work with stay fit and healthy, not every one has been so lucky!

Didn't put say this week most of the players live in flats.so didn't even get to walk in the garden

Unfortunately the EFL will not postpone games, but leave it for the clubs to make that decision.  Quite rightly the onus is on the clubs to fulfill their fixtures, which should ensure that everything possible is done to ensure games go ahead.  We have been very unfortunate in that the end of our isolation period came just before our game was due to be played - but then with our fixture list, that was always going to be the case (prior to Portsmouth calling off their game).  perhaps the other affected clubs were looking ahead to their return date in relation to available training time, prior to postponing their games.  That should not have been allowed, but would presumably be under investigation by the EFL.

I do wonder though, if Sunderland are now exploiting the situation.  They seem to be playing mind games with the EFL.  Following on from their initial response, despite knowing the same rules applied to every club, they seemed to want the EFL to guarantee that they would not be penalised by postponing their games, when in fact the EFL have always stated that any postponements would be investigated, and no club had been penalised when their Covid related reasons were genuine.

With yet another game being called off by Sunderland, I think they are testing the waters, and seeing what they can get away with.  I cannot help but feel that an already difficult position for both the clubs in trying to fulfill fixtures even when not quite ready, and in the EFL in trying to ensure that clubs fulfill their fixtures, is being made more difficult by Sunderland.