Coventry Saint

I thought Tait was going to stroll the POTY awards at the start of the season, but gradually Marcus Fraser has improved week by week and now he is a standout, he's my player of the year at the moment. Completely agree. He's really grown in confidence too, I'd say, and moves forward far better than I was expecting. I think he does pretty well on the right of a three.

Interesting to note which clubs those who are touting Goodwin support.

...In the middle of Aarstreet?

Think I'll be going for a spot of insurance gambling when the time comes. Double chance Accies draw/win and St Johnstone win.

I assume you guys have all seen what Cammy Smith was up to yesterday?!

If only you actually needed your players to be in form.

Jeeeesus. We're watching them play around us. Utter horseshit from us. Some finish, tbf.

Poor start from us. Repeatedly failure by to clear our lines/find a teammate.

Meh. Hard to get too wound up about the crowds. Can't make sense of our formation today, mind. Connolly and Quaner up front?

Tyldesley was very decent last time we played. Wasn't sure what to expect but he was well-researched and pretty balanced.

Sticks in my head that we tried it against Celtic, I want to say in the Gravesen hat-trick game, and Gus changed it after about half an hour. I could be massively mis-remembering that, tbf.

I broadly dislike a 3/5 for that reason. It's been well discussed but Mason doing a job on Tavernier was key that night. Our attitude towards games against Rangers/Celtic has been much improved since the 3-0 at Ibrox (the 4-0 to Celtic was an aberration and we actually set up/started well). I mainly hope we continue that tomorrow.

Fair enough. TBH, I tend to use 3/5 fairly interchangeably in that instance. It amounts to much the same.

We do, and have done loads this season, especially recently. Tait RWB, Fraser, McCarthy and Shaughnessy at CH, Durmus LWB.

We're still far from full strength for this, but at least we'll have been slightly rested. Expect the 5-3-1-1 to continue, with Obika up front, McGrath off him, and maybe JDH, Erhahon and either Flynn or McPherson across the middle. Note that that's not us making special measures for Rangers: it's how we typically line up.

Did you see the Fulham 'handball'? Utter joke. That could literally send them down.

Mainly hoping we at least challenge him this time.

Really upsets me when the United fans call us the Maureens. It's like they've taken a girl's name and turned it into a different girl's name, because being a girl is bad, m'kay? I think you'll take an early lead and then we'll both be comfortable with a 1-0 - quite important our GD doesn't take a doing - so the game will peter out.

This. I can't for a second imagine that fatigue/games played will play a significant part, and the bottom end of the Premiership is broadly as competitive as it's been for a very long time. Whoever finishes 11th will actually not be a terrible side. It's a shame, but I'd say the final is a foregone conclusion already.

Over the past few years I've really carried Saints' relative fortunes around with me - probably a symptom of relatively fragile mental health, especially over the past 12 months (certain I'm not alone there). Since 2016 in particular I've been finding the losses weight on me a bit heavier/have influenced my general state of mind a bit. Sensible part of my brain knows its daft, but the other part ignores it and pisses me off anyway. This respite from a relegation battle - arguably only our second such season since 13-14* - has been very, very welcome. * I was counting 15/16 as a relegation battle in that we struggled a lot under Murray and were looking awful, before ending up fairly comfortable after Rae came in.

It's nuts, isn't it? I'm 42 and have no memory of us finishing any higher.

For years I've wanted to be one of those mid-table teams that is playing in flip-flops by early March.

Yeah. "Challenging for top six" was at the very upper end of my expectations for this season, especially at the end of September. Achieving it would be great, but I'm not going to stress about missing out. For the record, I think we'll manage it.

Great shame that St Johnstone's opportunities to stitch us up by not trying are limited here.