Roy making his usual noises about next season:

"A lot of the money that I have spent in my couple of years has actually been recouped, in part by the sale of Smalling.

"Of course that doesn't help the chairman, because all the money he has put in in the past hasn't been.

Timmy from The Offside was good enough to invite me to take part on his podcast.  I have never actually listened to a podcast, I don't think, but thanks to the miracles of modern technology Timmy called me on Sunday night and we had a brief chat about Fulham, which he recorded.  You can listen to that recording here.

Depth Chart:

Schwarzer, Zuberbuhler, Stockdale
Paintsil, Baird, Kelly, Stoor
Hangeland, Hughes, Smalling
Konchesky, Shorey
Duff, Davies, Riise
Baird, Dikgacoi, Etuhu
Murphy, Greening
Dempsey, Gera, Greening
Johnson, Kamara, Nevland, Okaka
Zamora, Dempsey, Elm

Not ideal is it?

Hopefully more from Jamie when he's back, but a good point, no?

Dikgacoi on after 55 mins. Here are our passes before then, and after.   Did well.

Some talk about Jonathan Greening on Friends of Fulham and, following up, by Dan at Hammyend.com.

Well this sort of thing's been my bread and butter for yonks, so I couldn't resist wading in as well.

It's been noted that Greening has been in the side when we did well, and out of it when we did not.

My neverending quest to understand football has taken me in many strange directions. Most recently I have been reading a couple of coaching books by a man named Allen Wade. Wade's name won't mean much to you, I don't suppose, but it was he who taught our Roy to coach back in the day.   From there it was natural enough that I might further explore Wade's philosophy, as a way of getting an understanding of Roy's.

It's all about the result. Today was a double-edged sword: on the one hand, when in bad form, what better than a home game against the team at the foot of the table? On the other, surely this only adds to the pressure? For Portsmouth are, to an extent, in a false position, and would be fighting for their lives.

Okaka gets 9, Shorey gets 7.  Best squad number allocation for new players ever?   I was always disappointed when Seol took the number 7, having grown up watching Kenny Dalglish use that particular number to devastating effect.  Shorey's okay in 7, in a Steve Coppell type way.  True, he's not a right winger, but the 7 gives him a cultured sheen, and I am hopeful it will lead to some lovely dangerous crossing.

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Well there we go.

The club neatly summarises ins and outs, but the major business equates to:

Nicky Shorey and Stefano Okaka in; Chris Smalling and Joe Kamara out.

We also welcome Germany youngster Christopher Buchtmann from Liverpool, and have sent Tony Kallio off on loan again.

Five defeats in a row. This predicament has snuck up on us somewhat, the problems largely having come away from home (insert England captain joke here), but here, in a tricky but far from daunting fixture against a good but slightly out of form Villa side, we fouled up horribly.

Since his arrival two years ago Brede Hangeland has been a tremendous player for Fulham, but this season something has been askew.

Football is a fluid team game, with good sides acting as machines where the component parts work together to make something good happen.  We currently have:

loads of regulars injured

just played a load of away games

And so things have looked bad.

One thing that was broadly okay on Tuesday was the centre of midfield.

Thanks to "Dan in Putney" in the comments...

Can we afford two defensive full-backs again on Saturday?

Who would you pick?

Would it be foolhardy to have Duff and Davies at LB and RB? (yes, but...)

I don't usually go in for team selection discussions, but it is getting interesting isn't it?

My XI:

Schwarzer; Kelly-Hughes-Hangeland-Kallio; Davies-Murphy-Baird-Duff; Gera-Zamora

Assuming Kelly hasn't been banished.