A colleague came up to me today and said “How many points are your lot on now – 16?” and I said that it was 15 before backtracking quickly.. Saturday’s game felt like a loss and it’s easy to forget that we did actually come away with something, albeit a solitary point when 3 looked so likely in the first half.

What a day, what a performance and what a result!

Beattie put a minor run of poor form to bed as Stoke beat a dispirited West Ham side 2-1 at the Britannia on Saturday. The poor advertising board felt the brunt of Beattie’s relief as that particular sponsor no doubt sat grinning to themselves at the free publicity afforded by the big striker’s right boot.

West Ham Correspondent Billy Blagg completes his story of the memorable League Cup of 72'

West Ham Correspondent Billy Blag recounts an historic cup run for his beloved Hammers which culminated in a lengthy, drawn out jostle with the high flying Potters...

A surprising line up but a good positive display saw Stoke take not just a point but also much encouragement away from Goodison Park.

I have let a couple of days pass to take in the result, the performance and the reaction – all of which have surprised me to be honest. It seems whenever anything goes wrong at the club, be it on or off the pitch, the ‘supporters’ always, without fail, need someone to blame; and not for the first time this season Pulis won this honour after Saturday's 2-0 defeat to the Champions of England. The game was poor, the performance from players and fans alike was poor – but aren’t we all entitled to a bad day at the office?

On the whole it was a good display by the Potters but once again we were denied in the closing minutes, this time by an equaliser from the penalty spot following a stupid and lazy challenge by Danny Collins.

Apologies to those regular readers for the lack of updates – I have been away for a couple of weeks and got married too so have been pre-occupied and although I specifically chose a non match day to do the deed I still found myself late back on the Saturday so missed much of the Chelsea game…

Stoke built on their 3 points against Burnley with another 3 against big spending Sunderland. A Kitson goal and and another dogged defensive display ensured city bagged the points and gained their third clean sheet in 4 games.