It's 1979 all over again - Forest v Malmö!

Can't see Dyche doing it but a three of Abbott, Boly, Morato isn't the worst on paper.

I think not having Cunha in the squad is a bit of a bugger. Also Hutch but then again you wouldn't have had Zinchenko. Which in hindsight.....

The Ginger Prince will probably look to get some parity in the squad with the return of Aina and maybe the Brazilian bloke from Botofogo who we bought. I honest don't see much of a future for Zinchenko because a) he's not a defender and b) he is made of Taiwo biscuits.... and Sean works his players hard. We ran 6K more than the Liverpool players at the weekend. I suspect this will be the norm from now on.

Do we have any yoof who can play full back? Might be an idea to blood them once we know we aren't going out of this competition. or fuck it, if they are good enough have them feature in this match. you have convinced me, Neco is playing in this game.

Chicago: Talking to myself..

Uh, of all our squad permutations? It absolutely is. A well designed combination of advanced age, inexperience, immobility and ricks, all shoved into an unfamiliar formation.

I hope we have a return clause on Zinchenko in January. Thanks but no thanks.

On the youths, I'd love to see Jimmy Sinclair given some minutes. Tricky right sided forward. Especially if we end up bringing Abbott on as a right fucking winger like we did last time.

I'll give the coaching staff a chance to see what they can do with him. They managed to get Sangare looking like he might be a player, maybe with the right structure they can use Zinchenko effectively. I'd fancy a combo of Stone and Woan to have some ideas of how to use a playmaking wing back who doesn't track back all that well.

Well yes, kind of, if I understood Dyche correctly a couple of days before Liverpool.

• "Douglas Luiz is making progress but he is going to be a matter of time; it's not going to be instant". i.e. Nowhere near the squad yet.

• "Dilane Bakwa is making good progress and back on the grass but not with us - he's with the medical staff & sport science staff. Ola Aina is very similar". i.e. Definitely nowhere near the squad yet.

• "Chris Wood is getting re-scanned so we are checking up on that. But it is good news so far. Being re-scanned in just part of the process - there is nothing untoward in it; it is just a check-up". Maybe part of squad, but I'd be pretty surprised if that = ready to start.

• CHO yes; came on as sub at the weekend, so (assuming no adverse reaction) you'd expect him to play on Thursday at the very least from the bench. But I'm afraid he's the only one of the 4 you mention about whom I'd hold out much hope. However "Chicago: positive" you might feel.

Oh, and your team has 12 players in it (the formation appears to be 4-3-3-1)....

Guess:

Sels / Victor: Savona, Milenković, Morato, Neco: Yates, Sangaré: Ndoye, McAtee, CHO: Kalimuendo. But I wouldn't be at all surprised if MGW & Jesus start (given the fact that both of them had 2 weeks of rest during the international break) - which would essentially mean Anderson & Murillo are rested.

Of course, the ideal is that we get a couple of goals up relatively early and are thus able to get some of the more important players safely off. But I doubt Dyche (let alone Marinakis) will be all that keen to toss off the Europa League at this stage; I expect him to go relatively strong to start off with - realistically we need to win this game.

Some extra Malmo tickets for Thursday just went on sale if anyone looking for one.

Zinchenko is a very good footballer, but he is not a left back; there is a reason why he plays in midfield for his country. He signed for Man City as a midfield player - it was only Pep who converted him to a left back (according to Wikipedia, because of injuries to his two usual left backs at the time - Benjamin Mendy & Fabian Delph, apparently... & Delph was also primarily a midfield player). Zinchenko might well work as a full back / wing back in a team that habitually has 60-70%+ of the ball, and where even a genuine full back ends up inverting into midfield in Pep-land, but we are not going to be that team any time soon, if ever.

I too would give the coaching staff the chance to see what they could do with him. I'd be happy enough to see him playing on the left of a 3-man midfield, provided he had genuine defenders behind him; his crossing, for example, is excellent (see the Betis game). But on the basis that it feels unlikely that Dyche is going to line up with anything other than 4 at the back very often, if at all (unless forced to by injuries), personally I wouldn't be wasting much effort at trying to integrate him into a full back role.

Can Gunn play? He can’t be worse than John, who seems even worse than that clown we had last season as back up.

More a lumbering shouting bloke, by all accounts.

He really doesn't.

Injured and not in the squad, so probably not.

Under 21s are playing tonight. No Sinclair or Abbott, which is to be expected. Anyone spot any other notable absentees?

Gunn's injured, isn't he?

EDIT: sorry, was scrolling down the page and not realised this had already been pointed out