Okay, I've pretty much ignored the team that I picked at the start of the season, haven't made any transfers and currently resides 2,890th overall;

Hahnemann (REA) £2.3m

Ridgewell (BIR) £2.5m
Ingimarsson (REA) £2.7m
Halford (SHU) £2.1m
Kilgallon (SHU) £2m

Eagles (BUR) £2m
Howard (SHU) £2.4m
Bodde (SWA) £2m
Kightly (WOL) £3.1m

Phillips (BIR) £4.3m
Ebanks-Blake (WOL) £4.5m

Total Cost £29.9m
Transfers Remaining 40

I'm currently 344 points behind the overall leader so (just for fun) need some help playing catch up . Looking at the recent team history page, Ingimarsson, Kightly, Bodde & Ebanks-Blake haven't played so I assume that they're either injured or out of favour and therefore need to be replaced before today's games get underway @ 3pm . Phillips also hasn't done very much so maybe he needs replacing as well?

Any suggestions on who I should be bringing into this team would be very much appreciated as I know jack about the Championship's teams & players, also do the play offs count in this competition?

Cheers...

RB...

That's a very good team to have picked from the start... shame you haven't been managing it

The play-offs do count, so save a few transfers for them if you can

Ingimarsson, Bodde and Kightly are out for the season. Ebanks-Blake has missed the last couple of games through injury and is expected to be out today also, so with 40 transfers left he needs to go.

I'd change to 4-3-3 by doing the following:
Ingimarsson (REA) 2.7m Gyepes (CAR) 1.6m
Bodde (SWA) 2m Gomez (SWA) 1.7m or Bailey (CHA) 2.2m (you could afford Hunt, but he's playing awful at the moment)
Kightly (WOL) 3.1m McCormack (CAR) 3.2m
Ebanks-Blake (WOL) 4.5m Scotland (SWA) 3.4m

Phillips hasn't been worth having but might be worth keeping today, at home to Plymouth, if he starts (which he may do as O'Connor might be out today). If not, perhaps go for Cameron Jerome.

Don't bring in any Ipswich players

Why?...

hulse and commons doing ok for derby

I'm not entirely sure this team would be that much higher up the league if I had been actively managing it, at least at this stage of the season I've got some stats to guide me through the final weeks of the season.

Defensively I quite fancy bringing in a few more Birmingham players, any chance you could confirm which players start on a regular basis

I'll definitely bring in Gomez (for Bodde) although not sure about switching to a 4-3-3 formation, I might bring in Bailey as a replacement for Kightly.

Striker wise will definitely replace Ebanks-Blake with Scotland, as for Phillips I'll keep an eye for the team news but is Smith @ Watford worth considering as his replacement?...

Good to know, I'll consider bringing in both players on 21/04/09 ...

Trust me that 4-3-3 is the way to go in this game, the strikers have been gold and the midfielders generally useless - the exact opposite of the main TFF Premiership game.

I recommended Gyepes of Cardiff because he's unbelievably cheap and a guaranteed starter in a defensively sound play-off team, gets forward for set pieces, and he frees up enough money to choose 3 stud strikers. You'll want to save enough to bring Ebanks-Blake back in for the next game if he's fit.

However if you're set on 4-4-2 and Brum defenders then only Radhi Jaidi is worth adding to Ridgewell. Stephen Carr at RB isn't listed in the game and Queudrue and Murphy are in competition for the LB slot.

Watford score plenty, so Smith would be a sound choice, as would Commons and Hulse.

We are lucky to have the survival points in the bag.

Cardiff seem to be getting lots of soft penalties* and McCormack takes them, as well as scoring in open play too. Almost certain to be in play-offs as well.

Last Saturday at Selhurst was a case in point.

Taking all of the above into consideration, here's what I'm thinking of doing prior to the 3pm kick-offs;

Hahnemann (REA) Taylor (BIR)

Ridgewell (BIR)
Ingimarsson (REA) Jaidi (BIR)
Halford (SHU)
Kilgallon (SHU)

Eagles (BUR)
Howard (SHU)
Bodde (SWA) Gomez (SWA)
Kightly (WOL) Smith (WAT)

Ebanks-Blake (WOL) Scotland (SWA)
Phillips (BIR) McCormack (CAR)

Total Cost £27.3m
Transfers Remaining 34

So I'm switchinng to a Birmingham semi-block and adopting a 4-3-3 formation, I'll only bring in McCormack if Phillips doesn't start today, if he does then I'll wait until 21/04/09 to bring McCormack into this team's line-up. These changes also mean that there's plenty of cash left over so that Ebanks-Blake can be brought back in once fit.

Any last minute tweaks needed to the above changes?...

Birmingham: Maik Taylor, Carr, Jaidi, Ridgewell, Murphy, Larsson, Johnson, Bowyer, Fahey, O'Connor, Jerome
Subs: Doyle, Queudrue, Bouazza, Phillips, McFadden

Phillips on the bench....

Cardiff: Taylor, McNaughton, Purse, Gyepes, Kennedy, Ledley, McPhail, Rae, McCormack, Bothroyd, Chopra
Subs: Heaton, Whittingham, Eddie Johnson, Comminges, Burke

... and McCormack plays (of course), so looks like all systems go for your plan B

Yep, just waiting for the Swansea & Watford line-ups before I implement plan B...

Okay Gomez & Scotland both start so just awaiting confirmation on Smith now...

He's in... go for it!

Confirmation received so team now consists of the following players;

Taylor (BIR)

Jaidi (BIR)
Ridgewell (BIR)
Halford (SHU)
Kilgallon (SHU)

Eagles (BUR)
Howard (SHU)
Gomez (SWA)

McCormack (CAR)
Scotland (SWA)
Smith (WAT)

Total Cost £27.3m
Transfers Remaining 34

Fingers crossed ...

I'm impressed at your sudden conversion to taking this game so seriously after total disinterest all year

Good luck!

Well I'm not taking it that seriously but it's going to be fun to see how much higher up the league I can get this team over the next four/five weeks.

Cheers for the advice, it's been very much appreciated ...

After today you can pretty much afford to swap in a hot player or two for any odd standalones, plus make very good use of the play-offs which should be five dfferent matches on five different days. If you're lucky the return of the second semi will be before the return of the first, like in the Champions League.

Why waste your time and energy? there is absolutely nothing to gain, relax, otherwise you might get FF burn out. I would have given up on this team long ago. Good luck in your Sky game

Apart from personal pride if you manage to improve the position significantly.

Instant return from the Welsh boys, shame about the keeper. Do you have a plan C for that position?

This team is in a unique position (certainly by my standards) in terms of the amount of transfers it has remaining at this stage of the season and there's possibly something to be learned by taking a MOTM approach to the final month of a season long competition...

I think I'll be bringing in Sheffield Utd's GK (whoever that is ) as a replacement on Saturday, it makes sense to do so as this team already has two Sheffield Utd defenders (I need to take a sh*t or bust approach with this team) plus Sheffield Utd have a game in hand...

And the play offs.

Not if they and Birmingham continue in their respective form.

And Cardiff?

And, I think the play off teams will be hoping that Swansea are not one of the four.

Someone's confused here because it's Cardiff that have the game in hand rather than Sheffield United. However, from their last six matches, Birmingham have accumulated 10 points, Cardiff 13 and Sheffield United 16 out of a possible 18. Continuing that form would see Birmingham finish on 82 points, Cardiff rounds to 82 while Sheffield would have 83 or 85. It's going to be mighty close. I think Swansea have blown it in reality.

Because Sheffield Utd play on 20/04/09 I assumed (incorrectly) this was because they had a game in hand, maybe Cardiff's GK would be a better replacement for Taylor?

League has now been updated, this team picked up 46 points from yesterday's games & now resides in 2,490th position...