ohmelads

Agreed. It's just a click bait story.

With add-ons they're paying 55M and you would imagine that'll get paid in full unless he has a stinker or gets badly crocked. Bellingham was 88M and he's 5 years younger, so I'd say 50-60M is probably MacAllister's market value.

Most likely the case I'd say. It's in his interest to give the headline low figure to generate the clicks.

Is this confirmed? Most sources have been saying 45-55.

Interesting appointment. I think he's what they need for the reasons many have said - he's grateful to have the job and won't behave like Mourinho and Conte, and they could do with a more positive playing style after those two. He needs a good start to get the doubters believing, but having no European football will be a massive help (as we know).

There's the thing. No way are Man U giving us a deal that is in any way favourable for us. And their squad players will certainly be on higher wages than ours, so that's another negative beyond the ripoff fee they will demand. I still think this is just a bollocks rumour from Twitter.

No one can say with a straight face that he has seen the trajectory of the ball - going away from goal - and made adjustments mid-air to get his fingertips on it.

I'd steer clear of Tierney. Yes he's an obvious upgrade, and as good as we'd expect to get when fit, but I'd say history suggests that more often than not, a consistently poor injury record continues true to form. He would want top end wages making him then difficult to sell to clubs further down the table if the situation carries on or gets worse. The quoted fee is high for someone with his injury record. Something just smells off about the way Arsenal are keen to shift arguably their best left back. They'll know better than anyone and have no other reason to sell him.

Well said. In fairness we used to think the same about Joelinton. I thought we overpaid for Gordon gambling on potential, but if we look at what Howe's done with Almiron and Murphy, I think Gordon has a higher potential ceiling than them.

He's expressed public disappointment, knowing he scored 19 league goals. We can all read between the lines. He and his PR team know what they're doing and most people have read it that way. They were meant to be challenging the title. We were meant to be a problem for another day. They've had more help from VAR than even Klopp himself could demand and still fallen short. He even uses the Liverpool marketing rhetoric: "We are Liverpool, this means more etc.". He is pandering to their fans but alerting other clubs. As class as he is, this might be the time to sell him. Sooner or later he will lose another yard of pace and be done. He would still hold a high value and I'm sure they're gonna do a Man U and attack the window with massive money this summer.

Liverpool were a second division team with a very mediocre history when they were bought out by the richest sugar daddy of that era and went on to spend unheard of fees before promotion. That led to their dominance (both footballing and financial) of the game and all their money now is a legacy of that. Now they want to kick the ladder away and say it's not fair, when in fact teams with lower spending are finishing above them.

Once. I'll let you guess which team it was against.

Brilliant result and we're in a fantastic position but let's be clear: we still need a point against Leicester. We don't want to go into the last game needing something against Chelsea while Liverpool play a relegated So'ton with another 20 minutes added time.

Who's the mackem on commentary? Ridiculous bias.

It must be nice knowing you can't be countered. They call it 'taking one for the team' but if you can't be booked, you can just press high up and foul the second you're countered.

Fabinho with a textbook cynical yellow to stop a transition. He'll do another dozen of those.

Just as I type that ffs. Howay Bournemouth!

Man U game is worth a watch too. If they drew this and only won 1 of their last 2 (say they lose to Chelsea and beat Fulham), then we'd only need 1 pt from our next two games to finish above them because of GD.

What a performance. A lot were saying don't start Wilson and Isak (with some justification after Leeds) and/or we have to adapt our play because Brighton love teams that press high (again a fair point after they battered Arsenal on their own patch). We stuck to our guns with the mindset that we're at home, we know our strengths and we'll force them to adapt to us regardless of the Arsenal result. Ballsy from Tindall- it would've been easy to say let's do what Everton and Forest did and sit back and counter - but it's paid off. We should've been out of sight before they pulled one back. More of the same intensity needed against Leicester - some rotation inevitable with injuries and fatigue I imagine.

A team of 11 athletes will only get us so far. We do need some more cultured players as well. If we miss out on 4th, people will point to the recent missed opportunities to wrap it up, but you could just as fairly look at all the draws earlier in the season where we couldn't unlock stubborn defences despite overwhelming possession and territory. In an ideal world you'd find someone built like Joelinton with the vision and technique of Modric, but that's not going to happen. I think Maddison could be like our Odegaard. No, I'm not saying they're identical players nor that their roles would be, but he'd move between the lines, he can take the ball on the turn brilliantly and quickly make the right pass, he can find the runners while offering massive goal and assist threat as he keeps proving every single season. As for who makes way, that's a problem we want. We need competition for places, especially playing in Europe. Bruno is playing half crocked and Longstaff is out and our season is in danger of petering out as a result. Top teams have different options and are more able to deal with that kind of situation.

Agree it's a good time to play them. They're a team that can cause anyone problems and they were one of our hardest games of the season at their place, but their defensive form has dipped in recent weeks. Hopefully all these fixtures are starting to catch up with them.

Wonder how much of that is to do with Longstaff being out. He does as much running as anyone off the ball and adds a bit of bite in midfield. The defence are missing that bit of extra industry in front of them I think.

We have two home games while Liverpool have two away games, which is the main positive to take. Liverpool's run of 6 wins has included 4 home games, and the last 5 of those 6 have been very tight games. They've somehow won all but mostly thanks to a string of controversial reffing decisions, and I can see that continuing against Villa if needed. Klopp gave the officials an absolute bollocking after the Spurs game was too close for comfort. They haven't been playing well and they're worse away, but they are facing the teams 19th and 20th in the table. I think they'll win all three and it comes down to us. We can afford a defeat but we have to win twice. Draws now don't do us any good; we could even take 5 pts from 9 and still finish 5th on GD if Liverpool managed a +8 goal difference in their next three. That's not easy to do but in our last 3 wins our goal difference was +10. Also consider that they're playing Southampton who are 20th for a reason and now have nothing to play for. If we draw against Brighton, then it will go to the last day, unless Liverpool slip up. We can wrap it up no matter what before the last game by winning our two home games. If we do that then we can look back on Leeds as a point gained.

It's not bedwetting. It's living in the real world and it's your experience as a fan. People are quoting statistical models and maths as if they've never seen the end of a football season, the build up of pressure at both ends of the table, the dark arts from certain managers and the shit they get away with, VAR, injuries. Its a multi billion dollar industry and everything is coming to a climax. The media work on narratives. Of course they say it's done and dusted and we have it nailed because that sets up a narrative for a miraculous comeback by the super league clubs. When Liverpool are 2/1 before our game, it's clear bookies see the situation.