midds

Regardless of the outcome of the pens, this has been a fucking shocking performance, got to be said. Shit from front to back, no urgency, shit defending and rank finishing. It's hard to argue Blackburn don't deserve it if they go through

Talk about making heavy work of this shit, jesus fucking christ. This should be dead, buried and patted down with a shovel long ago

Is that.....a bench......that I see??

'should' they part ways 'when' surely?

Possibly? But it would still be nice to see the impact or otherwise the new rules have had. There's always a decent chance I could be being a little paranoid and thinking the reason we're not seeing the stats we did last year is because we're way off the pace and not a threat this season. Maybe it's all just a coincidence

Speaking of which, does anyone have the 'ball in play' stats that were rolled out every week while we were doing really well and threatening the top teams last year. Come to think of it, has anyone even seen it mentioned it this year? Funny that.

Ashworth found out he had a gambling issue - Bruno grassed

Fuck off

Leao with an absolute banger

He just looks like a squad player who is struggling when a few things aren't there for him to function. He's a bit like Dabizas used to be - solid enough as a squad player to come in and become part of the system he's been dropped into for 4 or 5 games. But as soon as you either a) leave him in longer than 6 or 7 games or b) take the quality players away, then he starts to stand out as being pretty poor. His mistakes are more frequent and more noticeable. Then he becomes a liability who the opposition target and pressure as they know they'll get joy. That's where we currently are. Lovely lad, grafts all day but just not quite good enough technically It's not his fault, he's doing his best and Howe doesn't really have much option but to stick with him for a little while longer yet. But I'd agree that he needs to be moved on sooner rather than later. Selling him would be a boost for FFP profit but we'd be losing a home-grown lad, it's swings and roundabouts

We still have all of the clubs around us to play yet, nothing has been decided yet. If we get players back and if we play well then 7th, maybe even 6th at a real push is possible. Not sure why anyone is even considering chucking the towel in and accepting a bottom half position, it's in our hands where we finish

Also, another thing that fucked me off tonight was the ref. Arsenal outclassed us and would have won regardless so it's not a biggy but the ref was so weak tonight. He, rightly, booked Odegard for chopping down Almiron as we're breaking at 0-0 in the 8th minute . I think it was their 2nd foul. He then allowed Arsenal to make another 13 more fouls without getting close to booking another player. Arsenal took the lead and were allowed to sit on it and kill any break we made chasing the game with a soft foul in the middle third that was never punished for the remaining 80+ minutes. When you're chasing the game and ref is just letting the winning team kill any/every attack you have without any punishment then you have no chance of getting back into it. Arsenal were brilliant tonight and fully deserved it but they played the ref like a fiddle and he let them control the game. We need to learn from it and do that more

I think the biggest legitimate criticism you can throw at Howe has been his inflexibility to change players and/or formation over the last few months. We all know injuries have played a massive part on things and he's had his hands tied in some respects but going with the same players in the same formation game after game after game - even when he's had the chance to swap things just a bit - has lead to us becoming a bit stale, predictable and soft. It would be naive to think other managers don't do their homework on us and come up with a plan and I do think he's fallen into the trap of doing exactly what the opposition expect and they've exploited it to the max. Not changing anything at all despite being cut open by team after team can't be anything other than a legit concern. Again, i accept he's only got so many players available but that's all the more reason to ask different teams different questions in different situations. Trying to implement a consistent structure and method of playing is one thing, doing exactly the same thing every week while you're shipping an average of 3 a game for months on end is ridiculous.

I know he's shipped 4 and that's not great by any stretch but I thought he did reasonably well tonight. He had little/no chance with 3 of the goals and seemed on his toes to clean up any balls played in and behind the back 4, he stopped the shots he had a chance with and there were no major mistakes at all. I'm not saying he was brilliant but all things considered it wasn't bad. He needs games if he's going to get sharper and they won't always be Arsenal (A)

Yeah, just got to take that one on the chin tbh. They outclassed us in every area from the first minute and just dominated and controlled the game, it happens, especially away to top teams like them. We're capable of giving them a bloody nose at home but on their own patch they're just a class above us right now. No point whinging or pointing fingers as I think any XI in any formation you care to name would have beaten us tonight. Bad night but tonight was never going to make or break our season, we've got a chance to get into the last 8 of the FA Cup midweek and that needs to be the priority. This fixture has been hanging around but now it's out of the way and we can look ahead, fuck it - they're better than us, just as we all knew 2 hours ago.

Just need to try and get through the first 15 mins without conceding and just try to get a toehold in the game. Realistically they'll have most of the ball and we'll need to just sit tight and be compressed and deny them space, make them go around the outsides and try to frustrate them for as long as possible. If it's still tight with 15 mins t play then they could panic a bit but there's also a good chance we're 3 down after 75 mins too. It's going to be a very long night though

Still think those 2 sitting in front of a back 4 is well worth a look next season. Gordon, Barnes and Player X ahead of them and Isak central would be utter filth

Well, yeah we know that but they just gave us the ball in the first minute then just backed off for the rest of the game basically. Plenty of Championship teams have stepped up and given PL teams a hell of a game in the past despite similar gulfs. But this lot just gave up immediately and never laid a glove. 0-3 flattered them

Gonna have crosshairs on his back tomorrow, Arsenal will 100% target him and try to get a reaction out of him. He'll need to be on his best behaviour

......and then they got an absolute pasting. Easiest derby win I've ever known, why they surrendered immediately I'll never fathom out

Exactly. Their personalities brought the audience and subsequently the huge sponsors, isn't it TikTok and Expedia? Sunderland's part owners have the personality of a fucking spoon. It's a decent underdog story I suppose, a couple of likeable fans but they're massively overplaying the impact they believe it's had for them. Highly unusual for that lot...

And I'd also finish off by saying it's still going to be a few more years on top of that before we start to see the benefits of padding out the youth teams and have them (hopefully) sending 2 or 3 players through to the first team squad every couple of years too. The Ashley years were barren as fuck and I think people forget how neglected the whole club was. We had no players of value, no operational systems in place, few/no youth products coming through and no willingness to even think about addressing it. Putting all of that right is going to take minimum 6 years. Not beyond the realm of possibility that the kids who are now 12 or 13 will break into the first team by about 2030ish. Sobering obviously but not unrealistic. Right, I'll shut up now

Yep and I'd also say that the players we manage to get out of the club will take a few years too as they're sitting on pretty hefty contracts and contributing zero on or off the park. We just need to see a few of them leave each window to create space for the better players we all want, it's just going to take some time, it's not going to happen in 3 windows or whatever, we're realistically looking at the 26-27 season before we can attack the league and cups with a bit of confidence

Totally agree, it's going to take a bit of time and patience to get the squad into the kind of shape we'd all like it to be in, maybe longer given the restrictions that we've been placed under from FFP and FMV etc. I just want the players coming in to be better than the ones who leave and it may be a bit frustrating seeing us miss out on good players in key positions for us for a while yet, it's just how football works, there is no silver bullet any longer. That said, it's still a hell of a lot nicer than watching Bruce and Ashley lowball every fucker for very very average players, christ we lived off scraps for years looking back

I agree. But some players won't have wanted to come up here so suggesting player x, y or z is fine but they may not have ever been an option on the table. We signed who we signed and I think it's a bit pointless picking faults and being wise long after the window closed. It's all just hypotheticals, no biggie