James

well he’s been a sick note since we signed him. Who was his last pre-NUFC manager?

Could we get a Saudi team to take a hit for us on Hayden? Wouldn’t be our fault if a Saudi team took him off us for a free and offered him a contract worth more financially for just six months than it would be if he stayed at Newcastle until 2026!

Never want to lock a thread but I don’t feel this is a football thread any more, needs to go on General Chat

we may regret that one, certainly one we should have considered

I think there are legitimate questions to ask (not just to Howe but a number of back room staff) but at the same time we are still having a good season and there a no need to be knee jerk. Would be a different story if this happened every season. But to date this is a one off.

NUFC 2007 to 2021. I wrote it, we all lived it.

The next stage of selling players I don’t think should be about who isn’t good enough - as all of our players are good enough relative to their squad status. The next changes we need to make is to bring in budget relative to the FFP by selling players who are not physically resilient. that means that Wilson an Willock are players I will be sad to see go. But they should go.

It will be Willock and Wilson

How long will it be before Bruce reveals he discovered Miley and recommended him to Howe?

Its win win win going into the last game. If we place 2nd, we exceed expectations in the CL this season. We claim a financial bonus and improve our European ranking for future seasons. If we place 3rd, we have always enjoyed the UEFA Cup and done well. More coefficient points and a genuine chance of a trophy. if we place 4th we can be proud of our performances in returning on the CL and can rest and refocus on a trio of domestic opportunities.

Reminder that in addition to our ongoing injuries, Gillespie, Krafth, Ritchie, Alex Murphy and Diallo are unregistered for this game.

Diallo and Murphy have not met the three year criteria to get an underage registration.

Although Krafth might be back soon he wasn’t registered for the Champions League, so he is out. Gillespie, Ritchie, Alex Murphy, and Diallo are also unregistered so there will be significant changes to our subs bench required.

I look nicer in blue

had a shower earlier thanks

I don’t like to blow my own trumpet however I have recorded a few stats of my playing career to date (see below) and must reflect and say ‘not bad’

Sometimes we have to fail, learn and move on. Even with a lower than expected league position (if that is what happens), there have been clear and obvious challenges this season and yet we’ve already had some memorable wins and will surely get some more, so it’s still going to be a positive season. Having said that, we do need to make sure we are learning and there is some reflecting to be done, for Howe, for Ashworth, and the owners: Stand Up to the PL Cartel I feel that we are a bit passive when it seems like for a second time the PL are prepared to change rules mid season, directly targeted at ourselves. Start showing some backbone. Injuries There is some bad luck this year, but let’s face it, we’ve been bad for decades particularly when in Europe, and also Howe had a bad record for this at Bournemouth. We need an investigation and action plan. Tonali This is a shambles and negatively affects our squad building plan and I’m still really angry about this and we should be taking any options available to us to recoup finance. Strikers Having our only fit winger leading the line is ridiculous, in the short term we should move Joelinton here. in actuality though we are in the same position we were in in January 2022 when we signed Chris Wood. Eyebrows were rightly raised when I said we should have kept Wood, but if we got rid we had to replace him, yet we hadn’t. Even a Daryl Murphy type of signing would have done the trick. Bruno we need to work out why we can’t win without Bruno

Chris Wood…

Who is the Sibierski of 2023?

We made a mistake selling Wood in my view. as we have goals all over the team we don’t need striker 3 to be be superb, just a body either with top league experience or with great potential.

Im in favour of having a good go at Europa, I think our group of death has been a big problem in how it has restricted us in rotating the squad and to stop this happening in future seasons we need to build up our coefficient.

Still the right call to ease him in after his ACL

Don’t understand how we have two player out with a lower back stress fracture

didn’t Ritchie just start our demolition of Man Utd. add in the ex-club facto and he’d be fine for Bournemouth.

Dont ever remember him defending Mike Ashley. Plus there have been many accounts of him protecting some of the younger players from the worst of Steve Bruce.