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Aye not saying that's definitely what's happened, but if he's as determined to put himself first as he apparently is, that was the logical thing for him to do if he had a deal lined up months ago. Part of what's odd though is he appears to have made a pig's ear out of the whole situation, for someone who's supposedly bright and calculating. There's a few things about this whole situation which don't entirely add up based on the publicly available information.

Yeah, had the same thought. If he's as uncaring, devious and manipulative as the evidence points to him being, it would be entirely rational for him to want us to have a dispiriting end to the season and a financially underpowered summer.

As I recall we usually play related units together i.e. the first choice back 5 starts one game, while the first choice front 3 start the other. So they're all still in a good position to cooperate when the season starts proper.

That one's working thanks.

Could you post the full Hope article please, the archive link I saw earlier isn't working for me.

In short, to be the best you have to be expert at lying about your own history.

Is this the guy @oldtype was talking about?

What a fucked situation it is that I'm rolling my eyes at the prospect of having to deal with these fixtures.

He's essentially said that he has in the past. Whether that's a good enough excuse etc. is up for debate, but I think it's fair to guess he's not always focused on his football.

Very solid argument this is worse than the Bowyer summer. Considering we weren't trying to spend money that year, whereas this time we supposedly are but are having the piss taken out of us internationally and mercilessly. And considering we'd spent well prior to Bowyer but have been 'keeping our power dry' for two years now while selling off players great and small, weakening our squad while taking on larger and larger playing commitments. Etc etc.

The most entertaining outcome is that we actually beat Man United to his signature, and he proves to be an absolute stinker of a signing, with us finally getting a 'miss' that tanks our project. So that's probably what will happen. Think early Joelinton with the attitude of Owen and the robustness of Marcelino.

I've got you now. I don't think PIF, or more specifically, Yasir has checked out. I think he's very persuadable. But I could easily imagine his underlings who don't have the same vision as him rolling their eyes at all the football malarkey and wishing it wasn't in their portfolio to deal with. People who'll seize any opportunity to have as little exposure to its risk possible.

A few things, but basically there's no one to fight the club's corner, or to notice an unexpected chink in the armour or a serendipitous ray of sunshine. The club will just look more and more reliably boring and unworthy.

But we still have people who are grateful she's gone!

I think it's worse than that, I expect whoever gets hired as CEO by definition won't be looking to push them and wouldn't pick up the phone if he had the number.

But back to the original subject, Allardyce is a good example of why I don't really care about someone's achievements in scouting analytics from 2014. It's irrelevant.

@Pandamninator is basically nailing this, but Allardyce never really got his feet under the table here. It would've been an interesting period for the club when he was hired by Shepherd as it was the first time Shepherd had ever expressed interest in voluntarily building out our backroom staff and training facilities, and looking to sign bargains rather than feature attractions. Prior to that, any investment that wasn't directly into first team transfer fees was seen as waste by him and had to be dragged out forcefully, but he'd been forced to acknowledge we had to manage our money better to keep up, so he made an effort to hire someone outright committed to that. But very soon after, the takeover happened of course and the rest is history. And if we thought Shepherd was bad at investing in off pitch infrastructure, fuck me...

More appreciation required.

By the (frequently shit) standards of his day, he did quite a bit. He was into Xg-guided tactics long before it was it was an accepted and dominant part of the game. We're talking 2003 here. The point is he had the advantage of being a first mover. Put him up against Graeme Souness and it was a no contest. But he essentially got found out as sports science and the like got more widely integrated into everyone else's approach and he didn't have an edge on his competition anymore.

If in doubt, trust the ones who have consistently publicly demonstrated the highest levels of performance and personal conduct.

First time I've unironically So stupid.

Yes, Sam Allardyce was a genuine innovator in the game once, too.

Not only understandable but rational.

Does anyone think Eddie picked that number?

Aye, thought the same.