80

Could be, but still makes for a crap, demoralising loan therefore.

That's fine but as a professional football club we shouldn't be shoving the rudder into the hands of a young kid. Involving him in the decision, sure, but responsibility lies with the club.

That's what it sounded like, yeah. I would guess that in itself shows we're still totally amateur in this department though. I would hope we'd have a much more considered structure in place for sending developing players on loan in the future.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/apr/21/manchester-city-fans-anti-racist-badge-slavery https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/apr/21/slave-ship-is-not-a-fitting-symbol-for-manchester More nonexistent statements from nonexistent people backing a nonexistent campaign for people to get upset over nothing about.

I thought he looked tense in the conference but not necessarily in a bad way. Seems like his energy is going to get directed somewhere on Sunday... Hopefully on Tottenham's faces amiright?

Very, especially with Trippier. Things could have been very different. That sort of squad maturity the top teams (are supposed to) have is a big advantage for them across a season.

https://www.nufc.co.uk/nufc-tv/latest-videos/howe-pre-tottenham-h-media-briefing-22-23/ They've fixed the press conference mics!

Just done an hour+ podcast with Ben Foster. Decent listen, recorded after the Brentford game. Approx. around the 15 minute mark onwards, they discuss confidence and dealing with mistakes, which I think gives some insight into how he's approaching playing for us at the moment re: being brave and forcing himself out to sweep up and claim balls.

...and that shouldn't reflect badly on the club in the slightest, let's be clear. Eddie and Dan are just living their best lives.

From what I've heard about his injuries this season, I'm not sure they'd have him on a free!

Been a rough season by their standards though. Might be making this up but £3m sticks in my mind.

My recollection is it was an obligation should they be promoted. Seemed like a clever deal at the time...

Our psychology isn't quite right. We're still immature. Which is to be expected given how recently we've come from where we've come from. But still, it's something we need to work on.

Absolutely. Winners win, so that's what we're going to need to do. I sympathize with people who are traumatised by everything falling apart in the past. But we've shown no sign of that since January last year. We shouldn't get too caught up thinking about fellow good teams possibly winning their games in hand, that's just how it works at this end of the table. Take care of ourselves in the position we're in and everything will be fine.

To be fair to him, there's plenty of people stirring shit about him outside of his camp as it is, so not sure it makes all that much difference. When so many of us are fantasizing about moving him on for a fitter, more Howeish player, he can't really be blamed for protecting his options.

That would be a major PR coup for refereeing.

Yeah, I don't disagree. Howe was talking about the approach to it in his most recent press conference.

I was interested/relieved to hear we have a club medical team member travel out and work with him each day while he's away to keep continuity between the club and the French treatment. Made me more relaxed about the situation.

I remember one phase which summed the game up, late in the first half, where we got a free kick just in their half. All the time in the world and we played it slow and just gradually got pressed back, passing it between ourselves until 30 seconds later we were almost in our own penalty area. Never seen us so bamboozled, it was like our Boxing Day fixture against Leicester in reverse.

I suspect we've crossed the Rubicon and pretty much need the flags there all the time now. Scaling down for games will just create an excuse mentality among other supporters etc. Even though yes, they are/will be gradually be less valued over time. Suspect that's why the ones that survive long term on the continent tend to evolve into protection rackets to sustain themselves. Doesn't take anything away from your accomplishments though.

Yeah he's definitely had some doubts creep into his game. Hopefully will iron out with time though. It's a pretty high stress season. He came here probably hoping for a tilt at 7th or 8th, not fighting for the Champion's League having been suspended at the last moment from his first ever cup final and maybe feeling guilty about the result. He deserves some leeway, he's doing more good than harm.

Reefer madness!

The Everton game is oof territory for me. Keep saying this about us, but we tried so hard to win we made ourselves lose there last season. I'm bracing for that game to be as ugly as can be this year.

Have to say I hadn't given much consideration to referee/VAR fuckery until today. I've got images of a Trippier red card in the 20th minute. Paranoia.

Yep. Revisiting Villa quickly, the way l see it, if we can discount them then we can pretty much discount everyone. Doing that table above, and giving Manchester United 100% for the sake of argument, I gave us 71%... The major difference from the table above being I gave Villa 7%. If this end of season was played out 15 times, do I think it would happen about once between now and 2038? Yes.