80

He was being stupid, mind. I wasn't impressed at that point.

Looked emotional after the game. Clearly felt the relief. Sure he'll get stronger as a consequence in the long term.

Seems like the whole tribe went down. Krafth, Ashby, Karius and others too. Good stuff. Seems like Gordon is settling in well judging by the scenes as the players came off the pitch.

If he'd have been happy transitioning to being a squad member it would have been fine. But he was throwing tantrums over being put on the bench, which was selfish and not good enough for the team. It was part of Robson losing control over the dressing room unfortunately. I'm not aware of him ever talking about that or showing contrition which is part of what bugs me, in contrast to Dyer, for example.

No, things were pretty dire under him. He'd already gone out of his way humiliate Rob Lee and not give him a squad number, for example. We were second bottom of the league.

Well, he said at least a year, to be fair to TCD. And I was talking 2004. Set us back from trying to progress as a club and keep a vibrant strikeforce while we were still a dynamic force in English and European football. Rather than turning into a one player cult that lost its one player to age and became increasingly financially unattractive to it's owners so they ditched it when a dodgy barrow boy with cash came along? I suspect Ashley worked out we were easy marks for a reign like his based on things like us happily fading the club away for the sake of a goalscorer's personal record. Hence the idea of hiring Keegan for perpetually happy headlines with a view to screwing us while were in a daze. The Halls and Shepherds taught him we were dupes, basically. If Shearer had gone in 2004, there might never have been a Souness and Owen, nevermind Ashley three years later, so I think that has to have been worth exploring. If I remember rightly, the talk was Liverpool were offering £7m at the time. It would have been pretty cool to have set them back instead.

Seems totally upside down to me. Maybe we'd have had more to cheer if we hadn't dedicated the club to that ambition for his last couple of years? It set us back when we could have been trying to move forwards from a much stronger position.

Yes, what came more immediately was Robson coaching Shearer on his game to help him make the best of what he still had post-ACL, using his strength and nous more than bursts of pace. Something Gullit patently didn't. Successfully, at any rate.

Don't normally watch them, but not sure if they expected him to get so worked up about the subject

Can do. That's one reason why having it too sanitised and sugary disturbs me. Put our best foot forward sure, but you shouldn't just fade the soul of football and it's highs and lows away.

Thought this was interesting, with three of our favourite people. Take it for what it's worth as it totally avoids certain subjects, like Rob Lee's treatment, and essentially makes up others e.g. the relevancy of our relegation a decade later. But still, interesting to hear his take on things including Gary Speed.

Figured it might be worth having a thread on the club's own media output, seeing as it's probably only gonna get bigger and more professional as time goes on. Especially with the upcoming documentary and the push to paint a picture of us for the rest of the world. Thought this could be somewhere to collate and highlight interesting pieces, and comment generally on what the club is, or should be, producing. First up - I like our match cams but lately every time I see one they get more and more biased. I get focusing on our action, but just erasing things like Pope's booboo against Wolves is like something out of the Soviet Union I don't want us to go down the route of painting everything as perfect in all ways at all times, it just looks delusional and dishonest when you see other clubs and organizations act like that. Also, seeing as they're collecting so much footage of us at the games, I think it'd be cool if sometimes they'd show the same period of play from different cameras, so you could see what different people were doing at the same time e.g. Almiron's celebration alongside Bruno's reaction. Might make for some nice juxtapositions.

Definitely a bit of that going on. Surprised to see one or two talking about dropping him after the last couple of games.

Got to go for the win. It's in our power. Just more of the same please.

Miggydona As others have said, hopefully the time out has done/is doing him a lot of good.

Reminds me of that captured journalist Isis had making videos for them.

I'm interested to see what he does if he starts, I like Murphy, but I'm concerned he'll revert to type if he starts. Suspect 10-20 minute bursts might suit him.

I get your point, but I do think that'll just be delaying the inevitable a little bit in terms of our season. I'm not asking to trash them but we could do with putting the ball in the net at least twice to prove first wasn't a fluke.

With no special justification at all, I'm feeling hopeful now. I can't really accept that Tottenham are going to do it. The next game really big for us. Just like the last half dozen...

Xer can be what xe wants

That's just gaslighting mate.

I do agree with your main points by the way. I don't want to get religious about it, but point 1 is maybe the biggest - I want as little to do with those clubs as possible. They don't want to do anything that will help us, and we should give them as little financial benefit as possible. The rumours are Eddie Howe feels similarly though, which is another reason why I'm not stressing too much about this possible deal, though.

Speaking as someone who hadn't been in the ground for a decade before the takeover, I can confirm the atmosphere now is shocking compared to before. Not shocking in a bad way, although it is, but shocking in the sense of "I don't recognise this place". It's probably more stark when you've not been watching the slow decline. The clientele (I use that word advisedly) and general attitude. The half heartedness. The (few) chants feel like transactional tribute acts. The confusion on people's faces, like they're in the studio audience of a TV chatshow. It reminds me of a more grandiose version of Bolton Wanderers, and we used to laugh at that. It's weird. I feel like the kid who left the choir when the new priest came in and started looking weird. Coming back left me in no doubt that I made the right move and avoided a lot of damage.

If someone's instincts are that far off, there's no salvation for them I don't think.

Just showing faith and support, I guess. The trick is to realise when that loyalty isn't being repaid. But giving no slack at all will get us nowhere.