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Held a straw poll over the idea of staying or going. They were palpably delighted moving was more popular than it had been a year ago. It seemed pretty clear it was the focus of the evening, talking about the struggles of raising revenues etc. before eventually raising the subject.

What have I said that isn't true?

It started as a light-hearted thing from Eales or someone about the club growing revenues for PSR - which was the main focus of the evening (building the case for a new stadium). But Mitchell joined in on the joke and kept going and going with it. Tl;Dr: Paul Mitchell is like David Brent. Not a bad guy but can look like a wally.

Loads to mention. But basically couldn't avoid going back to the summer and Eddie issues. Literally his first sentence was about how he'd never join a club mid transfer window again. Plus how rotten he was personally as a footballer. Talked about holding hands with Eddie at the boxing in Saudi. Became fixated on needing to drink several pints a day in stack to help boost his own transfer fund, and hoping to get Eddie to join him in the drinking too. Like, I'm honestly trying to be charitable in thinking he must just be much more of a doer than a talker

Honestly, I felt bad for him. It's like you could see his balls were shrivelled up somewhere near his kidneys. I appreciated the self-deprecation but it never stopped

Paul man. Need to keep him away from mics for his own good. I was half waiting for him to say he'd never come over a little queer. His very last answer at tonight's talk was good, I thought - about how player targets are arrived at with the manager, and the considerations that go into it. Actually sounded well considered and natural - like he meant it. But prior to that he was having a mare - I was starting to feel bad for him. He's been rocked badly by the past few months.

That'll teach those silly Swedes for keeping their league football VAR-free. They'll definitely see the benefits of it now.

I think my only issue is I abhor crap statistics and sophistry. I can get along with the idea that we play better with Longstaff in than Tonali or whatever - especially as he seems to be removing some of the worst parts of his game in recent weeks - but the justifications based on points picked up and games not lost etc. are invariably shite. The original one was outright bait. Would be better if people just use their eyes and say "Bruno looks a lot more comfortable alongside him" or "the opposition find it a lot harder to pass through our structure with Longstaff in the team". Of course, that does beg the question of how we've managed to spend £60m on a player and still find the same players we had in January 2022 are our best midfield spine, three out of four of whom played for Steve Bruce.

Plus the last time I checked, it wasn't this much. I think a good year for a top referee including bonuses was £100k, and it can be as low as £50k. Which is neat but nothing amazing in this world. You can make that money selling cheese strings to corner shops.

When you're surrounded by 20-something year olds screaming at you who can buy and sell your family several times over, you're liable to feel underpaid and resentful. It's inviting corruption, is my point.

A bunch of underpaid, low status, middle aged berks with the power to influence outcomes in a multi-billion pound international industry. It would be weird if very serious attempts weren't made.

We should examine just leaving FIFA.

Wonder why he's meriting this assassination.

Another thing to consider in all this is that PSR might collapse - or at least be heavily altered - in the next year or two, thanks to the associated parties and debt rulings. That might lead player prices to severely spike again.

PSR profit is paper profit ultimately, though. It's like selling Barnes for £30m and saying we've made a profit on him. In PSR that's kind of true, but you can't lose sight of the actual money, either - and thanks to spending little last summer, we're less desperate for PSR slack than we were.

He's thinking of you describing it as being a decent profit, I believe. Which I'd disagree with, as we supposedly paid £63m for him, and will owe Sociedad 10% of any sale. Profit or gross, I'm not sure - assuming it's profit, that would give us £15m on the sale, which is sod all for assuming all that risk.

No, the forum's objecting to the idea he's worth any less than that...

He was on the decline from when Grealish said he'd been made to look stupid, around November or December time.

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2024/nov/12/england-nations-league-lewis-hall-audition-thomas-tuchel-newcastle After about ten paragraphs you get some decent quotes from him. Lads, he's a Ben Arfa fan Interesting that he says he arrived expecting to play a lot more last season. Sounds like he's done really well to fight through that difficult period last season.

That contract runs out in July 2028 though... So there's seriously no rush. Unless he spits the dummy, and I think he's bright enough to know that if a club's offering £80m-£90m for him, they're clowns who aren't taking buying him seriously.

You'd have to imagine there's someone worth us hiring in there?

That, most definitely, is the spirit.

That's why something in the 90s is unacceptable... Replacements don't grow on trees and we need enough to buy at least one plus another good player for another position to make letting him go worth our while. Otherwise, why sell? A pile of money won't score the goals that actually make us money.

To be honest I wouldn't be surprised if this chat is somewhat agent driven. Not necessarily Isak himself, mind. Just need to stand our ground as supporters, whatever happens we should get a positive result.

It is. Although I'd also be interested to know how those results compare with games where we've had Willock, Bruno and Joelinton but no Longstaff (I doubt there are many of those, mind).