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Like loans, I don't think we'll ever see Eddie really buy in to getting players in for a quick flip. It'll happen on special occasions like Targett and Kelly, but he only wants players who fundamentally see their future with him and the club. I think it's pretty clear that was not going to be the case with Huijsen.

Aye, happened in the summer, as I recall.

I don't understand why supporters talk about good servants like bits of shit when they hit a serious problem. Hopefully he works out fine, but if he doesn't, it's a tragedy, he's not a wastrel.

I would be tempted to say we should keep VAR only for off ball violent conduct and diving. But it's perfectly apparent they would fuck that up as well e.g. Schar's red card against Southampton or influencing referees to just whistle for everything in the mistaken belief that VAR will correct any errors.

I'm a contender for the biggest VAR hater on this forum but I don't see this injury as being a solid argument against it. It could've happened at any point in the match ultimately, just like Given's did.

Agreed. I don't think Eddie will ever let himself really throw away a game/competition, but I hope we have a squad next season that lets us properly put everything into qualifying for CL (and more...) again. It would be my only true target, although scoring another league cup on the way would also be massive for the club.

I think what you're getting at is it looks suitable for representing Wycombe Wanderers or a council leisure centre or something.

I feel bad for Willock that his part in that campaign is getting written out of history.

In 22/23 this was true enough, in 23/24 this was extremely false.

I think he was a lot better than he was at Everton, but has gotten worse again this season. Has been going for cheaper options while he was out of form.

Re: decision making, if Howe can get Murphy consistently making the right decisions, it's surely just a question of time until Barnes is. Entirely up to Howe on whether he's open to moving him on or not as far as I'm concerned. The traditional reasons for selling are obvious, but he's made a valuable contribution this season and we've got a lot of games to play next year. So I'll just wait and see.

I don't want literal seahorses, and it looks a bit like the New York Yankees, but I'm impressed.

It was more the standing and walking around like he didn't give a shit at various points in the match when he should've been doing other things etc. Strictly speaking I had him down as our worst performer. But I really don't believe in the slightest that was down to a lack of effort, though. Having a bad touch, yeah fair enough that happens.

Yeah, there's no point in getting on him about it. He definitely wouldn't choose to play this badly, he's just doing what he can and we clearly feel he's still the best option we have.

Yep, think I said on here when it first came up that it would need to be 9 figures for us to even have a conversation. He seems really happy here and is best mates with our other fullback for the next decade so any suitors should be told to forget about it, frankly.

Been rumoured since at least last summer so I'd guess there's something to it. Think it'll be a firm no from us though.

Sad but completely true.

I didn't think he was that bad yesterday. He did some things very poorly, and some important things very well as part of a winning team performance. He definitely wasn't a dead weight on us. I find it weird to want to pick on him in the circumstances.

Was funny how utterly unbothered he was in contrast

No idea how we ended up with twice as many yellows as Chelsea.

Back to his best today, really cool, calm and collected. Did a major service for us in our own half.

Ha, that takes me back. Crazy what eventually became of him pretty shortly afterwards.

He did it more today than I think I can remember ever seeing. But fuck it, he was otherwise excellent today. Really helped set the tone. It was the game I could see him having at a crucial time in our run in, much more like his old self. Just need him to return to putting that out consistently now.

Thought he quietened down a lot in the second half, just think he was more tired.

We do a fair bit of that ourselves to be honest so I'll take that as part of the business... Thought he had a great game, particularly considering the incident.