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It's all imagination though, isn't it. So other people will imagine other things and feel differently.

The total absence of public statements. I assume he's not talking about what's happened to Eddie Howe's face or whatever. I accept there are possible reasons for not being able to say anything publicly - I remember someone on here making a good point a few months back but I've forgotten what it was! But it still does feel very surprising that no 'I want to apologize to the fans but I need to take some time out to deal with this and I intend to repay the faith the club have shown me' type statement never came out. It's inevitable that some people will be rubbed up the wrong way by that not happening.

You're right, but on the other hand they wouldn't be charging him for betting on flies... So we don't know what he has or hasn't been doing outside of football.

Personally I haven't seen it as a slam dunk that he actually is addicted. It's a very easy thing to say in a situation like this. Having a therapist come out making public statements about your psychology within days of getting charged seemed a bit convenient. BUT I'll accept whatever comes out of the investigations, and these latest charges support the idea it was compulsive behaviour. As Paul Merson said, they'll probably be able to tell pretty easily about his state of mind by looking at his historic betting patterns. In a way it's bad news if he is, as gambling addiction is an absolute bastard to deal with, as I know one or two people on here have experience of. It'll be a long road for him.

As things stand the latest charges add weight to the idea he didn't know he was being investigated. So in that limited sense, it's actually a good thing.

Some definitely are. Also, correct me if I'm wrong, but the rehab programme he's been put in is 8 months long isn't it? So it would be an 8 month ban for a first offence rather than 10 months, based on what you're saying. Many would say you're an addict for life and might always need outside assistance, too, so that might work out pretty badly for some players. Again, this isn't about someone doing something legal and fun. It's about doing something in the neighborhood of insider trading or fraud. The kind of thing that can get you blackmailed into fixing games etc. bearing in mind the people taking your bets know they've compromised you. That's why it's a killer. I'm perfectly open to ideas around an amnesty for players who haven't been caught yet and come forwards etc. It's not about hang em and flog em. But a lot of people aren't understanding how close to the edge this kind of phenomenon can take things if it isn't stringently policed.

Still think it's silly to try and minimise the offence of gambling on your own business. Opens a massive window to corruption that could kill the sport. If you lose the trust you risk everything. A slap on the wrist isn't enough, ill or not.

Well, the timing of him seemingly stopping betting and being charged implies he wasn't actively aware he was about to get done when he came here and just joined us to save Milan taking the hit. So we've got that going for us...

Apparently the takeover was a bruising experience for him.

I imagine him as our guardian angel. Ashley was always destined to be an arsehole, but certainly at the time Mort ending his sabbatical from Freshfields and Llambias replacing him felt like a massive sliding doors moment.

Yes and no. You'd have to factor in things like the structure of those clubs in comparison to ours, the strength of the wider staff, where the club was historically and tons more. There's loads of room for charlatans to prosper and good people to be overlooked. Honestly, in another dimension I could see Pardew developing a public reputation as a good DOF through pure bullshit and good luck.

He was quietly involved in supporting Staveley and PIF in the takeover, wasn't he? Never heard anything but good about him.

Agreed. I certainly hope so. You might even say 'best in class'.

I think it's funny you've been swayed by a 4 paragraph puff piece, but you are basically right about this. Almost none of us have a clue who would actually be good for this role. We don't even really know what the role is, given DOFs are are still an evolving concept. We're mostly basing everything on 'he sounds good' and 'they've done well lately'. Maldini does sound sexy as fuck though. Surely that would be enough to bring @Milanista back.

They said beforehand that there'd be none of the usual media stuff this time around. Idea being to focus on the fundamentals.

Can see this one defining Howe's future. We need to not look listless and disorderly. Hope we take them apart.

Don't remember it, but this is ringing bells for the mental comment...

I'd happily have it become an iconic number for us. Save and use it for our best CM talents. Maybe Miley one day.

Was waiting for him to start talking about race. Looks like he's played a stupid game and won a stupid prize.

Could almost do with a tincy piece of it back

Think it was said this was one going to be kept ultra private and focused.

It's a pity that I'm only shrugging at this news. Hope he's doing alright in himself.

I don't especially disagree. With the point your opponents are making about teams moving to lower defensive lines, I think a counter point is that it'll potentially create more space in midfield for the kind of players we've traditionally loved to watch. Rather than the condensed, sterile, ultra disciplined, pass you to death Man City style being all conquering, we might see more room for mercurial inspiration in the game. Going back to offside though, the issue is football, like much of life itself, was never designed to be litigated with millimeter precision. When we start trying to isolate and quantify every element, and pin every action down with legal tightness, we kill the thing we love. Neither interpretation of the law is really wrong, what's wrong is the fixation on the exact moment something is or isn't off. We need to learn to tolerate some uncertainty and inexactness in a world in which technology allows us to retrospectively give ourselves the illusion of certainty and accuracy. Will daylight let us more easily spot if someone is offside? Yes I think so. Will it be farcical if someone's trailing toe being in line with a defender's leading toenail means the action is onside? Also yes. Most of us know what feels right in the game and feels right for the game, we're just struggling to translate it into legal language and technological certainty because the game was never meant to seriously interact with either of those things.

That EE logo is vile. Someone photoshop it out of existence.

Of course, the real fix is just to get rid of VAR. Then either rule works reasonably well and makes for an enjoyable game.