80

In all fairness to him, that reads to me as a clear joke.

No problemo.

At their level of success and income, hoping to win a Champions' League in the next couple of seasons, then sure.

Another brick in the wall built by Eddie "14 Words" Howe to keep immigrants out.

Hmm. Loans. Interesting thought. They got any wunderkind CMs we could do with for 6 months?

Only in Saudi land. I thought there was a slim chance we could con someone like Forest for money approaching that last summer for exactly the reasons you've stated, but our negotiating position has weakened since then.

Until the last few days, I thought that might've been the other way around. I've never really bought into the crown jewels thing over the past couple of years, as a kind of preventative psychological defence mechanism. But with the moves that seem to be going on, it's looking good.

Been image searching for fat nazi girls without success. Turns out they were all quite svelte.

Definitely suspect it's a pattern we'll see for years to come, mind. So long as FFP remains a thing, anyhow.

This sentence had me worried for a second.

The logic of January being a bad month for buying suggests it's a good month for selling...

Rumours swirling that he's a Greedy Cunt™.

Same. But I think it's important to not get overly disheartened yet. If it does happen, it makes a big difference if it's being done with a view to making a vital signing while holding on to Bruno and co. into next season and beyond. Only time would tell on that, but I think we owe them it.

He seems fine to me. Would rather have someone willing to say things in public and be judged on his words than a faceless bureaucrat skulking around in the shadows quietly screwing us over. Much harder to monitor.

The fee in question is a big factor here. Feels shit to be considering this of course. But I guess another key issue is how voluntary this would be for all the various different actors. If anything like this did happen, the club would need to put in some serious work on messaging for both the supporters and possibly those inside the club. Would be pretty important to have an incoming as well as an outgoing.

So you're saying we're good for about three years...

I really don't get this one.

Just have to cross our fingers that all this doesn't have a long term impact on his game. He was maturing so nicely in the second half of last season. If goals ala this season's at Old Trafford became a consistent part of his game, we'd have a hell of a talent on our hands. To be honest I took the easy route by saying just him. Becomes more of a discussion on departure number 2. Dependent on Willock's fitness, as said above, I think Joelinton would be next for me. I'm fantasizing as though nothing bad ever happened with Tonali there, mind.

I think there's an outside chance Willock could make it too. But yeah, I just think sometimes we climb too high up the tree when it comes to never wanting to lose various players of ours. I don't either, usually, but that would come at the expense of not having room to buy new players who can take us to higher levels, too. I really don't want to lose him, but Joelinton going for £50 million would be about as beneficial as selling Isak for £100m, when it comes to FFP. And I'd say Isak would be much harder to replace, in terms of position and ability. So... These things can't be totally ruled out.

I love Joe, but genuine question: assuming you think we haven't got the best centre midfield in the world, which of our first team 5 (Bruno, Tonali, Joelinton, Longstaff and Willock) will need to make way for upgrades in the next 18 months? Because they're all of an age where they won't want to play the Ritchie/Manquillo role. It's Longstaff first of all for me, by the way. But homegrown status plus value and desire to stay here might complicate that.

It's stuff like this that used to make me smug about stopping paying attention to football. What a soulless piece of shit the whole enterprise is nowadays. Might as well support crypto currencies and make money through your hobby.

Given the (lack of) season he's had so far, I'm not so sure. But yeah, if we could get that much for him it would have to be taken seriously. Unfortunately.

Totally. Although, as I've said before, we did have fantastic luck with injuries last season, also - they were always spread around the positions, avoiding vital players, with players timing their recoveries perfectly to cover others e.g. Wilson and Isak, Almiron and Murphy. That could've been a very different season too.

On your first point, it's fair comment about only talking about the defeats, but I think where we got our wins kind of proves my point - the Chelsea-PSG-Man U run came directly after an international break which had followed the capitulation at Bournemouth. Certainly, I was worried after the Man United match as I knew what they'd all given was epic. And in terms of resting against big teams, well, I got a fair bit of stick on here last season when I was arguing that we should be prepared to accept fielding reserves in the Champions' League in order to prioritise a tricky away game against Brentford or Brighton this season, on the grounds that the league sustains the club's future. So I have form on that. The exact details are up for debate, but it's fair to say I didn't expect to play the same eleven players over and over again this season when I was saying that, though.

Out of respect to my opponents, this is harsh