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Agreed. I'm not exactly shy about getting my knife and fork out for Mitchell, but we're not in a position to say anything bad about this January. Not without clearly explaining a plan, anyhow. Of course, there's the separate issue of it being very hard to ever judge if a DOF is helping or harming, but that's not exactly his fault. It's inevitable he'll get both praise and flak that's undeserved though.

And we'd possibly still have Elliot Anderson, be in a better position to sell Longstaff, and not have to (seemingly) pay £20m for a goalkeeper who can't make our subs bench. Maybe even have had less boardroom strife. It's not a mystery why it was a pity...

You have to respect the dear boy's wishes...

This is constantly ignored. We don't know what we were offered for Trippier, so the idea we rejected £15m for him is fantasy.

It's going to occupy a whacking part of the city and form an important part of its international identity. Why wouldn't you want to ensure it looks the part? If after a while it's made out of fraying, discoloured lumps of plastic we'll regret it.

Expired yellow ticker wanker.

Yellow ticker! Proper Roy Hodgson moment.

It's TBG, he's having a giggle.

I'm not sure what anyone sees in these what I'm now learning are called bubble wrap stadiums. They seem to be popular? I think they will look so dated and embarrassing in 20 years time. I think they psychologically prep people to sit down and shut up, too, atmosphere-wise. "Come on kids, we're off to the mercury blob now". This is going to be imposed on the city for possibly 50 years. It should be future proofed as much as possible in terms of possible uses and aesthetics.

Churlish, but I'm hoping for more than 70,000. A 10k difference between a new SJP and a new stadium doesn't seem that dramatic.

An average of 2,093.67 minutes per assist, I am advised

I think that's exactly it. I don't think we're in any immediate trouble this year if we hadn't sold.

Ignoring whatever is actually happening with us: as I understand it, amortisation (and wages obviously) are judged on a daily basis. So if you buy a player who would cost you £12m a year in PSR, for the first year they'll only cost you £12m if you buy them on day one of that year. Sign them half way through instead and they'll cost £6m, sign them with one month to go and they'll cost £1m. So a small amount of PSR budget can go a long way in May/June if another club is gasping for cash. Which means there's a lot to be said for keeping some powder dry for that time of the year.

Interesting if true. Somehow disappointed, but obviously I can't complain. Limits our options in terms of other outgoings mind. Was thinking last night that if Longstaff left and we have an injury crisis, an emergency option would be to push Hall into midfield. Or Targett. Always intrigued to know how that experiment as a DM at Old Trafford would've turned out if his hamstring hadn't gone after 5 minutes. It was one of Eddie's more creative ideas. Think that was the final moment of his real career here.

He's 27, so whoever signs him is pretty much committing to never seeing the fee they pay again. And the kind of clubs who'd sign him probably either lack money or expect to need PSR wiggle room in the future if they see him as a stepping stone. So that hampers things for us. Won't deny it's not the easiest one to swallow mind. But if we were another club making a January 22 style survival bid, and the club's big idea was to sign Longstaff for £20m, we'd be thinking wtf.

Yep, that's right about Isak. As I say, it's hard to judge for sure as an outsider, but the signs are certainly positive. So even when something doesn't look naturally right to me e.g. overworking players, I try to keep schtum and just see how everything turns out this season.

Ordinarily I'd probably agree. I've kept thinking about posting this but I'm not sure where or when to do it. But I'd be very interested to see what the input of Bunce is on our fitness decisions. Particularly lately I've noticed some slightly odd looking decisions re: who is or isn't subbed/rested, and I've wondered if that's being influenced by his view on what the players can manage, or even if they're now receiving adjusted training levels. I remember an interview from him a while back where he said contrary to popular belief, he's sometimes saying players need to be worked harder to get the best out of them. I could be misremembering, but I don't recall Murphy constantly being an early sub in previous seasons, but he is now, and I wonder if that's a factor in him keeping his form up.

I'm take it or leave it with xG. It doesn't offend me but people who rely too much on it look silly. I'd like to imagine there are much more sophisticated xG analyses available to clubs for the right price, factoring in how many defenders are positioned in front of the goal and where, which individual player the chance has fallen to, the speed of the ball received etc. etc. I find I'm usually pretty good at guessing what the xG of a match I've watched is, which implies it's not wildly out of keeping with what I'm seeing with my eyes.

I knew I agree about losing possession etc, I think that's exactly why he's not been played much. We've had a weird season with, initially, a lot of close games and disappointing results, which I can see Howe not wanting to hoy him into. And then suddenly a winning streak where Eddie's understandably said he didn't want to interrupt much to let players establish their rhythm and keep things going. The good thing is Osula looks like he's matured a decent amount already, judging by the (very small amount of) time we've actually seen him. He doesn't look like a reject given the reaction to his goal against Bromley.

And on the flip side, it's not like he's not being used when the first half dozen other eligible forwards are injured. They keep saying good things about his application in training etc. (unlike Hall). And in the modern world he's not that expensive. I don't think there's too much to worry about in terms of where he's going with us. I'm pretty optimistic.

Yep, agreed. The problem is this is football now, and it will be until PSR-type measures are removed. In the mean time, it will touch everything in the game and not bothering your mind with it is like not bothering with the offside rule. You just end up getting angry at your striker for not positioning himself 30 yards upfield in all that open space...

And Osula and Vlachodimos. £60m between them all, supposedly.

This isn't a criticism but I wonder if we're leaking players we would've liked to have gone for to stave off criticism of us doing nothing this January and ram home the PSR issue. There's still plenty of people who don't get it and will assume the club staff are just taking the piss unless there are concrete signings.

He's pure PSR profit so that should be taken into account on the fee. Should offer them £40-45m to tempt them initially. They know they could do a lot with that.

I physically recoiled when he came on the screen