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Nothing wrong with not rating him and changing your mind by the way, that's life But the first probably 40 odd pages of this thread reached hysteria levels.

My recollection was there was all of about 3 people willing to give him time of day. Considerably more were worried about his impact upon the club's homoerotica.

Accepting foreign fans and such as equals is one thing, and fundamentally alright with me. But saying you don't know who Mike Ashley is and calling yourself a diehard fan, akin to fans of Disney and McDonald's, is embarrassing - when it isn't an obvious wind up. Got far more respect for someone who, let's say, is Saudi and started following because of the takeover and isn't fully into it yet but is enjoying the ride and gradually falling for the place while learning about the backstory etc. Easy come support is easy go, too.

Good one.

It was my joke. Depressing is the word

Rotterdammerung. You don't get to use that every day.

There's no way I'm gonna be able to properly catch up on 50 pages... Can't help but suspect this deal is significantly motivated by very big doubts about his ability to stay fit long term. Particularly in our style of play at least. Our medical team might well be saying he's looking at 20 games a season tops.

I think it was a bad one to be fair. It was about as well timed as possible I guess as he would've lost half a season otherwise... But a real shame nonetheless.

Can the as yet unnamed poster confirm if Bramble was ever able to keep it up for 90 minutes?

On a similar note, while I agree he often sets up chances that don't get finished, I wonder if that partly relates to his erratic style of play. xA won't easily take account of those intangibles. Once again, we saw a player eyeroll about him being unpredictable when they were meant to be complimenting him - this time Anderson after the Gateshead match. Could it be that his style is just too surprising for our other players to mesh with and comfortably convert?

To me, that's a key point, and sets him apart from a lot of 'those type' of classic flair players we've had in the past, in terms of how I think of him. He's clearly not really designed for it, but overall he's done his best to buy in and avoid rocking the boat.

Some people hero worship/ped ASM, not least because he was light in the dark. That was never the case for Robert. I'd say he was always beneath a few players in the pecking order - not just Shearer but Solano, Speed and Bellamy. Even Dyer, plus obviously Given, Woodgate and others. As Brown Bottle says, a solid portion of the crowd detested him, there was real anger, and not many tears shed when he left. Think history has been rewritten a bit over time. Overall, as I say, I think ASM has had a strikingly similar time with us as Robert, HBA and Ginola.

I don't think that's right. I'd say Robert got less love, for example. I find it freakish how we keep ending up in the same relationship with French left wingers.

Fair point, the Russian army was pretty successful during the Napoleonic period too now I think about it.

Had the same thought. Think it's a little bit too far over the rainbow to imagine they're giving hundreds of millions to competitors of ours just so they can slide an ASM deal through, but it's definitely a happy upside to dipping everyone else's hands in the blood, as the saying goes. Suspect things will end up being a lot quieter from some quarters going forward.

So will there not be a third kit this season ala the blue and gold? Was hoping this green kit would get just occasional special runs out. I'm with Tron on this. Ironically a lot of the fellow green teams getting mentioned are famous underachievers! Any team can beat any team in a one off match, but across a season I'd rather have any tiny advantages on our side rather than against us. Would be better with white socks at least.

From a couple of little interviews I've seen, he looks a young 17, mentally speaking. I'd keep him at home for a while.

Yes, I was laughing to myself earlier when I read someone seem to suggest that they thought it was the MBS government holding the Saudi people back from having some kind of liberal paradise.

It's stuff like this that encouraged me to just stand back and let the club make it's judgement when it went for Gordon. Serious people with serious football chops have rated him for a long time, like Ancelloti and Benitez. He's had a disrupted development partly because his first club became a basket case, but if someone like Howe is positively beaming about working with him, then I say have at it.

To be fair, if we hadn't signed him, the way it was going, he probably wouldn't have won the award!

Don't know why people are so repelled by this. Re: sideways moves, sometimes they help you get where you want to go faster i.e. changing lanes on a motorway.

Sounds like he has a reasonable understanding of English already, just not a talker yet. Should help smooth things along

Seems super focused. Very measured.

I'd take it as a very positive sign about our intentions, but yeah I'd be a little surprised myself if they didn't entertain such an offer at all.