TRon

Yeah we need a touch of class up front, not more honest running.

Some decent play up until the final third, then the front three look pretty powder puff. Gordon marshalled pretty well so far, Barnes not really got clear space to run into, and Miggy too weak to hold the defender off when he was put in behind.

Miggy disappointingly anonymous so far.

Really need Miggy to step up today with no genuine striker up front.

Are Man U playing this weekend?

Could have been worse, at least Jacob Murphy's there to swap out one of the front three if needed.

Again, that will mean we are relying on these front three until Isak or Murphy are fit to rotate. Not exactly ideal when Gordon himself could probably do with the odd game starting from the bench.

My impression is that Howe will be more pissed off that Ashworth will be taking inside knowledge of our long term strategy with him to Old Trafford. Eddie is definitely an all in kind of guy, he's not going to look kindly on a mercenary whose been privy to high level knowledge jumping ship.

What is an even bigger pisser is that when Howe was talking about alternative strikers in our current squad last summer, he mentioned Gordon and...wait for it....Joelinton.

No one's going to pay serious money for him, but as @TheBrownBottle has already said, there will be relegation threatened teams who might reckon even half a season worth of Wilson goals would keep them up. At this point the only reason to get rid of him is so we can bring in someone who might stay fit for the majority of the season, otherwise we can just keep him for the final year. He's probably scuppered this season well and truly though.

Knock about £10m off those figures and you might be talking.

Agree, but we are in the same position again, this time let's not make the same mistake. No more contract extensions, either sell if someone will actually offer some sort of a reasonable fee, or just use him as and when necesessary during his last 12 months here.

It's more about getting in the right mindset that players have a shelf life. As it stands, looks like we won't be able to fetch much of a fee for Wlson anyway as he would have needed to finish this season fit and firing to drum up interest. Right now no one would want to pay a significant fee for him, and in the summer he'll be entering the last year of his contract. Might just end up keeping him here and hoping he stays fit for enough of that final season.

Exactly this. I've been a huge fan of Wilson but we can't allow sentiment to cloud our judgement. One of the reasons I think Eales came out with that unpopular quote about selling players when the time or price is right. There's usually only a certain window when you can capitalise on a player's form and at the right age, after that it's usually downhill. Miggy last season for example was at the height of his worth, every year we keep him here his value is going down.

While I can understand why he might go, I'd hardly call it a no brainer. Man U are one of the biggest clubs in the world, but so are we now. If he goes you could understand why, if he decided he'd rather see out this very exciting project at Newcastle, that wouldn't have been a huge surprise either. I think his close ties with some of the people at Man U is playing a bigger part than the reputation of Man U.

Ouch!

Even when he was getting pelters during the Bruce years, I always thought he was actually pretty good at defending. Not exactly Trippier levels raiding down the flanks, but he wasn't the worst either.

He's a Sporting Director at the end of the day, those guys do their work behind the scenes, it's not like he's going to get carried on fans shoulders should we ever see the glory days. It's usually the players or the manager who go on to become legends. He's at a great job right now, Man U is probably one of the two or three which might appeal more if his ambition is to run things at the very top.

Ritchie and Dummett are pensioners tbf, Krafth is still only 29.

He's a decent enough squad player tbh, that he can cover as CB works in his favour as well. I'm assuming he's not on big wages.

Can't understate how much this matters. We might eventually be the club everyone wants to aspire to, but while FFP is in place, we are a few years off at least. Even then it would take some movement in how FFP is applied to allow other clubs to catch up to the cartel. Ashworth is obviously good at his job, we'll just have to find someone who is of the same calibre, hopefully better.

Why would it end now? Let's face it, watching a team desperately trying to come out of the shadow of their neighbours failing, getting up, failing again, rinse and repeat makes far more compelling viewing than watching Man City sweep the board season after season.

No PL side will pay us a decent enough wedge to make a move worthwhile. The only chance of getting £20m was from Saudi, if we are talking about normal clubs then I'd be surprised if we got much more than £12m. If that.

I think how our season pans out depends how quickly he is back playing from the start. With Joelinton out, he would be the perfect alternative on the left side of midfield.

He might not want to go and prefer to sit his contract out.