TRon

Never feel the need to justify slagging off Liverpool fans. They deserve everything they get the entitled cunts.

I keep saying this, but just because a world class striker commands world class wages, doesn't mean every other squad member is entitled to them. Bruno highest earner clause notwithstanding - assuming that's even true.

No wonder they aren't in a hurry to offer him an improved contract if it is.

Yes they are but I would guess their knowledge of football is rudimentary, so I'm guessing they are relying on sound advice from the sub committee and not sure about the other board members. Can't imagine the PIF ones know that much outside of business, so a lot depends on who is drilling down to the crucial decisions.

Agree, but then there's no point in complaining if the owners don't bend over backwards trying to find loopholes. The best we can hope for is they might. They could just as easily sell up and buy a cartel club instead where the restrictions wouldn't apply.

Those rules yes. If you are the richest owners in the planet it's a bit like saying if you want to win stuff, then buy one of the cartel clubs, because there's no chance you are doing it with Newcastle United. Premier league teams will vote for it because it's the crabs in the bucket syndrome. They aren't Newcastle United so for them it's fuck NUFC, if we can't have it, why should they?

There's plenty the chasing pack could do....if they were allowed to. The PL rules have ensured the league is a closed shop essentially.

What I'm saying is that I doubt Jamie Reuben or Yasir are sitting down themselves to thrash out who will be Eales successor. They would have a board in place with people who make these decisions surely? It was something I was wondering myself given that it seems Eales appointment was not really a success if you look at the clash with Staveley and his subsequent appointment of Mitchell.

The owners would have delegated the appointment of chief executives. Who is actually making the decisions on who takes over from Eales?

He wants 300k a week apparently.

Can't see him going back there as he'll be on a much higher wage bracket now. We were only pushing because he was on a free, would be too expensive now given Chelsea will be looking for £20-30m.

Feels like hoping for the best rather than a long term solution, but I'm no medic so I'm sure they know better.

Rafa's game plan didn't require possession as much, and with it being a counter attacking style, usually that meant emphasis was more on sitting deep then hitting the spaces when we got the ball. I just feel that suited Sean's game a lot more than the midfield frenzy you get with the high press tactics Howe likes to use.

Agree, but I can't really blame Howe for wanting the best ready made players. He wants to compete with the elite clubs and for that you need the same quality of playing squad. It's frustrating but we have one hand tied behind our backs with the PSR bullshit.

I think some fans have lost sense of reality, which is that when it comes to signing the top tier players, the clubs already at the top will have more pull than us, so there's no point in getting pissed off when we lose out on players like Pedro or Ekitike. You could question whether we should be shopping in a different market, but that's on Howe, not us.

That would be pretty unforgiveable if they made a bad judgement call on doing the surgery during the off season.

Eales clearly was following a different remit to Howe. He was trying to fit the PL's PSR handcuffs and Howe wasn't ready to fall in line. Just different perspectives and given Howe's success there was only going to be one winner.

I think that was what Mitchell's remit was, but from Howe's POV we have outgrown that. He wants to compete with the cartel clubs NOW not down the line, and that means going for the top tier players. Of course because of PSR that's not realistic, but you can't really expect anything less from a manager who has big ambition.

If it's going to happen it will be with PIF for me. I don't see any other owner coming in and investing that sort of money to build a new stadium. Not the sort of chancers we've been associated with in the past. I'm relatively encouraged by the appointment of the new stats guy Suds, at least it shows we are still moving in the right direction, if slower than we would like.

That's what Isak is there for.

Let's look on the upside. It makes Isak's agent's hand weaker when it comes to negotiating a move away.

Let's not.

I don't know why people can't get their heads round this. It's not just nice to have two top strikers, if you are a CL club it's ESSENTIAL.

I was just giving my reasoning. You could argue loads of different scenarios if you use different figures. I felt a release clause of £150m was reasonable.

Yep that gives us some hope tbh. For Levy getting in a younger player is more important for resale value. For us, having PIF as owners might give an advantage as we may be making moves in case PSR gets made redundant by the end of Wissa's contract.