TRon

It's a fair point. I think with Rafa we were just so grateful to have a respected manager in charge of our club we felt eternally grateful. And he was a top bloke to boot. Perhaps we have a section of the fanbase who feel more entitled now that we have the allegedly richest owners in the world. "Whatt? Eddie lost the cup final? Fuck him and get Pep up here, he knows how to win trophies" I mean there's only going to be a few knackers who think like that, but they are the ones who probably make plenty of noise.

One of the issues is that many of our forwards don't strike the ball particularly well. Joelinton (although not sure he's still classed as a forward), Almiron and Willock are all pretty tame in the shooting department. ASM is better, but doesn't usually get his shot off quick enough. This is where a James Maddison type of signing would see a massive improvement in xG.

He does, but he plays the team game more effectively. Both defensively. Collectively we move the ball around better when he's playing IMO. But yeah, he's far from top class.

This I agree with. Our form wasn't a flash in the pan, we have been performing well for best of a year. We were really playing some nice football as well this season, I don't see why we can't go again.

It's not about looking for scapegoats, it's about effective team play. ASM's a very exciting player, but he's never going to hit a first time ball to release the striker before the defence knows what's hit them. He'll want to take it, control it, then maybe have a little run at a player or two. Fair play to him, he's one of the best at it, but it also allows defences to regroup. I just think we were playing some really good football for a while with a lot of inter-passing moves, and we aren't seeing it now.

Before the season I would have been really happy with 7th, but having spent the majority of the season in a CL place, I agree, less than 6th would feel slightly disappointing. Although in reality we should have no business being that high considering our squad value.

Also came probably as close to criticising the players publicly as he has done after the final when he said we made good opportunities but weren't clinical enough to take them. It's more or less an admission that we aren't good enough, something he emphasised again afterwards when he said it will be a long process to get us to where we want to be as a club. He's never going to slag anyone off individually, it's just not what he's about, but there's a burning desire to win in there. Some fans are just too thick to see past the surface.

Yep. I still feel the best football we were playing was immediately before the world cup, there seemed to be a lot more intensity, and better one touch passing. Maxi wasn't playing then. But if Howe feels he can get ASM to fit his system then great.

Thank God I don't bother reading that shite.

Prefer Willock tbh, I thought we played better all round football with him in the side, even if individually he's not as dangerous as ASM.

That's why it was handy having the poster with the words embedded, don't have to actually listen to the show to see the quotes.

Just so happy to have these owners, she was hugging all the players yesterday.

I'm generally in agreement about growing organicaly FWIW. But even doing that, at some point we will have to pay the top wages for the top players. But hopefully we don't just chuck money at it like Chelsea. Not that we are going to be allowed it anyway, even if we wanted to.

I'm never going to disagree about signing Brunos or Botmans, but tbf I laughed at Man U spending £60m on Casimero...but he's won them the cup, and will get them into the CL as well, so I guess they aren't going to complain.

Has to be Dubs because he's a better keeper. But after this season I don't expect Dubs to be here anyway. Whether Karius is good enough to be no 2 is another question, I suppose he deserves the chance to make his case.

I thought it was offside as well, but not really surprised when they gave it. If it's marginal it's always going to go the way of the royalty clubs.

I absolutely hope we do adopt that approach, although it will probably take us a couple of years at least to be in a position to do so. If you want the best team, eventually you have to pay top wages. We can't do it yet, but we will at some point.

Wouldn't be surprised if Targett wasn't better in the air as well.

I watched a couple of his videos but the ITK stuff was just so bad I quickly avoided any later ones. That said I don't really watch any these days, not even the good ones like Toon Review or Loaded. They're just too fucking long.

Spot on about the lack of bodies in the box. It makes it much easier for the opposition to then mark the lone striker.

Tbf, doesn't matter if teams have caught on to the patterns of runs between him and Trippier, there's not that much you can do to stop good pass and move, which is what Miggy is excellent at. The patterns aren't the problem, it's the final ball or shot which sometimes lacks quality. Even then he's scored 10 goals and we still have 15 games to play.

The World cup came at a bad time for us tbf, not seeing much from many of our players since then, world cup or not.

Still don't think you can blame a striker if there's no service.

Pope should play every game tbf. He should have played today really. For some reason he didn't.

There'd be no shortage of buyers IF we wanted to sell him.Danny Ings is a great example of what goals are worth in this division.