TRon

Such a shame because that last few seconds spoiled a great performance.

It was really stupid not to be able to see that out when they were all but done.

We should still have been able to keep them out with the whistle about to go.

Did enough to win that but in the end we let them in when we only had to stop one final attack.

Keeper looks decent tbf. I wish we could find a finish to the good work we do in the approach play. Could have scored a couple with a well timed pass.

Enough moaning lads. Osula might just turn Beserker on these and tear them a new one. Why not?

Big Al also saying it would make more sense for Gordon to play 30 mins at the beginning rather than as a sub.

I would. Might as well get the most out of him before the script is written.

Don't see the point in having him on the bench. If he's going to play a part would make more sense to let him get at them from the start then come off when he's spent.

Yep. There's boatloads of money in football, but it's the players and agents getting rich, and the fans are paying more for it.

Well it happened with us with the Elliot Anderson/Vlachy fiasco. But regardless of whether it's a swap deal, it does seem City are sniffing with Tino, and it does seem that he might fancy it. Then you factor in he has two years left on his contract and has shelved signing a new one. And we did try to sign Trafford previously. Make of all that what you will.

Maybe that's down to his contract only having 2 years left on it. Some sort of deal with Trafford might not be the worst outcome if Tino is set on moving to City.

Why would they get him at a cut price deal? Did I miss something?

I would be looking forward to this game a lot more if there wasn't this sort of caveat going into it.

I wrote a letter to the Pink about it many moons ago. I got the piss taking "Meoww!" retort from whoever was replying to the letters at the time.

I'm not up to date on the selling players between multi-club owners, but I'd imagine there's something along the lines of "NUFC are barred from doing it" or words to that effect. But if that's an option then we should be doing yesterday.

If we try to press these, we might get 30 mins of joy in which hopefully we'll score. After that, I expect they will pass it all around our press and exploit the space behind. Similar to games against high class passing sides we've already played in the CL and on Saturday against City.

This is what it takes at this level to compete then. We are miles behind. Can't afford the best players because they are out of our spending range, and can't buy the next generation because we don't have a structure like City or Chelsea. Yet.

If Howe himself shared that lack of faith in those above, he'd be gone so I think your fears are baseless. Howe just wants backing for his methods, and by and large, he has got it for most of his time here.

I'm not sure we have stopped doing it, it still seems to work against the less physical sides like we come up against in Europe. PL sides seem to be fighting fire with fire, and often it's us who wilt under their counter-pressing and our technique gets found wanting.

This. Obviously things haven't gone to plan as when PIF first took over, but that's because the goalposts have been changed since the days of billionaire owners being able to buy their way to the top. It's a closed shop now, and it is going to be a long road to breaking into the cartel. I expect moans and groans from fans, and I'm sure plenty of mistakes have been made. But my general feel is that we are still trying to break into the elite. When someone with more resources and intent comes along who can shoot us there quicker, I will get behind them.

Read in one of the papers yesterday that Mitchell pushed to sign him, and Tindall provided good references. I would prefer us to have targeted slightly higher profile players, but he will be sold at a good profit so justified from that sense.

He better be otherwise we'll end up having a repeat of last summer. Tino and Tonali are probably gone, I would think there will be pressure from Gordon and Hall camps as well. I know this will go down like a lead balloon, but we need to be ahead of it instead of sticking our heads in the sand.

I think that gets overblown tbh. He was pretty anonymous in his first few games, but he did score a few worldies which took the pressure off. We weren't really able to get up the pitch using him as a target man, and pressing isn't really his game.

So was everyone else.