Shak

As a first team player no but he'd be useful in a squad IMO. Decent option off the bench when chasing a game and could start at home against weaker sides. Not sure anybody in our squad is good enough to be a starter but Shelvey is one of the few who has some actual ability and could be worth keeping around. I think that's the case for all of our players tbh. Lascelles and Merino have been mentioned as our two outstanding players, but Merino has been sloppy in recent games, and Lascelles has barely established himself as a Premier league defender. Both of these would be great as squad members, but we shouldn't be relying on them. We need an injection of real quality and that will raise every other player's game as well. Yeah, I reckon if we had two players of genuine quality playing in last night's team instead of Diame and Gayle then all of a sudden a lot of our players would look a hell of a lot better. Our creative players like Shelvey and Ritchie are getting a lot of stick recently but it's a bit of a thankless task trying to carve out chances for wasters like Perez and Joselu or trying to build good attacks with Gayle offering absolutely fuck all in terms of leading the line.

As a first team player no but he'd be useful in a squad IMO. Decent option off the bench when chasing a game and could start at home against weaker sides. Not sure anybody in our squad is good enough to be a starter but Shelvey is one of the few who has some actual ability and could be worth keeping around.

If the aim is to challenge for a top six spot the players I would say are good enough to be part of the 20-25 players that make up the first team squad are Yedlin, Lascelles, Merino, Shelvey, Atsu and Ritchie. So yeah, just the 15 players needed over the next couple of years, assuming there's money to spend. Obviously not really feasible to do all that in a window or two so I could see us keeping hold of Clark, Gayle and maybe one or two others for a while more while we address the more urgent needs in the squad. Hopefully the likes of Lejeune and Murphy will be a pleasant surprise and show themselves to be worth holding on to. I would say the most urgent areas in need of address are - Attacking midfielder. - Striker. - Left Back - Goalkeeper Those four spots have to be addressed in January, we simply don't have anything approaching PL quality in those spots and it's killing us.

Can't wait until we replace all of them. Maybe keep one or two of the better ones around I suppose, for the sneer.

There’ll be people bumming in the stands at this rate with all this excitement.

Fuck it, gonna get fucked on angel dust tonight in homage to our new overlords.

It’s beginning to look a fucking lot like Christmas. Fuck me, I’m in shock I think. Fuck.

Been giving him lessons, have you?

Pathetic from Ritchie. Ridiculous we hadn’t made some sort of positive sub before then though.

Has anyone ever seen another footballer who falls over for no reason as much as Perez does?

Flaw in this plan of course is that not a single player in our squad is a good option playing just off Gayle.

Can trust him not to get sent off once a season. Isn't that what's really important in a striker?

Amanda pls

Big picture much of what he's doing at the moment doesn't really matter. Club either gets sold and 90% of the squad will be replaced or else the takeover falls through and Rafa will be off. He does absolutely deserve a lot of criticism for his selections of late though, he clearly plays favourites and it's a worrying sign for the future. Does seem that the Spanish lads in particular get more slack than most. Starting Joselu and Manquillo is no different to when Pardew and Carver were playing the likes of Colback and Shola ahead of better options, very disappointing.

Are we allowed to say that Rafa blatantly plays favourites with the Spanish lads but still think he’s a class manager anyway?

Need that takeover. Him playing favourites won't be so annoying when all of our players are brilliant.

Oil money and better players please, this is grim.

What is ? My bath. Takeover bath.

Fucking fuck you Lejeune, clumsy fucking oaf.

It was such a PES goal.

Dunno like, think he’d make a good political activist. Honestly think there is a good chance that he would have been some sort of IRA terrorist. God you're a fucking retard.

Fucking class. Absolutely delighted.

That goal.

Hoping we'll get a look at Shelvey in CM with Merino.