STM

I watched that overlap pod. I found the whole footballing discussion really engaging but yes Andy Cole comes across as someone who gets huffy quickly. Even his son didn't seem to like him. He's just comes across, cold, impersonal and hard to talk to. The bloke was an absolute goal machine like.

Classic one for the future. The problem with summer spending is that everyone, myself included, focuses on how it will effect the upcoming season and not the next 4/5.

I think we might get hung up on the "used to get played in CM" stuff. Ultimately at some point you need to concentrate on one position and own it. I can absolutely see him slotting into that midfield role later in his career though, he needs more experience on the pitch though. Midfield is a different animal.

Would be really interested to see how that looked. Did he find he couldn't do the drills? Was he not fit enough? Did he not look interested or concentrate enough?

At one point last night it felt like Bruno and Hall were the only ones on the same wavelength footballing wise. For a 19 year old he doesn't look like he knows how to give the ball away, or at least he's heading in the direction which suggests he's going to be that "press proof" type. His passing, shooting, crossing technique is outstanding. He's nowhere near polished defensively, positionally etc but I'm already at the stage where I can take that.. to an extent, because of what his all around game gives to the rest of the team... and of course he can improve on the job. I hope Howe and his team do everything on their power to convince Hall of the sacrifices he needs to make, that's my only worry. He seems quite a relaxed character, who perhaps doesn't like the hard side of training. Not a critique, just different. If he can go into this summer with the same attitude Gordon had last season, he could be in the England team by next season.

I can't remember the last game where we controlled the game. We've battered teams but I've not seen us control a game for a while. The two are different. Sometime our quality has seen us score for fun without actually looking fully in control like last season.

How much you want to bet that he starts vs Brentford? And if he does, my point stands.

Liquid I'm with you mate, I genuinely am, but sometimes there is the odd justified frustration that deserves a whinge. Don't try and fix the ones who hated Howe before and after.

I can't be having this mind... Pope will start vs Brentford and that means 3 days was the difference. On the other hand, I hate seeing this thread bumped, because I love Howe and I'm fully behind him.

5 times we've allowed that. Bad coaching.

Right? And then the added time to go with the wait.

I've never seen refs that are of a high standard. When I do, I will change my mind.

Aye but I'd rather have one wrong decision than two. There's too many downsides to wait for competent officials.

This is a fair take. If he can't see Trippiers performance tonight, he may end up with problems next season. No matter how much experience he might have, pace is pace.

Let's be honest, VAR didn't even see the rake on Gordon for the pen. It's not corruption, its downright incompetence. Get rid of VAR, we will never have the officials with the brain capacity to make cognisant decisions. Bin it.

Don't make rustiness excuses from Trippier when he did exactly the same thing during our poor spell in December. I know its a cliche but I think his legs have gone. People slated Burn when Burn never made a chronic mistake like that. Fair is fair. Also, like above, why is Trippier getting corners when Gordon is better.

Genuinely the worst take I've ever seen. Longstaff is invisible, Anderson not much better, Trippier has his zimmer frame out and this guy is calling out our best player.

We will score here.

Excuses for who?

Any idea what contract Hall will get, bound to be 6 years? His fee was reported as 28m + add ons, I would assume those add ons are appearance/performance based and unlikely to kick in until next summer... If his 28m is amortised over 5 years, that's around 5.6 we have to account for this season. I'm not saying it's nothing but it's also not alot.

Perhaps not, it was a rough guide. I should have known better.

Well I'd suggest our scouting department disagrees. From all accounts we have a serious interest in Sesko, before and after Isak joining.

That's just a lack of imagination on my part with the strikers. This is where we need our scouting department to know where to look. If we can find a 21/22 year with some experience but plenty of room for growth around the 30m mark, that's where we should go. Joao Pedro really was that deal. If we can get someone like that to dovetail with Isak, I think we are in business.

Spot on. I made a long post at the start of the year along the lines of "there's always 2 of the big six in crisis". You can absolutely rely on one or two imploding, simply because 2 of the teams can't be in the top 4, therefore by extention are deemed to be failing (Spurs can get away with a couple of top 6 finishes). This year its crisis city centre for Man United, Chelsea (until late), last year it was Liverpool, Chelsea and Spurs for parts of the season. You'd put good money on Liverpool dropping back next year, Villa having to deal with extra work load, will Spurs kick on? I doubt it. The only thing I can say with some certainty is that Arsenal and City will be 1 and 2... and that Chelsea will be much improved. In short, don't worry about what other clubs are up to, they will always cut each others throats.

More than anything I've learned that when predicting results it's less about who's better or who's worse, but more about timing. We seemed to catch Brighton just as they have hit some form, after beating Villa, in the same way that we caught Spurs in shite form a few weeks ago. You'd think that this is Man United in the worst of form but..... I dunno, I felt that they weren't bad against Arsenal. They weren't good either... but they weren't bad. Arsenal batter most sides and Man United made one sloppy error to lose. Its also at Old Trafford, we are inconsistent at best on the travels and even when shite Man Uniteds home form is never terrible. One thing is for sure. I will be able to tell you within 10 minutes of kick off whether we are getting a result. We must start strong.