Memphis

In this day and age, you can never truly know what's in a player's heart - but man, it surely looks and feels like Bruno adores the club and the city as much as the supporters adore him. We all know how talented he is, it's obscene what he can do, but I would argue almost as important has been his attitude, his approach, his whole-hearted love of the club and his teammates. He joined us when we were in the shit and helped to drag us out of it, without a relegation clause in sight. He seems to have taken the elevation of the club as a personal goal and him raising the standard has done so, so much for the entire club. I just love him.

One of those days. It was bound to happen. Villa are flying and we've been hit by the same thing we've been doing to opponents all season, out fought and out thought. Look like we need rest.

(to the chorus of "Jailhouse Rock") Isak Alexander Isak he wears the 14 up top we love Alexander Isak

I remember driving 10+ hours with my 8-month pregnant wife in 2011 to watch a turgid 0-0 with Sporting KC in 100 degree F weather - she was a real trooper, I give her massive credit. I did get to go to training and pre-match sessions, watching Hatem was very very special indeed. But otherwise, yikes.

At his best I would put Joelinton up there with almost any box-to-box midfielder in the league. He is physically off the charts, he's gigantic, he's strong, fearless, has learned to finish, genuinely seems to love competing against the best. Every elite side needs a player like him, he does the work of two players and allows the forward players to have so much more space and time. I think he's worth twice what we paid for him, which is an incredible tribute to his persistence and to Howe's (and staff) coaching.

Cannot believe how much better he's gotten. Love his attitude and his commitment. He's a valuable squad member, no doubt. We can and will upgrade on him from a skill standpoint but players like him buying in and grafting like crazy are a big reason we are the squad we are.

Like it or not, we're going to hear about FFP until we get our commercial revenues up to a decent level. Our previous owner fucked us royally and our revenue streams are shit for the size and scope of our club. That's where FFP comes in. Also, we'll still spend loads this summer. No point in us advertising to the world that we're flush with cash and are easy marks.

It just depends on what Howe envisions for McTominay. If he sees him as a nailed-on starter, then he's nowhere near good enough for what we want to be. If he sees him as a nice piece of squad depth, then I'd be more likely to be OK with it. Howe has improved a lot of players but even in their improved forms, they're still nowhere near good enough for a CL side. I can't imagine McTominay as anything other than a depth signing and just one of many other signings. I suppose we'll see.

You can see how far we have to go to reach that elite level. We've done so well to get so close but we didn't deserve to win today and we look like a team that's run out of steam. I hope we can find some more energy for the final weeks of the season.

I don't think we've been that bad. Probably been the better team overall. But we don't finish lately. Just don't have that final quality. They do. And got a bit of luck - and some poor goalkeeping - for the second. We're not out of this yet. But if we lose our heads, we will be.

We have been comfortably the better team 10 v 11. ASM has been doing incredible things.

That's fair enough. I don't rate him, no, and I'm exaggerating a bit out of frustration. He shouldn't be anywhere near our starting XI. As a club, we took a risk that we could survive without reinforcing our midfield in the transfer window and we got burned. Not Anderson's fault that happened, not his fault he's playing, but he's not of a standard required for what we want to do.

Been a good response, all in all. Unlucky not to have pulled one back. What an insanely bad 20 minutes that was for us...

That your first time watching him play for us?

With respect if you can't see how much better we are playing without him even on the pitch, I don't know what to tell you. He's certainly not the only one but his presence weakens our midfield hugely and allowed Liverpool to open us up with some clinical passing.

We've replaced Anderson with no one and improved.

First time in a long time I have legitimate questions about Howe and about the ownership. This is the flip side to his loyalty to current players and squad unity - starting Anderson in this match over Gordon, for example, was a tip of the hat to the squad but at the cost of playing a major liability. Obviously Pope's moment of madness was just that, he mentally collapsed. Nothing else to say. This hits too close to home. Happened like this over and over again.

Trippier has been awful. All the things people have said about Trent Alexander-Arnold this year apply to Trippier but even moreso...

Bringing back all the wrong memories here

Bruno's red card has proven to be a major turning point for us.

Wasn't handball. Off the chest. Uncharacteristic from us, bad defending, no one tracked Nuñez coming in from the left, big gap between the CBs

He is incredibly professional. Incredibly driven. Incredibly detail-oriented. Pivotal. Has been almost perfect.

That second goal was absolutely off the charts gorgeous. Prime Barcelona stuff. I just can't believe this is Newcastle United now. Amazing.

We're in a weird spot. I agree that it's risky not to replace Shelvey but I'd argue that it's equally risky to replace him just for the sake of doing it. If we can get one of our targets now, then we need to go ahead and do it, even if it was originally to be a summer move. Otherwise, given what should be a lighter fixture load for the last few months, it's not crazy to think we can handle it with our squad as is. We're not at Shefki Kuqi levels here.