Yorkie

fucking rights. Bollocks to symmetry.

I love the Europa League and will be elated if we qualify for it via our league position in May, but I can't decide how I feel about the prospect of entering it by failing to progress in a separate competition. Of course it represents a tangible hope of silverware but I've always felt like the opportunity is a bit unearned in that scenario. I didn't feel the same excitement as a lot of fans about CL qualification but, Christ, I've loved every second of it since it's started. I'm now dying for us to qualify just to see how far we can go.

The lack of the word 'adidas' pisses me off a disproprtionate amount.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/67268518 State of this utter shitstain.

Manquillo "has a groin problem" apparently. Sounds 'avoiding contract extension'-ariffic to me lyke.

"To not use our squad would be really foolish but that doesn't mean we don't back our squad and trust our squad to go to Old Trafford and try and win the game." All you need to hear really. Howe knows what he's doing, he's got no choice but to rest players.

Looking forward to the palpitations whenever Schar goes to ground during the months to come.

We had this all before when it looked like he was getting Derby. Reading are literally at their lowest ebb since the early 1980s, if not their whole history. Ashley could well come in and stabilise them by virtue of just the change in ownership itself. He'll be lauded and we'll be sneered at but the context couldn't be more different.

Do we think one of those other Adidas 90s kits would be remembered as adoringly as the grandad collar, had they been the ones worn when chasing the title? Or is the grandad collar still the best at a purely baseline level, forgetting how the team performed in it?

We also won because the no-hopers in the line-up made it to HT with the scores deadlocked and City's vulnerabilities exposed. If the game is there to be won after the break then I wouldn't object to someone like Gordon being brought on again this time, either. Tbh, even since the City game (which featured ten changes from the league game prior) we've lost five of those who started/came on. So any talk of ten changes again is pretty much a moot point anyway; certainly one of Wilson/Gordon will have to play.

I still don't have a clue how providing the fringe players with an opportunity and/or safeguarding our most frequently-featured players from injury or burnout = wanting to throw the game. Like I said before, it's like no one watched the Man City game. I expect us to go to Old Trafford and be competitive regardless of the individuals selected.

Obviously not. Despite us having absolutely no chance of winning it, sadly the Champions League is more important than the League Cup. Btw how does rotate = 'throw the game'? Did you miss the Man City game?

Rotating the team and protecting those players who are absolutely critical to us doing well in the league or progressing in Europe is just pragmatic and realistic. And it's hardly throwing the game when you consider who featured in the side which dumped Man City out in the previous round. We rotated in the early rounds last season too and got to the final, so we weren't exactly throwing it then either. There's also the matter of squad harmony and giving some players a fair opportunity to provide some contribution. Not everyone is necessarily going to be like Lascelles where they're content to do next to fuck all for two years and then jump back in with some career-best performances. The "they're young/professional athletes" line is just pure boomer, sorry like. Just because they're physically capable of managing a hectic schedule doesn't mean that playing more games won't impact them; the evidence was right there in front of our eyes yesterday. Meanwhile our competitors will rotate and keep their big hitters fresher. It's such an archaic view to just expect players to be robots and never get burnout, and sadly one that seems to pervade the governing bodies and broadcasters (though that's another story). Ultimately, what's happened here is that the draw has been unkind and made wholesale rotation more risky. If we were at home to Port Vale no one would give a fuck if we dared to ask Javier Manquillo and Paul Dummett to put on a Newcastle shirt.

It feels like quite a lazy analysis but there really are pre and post-Salah versions of Nick Pope at Newcastle. Pre was absolutely exceptional, easily the best keeper I've ever seen at the club. Post is brilliant but nervy and only arguably the best I've ever seen at the club. But he's still class and a huge asset to this team, it's just a pity his decision-making when coming off his line leaves a lot to be desired. There isn't a perfect keeper who doesn't make mistakes in the whole league and, based on what I've seen, he's still right up there with the best for me.

I'm really trying to remove any bias but I honestly don't see how that penalty call was so contentious. It's unlucky and Schar buys it, certainly, and it's disproportionate that an infringement like that leads to such a major scoring chance; but Schar capitalises on the Wolves player really fucking about. Hwang doesn't receive it cleanly and, relatively speaking, takes an age to manoeuvre himself into making a clearance. Schar pinches the ball and takes a kicking. Soft, lucky, borderline probably, but it's hardly up there with some of the true scandals of the VAR age.

Wholesale rotation is the only sensible option here, like, but the state of the squad means there's gonna have to be a couple of first-choicers. Those who played against Man City have earned the right to play in this one anyway. Dubravka Manquillo Lascelles Dummett Targett Bruno Ritchie Willock Tino Wilson Joelinton

Tough fixture, big effort, good point. It wasn't vintage but in the circumstances it wasn't a bad performance imo. Take it and get outta there.

Pretty even Id say. They look canny dangerous when they get the ball on the wings They're not quite but not far off a one man team imo.

If anyone is having a moral quandary about that pen let me remind you of 2018/19 when we were utterly robbed home and away against these fucks.

Honestly don't think there's a thing wrong with the penalty call. It's lucky because the punishment outweighs the crime enormously, just like Gordon's against Brentford, but both were very much won by our players. Fuck calling it lucky, we're Eddie's shithousing Mags.

Schar pinches the ball then Hwang kicks him, don't understand how it's not a foul?

barely dared even raise my fist

Molineux is ugly as fuck to watch on the tele. Hoardings everywhere, including the double-up, away fans all across the far side and set back.

Green kit...