Yorkie

Signing a young player with high potential for pennies isn't senseless, especially in the PSR age. Every signing like that is a gamble to some extent. At worst you make a small loss.

Must. Be. Unnecessarily. Critical.

Owen is the only one from that list imo. Was there any reason to hate Cabaye? I hated Duff when he was here but an irrelevance thereafter. Enrique got his comeuppance and Carroll was complicated; I was fuming at the time but let's face it, it was just Ashley. It was always very sour with Bellamy after he left.

I don't think B.I.G. has ever been given a fair crack. Barnes is settled in the team and in a good rhythm now which hopefully provides a fairer test of that front three. It's no slight on Murphy; he's been instrumental for us this season - but I think the attack could use a bit of freshening up, particularly with Isak struggling to get in games atm.

Hope Gordon comes in for Murphy, can see AG being right up for this.

That makes sense as an explanation tbf. Still very weird; the cliché bashful non-celebration couldn't be less necessary.

Think that's a bit harsh tbh. We absolutely battered both Man Utd and Palace, playing brilliantly in both. Then you've got Leicester and Ipswich which we made light work of. I think we're routinely playing pretty well but have spells in most games where we look untidy. Today we were poor in the first half but were well worth the point in the end.

Ramping up the need for us to get a big home win tends to energise us tbh. Hate to see Chelsea do anything good but I'm not too fussed from our point of view. No fear about the pressure being kept on us; it rarely does us any harm.

It's been the type of game we've stepped up in all season. Looking forward to it. KO time is lunacy.

He's got one particularly strong weapon in his arsenal and that's bolting past someone on the left flank and getting to the byline. He did that once today then kicked it out of play. Being kind, I think that was as big an indicator of rustiness that we've seen. It's frustrating because we can't really accommodate rustiness at this point. Definitely accept that his fellow midfielders were poor as well but in think Howe's gambling a bit with Willock, in the hope he plays himself back into form. Feels like we've invested that time now so might as well stick with it to see if it pays off. It worked for him earlier with Pope being preferred to Dubs when the optics indicated the latter would be better. Same might also be said for Wilson over Osula.

Agreed. Was strange to see us take so long to move the ball today; was like having a few Longstaffs on the pitch in that regard.

Performances mean fuck all but it wasn't that bad in the end. We weren't particularly effective with the ball - usually taking too long or needlessly giving it away - but we forced our way back into the game. I think that's to their credit.

Take that all day long, particularly after the first half. Just about the points at the stage. I think we just about deserved one.

Two changes to the backline at this point seems wild

Yeah, poor. Look disjointed everywhere with one or two players seemingly trying to do it all themselves. Not a clue what Tino is doing at times. Hope for an improvement; still points in this for us.

Some serious shithousery.

Very drab affair. Not impressed with either team so far.

Excluding the cartel these are probably the club I like the least. Maybe Everton. But I fucking hate losing to them so on that basis I'd accept a draw.

Which they only won because of an imaginary offside against Coventry.

Any opportunity to lay into Ange, based on facts or otherwise, should be taken.

Yep, fair comments. Needless to say, ten defeats gets you absolutely nowhere near the title race. That very competent middle tier of teams is arguably the key to it all, really. The good thing about them is that they're capable of taking plenty points off the challengers. I guess my theory is that the likes of Liverpool, Arsenal and City will drop points to that lot next season too, and there'll be more sides in the title race as a result.

You never know. Liverpool have a lot of work to do to sustain this and the other challengers have flaws. We've got multiple A-listers in the team already; recruit well on top of that and we can have a crack at it.

Ridiculously early days I know but feels like the title race could be very competitive next season. If we do things right this summer...

Knock it tf down.

Was a very exciting time, that. We were playing great attacking football under Keegan, after the misery of Souness, Allardyce et al, and there was a transfer window under new ownership right around the corner. A top 4 challenge surely beckoned.