Andy

Eh? It was basically the same as the end of the second half up until five minutes before they scored from a set piece. We're playing Blackburn though, not Liverpool. And we're Newcastle, not Liverpool. You really think we were doing well in this half until they scored? What did we create? We've had two goals chalked off and their keeper has made a canny few saves. Rafa's left the changes too late and the goal we conceded was stupid, but to argue that we haven't created enough to have won the game on another day is bollocks tbf.

To be fair, it's equally mental how bi-polar some fans are when it comes to evaluating him. We have a "good" squad for the championship but we're not exactly Real Madrid and we're not going to win every week, nor or we going to dominate games every week whether home or away, so when the wheels come off it's a bit stupid throwing a hissy fit over it. There's a lot of work to be done and I'm pretty sure Rafa knows that.

Merry Christmas everyone

People read far too much into stuff like saying he's happy at the moment is a pragmatic way of answering the question, nothing more.

Reads a bit like RTG's users shouting "mag" at first opportunity in here like I haven't been to the stadium of light recently but the atmosphere at SJP generally is cack these days tbf, especially if we're losing

One's who the club released on a free, rightly or wrongly? Probably aye

There's definitely a lot of truth to this like. You'd expect any player on a night out to be very careful to sing from the hymn sheet the club expects him to sing from. There's no way he'd speak out against the regime in case he was unknowingly talking to a journo or whatever.

I'll remember Sissoko as being a great athlete, no doubt, but as a footballer he's always been technically frustrating with progressively less end-product the longer he's been here. His goals/assists statistics from last season were pathetic for a supposed £30 million player, and while statistics never tell the full story his actual performances often told a worse one tbh. He's probably better at this level than what we've got, aye, ability wise, but he hasn't been motivated to play for us for ages. He couldn't even produce performances consistently when he was "happy" here so what good would keeping him around this season have been? The bloke has spat his dummy all summer, he would've been a terrible influence in the dressing room if we'd refused to sell him and playing him would've sent a disastrous message to the rest of the squad who did want to be here. Best athlete? Yup. Best player? Highly debatable statement at the best of times given his actual product. Best player for us to have kept around given the circumstances surrounding him and the club? Absolutely fucking not. Regardless of whether that money is even reinvested his position at the club had become pretty much untenable.

I'd just rather we kept our best players, tbh. If Mike Ashley pocketing £30m gets you hard, fair play. His overall performance and contribution last season was shite, he vehemently doesn't want to be here, and he's taken a massive strop over not being able to leave which would instantly transfer to the dressing room and onto the pitch. I can't see why anyone would be unhappy about this transfer other than to be pointlessly contrary. As fans we get nothing out of this, man. If he'd stayed we'd be a better side. It's not tough to figure out. I don't feel like we'd be a better side at all for having a player on the pitch who publicly didn't want to be there like (and who the fans didn't want either). I don't see how that would rub-off well on the other players at all. And besides that, purely from a footballing perspective, I've never seen Sissoko play well against this level of opposition ever. He'd blatantly go missing in every match, especially when he's already in an absolute huff with the world for not getting his big move. Even if that £30m isn't reinvested (I feel like it will be, fwiw) I honestly don't think we're worse off for him leaving, given the circumstances. It's maybe not something to celebrate, but it's certainly not something to bemoan.

I'd just rather we kept our best players, tbh. If Mike Ashley pocketing £30m gets you hard, fair play. His overall performance and contribution last season was shite, he vehemently doesn't want to be here, and he's taken a massive strop over not being able to leave which would instantly transfer to the dressing room and onto the pitch. I can't see why anyone would be unhappy about this transfer other than to be pointlessly contrary.

And he's good enough for the championship as a squad player at the very least, which is all that matters until next Summer. The coaching argument definitely holds a lot of weight though. If you go back to the early pages of this thread, people liked him as a player; during his first few months he was decent and provided good movement and a bit of a goal threat. That was all coached out of him gradually in the proceeding years (he's not the only one either) but there's nothing to say Benitez and his team can't get something out of him again. He's been okay so far this season and I'd rather have him in the squad than not right now.

Heard rumours of him being a bit of a dick around the dressing room in the past, could just be that Benitez doesn't like him as a character rather than as a player.

We're a championship club now, the players we sign as backup are going to be decent-to-good championship players. His goal scoring record looks okay and he's an experienced head in the dressing room, as a third or fourth choice striker that's perfectly fine.

We're very pedestrian so I can certainly see why Rafa might want to add pace. Never been too convinced by Yedlin but I think he'll be good enough at this level, it may even be the making of him.

And I disagree with you - Anita got skinned a few times last night - he doesn't have the physical presence and offers very little in attack. In 3 games in midfield, right wing and right back he has not been very good as he is not a very good player Janmaat is never in position to get skinned. Benitez found him out at the end of last season and preferred Anita there and has gone back to that again after giving him another shot at it against Fulham and Huddersfield.

I completely disagree like, end of last season we looked far more solid with anita there than we ever did with Janmaat, the amount of times he gets caught on the wrong side of his winger is beyond belief.

He's not like He is like. Defensively anyway. Not a big statement though, Janmaat is dire positionally.

I feel like he's overthinking this league so far. We don't need to produce a rigid tactical masterpiece to beat teams like Huddersfield, we need our players playing with freedom and confidence. We shouldn't be setting up to not lose.

Rather get a sloppy, uninspired performance like that out the way in our first match of the season to give them a kick up the arse. We're habitually poor at breaking teams down that defend deep against us and that's going to happen a lot this season, hopefully this game will reinforce that to rafa and he'll drop the idea of playing so many defensive minded players quickly.

Ehhh, as fourth choice centre half (possibly fifth if you include the likes of Dummett/Gamez) this signing is perfectly fine for Championship level.

he runs and chases but with very little purpose, and yes he can finish but needs a clear opening to do it Granted I haven't seen as much of him as you, but the goals of his I saw last season contradict that

Clear pen IMO

Italy are gon' win this

I'm glad we're not getting carried away about him