Andy

Isak was almost entirety irreplaceable though to be fair, Gordon is nowhere near that.

We have a scouting department? Thought we were still working through the list that was compiled in 2022.

We're managing to find goals to take the lead but still playing an entirely unconvincing brand of football and looking second best for significant spells in games. Putting it right is not outside of Howe's ability, but this is definitely his biggest challenge if he remains manager.

I agree with this like. It's definitely not ridiculous that people were/are questioning Howe's capacity to carry the club forward after the recent dismal run of form and performances, and a win against Brighton doesn't suddenly make everything completely rosy. I think it is pretty rational to have doubts given that Howe himself has shown precedent at Bournemouth for struggling to turn around strong backwards momentum, particularly with his preferred tactical style seemingly being negated by most premier league clubs this season. He absolutely has credit in the bank and deserves another crack at it for me, but at the same time it's not obscene for people to have doubts about whether that is the right thing to do. People are basing this judgment on whether they think he can adapt and change tactically, something we've never really seen from him yet with any kind of consistent success.

It's absolutely dogshit from Villa as others have said like. Chance to relegate and fuck up a big six club for years and Emery has dished up this shite.

Said yesterday that I felt Spurs would get something here. Seemed inevitable with it being sandwiched between Villa's European games.

Depends which Admin you're talking to, Yorkie is a ruthless dictator

Everyone cool if we ban Froggy if they manage to lose this?

Aye definitely, the contempt in which he held the fanbase outweighs the incompetence of the others on the list.

Doubt he's alone in that take like, Pardew was definitely the most hated manager I've seen on here.

Happens with a lot of attackers coming here from Bundesliga, he's the latest in a line of strikers from there who just don't look threatening in this league.

Watching the highlights back, that run and cross for Wissa deserved much better. Would probably have been our best assist this season.

Correct decision in my opinion, but we need to hit next season running. No pissing about in the summer, identify our targets now and get deals in place so new signings can have as good a pre-season as possible. If we're backing Eddie then really fucking back him.

I tend to agree with this. The approach we took evidently worked today but isn't sustainable IMO, Brighton played right into our hands by being absolutely wide open at the back, which is a complete rarity in the PL now. I'm glad we got the win, hopefully we can finish the season strongly. However, there is a monumental amount of work to do over the summer, both in recruitment and on the training pitch.

It was a weird performance, a lot of good in the first half and a lot of bad in the second half, it's easy to see why it could be viewed from both perspectives. I thought overall we edged the match over 90 minutes but a couple of key moments in the second half could have easily had this thread looking different. Main thing is we finally got a result over the line. We need to bottle that first half performance and find a way to produce it with consistency, until then I won't be fully convinced that we've turned a corner.

Job done, second half was iffy again but at least we held on. Still not convinced that starting XI gets you consistent results in this league, but it worked today so fair play.

Good football that like tbf.

West Ham are gone I reckon, Spurs will get something against Villa tomorrow.

I feel like even if we win it's far too early for anyone to gloat, we've had plenty of false dawns this season and need to see performances like this for 90 minutes across multiple matches.

Fair fucks like that first half performance was a lot better than expected. Glad we have the two goal cushion as they definitely still have a threat.

Dan Burn left back, inspired stuff Eddie

He wasn't our best player last season, that has to go to Isak or Tonali, but he was good - at centre half. The left back thing always works for one or two games then ends up turning horrific. It worked in the 4th placed season as we had a great balance across the pitch and our ultra-attacking right hand side made up for it.

I don't think "something different" meant dropping our best performer this season and going back to "something archaic" in putting Dan Burn back to LB after it's already been exposed a multitude of times, to be fair. I think people were hoping for a tactical change, ie. trying to bed Woltemade and Wissa into the same team, finding "something different" strategically to actually get our more talented players clicking, not sitting them all on the bench. Hope I eat my words at full time as we have done many times in the past, but that lineup is definitely uninspiring.

It should be pretty clear at this stage that "height" was never the logic for the Arsenal game. Hall has obviously been dropped as a result of the Bournemouth first half.

Burn at left back to deal with Brighton's height?