Minhosa

Wonder how easy it would be to bring forward all of next summers budget to January and how much appetite from the owners there would be...

He also coped with Mbappe twice in recent months to the point where Mbappe had the hump because he got nowt off him. Can only assume from that @leffe186post that Trippier is a better player now than he was when he left Spurs because he's much more to us than that imho. I think Spurs will be real contenders next year and I really like the Aussie but I'm not sure you can win the PL playing that way. There's too many good teams that can catch you out and sit in imho. Great to watch though and thoroughly deserved their win yesterday.

I'm really relaxed about this whole thing, why? - Howe has shown already a brilliant ability to turn around poor runs of form. He will again. - We're another weekend closer to January. - We're another weekend closer to getting some key figures like Botman, Willock etc back. - We've just been howked off two much fresher teams - no Europe and nowhere near as many miles on their legs this season. - We've got through another game without losing any other key players. - We've got lots of the season to go and lots of time to right these wrongs. I guess a huge part of this is about personal context imho. I'm still massively grateful of the takeover, still believe we are years ahead of where we could reasonably expect the squad to be and have to back the owners to get most of the calls right, which they have done to date. With that wider context, I can overlook a Trippier mistake, Lascelles poor show or a tired Schar having a rare off game much more easily. I'm still one of those rarities looking to get to 40 points tbph, anything else at this stage is a bonus. I'm happy to sit back and enjoy the ride. This was never meant to be easy and I'm happy for that too. Nothing worth achieving ever is. It's weeks like this that will make any success, if or when it comes, taste much sweeter. On to Milan. Imagine saying that a few short years ago?

We can't expect him, or any of our other top performers, to get everything right all of the time. It's a fucking tough gig when you get 99 things right and 1 wrong and you're getting questioned. Confident he'll pick himself up and crack on.

I like how they present the fixtures/results page, particularly when viewing on a phone. So, if I want a quick look at fixtures on the go, I use it. Otherwise, nothing else.

One of those games where the scoreline isn't really a true reflection of the game imho. If that was a boxing match last night, we'd let them punch themselves out by the 6th round and had started to control matters in rounds 7/8/9 and best part of the tenth and then we've dropped our guard badly and been caught - totally changed the game the Trippier mistake. At 0-0 I felt we looked more in control, if not hugely threatening. If it wasn't for the first mistake, I couldn't see them scoring tbh. Very different defeat to say Bournemouth where we simply weren't at the races and got exactly what we deserved. Everton were everything you'd expect from a Dyche side, industrial, zero flair and a bunch of triers - I'd rather pull my eyes out than watch them every week. We're gonna have these results whilst we're on the bare bones but overall, I don't think a point, at 0-0 would have been an unrealistic outcome nor wholly undeserved.

Eh? @Kanji's been a huge Newcastle fan for years. He's spent fucking years of his life reading up on, watching, researching and falling in love with the club. Enough to travel over to see us in the Carabao Cup Final and he's made the pilgrimage to SJP. Given he's as researched as anybody else and he's lived the experience, I'd say he's more than entitled to his view on things and can say whatever the fuck he likes about it. He's better versed than many locals I've met in the whys and wherefores of all things NUFC so let's not gate keep or feel the need to condascend other fans because they've got a view. Perhaps some of our overseas fans place an even higher value on our heritage and history because that's what they've bought into when choosing us. That can't be a bad thing imho.

Yep. ST holder. Didn’t get it.

I'm sure I read somewhere that he'd spent most of his Chelsea youth career in midfield so you're bang on with the Zinchenko likeness.

Just hypothetical to see what folks would do.

Think we'd need to soon enough anyway if we've got ambitions to look at competing for the title. He's a really really good keeper but he'll never be elite for me. He's fine for where we are now and he's been a great buy for the £10m or whatever it was we spent on him but we need better if we're serious about challenging imho.

If I'm perfectly honest, I felt the fee was high at the time given his recent ACL injury. To play like that though, 3 90 mins in a week, against that level of opposition and be outstanding. Wow. What a buy.

Hypothetically, and I'm not trying to mischief make here, but imagine you're Eddie Howe and it's the last game of the season. Hall is currently a loan with an obligation after x appearances, let's say he's one game away from that deal being activated, and the game is dead rubber. Bearing in mind, he's a £30m fee for next summer and you've only got a budget of say £70m for next season. Do you play him and tie up the budget or leave him out to free up the funds for next summer? He returns to Chelsea. I'm interested in what people would choose. FWIW - I'd play him and commit to the spend based more on how successful our recruitment team have been with pretty much everybody else perhaps rather than having been blown away by the initial impact of Hall. Also considering he's still very young and english.

Was there much of an outcry from Southampton fans when he was sold? I honestly can't remember in contrast to say Lewis Hall where there was major disappointment from Chelsea fans. You'd have thought Southampton fans would have been gutted to lose him.

You're already helping clubs in 'any way' by staying the fuck away you utter shitstain. And, as for a question about football, how about having a go answering this; 'As an ex centre-half, how blind fucking were you not see to a player in Fabian Schar?' Thanks. The ego on this prick knows no bounds. His only constant is failure and yet he thinks the rest of the profession should keep funding that because he fancies a cushy gig. More fool the person who employs him next.

Seem to remember West Ham being credited with an interest a wee while ago. Be interesting to see if they renew that if he's available.

Cheers @Froggy- good to hear the logic. Where would you say Varane ranks when compared to Ferdinand etc etc. Now things have settled with Martinez after the initial shite in the media, how good do you think he can be? Does he have much more of a ceiling or is this pretty much it with him do you think?

How does his popularity with your fanbase compare with Martinez's?

Yep totally agree with this. Would love to see what Howe could do with him and I thought the raw ingredients were there during his time at Chelsea but they just played him in the wrong position so often he ultimately failed. Similar to us with Joelinton I guess. If it wasn't for Howe/the coaches (and a sprinkling of Ciaran Clark) he'd have probably been written off too.

Yep - he's the one that got away imho. Would've loved him at our place. Looks superb.

100% agree with this. I'm sure David Batty was around 28 ish when KK signed him and he was 'oven ready' from the off. Zero bedding in time. Would be fairly similar with KP I think. Just needs to learn a bit of our style of play and get his match fitness levels up.

Thanks for the pointer, I was about to enter the Tonali thread for a little pick me up and then stumbled upon 'Apology-Gate'. Any chance we can send N-O's normal 'Strong views on Fucking everything' crowd and professional opinion-isters over there and lock off all of them in for a fortnight? Might make the place bearable.

Was talking to some Leeds fans over the weekend about that exact point. Both of them were adamant he could be 'Howed' very quickly and become an asset in no time.

Fuck me. Is this going to be the filler between now and the PL coming back? Fucking international breaks have a lot to answer for.

Yep - miserable old cunt alert - I fucking hate this stuff. Literally got zero interest in any of them or any of the shite they do for money.