Conjo

He's had two seasons with Nottingham Forest whom have been playing a low block and hitting teams on the counter. Hope he has a good work rate and is adaptable to a high press. I love his pace and that he can cut inside to shoot or go outside and cross, so he'll definitely strengthen our squad. If Eddie wants him above cheaper alternatives and possibly at the expense of other areas that could use strenghtening then so be it. I don't think there's an issue with the player, but I can see it coming back to bite Howe in the ass at the end of the season though in the event that we start getting injuries to a few key players for a lenghty period of time which starts affecting our results. We can't really excuse him for poor results due to injuries if we've burned our budget on say 2 new players.

Doku in our team is 2x the player and way more exciting to watch than he is in Borediolas system. I don't know anything about him as a person, but going by skill alone I'd probably have him over both Gordon and Barnes.

Yeah, I'd love to see them given a chance too. Some rise to the occasion, some don't. Chelsea sold Hall for psr.

Tino and Hall had already had their breakthrough when we bought them, by being given enough time to show what they can do in the PL by Southampton and Chelsea. Of course, more players will not make it than those who will, but we won't know until we give them a chance.

We'll never unearth talents here if we aren't prepared to give talents the opportunity. Both Miley and Osula got criminally little game time this season imo. If they don't get more next season they should get as quick and far away from here as possible for their own sake. With peace and love, the "he hasn't shown enough" crowd can go fuck themselves. Can't show anything if you aren't getting meaningful game time.

I thought their documentary series was funnier than ours.

They already need to strengther their whole squad. Would be a massive blow for them if they start the transfer window having to replace one of their best players on top of that. £25m doesn't help them mucch, if any imo. They're better off keeping him.

He's got 3 years left on his contract, so unless there's a release clause triggered they'd be mad to accept. A half decent season in the PL and they can double that amount.

If we end up not getting him, and Brentford isn't keeping him, I can't think of any other (realistic) place I'd like to see him go than Man Utd. He would drain a huge amount of money in transfer fee and wages (without this made up CL/no CL clause) from them while being unsuitable for Amorims system.

Is this the new thing instead of ballers?

Wish I had seen this post sooner. Still 34 new unread posts, but wasted too much time on reading about nothing apparently

Exactly If he can be managed/rotated so he is available ~70-75% of the season without playing with minor injuries that affect his performance, I think he'll be extremely scary too.

And managed that by playing through injury in two periods of the season where he was really ineffective and contributed nearly nothing. Reckon he'd start 27-28 games if he only played when fit, but its impossible to know exactly how many games it was.

Clearly not enough experience in this Inter team. They went for youthful vigor and it failed. Put on De Vrij, Darmian and Arnautovic to shore things up.

Serie A jobs for the boys

They'll end up bending over and paying him £180k, without this mythical CL/no CL clause. He'll continue having these muscle injuries, playing on and off with the odd glimpse of promise until he's 26 suddenly realizing he isn't 20 anymore and wonder wtf happened. Then he'll move to west ham on a free to maintain his wages and retire at 33.

Don't you think that may be the biggest reason why there was literally nowhere else he wanted to go?

*If he can stay injury free

If he joins them on a modest wage without any playing time guarantees then it would be a great move for Sunderland to get his experience in to help guide, mentor and set the standard for a very young team, and be there as an option on the bench/cover for injuries.

That's actually a very fair comment I hadn't thought about. Although your point is still valid, I'd like to clarify that I said that, not due to me constructing fictional scenarios on how things are behind the scenes, but based my observation on the type of players we've bought under Howe before Mitchell joined and his loyalty to certain players I've felt have been standing in the way of others. That's still me assuming things on Howes behalf so fair play, point taken.

Forgot that Szoboszlai, Gravenberch and Mac Allister were bought last season What a turnaround they've made this season.

He's 31 in a few months and this Man Utd team is going nowhere - he might as well sell out and cash in while he still has a few years left of his career.

Genuinely curious - would you have felt the same way if we had won the Europa League and Tottenham had won the league cup against Man Utd this season?

I find it so weird reading all these posts about a made up Howe power move, Mitchell being shit at his job (and bald) despite having nothing to work with (unless you make up in your mind that we had a billion to spend because there were rumours that we put a high bid in for Guehi), wild theories of constant drama behind the scenes, plots from Mitchell and Eales to stab Howe in the back, them being complete opposites and butting heads all the time. None of us has a fucking clue how it was behind the scenes, and all they've communicated from the club themselves throughout has been that they had a good relationship. If you just didn't like him because of vibes, just say so instead of making up stories to justify why you didn't like him Not sad to see him go personally, although I'd prefer we had someone in place to challenge Howe a bit more. If we have a decent scouting team assisting Howe and others whom may be involved in the recruitment process I think we'll be fine. When the time comes and Howe is finished here, we'll have a bit of a challenge setting up a new system, but hopefully that's not relevant for the next 15-20 years.

He didn't say our recruitment wasn't fit for purpose, but our transfer policy. He was right, because we've paid for that policy the last three windows by not having the leeway to buy players and staying within PSR requirements.