Conjo

Let's hope he and Hanley can both benefit from Rafa's coaching team, and philosophies. Is Hanley really only 25? This could be a massive season for him, I think Lascelles, because he's captain, and Mbemba, cos he's Mbemba, will be our main Defensive pairing, but I'm sure their will be times that we switch to 3 CBs, and Mbemba will be going to ACON, or will he? I can definitely see Hanley developing into a defender who is ready for the PL, Clark has had a crack with a lesser management team and could earn himself a second crack at it. I find it hard to find negatives in what the club are doing under the wise guidance of Senor Benitez. Even if they amount to nothing more than Williamson level, I still trust Rafa to get more from them than Pardew, or Carver did. Im sorry, but

This. I was thinking the other day when Pardew was here and I actually wanted us to lose games. When we scored it was just a Partridge shrug.gif. Now Rafa has brought all the love back,and considering we're in a lower division than before,that's quite mind blowing! I remember being absolutely gutted at times when we scored. How did it ever come to that? Because the camera instantly panned over to Pardew uppercutting the air?

He played every fucking game last year, so not really

The whole interview is dreamy. He just gets it.

I think they'll lose to Hull, but get a scrappy win against one of the top sides before that.

Yeah I think it'll be perfectly clear that Rafa has no use for him and he'll be shipped out eventually. pls Who the fuck would take him? I can´t see any PL team take the chance, heck, might not even Championship teams. Even if there was a championship outfit ready to take him, they would not be able to give him the wage he would need to leave us.

We've done fine without him so far. Don't see why we would need to replace him immediately if he leaves today.

#biting He hasn´t since he has sold the best player in the team.

This is more like Fantasy Frustration League. Why can't City keep a clean sheet? ? ? ? Why does Barkley systematically adjust his output to 0 every time I have him in my team, only to go on a great run the minute I take him out? ? ? ? Why did Hull start well, as my opening two rounds were based on them crashing massively? ? ? ? ? I fucking hate this shit.

Same. Just add "and add competition to the squad" Compare that to the quotes that were linked on here a couple of days ago from when we signed Cabella

He has the same "give no fucks, let´s eat an apple"-running style as Shola has.

Maybe we should put Shelvey in goal instead.

This is one of the toughest opponents we´ll face this year. Joke of a league. Bring on the Premier League!

Did you expect that we would upgrade on Gayle and Mitro after going down a league? We´ll sleepwalk to 1st with this squad.

Meh...probably won´t see him starting any matches if our players stay fit. Proved he can do it at this level so is good cover, and can probably teach Mitro a thing or two on how to deal with this league. Is the £3.5m fee that was quoted in another thread still being reported?

£3.5m for a 33 year old Daryl Murphy? Yeah, no. Won´t happen

And he was all around poor. Bar the beaut of that Klinsmann penalty save. Very good kicker of the ball though. A bit off topic here, but can anyone link me to a youtube video or something which illustrates what good distribution (not wordly goal kicks that happenes 1 out of 1 000 000 000 000 times) for a keeper is? I´ve never seen what was/is so bad about Givens, Harpers or Kruls distribution. Surely as long as the ball isn´t passed short or thrown out, the goal kick "quality" doesn´t mean shit as outfield players from both teams will have ample time to position and contend for the ball anyway.

Surprised to hear Rafa toeing this line. As more money pisses in to the Premiership then prices everywhere will inflate. If promotion first time is the priority I'm sure dropping a few extra million here or there is well worth it over missing out on key players. I sure know another year in the Championship will cost us more. Its how it should be. We pay what we feel a player is worth and if we can't reach agreement with the other club then we don't do a deal. So you would be happy to see out the rest of this season with the squad we have right now and chance it instead of over spending? Seems a bit mental really. Any over spending will be a fraction of what it would cost to fail at promotion first time round. You can kill a fly easily with a 50p fly swatter, and you can easily kill a fly with a £500 electric bug zapper. If we don't have to spend £xm to get promoted, then why should we? Just because we have not spent much previous seasons? Edit: As said above, money spending is a non-issue for me as Benitez makes the calls now. If a player is too expensive in his mind, then he is. Benitez having the full responsibility forces him to have a long term plan as well, and that includes making sure there are funds availbale for extensive upgrading of the squad when we return to the premier league. The squad and manager/coaching set up as it is today is more than sufficient for automatic promotion imo. Can't fathom why so many on here are desperate to get 4+ new player in before the window closes. Strawman argument man. All I've suggested is that I think it would be OK to let the purse strings stretch with getting the final peices of the puzzle together in this window. The reason? Because missing out on them could risk promotion and that is many times more expensive than a little over spend now. Let's pack the Strawman away and stop over dramatising this. Thank you for making me google what the heck a strawman argument is. Learnt something new today Still don't agree with you because: 1. I don't see much risk of not getting promoted as it is 2. I trust Benitez to set the correct boundaries between what stretching it "a bit" is and "to severely affect our funds for next season"

Surprised to hear Rafa toeing this line. As more money pisses in to the Premiership then prices everywhere will inflate. If promotion first time is the priority I'm sure dropping a few extra million here or there is well worth it over missing out on key players. I sure know another year in the Championship will cost us more. Its how it should be. We pay what we feel a player is worth and if we can't reach agreement with the other club then we don't do a deal. So you would be happy to see out the rest of this season with the squad we have right now and chance it instead of over spending? Seems a bit mental really. Any over spending will be a fraction of what it would cost to fail at promotion first time round. You can kill a fly easily with a 50p fly swatter, and you can easily kill a fly with a £500 electric bug zapper. If we don't have to spend £xm to get promoted, then why should we? Just because we have not spent much previous seasons? Edit: As said above, money spending is a non-issue for me as Benitez makes the calls now. If a player is too expensive in his mind, then he is. Benitez having the full responsibility forces him to have a long term plan as well, and that includes making sure there are funds availbale for extensive upgrading of the squad when we return to the premier league. The squad and manager/coaching set up as it is today is more than sufficient for automatic promotion imo. Can't fathom why so many on here are desperate to get 4+ new player in before the window closes.

Think he might be used on the wing more than at left back. Going purely off of the youtube-videos of him and our lack of wingers.

More like:

3-1 '15 Knockheart - N-O goes ballistic, "we need 5000 new players with premier league experience to compete in this league" '44 Gayle - Scrappy play leading to a tap-in by Gayle - N-O calms down a bit '52 Lascelles - Header from corner, Ritchie assist '87 Gouffran - Counter attack after Brighton pushes entire team up after controlling most of the second half. Gouffran is played throught by a perfectly weighed pass by Shelvey Everything is good forever, until a minor setback in either the transfer window or next match happens a short while after.

Copy cat

Sunderland