afar

Has to be a pen that

That's hand ball

Too many long balls so far, without much quality to them. This team doesn't look balanced at all, Anita on the right is not working.

Ref got it spot on, lucky not to get sent off, poor free kick though.

We need to get some possession here, this is poor.

Disappointed that he went with Hanley over Mbemba.

Dunno if you guys are getting the same coverage as me over here in Canada, watching Bein Sports. But they just had a graphic up for players to watch and on our side it was Dwight gayle but they had a picture of Messi instead, lol.

I ended up signing up for the $20 Bein sports, damn it's shite, if it weren't for Newcastle being in the championship, there would be literally nothing to entice me to pay the sub for. Their streaming uses Silverlight which is no longer supported by Microsoft and therefore you can't use Chrome or Edge to watch the stream you have to revert back to IE. Anyway the positive news, for me at least, is that there is a buffer or something that the stream is uploaded into, so you can rewind the live coverage by about 2 hours or so, also of course you can pause the live show. That'll help me out a lot.

I'm not going to hold stuff he did in the past while playing for them against us, against him. He had no alligence to us at the time other than being from the city, he also probably felt the need to overcompensate to prove to the fans of the club paying his wages that he was behind their cause. What concerns me is his form for us, if he plays like he did against Spuds for the majority of the season, I'll be more than happy with him, if he reverts to the player he was prior to Rafa's era then crap like this will get dredge up and he'll deserve the shit that comes his way.

We also put in our best performance of the season in the last game with Anita injur4ed and Janmaat back at RB. He's a quality player, delighted if he's staying.

I think there must be some truth there, he must be waiting on someone leaving and Sissoko is the obvious candidate, how difficult would it be to give him a number right now ? Clear they expect Moussa to move on perhaps before the Fulham game, so must be in talks with a club, if Diame runs on to the pitch in the 7 shirt it may weaken our bargaining position.

This is how I feel. I used to have strong opinions on starting elevens but I trust Rafa. Whatever he plays is fine with me. Haven't felt like this since Keegan/Sir Bobby. Just don't f***ing play Colback, man. Most of the time I would agree with that, but him favouring Cisse over Mitro last season was a mistake IMO. Over a long season I could see the logic in it, It served to give Mitro a kick up the backside, and like the Norwich game he proved to be an impactful sub, but over the short time period where we needed results, we could have done with more of the performances Mitro put in against Spuds (before he got sent off of course), than the abject displays we got from Cisse in the run in. That may have been something to do with name recognition though. Colback was much improved under Rafa, against Spuds he actually played really well. Clearly Rafa wants those two central midfielders to sit back and protect his back four he'll only change that up with a more attacking option if we are not leading. Shelvey could be a important part of the squad from that aspect, he gives Rafa an option to change things if needed. I can only ever see him as an impact sub, which is how he's been deployed at the club since Rafa has been here, eventually that's going to piss him off of course. In home games in this division Rafa may feel he can get by with just one holding midfielder in that case I could see Shelvey getting a start.

I like him and appreciate his attitude, as a person deserves the role having said that I hope that this does not influence his selection, he needs to win his place in the team on merit, in my view, quite clearly our best CB is Mbemba, Hanley and Clark are new signings, Jamaal needs to show he is better than both of them to partner Mbemba in my opinion. Got a feeling though Rafa may go with Hanley/Lascelles pairing as first choice which would be a mistake. Obviously there will be some squad rotation going on here but we will still have a first choice pairing.

I'm thinking we really need at least 2 wingers now maybe more. We really only have Ritchie and Aarons as true wingers in the squad, since Sammy doesn't seem to be considered. Obviously we have players that can play there like Sissoko, Janmaat and even Anita, but we are now really thin in those wide areas and if Sissoko goes, it gets even worse. I think at bare minimum we need to bring in one permanently and one on loan.

I always put a lot of stock in what fans (well the non lunatic ones anyway) of the club a player played for say, after all they've watched him for his career so far. Obviously though Rafa sees something in him, it could be arrogance in thinking he as a coach is capable of getting that thing out of him and develop the player. TBF to Rafa he's got a pretty good track record at doing just that, think this one could go either way, but if nothing else adds to our numbers after losing 3 CBs over the last couple of windows we need the cover and there is nothing coming through the ranks right now. Perhaps though there were better options out there for 5mill.

This is obviously a signing to get us out of the division rather than the future, unlike most of the other deals. Sounds like in the short term, this could be a very important deal, I wonder though if Sissoko ends up staying how that will all work out, seems like the direct replacement.

Wow got a really thick Irish accent there, lol, kinda like Paul Dummet's Welsh one.

Yeah looks like Fubo is US only, so lame In Canada we have to pay an extra $10 and no PVR (not sure about that ?) Well it's only $5 more if your provider offers the channel and of course mine does not !! OK further investigation: Looks like there is an enhanced service (that's the reason for the extra $10) called connect, that not only offers the ability to play on computer and devices but a lot more channels ! They have 10 channels and advertise this service as "live events not available elsewhere" I wonder if that will include additional championship games, with 10 channels they could stream a few games at the same time at the 3pm Saturday slot ! Sorry I just read the previous page in this thread and I'm just repeating what Semtex has already said I think. Yet another edit: Sent an Email off to Fubo to ask if they were available in Canada, as their website is a little confusing, got a quick response back to tell me it's definitely not due to licensing agreements, it's probably the whole Netflixs crap again where we are stuck with a far inferior version of their service, it's stupid. Anyway gonna just sub to Bein connect at $20, will be worth it if they show more games and even more so if there is some form of PVR/On demand component.

So in Canada (I assume this is the same for the US) we are stuck with Bein sport right ? TSN or Sportsnet aren't showing any games whatsoever. My problem is that I often have other things going on during the games so rely heavily on my PVR. From what I understand my cable provider does not have BeIn sports, the only way to get it is through the internet at $20 a month, which I was p*ssed off at, at first then remembered I pay $50 a month for NFL Sunday ticket ! Anyway back to my point, is there a means to record the games through BeIN, are they available through a "On-demand" type service or is it just not worth my while bothering with this and just watch the highlights show ? Edit: Another question. I've been looking online, looks like Fubo.tv includes Bein and only charges $9.99 per month, anyone know if this is available in Canada, or is it one of those annoying US only type services ?

I'm a pessimist by nature but still starting at 7. Looking at our run in last season we struggled against the poorer sides, while performing above expectation against the better ones. Defeat at Norwich, Draw at Villa, Draw with the Mackems those three results killed our chances, we even struggled to beat a really poor Palace side only a great free kick and excellent penalty save got us the points there. We will be playing a lot of poor teams this season, we have to learn how to beat them. We do without a shadow of a doubt have the strongest quad and best manager in the division, it would be a major shock if we didn't go back up but not counting any chickens here.

A year ago I would have thrown my toys out of the pram if we were about to sign this guy, but a year on we are in the championship and managed by someone who has a clue, so think this could be a good move, we need the bodies if nothing else.

I really have not been paying any attention to his career, is he any good, seems to have bounced around a lot of crappy teams and is 29 ! On paper not sure about this one, but if Rafa sees something there that we need then I guess it's a good thing.

Sissoko's still here, but yeah I'm sure there'll be at least one more wide man coming in. We've got Gayle and Aarons who could do it at a pinch for now. I'm not counting Sammy Ameobi because he's not good enough. Where is Sammy, hasn't featured at all in pre-season, did I miss an injury to him or does Rafa really not rate him ?

From the short highlights of the two pre-season games he's been involved in, looks in good nick, I think along with Aarons he gives us something a little different. We are paper thin on the wings, we can't afford to let him go unless we have a replacement lined up.

Personally think the squad is good enough right now, adding two or three more would guarantee things though, so think we need to push on with another creative player, another wide man and a defender. We don't have to do them all via permenant deals, to fill the squad we could bring in a loanee or two, I'm sure we are not short of clubs offering us some talented youngsters they would like to see developed.