afar

I had no real expectations for him when we bought him, so for me he's doing fine, he needs a lot of work to become a true PL full back but the raw skill set is there, if anyone can bring that out and mould him into a competent player at this level it's Rafa.

I completely forgot Leicester are still without a manager too, this may push them to make an appointment soon if they are after the same bloke, Dyche for example.

I hope he gets a rest from the starting job against Burnley, I doubt it though.

Got to be a Liverpool fan, lol: Nikul: The only man who can take Everton forward now is Gordon Strachan. Bring him in immediately. http://www.bbc.com/sport/live/41719700

Good shout Yes they should but I don't think they will, Dysche would be the more likely appointment.

Would fit their bill tbh, never really thought of him for the role before, but that one actually makes a lot of sense, would certainly organise that shower.

They've looked a mess. Absolutely, it's not just their results and the difficult fixture list, they just looked all over the place.

I'm not worried yet, if this takeover wasn't going on right now, I would be but Rafa will know to sit tight for a little while. With his Liverpool roots, it's unlikely he would go there anyway. Can see Koeman at West Ham next, might be a good fit for them both, once Bilic eventually gets peddled.

Would be glorious if they appoint either.

Hardly a surprise, they've been a mess this season, not sure how much he had to do with their summer transfer dealings but that's where the problems have started. 50 million was way too much for Sigurdson, 30 million for a slight upgrade if at all for Pickford, Rooney to replace Lukaku, it's a mess however a new manager will make a big difference and give them the bounce that they need to get out of trouble, Koeman has looked lost of late.

Swansea to me look very suspect, I think both Brighton and Huddersfield will start to falter soon, Palace have a lot to do and as seen on Saturday, if Zaha isn't scoring who is there? Stoke need to sort themselves out, find a formation and team that works, pretty soon. West Ham too are in real danger. I would imagine Everton will find a solution to their problems but it may not be until the window opens again. Bournemouth are a strange team difficult to predict, but they need to play a lot better than they have been to survive. It will be interesting to see Burnley close up this weekend, got a feeling they will be sucked into it. As for ourselves, we'll be just fine as long as Rafa is in charge. If I was going to pick three right now it would be Palace, Swansea and Stoke.

Since I got so much stick last time, I'm stating on the record that I would be disappointed with anything other than a win here. Burnley have started the season pretty well but there is not a lot of quality there and they struggle to really hurt teams. May end up a draw in the end but one we really should be winning.

Down to 7th ffs Rafa

It's getting really congested.

We've for sure had a very imbalanced schedule to start the season, we've only played 1 of the current top 6 and 4 of the current bottom 6, interestingly we've lost that one game against the current top 6 and won all our games against the bottom 6.

TBF it was far from a difficult game for any centre half, but when called upon he did the right thing consistently.

Your comment that Palace have much better players than us is comical dude.

Catts for me like https://www.readytogo.net/smb/threads/hands-up-cattermole.1398266/

Southgate was there today, obviously watching three players in my view, Shelvey, Townsend and this lad, he did his case no harm at all today.

All three promoted teams win, none in the bottom three.

He's got an extremely loyal chairman, don't think he's in any real danger yet, but a few more defeats and even those owners will start to get a little nervous. Seems to me like he's got a very lopsided squad, doesn't know who he should play or what formation. He just seems very confused, the right thing to do from their perspective is to probably pull the plug.

Just caught the first 30 mins and the last 10 (although my PVR recorded the full game). Sounds like I won't need to waste my time on the stuff in the middle. Hugely important win, 14 points from 9 is a very healthy position to be in at this stage, the schedule is going to ramp up in difficulty, but we've caught something of a break because I always think it's harder for the more successful clubs to maintain their form when they are playing twice a week as they are now with European games in full swing.

Despite the fact that West Ham have been terrible, this is impressive from Brighton.

It's just too slow and deliberate and the final ball is woeful by West Ham.