afar

If Hull join, boro and the Mackems in relegation and also Fulham or Reading win the playoffs, will we be the only Northern team on the eastern side of the country in the PL ? Sad to think of the legacy NE and Yorkshire clubs have to say the premier club in that area is Hull City, who are fighting it out fr 17th spot in the table.

If you read their forum they genuinely believe that their squad which will struggle to break 25 points this season, is better than ours that went down last year on 37 points. It's just been badly managed by Moyes and they've been unlucky with injuries. I would lay money on the fact that had Rafa been with us all last or even given the same amount of time as the Fat odious git we would have finished comfortably mid table. It beggars belief, they really don't see the lack of quality there, even if fully fit that squad was always going to struggle to survive. Now the work begins for them, I think realism is starting to kick in though looking at their forum there are fewer and fewer that seem to think they will piss the league next year. They will be fine though when they get the 70 million for Pickford et al

Looking at the prices being quoted and the needs we have, we are going to have to take a punt in the markets we've been playing in. 20 million for Loftus Cheek, ffs, he's barely played ! If we ask about Abraham, don't expect the price quoted to be much less than that either and it's only going to get worse when the new TV deal pay cheque lands on their doorsteps.

We got 8 million or something from Spuds for him too, we've been addressing the them fleecing us on Gazza and Waddle in the past by selling them crap like jenas, Bassong and now Sissoko at inflated prices !

Think we need to learn from this year in the championship, there are a few players we've come into contact with and are much more aware of playing at this level that could do a job for us in the PL; Mooy and Abraham at Huddersfield and Bristol would fall into that category but arguable whether their parent clubs would let them go. We will still of course need more proven quality to augment these kinds of signings but it's not just a case of improving our first choice 11 we've got to think of the quality of our overall squad.

LOL was reading one of their threads: https://www.readytogo.net/smb/threads/our-squad-compares-unfavourably-with-derby-leeds-villa.1357620/page-2 This quote just typifies the clueless nature of that lot, they really believe crap like this, lots of thumbs up for the post: "No one knows what our squad will be. If it contains Pickford, Oviedo, Ndong, Cattermole, Watmore, Borini and, Anichebe it will be the best in the division."

Has to be for me, in any division that was sheer quality.

It's not the amounts that people are picking at, its the players that have come in. Even the free transfers he bought in were short sighted and totally the wrong players. Moyes quite obviously had some sort of influence in the deals as he had managed a lot of them before. N'Dong may be an exception to that rule. Yeah the N'Dong deal gets the attention because the way over spent and broke their transfer record, but tbh it wasn't their worst deal. The signing of sheer pap is what got them where they are, Gibson, McNair, Love, the unpronounceable CB, etc are never in a million years going to get you out of trouble, couple this with a bunch of cloggers that were already there in Rodwell, Bily Jones, Larsson, Catternole, Whatmore, O'Shea, along with disinterested players in Khazri, Kone, Defoe etc and the rest are oft injured or fill all the above categories. The squad was a disaster, hell of a lot of work to do to get themselves ready for the new season, not writing them off yet though, they'll pull something off I think that will give them some hope for the new season.

Agree. I think he is showing up as a busted flush. The signings of players that he had worked with previously must have been orchestrated by him, you would imagine, and the likes of Pienar (sp) and Anichebe have proven to be passed it/never were it gash. if he leaves them I think he may struggle to get a new job, certainly in the top 2 divisions. Someone in the championship will take a punt on him based on his record at PNE, where he didn't even get them promoted, he's done in the top flight for sure though until he rebuilds his rep, if he ever can.

McNulty loves these Harry Enfield's "You don't want to do that" character type article, but this is still a good read: http://www.bbc.com/sport/football/39759279

I've enjoyed the last few weeks immensely now the pressure is off !!

We are probably kicking ourselves now for the "you must buy" clause in the loan contract. He'll be worth a hell of a lot more than whatever figure they put in there, I'm sure.

Will know a few more thousand off their average attendance. They'll get 30k max, was under 25k last time. I'll be surprised if they got that many for the game on Saturday, a must win game for them. They quoted 38k, but at least half the bloody pink seats were empty, do they play in a 76k capacity stadium ??

They've defied the rules before by losing the playoff final and still getting promoted, so don't put it past them ?

Exactly, people going way overboard with the standard of competition in the PL outside the top seven. Voice of reason there Dave. Ffs players like Sissoko, Gosling, Gini and Simpson who have been slated on here still play in the division, it didn't suddenly get 10 times better in the year we've been away. We do need to improve, but we don't need to completely rebuild, unless we are targeting the title next season which we surely are not.

I have no desire to see them back anytime soon. I know it looks like it's going to be a tough task for them to bounce right back up but they have a history of doing that, after getting 19 points or something I think the very next season they won the championship. Interesting reading their forum a bit some questioning Defoe, I mentioned this the other day it may well be in their best interests for him to walk. A few making the point that he's been crap since the turn of the year.

State of that post suggests he's had more than a few cans.

I never get why wearing a replica shirt to a game is supposedly wrong like, you're there to support your team, its probably the only time to wear it FYP. I wear mine at matches, but 90% of the time it's under a jacket/coat. I wouldn't wear it out of the house on a daily basis though. Watching football, and doing exercise is the only acceptable times. I wear my Nufc stuff all the time, when you live in a far off place, there is no harm. Didn't tealise there were rules in place here!!

No sympathy, they dished it out last year time to take all the s*** that is headed there way fully deserved to each and everyone of their fans.

They are kinda angry that Moyes hasn't resigned yet, lol, still don't get the concept that he would be walking away from a big payout if he did.

If we beat Barnsley which we should we will get to 94 points, that's pretty darn impressive irrespective of where we end up finishing

Nice, at least we didn't just hand the title to Brighton, they have a chance to win it themselves

If this stays like this and Brighton fail to beat Bristol, do the championship have a replica of their trophy because they have to wheel one out to SJP and Villa Park

Could have been a red that like

We need to tighten up a bit really