Chris_R

Disgusting dive for that. Those kind of things should be overruled by VAR as much as fouls the ref misses. There was zero contact.

Well, the alternative is he has to blame himself. Obviously that can't be true, so it must be the fans.

Quite right too.

Can anyone remember why the Leazes was left so much smaller after the roof was removed? I can't seem to find anything online about why the roof was taken off and, more importantly, why it was left just as a tiny strip of terrace when before it was as large if not larger than the Gallowgate? Surely they could've removed the roof without making the terracing so much smaller? Surely it would actually be cheaper to do that than to also reduce it in size? It's something I've never understood.

Thought it was only for crowds of over 10,000?

I don't get the "The new owners have never run a football club" and "We need football people" arguments. Competence is far more important than experience. Steve Bruce had loads of "experience" of being a football manager, but he was fucking shit at it. Charnley had loads of experience running a football club by the time he left. Conversely, John Hall, Freddy Shepherd etc had no prior experience of running football clubs, but even from the off I think we did alright under their tenure? People can learn new skills. People can bring existing skills from previous jobs and use them well in new roles. Yeah, hiring really top-drawer recruits in ANY position is always a bonus, but there's no reason to assume we're going to fail just because the new owners are taking on something they've never done before. Running a football club or signing players isn't some unlearnable task. Again, I'll be delighted if we sign someone fantastic to look after player recruitment, but I'll not shit the bed if we don't.

I've voted in the poll but tbh whilst I have opinions, really I don't give a shit. Yes I'd prefer discrete advertising. Yes I'd prefer the old font back. But I also acknowledge they own the club and can do whatever the hell they want with it and I'm comfortable with that because I know that we're trying to do the right things for the right reasons commercially, and that the money will be reinvested back into the team.

It's certainly what we became, just a glorified advertising hoarding whose sole purpose was to exist in the PL so that he could get maximum exposure for his tat emporium with minimal outlay.

The SD signage was, for me, objectionable mainly because we received nothing for it. And even if we did, or when we did towards the end, you just knew MA was taking the money back out the other side again somehow. Although it's a shit brand, I'd have been OK with it if it had bought us a few players here and there. Having it on places like the front of the East Stand and the roof of the Gallowgate was just awful though. He was just trying to cover every square inch of the place for the minimum possible cost because that's the kind of cheapskate he is.

Actually yes, city probably would to be fair. Forgot he played for them, thought he was still at Chelsea. Showed how much attention I've paid to football for the last few years. They're all desperate for us to go down because if we stop up we'll be threatening to leapfrog all of them which makes their lives harder. Transfers they might have to accept, legally, if we match another club's bid. Loans they can refuse citing things like playing opportunity concerns, training facilities, anything, because they'll still own the player.

No PL club is going to loan us anyone.

My god that thread's a depressing read. Bunch of knuckle draggers. Beyond incredible that they can - with straight faces - trot out any bollocks about human rights etc.

I refuse to be anything other than positive today. 10-12 points from that lot, Liverpool away we might be held to a draw if they have a good day. Bring it on.

Willock is playing out of position, he's not a central midfielder. He needs to be further forward. If there's no room for him further forward, he needs dropping. I'd be tempted to put Joe in with Shelvey and play Willock as an attacking midfielder.

Absinthe

Get the fuck in. Celebrated the whistle with the same enthusiasm I celebrated the goal.

Fucking tremendous finish. I'll not be anything other than completely terrified until we're at least 2 clear though.

We are absolutely rank like.

The absolute definition of a six-pointer, this.

Which should make Lascelles one of the first names off the team sheet, then?

We had one solitary shot on target in 90 minutes, and that was the penalty. They had 69% of the possession and 6 shots on target. I don't expect us to outplay them with 10 men, but explain to me how we were closer to a second than them to a first? Which chances do you think we created that were especially noteworthy? We offered nothing after we scored. I said as much with over 25 minutes remaining; that it was unsustainable to play like that. Given what then happened, I stand 100% by what I said before and after. It's like cricket: Even if you're playing for a draw because a win isn't feasible with the time remaining, if you just repeatedly block, block, block, then the fielders get closer and closer and eventually you knick one and you're caught out because they've crowded round you, knowing you're no threat to them. You've got to drive them back with the occasional attacking shot, put them on the back foot. Same here. We don't have to outplay them, but we have to drive them back up the pitch a bit by offering some kind of threat, which we absolutely did not do. That allowed them to camp in our half, committing most of their players forward, and them equalising became far more likely. Don't misunderstand me, nobody is a bigger fan of Howe's than me. I've lived in Bournemouth for the last decade and a half, I've seen up close what he can do. But I can think that and still say things could have been better today.

After we scored we went to a back 9.

Our inability to get out our own half led to them being able to camp in our half and create that chance. You have to threaten the opposition on some level, or they just throw everyone at you. It's imperative to push some of their players into their own half by at least looking like you want to attack occasionally.

Fucking painfully obvious what would happen shutting up shop after we scored. You MUST carry a threat or you just get bombarded, then the inevitable happens.

We've got to continue to offer a threat here. We're not capable of just defending for 25+ minutes.