Chris_R

0 pressing, 11 behind the ball. What are we going to do with it if we do get it in that situation? Our only option is just to twat it up the pitch so they get it back again. Awful stuff.

83% possession for Chelsea so far. We're happy for them to have the ball as much as they want, completely unchallenged, anywhere except the last third. Dunno what we expect to happen doing that, but I think the outcome is predictable.

Shit lineup. Like, genuinely dreadful. You could understand letting him try his thing for one match, but it didn't work. We were awful with this team vs Palace, absolutely dreadful, which we all expected when we saw this lineup, but to have that verified and then play it AGAIN is just incomprehensible.

A front 3 of ASM, Wilson and Almiron is a must for me. We need more than one player who can run with the ball. Our central midfield options are largely shit but just please not Shelvey. I'd play Willock slightly ahead with Hayden and Longstaff behind. Schar needs to start at the back, he offers so much the others just can't do by being an actual footballer, maybe alongside Lascelles. Manquillo on the right and I really don't care who is on the left because they're all shit. If we really must play 5-2-3, drop Longstaff for another central defender. Maybe Ritchie left wingback and Murphy on the right? Dubravka in goal unless he's dead. Chelsea still massive favourites, but that's how I'd like us to line up.

Think you meant to post this on the Chelsea forum.

You "Fully expected"? - I didn't realise the consortium were required to report in to you? These things take time. Negotiations are complex. Who would you go for? And they haven't had "ages", the takeover came out of the blue when they were expecting nothing to happen until at least next year. No point having names lined up now when things can and will change so much by then. I'd far rather we took the time to get the right person in, rather than rush things, get the wrong person, and get relegated just so that your "expectations" are met.

If (and it's a massive "if") we're in for Benitez, Everton will demand full whack for his contract. And rightly so. There's no reason for them to help us out when they know we're keen, they know he won't walk away, and we have (in their opinion) unlimited money and aspirations to replace them in the top half of the table sooner rather than later.

That's nothing, I clearly remember him burning £60 notes, the prick.

Cricket is a day of getting pissed in the sunshine, whilst a match just happens to take place in front of you. It's superb.

Ashley had loads of candidates to replace Rafa. Problem was, the first 10 all turned us down...

I've got no idea what Le Tissier used to be like as a pundit, but now he's a science-denying anti-vax moron who should never be allowed a public forum anywhere ever again. He's actually a societal danger and much though I dislike the term, he should be cancelled.

Edit: didn't see the new page, already covered.

Feels a bit weird seeing a Newcastle manager, even a caretaker, taking their job seriously and being professional. It'll never catch on.

Fucking hell, I'm opening this is on a fucking work laptop. Gonna have to go outside and just yeet it into a bin now.

Even if he's still a bit Bruced, he's vital to us, otherwise we have only ASM who can carry a ball forward which just isn't enough. Hopefully a competent manager comes in who can get more of a tune out of him though, I'm confident there's a really good player in there who wouldn't look out of place in a top 10 team which would be a massive help to us in the next coupe of years because we've got precious few of them on the books.

Maybe they should have voted against banning sponsorship from related companies....

A good manager would see that the opposition had put 2, 3 or even 4 players around him and use the space this leaves for the rest of our attacking players to exploit. Unfortunately we don't play with any other attacking players, which in turn allows the opposition to continue to put 2, 3 or even 4 players around ASM. If we just offered more as an attacking unit, the opposition would have to cope with those players and it would leave him more space. This all starts from us getting higher up the pitch and pressing the opposition more, something which we cannot or will not do, perhaps because of a lack of fitness or a lack of instruction to just do it, I don't know which, but it all leads to us being penned back with no possession - lumping it forward in panic when we get it because there's nobody transitioning into attack, and repeatedly losing it.

Imagine Rafa comes back, then finishes lower than 12th despite the millions we'll throw at him in January. Imagine the press reaction. They'll be fucking unbearable.

Today was an improved result, but not an improved performance. We had 25% possession, and one single worthwhile shot. They should have been out of sight.

Probably realised she was still within her 14 day money back period, but had lost the receipt.

By the sounds of things the draw papered over a lot of cracks for some on here. If we'd been beaten 3 or 4 nil though, we could not have complained. They had a goal disallowed that on another day might have stood, they hit the post, Benteke shot wide from about 6 foot out and unmarked, hell they should have scored with only about 20 seconds played. For our part we scored a wonder goal and had a laughably low 25% possession. Twenty. Five. Percent. We didn't compete in any area. Nothing was good enough today. We need to press better, be higher up the pitch and be better with the ball. It's not just the tactics, which you could argue Jones had little time to do anything about (I'd not buy that either, he's been coaching this team for ages) but the team selection was wank too. Almiron provides an outlet which we desperately lacked in the first 65 minutes, Fraser is dogshit and Schar is our best centre back and Krafth should not be in ahead of him.

Fucking brilliant goal. Clearly my stream is about 20 minutes behind everyone else haha.

This is absolutely tragic. Clearly what we're doing isn't working, and hasn't worked since the first minute, yet we're seemingly either unable or unwilling to change anything. No excuse for not getting all 3 subs on immediately and trying to switch it up a bit because there's 0 chance of us getting anything at all from this match otherwise.

What, that all our attacking has been coached out of us? Think that's all the more reason to get a manager like Fonseca in.

Considering how bad we were going forwards, I can only assume that Jones is trying to get Bruce his job back. Absolutely woeful. Defence was just about OK, but we just cannot move the ball forwards at all. I think part of that problem is that although I say the defence was just about OK, we don't press at all and just sit really deep and let them have the ball in front of us. This means when we get the ball back everyone is in our 18 yard box and we can't move forward, it's too congested, so we just boot it away and lose it again. We need to get forward and press when they're in possession, so we're in a better position to create an attack if we win the ball back.