oldtype

Well, I'll shut up now

Fucking shit

Great performance so far

Aye, Free speech = the right to express your views + the responsibility to face the consequences when those views are utterly fucking shit

I was at Charlton-Bolton on Saturday. He was largely anonymous and subbed mid second half. I'd definately have him on the form he showed 2 years ago though. I'm surprised he played at all given that he was on for 90 minutes in Korea the previous Thursday.

To be fair on Williamson I think he'll put in some decentish shifts again when he's only being called upon for the odd game here and there as opposed to every week.

Seeing Lee Chung-Yong at last weeks internationals he is fully recovered and once again in top form. A fantastic player and exactly what we need.

Depends. Is there anyone on the French national team left that we haven't signed?

He sounds like a more controversial version of Souness when you put it that way. Basically Souness. With no top flight experience. And less pedigree. And a Nazi.

This really was the worst appointment imaginable for them, wasn't it?

At the end of the day, we're probably paying Di Canio too much respect by even having a serious discussion about this. He's most likely just an attention whore who thinks associating himself with Mussolini makes him look hard or something.

Whenever I see player threads bumped these days I just assume they're out for the season. Such is the sad state of affairs

Well, how do you justify shutting your country up from other countries and peoples though? It's generally not easy without some sort of idea of racial purity/superiority. It's even more difficult to imagine how on an individual level you could be ideologically "fascist" without being racist. Does Di Canio just somebody who thinks 'This has nothing to do with any other country, but our government is so awesome, so fuck our individual rights and lets give it undisputed authority?' That's probably even more screwed up than Racism

I imagine it would be possible to be a fascist without being a racist. Certainly wouldn't be easy though. the origins of fascism were not based on race whatsoever Let's say we are to define fascism as a political ideology glorifying and concentrating power into the state and its authority figures. To mobilize people to accept that sort of model en masse is generally impossible without aggressive nationalism. It's very difficult to have people buy into that sort of aggressive nationalism without notions of racial supremacy, or at the very least a strong dose of xenophobia. Therefore, while racism might be an integral part of fascism, it's usually part of the model as a means to an end and it's pretty hard to separate the two completely. Of course, we're talking about political ideology on an individual level here and not recipes for regime formation. In that case, I'm assuming you'd be skipping line one and going straight to line two, which makes it even harder to divorce fascism from racism on an individual level.

I imagine it would be possible to be a fascist without being a racist. Certainly wouldn't be easy though.

I mean, seriously, just compare O'Neil's CV at the time of appointment to Di Canio's right now. How does any sane person even imagine that this is a step up.

Funny how the ones who say they don't care about politics usually care the most.

So lets ignore Di Canio's politics (which are disgusting,) and his personality issues (by all accounts a dick and an attention whore) for a moment. Fact remains that even if you do that, he's still a relatively inexperienced manager with no record whatsoever above League 1 level. If he weren't a famous ex-player he would not be getting anywhere near a Premiership club with his CV. This feels like it's from the Paul Ince school of managerial appointments. I don't see how this could ever be considered a smart appointment for Sunderland.

It's like there's some kind of rule that they always have to appoint the least likable manager possible.

We haven't won a derby under Pardew so far have we? Ryan Taylor over the wall

Derby's going to be ridiculous now. "So yeah, the fans will hate you if you lose this. Oh, and it's also a relegation six-pointer. No pressure though."

It's staggering that we're making an operating profit. If you'd asked me a few years ago I would've thought it would be about as unlikely as us making the Champions League.

Could do worse for a Shola replacement.

That Lee Dong-Gook from Boro could still be starting up front for you.

This match really shouldn't change your opinion about Pardew one way or another.