toon25

Tbh, I don't mind being boring if we're solid at the back. We're not.

Would be nice to see a central midfielder come in that's comfortable in possession and can dictate play.

Agree - looks better than Sels. It's almost as if Darlow himself didn't look shaky to begin with before a run of games brought him up to speed. Quite. But surely the safer bet was to bring Sels in gradually, not the other way around.

Don't know why Darlow was dropped tbh. Needs to be given another chance given some of his performances at the back end of last season.

A complete and utter waste of money. Again. Contributed fuck all in his time here.

No chance imo.

Monk is a massive wanker. Imagine having Cellino as the owner of your club though. He's like a rage quiter on FIFA or a 'quit game to start screen' without saving on FM

Delighted this useless sack of shit has been bench warming. Not convinced it'll last though. Reckon he'll come back in next game.

This guy is a guaranteed threat. Always looks dangerous. Hope we don't become too dependent on him. Need another.

Aye. I don't think he'd have been a long term solution, but he'd certainly have helped us get out of this league.

Not everyone here is a doom monger just because they say what they see. Most sensible folk realised before the season started, and before we started tonking pub teams in pre-season, that this squad was in the grand scheme of things still not particularly good. Those same folk probably also recognised that the Championship today is far more competitive than the last time we were down here - largely because of the money trickling down from the PL.

Should throw silly money at them for him.

Villa successfully managing to do what we didn't and put some shitty mid-championship side under a bit of pressure.

His heart isn't, and won't, be in it if he features any time soon. He'd be another liability who certainly wouldn't have the fans on his side if he loses the ball etc. That's only increase tension if we don't start picking up performances on the pitch.

This is where I am with him tbh. Give him a chance and see if we can get a run of games out of him.

Urgh.

When's he due back?

I don't mean to call you out because you're far from the only one, but are you all this negative with other things in life? If so, there's a lot of miserable bastards on here. It's two games, we still have one of the best squads in the league, we probably will get at least one more in, and we have the best manager in the league by some distance. We may not walk the league like everyone thought, but we have 44 games to go. Let's all calm down a bit and have a little faith in the first quality manager we've had in over a decade. Not at all. I'm frustrated because we're not playing well, and I continue to see the problems popping up in the same areas. I've not once questioned the ability of players brought in. Of course they need time to gel. What I'm saying is that I don't think there have been efforts to address the weaknesses in the 2 positions we've known have been problematic for nigh on 3 years. I don't think this is negativity; we're short in key areas that haven't been addressed yet. I hope to be proven wrong, but time is ticking and I worry that we'll be left short of quality to mount a strong challenge.

In addition, I think a loan for an Everton reserve is hardly a long term solution the LB problem.

I don't know, like. I think given what we've seen it's clear that there are areas that need to be addressed. A left back and a central midfielder should have been first through the door. We've been short of quality in these areas long before Rafa arrived.

After initial optimism, I don't think there's any way we'll get what we need between now and the end of the window. Having seen the deficiencies in the squad over the past couple of weeks, there are simply too many holes to fill to make us competitive given the strides some of our promotion rivals have made recently.

If he needs motivation to play for Rafa then he's not worth bothering with.

I still have absolutely no idea why we signed him. Especially given the fact we were in a relegation struggle when he arrived. He's a player we simply can't afford at the moment, good passer of the ball or not.

Central midfield has been a problem since Cabaye left. Fucking joke.

Aye. He's not going to be given time to show what he can do in this league.