alexf

He's probably already cost us about £3-4m in wages and signing on fee since joining, if rumours of a £100k salary are to be believed. Hopefully won't be be missed if we don't get an overload of injuries to the left side of defence.

Going for 1:0 to us or 0:5 to them. Can see either possibility unfortunately.

Was hoping he would start today. Teams are targeting Burn and Hall and putting their fastest player on that side. Not to mention most teams now just wait and let Burn have the ball and force him to play a forward pass and then nick the ball back. Happened time and again. Atleast with Sven you know he can ping a nice ball through the lines occasionally. Would have rested Burn for this and then maybe played him against Arse. But perhaps Eddie is playing to use Sven Wednesday. If he wasn't before I hope he does now. The defence hasn't worked for two home games in a row.

Not done much to stake a claim for when big Joe is out for two games

Also says alot when Fulham have far far better options off the bench than we have. Yet we are supposed to be the team chasing Champions league. Was always a long shot for me with is this squad.

That's why I never got excited during that run of wins. Yes it was nice but it was unsustainable. We don't have the depth and as soon as other teams work us out, out weaknesses are badly exposed. There's going to be plenty more games like this at home now where we don't have the legs and don't have the personal to change it.

Gordon looks key today. Got the beating of Castagne. Likewise we need to protect Hall. Can see their blatant tactics of sprint and press Schar when he has it but let Burn have it and wait for an error.

Wtf is wrong with him sometimes. I know he likes to play with aggression but today has just been stupid. Like he's trying to get booked.

The goal keeper for that 7th just awful.

A little column A, a little column B.

Still dreading that Forrest home game. They are so good on the counter.

Level on goals with Isak Some season from Wood this.

There's a lot of athleticism there for them. Knew they would play Traore for this. We have to be careful not to expose the back 4. Even Lukic in the middle is a powerful player. Not been looking forward to this as it feels a dangerous fixture. But I think if we turn up then I don't think they will live with our attack.

Would be annoying however if they did get the Rashford of a few years ago and he helped fire them back into a champions league place. I'd back Emery over most to get something from him. But hopefully it will be a car crash.

This graphic isn't a true reflection of the problems we had that season. Burn and Anderson both had broken bones in their back, Burn in particular was horrific for awhile when he returned. Willock was pretty none existent, he would play the odd game then be injured again. Isak was carrying a groin issue for the bulk of the season if memory serves and never looked fully fit but we were making him play every minute. Longstaff allegedly had a foot injury he was playing through and looked like he could barely move. Main issue was we didn't even have any young academy talents to bring in other than Miley so we got into positions where Dummett and Ritchie started games for us last year. Now go and look up where both players are this season and how they are doing and tell me that it's not a miracle that Howe got that team to finish 7th after needing to play players like that in 2024. Spurs have had similar issues, not going to claim better or worse but I think they have managed it horribly. Most of their injuries have been defensive players. So if Ange had set them up differently and protected his goal better, then they could have accumulated far more points.

No disrespect to Sean, but if our scouts can't find a better player than this current form version of him, with the money we would get for selling him, then they aren't fit for purpose. Now ofcourse there is always a chance if he got a run of games he could return to the form that saw him be a mainstay in a side challenging for top 4 a few years ago. But I think the team has moved on from that and seems something has changed in that Howe has started bringing on Miley ahead of him now and starting Willock if fit.

I'm pretty sure it came out that Bayern were rumoured to have only offered between £2m-6m or something like that. At the time that seemed no where near enough to justify what we would lose. Problem is, since then he's regressed further and further. I think if the club received a £12m bid they would have taken it but in reality the bid was no where near that.

Louise's questions in the press conference every week

Watkins looks like he's got a good few years in him, rarely injured and proven in the prem. Not a bad signing if they got for under 60m. These clubs can afford it unlike the rest of us. But he would massively improve them. Don't think they will get him now though unless Villa have an alternative lined up.

Still don't quite get what it means

No I can see that...the strategy so far has been not to cash in on any of our real assets. But is this method working? You say we are building a formidable side but most of that building was done awhile ago. We have been needing a new RW, RCB and replacement for Wilson for a while now but from the sounds of it we aren't able to do that and I even have doubts if we can get all that done in the summer with the funds it would take to get players better than what we have. Without top 5 this season we are going to be vulnerable to the cartel flying around like vultures for our star players. Likewise if we get champions league, we aren't going to have the funds or the wages to revenue space to flesh out the squad necessary to avoid another season like last year. Sorry I think my general bleak outlook to life at the mo is filtering over into my pessimism about PSR and how frustrating it is, knowing this squad is only a few key players from doing something special.

Does anyone feel like it's inevitable that we need to sell one of they core players for a minimum £70m+ in order to try and start building again? I don't see any other solutions at the moment. The squad was already getting stale and it was only the return of Tonali that has helped boost it this season but there's very little beneath the first 11. It doesn't seem like we are able to sell the deadwood for sufficient funds to be able to kick on, in the same way other clubs are able to do. Seems like we're pinning everything on getting top 5 this year but it's gonna be a tall ask with so many teams competing for it.

But why the inflated fee's? I get the need to pay the players higher wages. But why should it make a difference to a club where the player is going. If anything it's better for them when players go to Saudi as they won't face them in the same league or Europe. Sure in January teams will ask for larger fees to let players go. But we have seen these high transfer fees in the summers aswell.

Yup. Said before, it makes no sense that the transfer fee has to be way over inflated aswell. Sure wages to entice players to a shot league, but why is every transfer fee atleast £20m probably over people's true value.

Gareth 🇬🇧