Jackie Broon

Yeah, noticed that too and how they referred to improvements over the "Benitez era" when discussing Everton but it was "since Howe took over" when discussing our massive night and day improvement.

I'd love him to, but if we're playing well he won't use up a substitution early just for the sake of giving Bruno time on the pitch.

That only matters to the consortium and they're clearly not looking for a return on their investment, at least in the short-medium term.

Conversely, a loss would put us right back in the shit.

Match sharpness will become an issue for him soon, it's a month since he last played 90 minutes. The most time he's had on the pitch since his last Lyon match on 21st Jan was coming on in the 73rd minute in Brazil vs. Paraguay.

Same here, Norwich, Watford, and Brentford to go down with us in 13th on 40 points. Although, I might've been a bit too generous to Burnley, who I had in 11th Palace and Villa aren't out of the scrap either, both have tough run-ins and are in poor form.

Eh? You're the one who involved yourself in a discussion about covid vaccination.

There are loads of jobs that require people to pass a medical for employment. Other than the fact that it's his own choice to leave himself at 10x or higher risk of becoming severely ill with covid, and higher risk of passing on to his teammates, how is it different to not signing a Demba Ba because his knee could explode at any time?

Property developers work to relatively tight margins, like profits of 15% or less with relatively high risk. Most developers would be likely to be happy to sell a site at an equivalent profit rather than develop it.

I agree, I only meant if Castle Leazes and the arena site are not viable, they would both be preferable options.

The club don't own the land. Also, most or all of it would probably need to be made into a park to offset the impact on Leazes Park. There probably isn't enough space on Castle Leazes to build a stadium without using some of Leazes Park.

I'm not familiar with Newcastle's Development Plan but it doesn't seem to be designated, nothing to stop us from buying the site and applying for a stadium on there. Not within the city centre limits but Hunters Moor maybe? If the Freemen would allow Castle Leazes why not Hunters Moor? Walkable from the city centre and It would resolve all of the potential heritage impact issues with Leazes Park that Castle Leazes has.

Me too, I've seen bits but never watched the whole thing. Fuck me, how do they see this as a good advert for them as supporters? The people working for the club generally come across really well, as does Coleman, and I actually feel a bit sorry for them. The supporters on the other hand, fighting after a friendly, attacking the camera crew, full of entitlement and bile, viciously turning on the team and manager the moment it's not going their way. Continuously trotting out shite about how the club should be in the Premier League and Short should continue to pour money into the club because they work hard all week and love the club. Guess what, so do the fans of every single other football club. They come out of it looking appalling and holding a big chunk of the responsibility for their plight.

Today is a freebie, anything we get out of it would be a bonus, it's not having him for Brentford and Brighton that would be more of a worry.

Architects generally know fuck all about planning, in my extensive experience. And I don't need to get out my BRE Daylight and Sunlight Assessment pack to tell you a 12 storey-ish building within about 11m of residential windows isn't going to be acceptable. Let alone the impact on the setting of a Grade 1 listed building.

Looking at it again it's not going to work, the east stand would be just about up to the lawn at the front of Leazes Terrace at the same height as the Milburn / Leazes stands, that's never going to be acceptable. It would also require the demolition of at least 3 and 4 St. James Street. If that were an option it would be much easier and less impactful to extend the existing east stand back the same distance.

Both lighting / overbearing impact and impact on the setting of the listed building probably. But if not it does seem like an ingenious option.

Yet when they thought they were going to have one of the richest owners in the world: https://www.readytogo.net/smb/threads/takeover-rumours.1483802/ (and check the first responses when they thought it might be "arabs") There's always a thread.

I trust Eddie to make the right decision but it seems to me that this match would've been the perfect time to give him a start. It's one that we wouldn't expect to win on paper and he could explain benching Willock to him by saying he wants a more defensive player in there for this difficult away game, plus it would be a good idea to have a more defensive player in there for this difficult away game. I am concerned that not starting him and not giving him enough time from the bench to earn his place (albeit due to the enforced subs and concern about Dubravka against Villa) is potentially creating an unnecessary issue and putting more pressure on him to instantly perform when he does get his chance.

It did, I hadn't actually realised how much. Although obviously there was the benefit of the improvements to the setting of Leazes Terrace. IIRC the planning department seem to have been supportive, at least initially, but English Heritage objected and it was withdrawn when John Prescot decided to call the decision in. In my experience Historic England are less likely to intervene nowadays, particularly on stuff involving Grade 2 listings. They don't even need to be consulted on applications affecting Grade 2 listed buildings / parks, although they would here because it would be a major development that impacts on a conservation area.

It is, we had a planning application in for a 55,000 seater that was expandable to 70,000 in the 90s and nothing has fundamentally changed about the site since then.

But is it really the case that thousands will be locked out? It wasn't difficult to get tickets for most games during the Robson era. If anything we got a bit spoilt and demand actually dropped a bit. I don't think demand necessarily increases linearly with success.

Yeah, but the point is having a 52,000 capacity isn't going to affect our ability to compete. Don't get me wrong, I'd love to see us have a 60,000+ capacity.

Juventus went from the 67,000 Stadio delle Alpi to their current 41,000 capacity stadium and it didn't do them any harm.

Same, I managed to go to most of the home European games but not a hope of getting into league matches. Although a lad I used to sit next to when I had a season ticket insisted he'd managed to get tickets for most home league game in the 36,000 era without a season ticket, god knows how, if it was true.