ponsaelius

Probably opens up Mbeumo as option if we really wanted him.

Never coming here I don't think but we should be all the over that.

PL is full of identikit southern clubs from wealthy areas backed by rich owners. There's also been so many tinpot non league clubs that get backed by local businessmen and pushed up through the leagues on unsustainable models. I think it's great that they've picked a downtrodden team with a history of horrific ownership and located in one of the most deprived areas of the country to invest in. Wrexham as a club have always had potential - the catchment area covers all of north Wales and there's a clear identity there to lean in to. Good luck to them.

Hope they do. Would offer a lot more to the Championship than Wycombe.

All set up for Villa to win the CL

ITK knobber on twitter (one who usually gets reasonable bits and pieces) saying the injury is worse than first thought and they're a bit worried about how long it's going to take to heal.

Deffo wrong, everywhere else has him on 9.

9 assists innit?

7-0 would do it on gerls scurred

I actually think Saints are better from what I've seen mind. Certainly gave us much better games in both.

What a bizarre game.

We've weirdly looked a bit crap. I think Isak looks half fit.

Thought it quite interesting to see we've only had 9 different PL scorers this season. We had 20 last season. Know we're not done but it shows possibly most how we've not had the same injury problems.

It was interesting the point Fernandes made in his post match interview about VAR taking away a lot of the edge of the derbies like this. No doubt it contributes to sanitising games a fair bit.

Again this belies the reality of the situation at the time though. When we signed Gordon in Jan 2023 he had played the majority of his career for Everton on the right. He was signed for NUFC primarily as a right winger - you can see that in the documentary when we are signing him as his position is highlighted on the whiteboard. He only had fleeting appearances for the rest of that season as his fitness was miles off. Barnes was a direct replacement for Maxi as left winger. The following season when Gordon got up to speed after coming back from the Euros it became clear very quickly that he was better on the left cutting inside. So we've ended up with two very good left wingers and unfortunately neither never look properly convincing on the right. The idea that we deliberately and wastefully signed two expensive left wingers is disingenuous. You could argue the talent ID on Gordon was slightly off, and we've suffered because of that.

Yeah that's not a bad a result.

Chelsea looking more dangerous since the subs

It will be largely instructional. He was a much safer passer at Milan. Howe wants us to be quick onto the front foot.

We'd also sold Maxi, who at the time was our best winger (Gordon had down nowt). It would have been ridiculous to not sign somebody of Barnes' quality and profile. We just got a bit unlucky that Gordon decided he was almost exclusively best on the left.

Every decision we've made so far in the market has now been justified in my mind by winning the cup Wouldn't want to mess with that butterfly effect

Yeah I like Longstaff and genuinely glad he's been part of the cup winning squad but the lad has proven far too often now to be a bad rotation player. He really does struggle in particular when he's dropped into the odd game or coming off the bench. Plus he's at an age now that he's probably not going to improve. It's the right time to move him on. Last time you're going to get to a fee. I think Eddie knows it too given he's barely played. As with Almiron it feels like the writing is on the wall. It may be that the right sided player we move for is somebody who can also play central.

Villa have GD which puts them a point down on everybody else basically and they've played two games more than us. I think the way of looking at it is if we finish below them we're not getting top 5 anyway.

Forest will definitely finish with more than 67 points IMO. I know what you mean about riding their luck but they've done it all season - it's not going to stop now.

Yeah I thought they were really good second half TBF to them. Murillo is their best player by a mile.