ponsaelius

It'll be real since it's using the lasses for promotion imo. The sponsor will be photoshopped on adding the weirdness to the photos.

Left on a free. Don't know where he'll go next to finish his career.

Messi going back to Barca now that the last of that generation of players has moved on (Alba, Busquets, Pique) and playing at the Olympic Stadium next year will have weird vibes.

Wouldn't read into attendances being up that much - they're pretty much up across the board at all levels of football over that period.

He's had an amazing career. One of my favourite ever players to watch, particularly in his early years. Reinvented himself as a footballer on a number of occasions to remain effective. Its always weird when a player lasts as long as he has at the top level. The Ajax team he broke through at over 20 years ago feels like it was from a different era of football entirely. He's actually older than all of Sneijder, VdV, Heitinga, Mido, De Jong. He's only slightly younger than the likes of Chivu and Van de Meyde ffs. The daft quotes and persona became a little bit tiresome in recent years but I'm still not entirely convinced he isn't willingly taking the piss out of himself.

Didn't realise it doesn't start until 20th July (and runs to 20th August). Seems a bit late? I know women's football has to exist of its own accord but can't help but feel it would be better not to be on a bit earlier before pre-season and start of next season ramps up. I'm sure they're usually on June-July. Is this something to do with Oz sports venues being used?

I'm creased just from those photos like. The publishing quality is very Business Secrets of the Pharaohs.

What the fuck

At the risk of boring everybody to death with this again, Miley and Anderson are irrelevant for now as they don't need to be named in the CL squad being under 21. The requirement for four club grown players isn't really that much of a deal, tbf. For example Man City only named 1 in Foden so the max they could have is 22 players named in their 25 man squad. They actually only named a 21 man squad - leaving one empty space completely in addition to the 3 missing club grown players. It matters little as they can rely on youngsters to step up from their youth set up. The likes of Palmer, Lewis etc for example don't even need to be named in a CL squad but effectively take their squad up to the 25. Its a bigger issue for us right now because I suppose we don't have the academy quality coming through. But even so we could name a 22 man squad with just Longstaff named - and still rely on the likes of Miley, Anderson etc to step up. For if we also signed for example somebody like Lavia, or kept Kuol around, they'd also be able to play as the B list of U21 players is unlimited.

Possibly, but equally loads of average managers have got average teams to top half finishes. I don't think at face value there's a huge difference between Poch finishing 8th with Southampton and Postecoglu's record in Scotland, Japan, Oz and at international level. It comes down ultimately to whether they think the manager has the character and acumen to step up. Personally I have no idea if he does - but I wouldn't rule the bloke out completely based on his track record. He has at least had coaching success on a few different continents and cultural environments.

To be fair Spurs have recently appointed two expensive 'sure thing' high profile managers in Mourinho and Conte and both have been rubbish. They might as well gamble on somebody a bit more left field. Poch had a less impressive career record when they went for him.

I mean they'd subbed off all their likely penalty takers. Poor that neither the forwards seem to volunteer to go up first.

I don't mind Sevilla winning it when they start in the competition, but dropping out in the CL groups and delivering it irks a bit more.

Load of defenders taking penalties, never going to end well.

You can see why Abraham has 8 league goals and Belotti 0. I'm amazed any striker even gets chances to score for Roma.

I respect Mourinho as a manager a lot but would never want him to manage my team.

This is gonna be carnage.

Have they? Not sure they've had a shot yet.

Alaves in 2001 was last one I think.

Haaland only played 24 games in the Bundesliga last year (even if fully fit throughout you still play four fewer than PL) and wasn't sole penalty taker like he has been at Man City. His goal rate is basically identical across the last two seasons.

With any London club you could simply include the real estate value of their stadium and training ground within an estimate in value. It doesn't seem so inflated if you consider it that way.

He absolutely screams Brentford with Toney's injury.

Not sure what kind of fee they'd ask for but I'd much prefer a move for Eze than Gallagher if it was possible. Think he'd slot in brilliantly into our current system and could play centrally or wide. Probably only the previous injury is a red flag. Tbh I'd probably even prefer him to Maddison.

I can definitely see that. In corporate and manufacturing industries getting your workspace/production layout wrong can have a huge affect on productivity. With football it's probably far more of a factor when you think about how crucial the intangible elements of team spirit, motivation and mentality are to a club's success. Leicester were a club where the success was built on being a smaller club punching above their weight. Think it shows the importance of getting the architecture of any new training facility right and that being biggest, most comfortable etc is not the only thing that matters. It's clearly not the only thing that has gone wrong at Leicester but it would be churlish to ignore it completely IMO as a factor.

I raised this a couple of weeks ago. It's really interesting to see their fans discussing the same points. Moving a training ground miles out of the city is not necessarily a good thing IMO - in that it can disconnect the players from the club. I definitely think there is an argument that has happened at Leicester. I don't think that will happen for us - all of the potential sites are within the city boundaries even at the rural edge. The cost of it has to be judged as slightly misjudged by Leicester too - especially since they were not able to sell their old training ground to help play for it (it is protected by a sporting covenant). Again I'm not sure that would be a major issue for us - as the cash cost isn't really an issue in the same way as long as it is not included in FFP calcs.