Interpolic

Reminder that Howe has signed no player of note in 4 of the last 5 transfer windows. The only window he did sign players he was forced to play makeshift DOF because the club didn't do the bare minimum of having a functioning structure operating above him. He also lost his most potent attacker for £130m, plus the likes of Anderson, Minteh and Longstaff. It's because our squad building hasn't been steady and additive that we see such a warped squad now imo. We can't be allowed to have so many windows signing nobody going forward.

Yeah, Cort was the big one that summer but there was a solid base there too with the likes of Shearer, Speed, Given, Dyer, Solano - all players who ended up being pivotal to his teams. You might glance at the other signings during that period and think they were left field (Gavilan, Bassedas, LuaLua, Acuña, Cordone) - most or all of these were recommendations from scout Mick Wadsworth. Wadsworth was Robson's mate/contact who he trusted and the club went with it, so there are parallels there with last summer in that we went after players the manager wanted but few of them came off at NUFC. So this was another form of backing from the board that was rectified later when they cut ties with Wadsworth and gave Robson one last chance with less control over signings. As for the outgoings and the effect they had on profit and loss, I'd say this was more a reflection on the high turnover of managers and being left with unwanted players, Robson certainly never lost anyone of the calibre of Isak like Howe did. Nuance eh, inconvenient to overly black and white arguments sometimes innit.

Bobby Robson at NUFC - finished 11th twice with good backing then 4th, 3rd, 5th. There'll be more modern examples somewhere but not loads because the culture is now to sack the manager at the first setback.

People think his stock's gone down in his time here man, fucking HELL.

Man City were allowed to throw endless money at the problem, surely you're not this daft?

Kin el, it's shit fan Christmas on ere then.

As is the difference in resources.

It's very uncommon for a CEO to dig their own manager out in the press, for good reason.

Doesn't really depend where we finish from here for me, he's earnt the grace of not worrying about a few places for one season. I think we'll finish strongly anyway, unless things really have gone to shit behind the scenes. If I'd asked myself that question back in May my answer would have probably been being in genuine relegation trouble. Just don't think it's a massive deal that we've dropped off a bit in the league as long as it's temporary. He's done the season with no firing strikers, no dependable goalkeeper, a defence that too often picks itself etc. Playing every 3 days for what feels like years. Cool heads and we'll be fine.

Since a lot of people seem to care about this, the entire football world will laugh their tits off at us if we end up losing Howe. You think the reaction to the 2030 comments was bad, this will be on another level entirely. The perception will be he deserves the maximum realistic time possible to get it right (again). He'll get a top job and tear it up again. Take the emotion out of (some) recent results and performances, ask yourself this... If someone said to you in May, after another CL qualification and a glorious cup win at last, in the knowledge we'd lose Isak what would it take for you to want Howe out of the club? Because surely for most it would have needed to be a hell of a lot worse than a probable top half finish and good progress in all of the cups. Yes a 3am post (newborn innit)

Mourinho hasn't been a good appointment for anyone for over ten years now. The game has passed him by. Even in his pomp his teams were often very tedious. Great character obviously and his achievements for quite a long time were top notch. The only positive to appointing him would be it being a helpful heads-up that the higher-ups at NUFC haven't got a fucking clue what they're doing, instead of the current scenario where the jury is out. I don't like this Hopkinson gadgie much at all so far though.

He's earnt a hell of a lot more respect than you show him.

You thought we were eliminated from the CL in the league phase, wind your neck in.

4 points. We've managed 9 points from our last 7 games including wins against Man Utd and Chelsea. That was in the middle of fixture congestion hell, which is no longer upon us. We've also put in some good performances lately, I'd argue the first half against Man Utd was the best we've been all season. Would be surprised at anything less than 10 but could quite easily be 15+ if Howe can get them galvanised for the remainder. Wissa and Wolt at the very least are playing for their futures so it'll be interesting how that affects individual performances.

Reddit ain't always the best for football communities but the views on the Villa subreddit are striking in their similarities to many of ours. They're having the same conversations as us all the time, maybe at different times but some recent ones: - panicking/fuming they'll have to sell their best player in Rodgers this summer - fans arguing about whether Emery's bad patch was acceptable or not as it was falling short of the standards he'd set himself - bemoaning their busy fixture list and how it has left them spread far too thin

This season has been a huge reminder of how fucking awful loads of our fans are, many of whom are posting relentless, entitled, babyish fucking drivel on here all day every day. This is a good thread though.

They're both already really enjoying their evenings.

This, and he's not going to deviate from the system and start playing a 10 suddenly in this game either.

This is how you flex your big club muscles to intimidate officials into not doing similar to you again in a hurry. Get the media on about it for a week or 2 and get properly in the ref's heads. On balance I'm glad we don't do this shit cos some things are more important than winning at all costs, but I'm convinced it's very effective.

Summer was the byproduct of having no proper transfer team in place after the exit of a huffy and egotistical DOF. We need to fix a few things imo, one of the less frequently mentioned ones being we need to be in a financial position where we're adding numbers every season. Adding very little in 4 of the last 5 windows leaves us needing big overhauls too often. I'd love to see more additions of the Lewis Hall profile - highly rated youngsters who might not be ready for a year but with massive upside. The summer will be interesting and show us how well the operation is working with Wilson in.

what is the point of this comment?

Really we should have gone into the 2nd leg a goal or 2 up and same with the first half today. Small margins then we were eventually well and truly punished for wastefulness and errors. What disappointed me tonight was that 5 minute spell at the start of the second half, it was quite intense pressure we were under but we have wilted in such spells too quickly this season. I had hoped Chelsea was a corner turned for our resilience and perhaps it was but this was another kettle of fish. Some of our defending was very poor and left us chasing unnecessarily. Tired legs and minds came unstuck. That said we were absolutely terrific for long spells of the 2 legs and had the mighty Barcelona scrambling. This run and this tie has been largely uncharted territory for us and I'm really proud of the team and manager for how they went about it. We need to get the changes right this summer and we'll keep progressing, I'm sure if it. In the meantime I wouldn't be surprised if we have a really strong end to the season. We've had our swagger back quite a while now imo (with setbacks), need to add consistency and we'll be alright.

You were moaning the whole half, I've helpfully collated the posts for you. I obviously wouldn't be pointing this out if you weren't miserable as fucking sin 24/7.