Stottie

My view is that McClaren is not incompetent so it takes "the manager" out of the list of things to be especially concerned about. It means we can instead focus on what Ashley is doing to the club. All of the inept set pieces and set piece defending under Pardew and Carver were only Ashley's fault in so much as those two were Ashley appointments. It will be easier to focus on transfer policy when its not a case of Williamson playing because the manager won't pick MYM.

I can see us losing, but not as badly as we would have done at the tail end of last season. We'll be better than under Carver, and I think they'll be more weakened by the players they sold this time than last time. Maybe 1-2.

My main prediction is that Man U will still be well short of challenging for the title, and Liverpool will do better than last year. I rate Clyne, Milner and Sturridge, assuming he plays. Benteke too of course. Gerrard was a millstone, as was Balotelli, easily the worst signing of the season. Gerrard->Milner and Balotelli->Benteke is worth 9 or 10 points, even with Brenda calling the shots. For Man U to do well, they need to sort out the keeper situation and get a top class striker in. Man U have loads of money, so they still may make bids at the last minute, as with Falcao last time. As things stand, their squad looks even more unbalanced than the one LVG inherited (Rooney RVP Hernandez Wellbeck). After di Maria, Falcao, Herrera, and Valdes, there are also doubts over whether LVG is the right man to handle whatever marquee signings they can get in. Premiership Winners: Chelsea (by a smaller margin) Runners Up: Arsenal (add a striker and they'll win the league) 3rd-6th: City, .......big gap......, ferk it, Liverpool, Man U, Spurs Relegation: Leicester, Sunderland, one of the promoted teams Overachievers: (relatively speaking) Liverpool Underperformers: Man U Top Goal Scorer: Costa/Aguero too injury prone, so Kane. Looks far too good to be a one-season wonder Break Out Year: Milner back to Villa form? Season to Forget: Van Gaal PFA Player of the Year: Hazard or Alexis Sanchez PFA Young Player of the Year: Kane, possibly Sterling Manager of the Year: Wenger (for winning or going pretty close) First manager to quite/be sacked/'mutual consent': Ranieri Newcastle United Where will we finish?: 11th/12th, which sounds meh, but we'll score a few more, concede at least fifteen less, and do much better at set pieces. I think we'll see identifiable progress and won't be worrying about relegation Top Goalscorer?: Cisse if still around, Mitrovic if not How will we do in the cup competitions?: Maybe win a tie or two before the draw gives us Chelsea in the fourth or fifth round as normal How will we do in the derby games?: Win one of them Other: How will Bournemouth fair in their first outing in the Premier League: Dunno, but good luck to em! When will Crystal Palace fans start to resent Alan Pardew: Haven't seen their fixtures, but I guess there'll be doubts by Christmas How many goals will Balotelli score this season: None, he'll be off How will De Jong get injured this season: Collision with Tiote?

In the Prem, Chicharito has played 102 for 37 goals, 12 assists. A pretty good output. But then, he's only played 4,840 minutes in those games. The equivalent of 53 whole games. 37 goals and 12 assists (for a "poacher"!) in 53 games. That's elite striker level. Maybe only Aguero (Sturridge?) will be higher over more than one season. Okay you can discount some of the goals as number 3 or 4 coming on as fresh legs in a four goal win, but not that many. Costa and Aguero get meaningless goals in one sided games too. In the CL he's got 8 in 32 games, but only 1,689 minutes. Less than 20 games equivalent. In La Liga, he got 7 goals and 7 assists in less than 10 games (!) worth of minutes. The boy deserves a bit more love.

He looked like a useful player to me, but he didn't get a proper run thanks to Pardew and injuries. With McClaren as Graham Carr's apparent choice, hopefully the prospects we sign from now on will actually get a decent chance and will be signed because they are the type of player the manager is likely to use. Anyway, good luck to the lad from now on.

Depay scored lots of goals last year, but it's the Dutch league and his total was only a couple more than team-mate Luuk de Jong, who even beat him in assists. It sounds like a big ask to expect him to hit the ground running with title-winning form in the Premiership. The same goes for Pedro, given what LVG got out of di Maria, who did actually hit the ground running for five or six games. Given the money they've been spending on midfielders, having no established cover for Rooney is indeed madness.

The first one was a genuine thunderbastard but it was Cacapa on ice for the next two. They were just nudging him out of the way.

I think there's a good chance that the Conor Wickham signing and the recruitment of Andy Woodman signal a turning point toward the Pardew we and fans of all his former clubs know too well. Even more so if Colo goes to them.

Just as something for McClaren to work on, we scored a grand total of five goals in the first half hour of all our league matches last season. In the same period, we conceded 21. Easily the worst in the league. http://www.statbunker.com/competitions/LeagueTable?comp_id=481&start_date=01-08-2014&end_date=24-05-2015&start_time=0&end_time=30 .com have it in graph form here. Only two in the first twenty minutes of 38 matches. http://www.nufc.com/html/2014-15html/goaltimes.html

The only finishing problem that struck me last year was Riviere. Cisse was fairly clinical on the whole, and Ayoze scored enough difficult ones to let him off with the easier ones he missed. The overall lack of chances, especially from pointless set pieces, was the main memory. More than that though, it was all the stupid goals we gave away. Krul passing it straight to Ashley Young after 93 minutes at 0-0 being a representative example.

New lads look promising, but the old problem of gifting goals to the opposition is still apparent, and that is the lingering taste. You can only do so much with better organisation/can't polish a turd etc. It's hard to judge the meaning of the game, but you'd normally expect more from a team that finished third in the Bundesliga. Maybe we are due some credit for that. If Cisse stays, I'd like a CB, an LB, and a better backup keeper than Elliot. Haidara as LB leaves two new CBs too much to do.

63 goals conceded last year, second worst in the league, i.e., worse than two clubs that were relegated. fwiw, bottom-placed QPR outscored us too (42 vs. 40) so had our goals not come in opportune matches, we would have gone down with them. I think the biggest lesson for also-ran clubs in the Premiership in recent years comes from Pulis at Crystal Palace. And that is, don't let your club be easy to beat. Be a club that is organised enough to not lose matches of its own accord. Getting beaten by a better team is fine, just don't give away easy goals because that's what makes you lose match after match like Carver did. I think McClaren is a big step up from Carver (and the other perennial hangers on with him), but there is only so much better organisation can add to the players we've got. Some of them simply need to be replaced. They're just not good enough.

Our preseason certainly doesn't suggest any major improvement at the back If we come out playing anything like we did in that Leicester game ....

Sorry if this is common knowledge or Giggs, but the video of SBR and Mourinho got me thinking about how the latter got where he has and his wiki came up with The source is Mourinho's biography.

Didn't realise he was 30. For that reason and his reported wages I can't see it happening. No-one in the Prem will give him close to 120 grand a week. He'll have to go to somewhere he can be the big fish in the rich little pond. Given his performance last year, I reckon Man U should keep him. The money is nothing to them and he was pretty useful. Depay could get injured/struggle, Van Gaal didn't play Januzaj much, and di Maria sounds like he's off.

The young Micah Richards had pace to cover any mistakes he made. I can't say I've seen him much for a long time, but the injuries may have slowed him down. I remember him having some great games against us, fwiw.

I doubt it too and question whether its an upgrade, but I think we could offload Cisse at very short notice if Austin goes close to the deadline. Which means that we can wait for QPR to lower the price. Other clubs interested in him mightn't have that option. The all-too-imaginable Ashley-era mistake would be to sell Cisse first and then fail to buy Austin or anyone else.

He'll leave QPR, it's just a game of brinksmanship to see who cracks first on the fee. As the deadline approaches, the two sides will come together. So long as Cisse is still around, we could leave it very late to make a move. The minus is that Austin would miss preseason, though ours is pretty shambolic anyway.

The players you mention don't have our old coaching staff speaking up for them, so I hope they're only being getting a chance first as a mark of respect for the number of games they got last year. Hopefully McClaren and the coaches will see them for what they are, and the "so that's why they were nearly relegated" penny will drop.

Well excited about this! I wouldn't have expected it after the long barren spell, but Cisse scored a lot off the bench last year. It suggests he'd be a better option as a backup striker than he looked twelve months ago.

Image rights for anyone playing for Man U will be huge too. The chance to appear in all kinds of adverts. I think a player of Muller's undisputed quality could do with going to a club with a more settled team and approach than Man United at present. It may well have affected Falcao and di Maria. With the chopping and changing, I don't think we've seen the best of Juan Mata either.

Surely that leaves only Barcelona and Real Madrid then? Without the need to debate. I guess that's down to opinion. But they are certainly two . As Man U stand vs. Bayern, it would be a step down for much more money. I guess that's also what many people would say if he went to Man City. (In fairness to them, in the past four seasons, Man City have gone 1st 2nd 1st 2nd)

Maybe someone could fill in the last bit? Ba de ya! Say do you remember? Ba de ya! One Chancel M'bemba! Ba de ya! ..............

If it's the Scout Nation one, the general play in that league looks a bit scrappy, but - good in the air - a number of sidefooted finishes, hinting at composure - takes up good positions and gets across defenders - looks strong for 20 years old - good on the turn Some promising signs there if you ask me!

Maybe the ones in the Premiership, but I remember watching the CL semis and actually counting their ex players. Pogba Evra Tevez Ronaldo Pique Chicharito (soon to be ex) Some of them are ex players and definite non "cast offs", but there are still six of them. Upgrade Tim Howard to de Gea and an ex players select team would look stronger than anything LVG could put out. That's some going for the third richest club in the world.