Chicken Dancer

Absolute worst case scenario this.

Don’t think anybody has said we’re gonna go down or that, just that we realistically could finish 16th. 14th would be rank but 16th would be fucking awful like.

West Ham wouldn’t need to for us to finish 16th. Forest in 16th have us at their place in 2 weeks and they’re 3 points behind us. It’s a legitimate concern.

I’m genuinely worried we finish 16th now.

It’s actually a fucking shambles we didn’t lay a glove on these cunts over 180 minutes. Unforgivable tbh, still gets me raging now. Especially that one last month.

Honestly can’t stand the thought of them fuckers sunning it up in September in some place in Europe. Forest win, Spurs and Arsenal draws. Inshallah.

Can't believe we're 5/1 for this I'd have a 1 in front of that 5 for sure.

Christ I hope that's bollocks. It's Bailey so very likely to be, but it isn't the first time I've seen that name pop up...

Good keeper with the potential to be great. Not sure I’d pay what they’ll probably want though (or if we can even afford it).

Not like us.

I actually agree with pretty much all of this to some degree, and I don't think anybody thinks he's turned into a crap manager overnight. I don't think there's a Newcastle fan alive who doesn't wish this season had turned out different. The problem for me is that it's now late April, with 5 games left, and the exact same issues that were hampering us in the early/middle part of the season are still happening now. We can blame the players/Isak/Mitchell/PIF but as you say, the buck stops with the manager. When we won the cup, Howe correctly took infinitely more praise than any of the players - both individually and as a collective. Now we're doing shit, he's ultimately going to shoulder most of the blame, especially when it's become all too predictable week in, week out. It's the way it's always been and always will be in football. Perspective is key of course, but I'd say the points you raised were valid reasons why we started slowly, not why we're still shite in April.

Aye best to go down fighting that with a whimper. We've got under their skin a few times in recent years, I'd be really excited for it if we'd been playing well after the international break.

Sadly agree. Like you, West Ham is the only game I can see them maybe squandering but I'd still be shocked if they did. City have Everton and Bournemouth away as well as Villa at home. Much harder set of games unfortunately.

Man U and Liverpool were probably our best performances in the league, closely followed by Everton (A) and Man City (H). We were desperately unlucky in the Liverpool game but that's probably the only time I can remember feeling pretty hard done by. On the other side of the coin I reckon Burnley would have felt pretty hard done by at St James' in December - with 10 men they looked the more likely and very nearly scored an equaliser at the death. Same goes for Fulham and Wolves too. The season has hopefully just been a down year and we can get back to our best next year, but I would like to see something in the final 5. Given Europe is probably out of reach now, I'm at the stage where performances are more important to me personally than results. I'd feel a lot better if we looked like our old selves in the final 5 with little to show for it rather than winning 1 or 2 flakey games with more of the same. Just me though, I totally get it's a results business.

Could have sworn Bournemouth Leeds was going to be high scoring. Not been watching but seems nowts happened.

He’s not shite by any means but always believed him to be a tad overrated. He’s pretty hopeless in the final third, which tends to be one of the most desirable attributes for a modern fullback. His pace is a lovely insurance policy but if you can get £50/60m for a right back you have to take it the position we’re in. Not sure we’d get that like, but if we did I’d be very tempted. Bit of a red flag he’s performed (much) better at LB too.

His biggest strength yet I rarely see him do it. On Saturday he was always coming inside when our midfield or defenders had the ball, and at one point second half Miley had a right pop at him for it. I'm probably forgetting now but I can only really remember him properly utilising his pace on the first day away at Villa then at Barca (H) in the league phase. Bar that he's just reminded me of Obertan.

I said it in the summer but I'd much rather have signed a couple of players to play RW for the combined price of Elanga than pay £55m for him. Might work, might not, but at least you aren't lumbered with a player nobody with a brain would take off your hands now. Plus you'd like to hope you'd at least get something out of 1 of them. People make a valid argument that he had a great season last year (statistically) so it was as much as a 'sure thing' as could be. Well, Jacob Murphy had a great year too by that metric. It was always going to be a huge risk. People also argue 'we only signed him because we couldn't get Mbuemo'. They couldn't be more different for starters - completely different players and we courted Elanga for so long it always felt like we'd get him. Forest were just trying to squeeze as much out of us as possible. Even going back to the summer of 24'. Another disaster, but the reports were it was 'Guehi or nobody' (from Howe) towards the end of the window. Before that we were linked with Max Kilman, James Trafford, Elanga & DCL pretty strongly if my memory serves. As much as he rocked the boat here and was a bit of a dickhead, I doubt Mitchell came in that summer with grand plans of signing any of those players and bet it went a long way to putting strain on the relationship between the two.

I often wonder if the sunderland game and beyond would have been different if it wasn't a total annihilation in the second half in Barcelona. It couldn't have done much for the confidence levels.

I reckon he's done here by the looks of it. Shame, let's hope we use the money wisely in the summer. If we can get some extra money for Willock, Tino etc then we could have a fair bit to play with. We need to do as much as we can before the World Cup though 0- including tying Hall down with a new deal.

Since we're probably unlikely to pick up m(any) points to end the season, if we are to pick up only one, please let it be this game. Alongside Isak getting injured it would be the highlight of the season.

Absolutely. The mackems have signed some players that would have definitely played a role for us this season - in fact they basically signed a new team for the price we paid for the 3 players we signed from the Premier League.

Please for the love of God no. Not fair on him whatsoever, I'm convinced that spell of playing him midfield has gone a long way to destroying his confidence. The proof is in the facts - we've gained more points with him as a forward than anyone else. Either play him upfront or not at all imo.

Very thought of this knocks me ill. They’ve got wolves to play as well, got me worried sick.

To be fair I hate playing Brighton at the best of times, but aye I can’t see us getting out next Saturday. Just shy of 2/1 for those partial to a bet. Likely to change if/when we lose on Saturday.