St1pe

Sort of looking forward to this (as much as you look forward to our games at the minute anyway). Would have gone if I could have made it. It’s one of those no pressure games that doesn’t really effect anything and hopefully we’ll get a home win for a change. Also hoping some of the players on the edge of the squad try and use it to push for a first team place like Murphy, Longstaff. Maybe even a bench spot for Sorenson. I’m guessing Woodman will play too.

And this is why Bishop is so secretly brilliant. This reaction is being echoed across loads of drone households as I type. Christ ?

Balotelli is exactly the type of mad transfer I could get behind. Don’t even care if it makes sense I’d love to see him here for the “what if he performs” moments.

What’s a Pen!!! ?

That transfer makes too much sense and it’s the type of deal we haven’t done in a couple of years. I wasn’t a fan of buying players with the sole purpose to sell for profit but we’re not even investing in young players like we were. Last time we were relegated look at the money we recouped from sales. We’ve barely got any assets worth selling now. Ashley seems to push us further in the wrong direction every season.

If we don’t spend in January, the takeover doesn’t happen and Benítez either walks after the window or walks away when his contract is up, (serious question..) where does that leave us as a club. Let’s say assuming we stay up. Without the over the top bad craic where do we go from there? What sort of manager can we expect to sign? Because I can’t think of anyone established that’s going to go near us.

Yes!!!!

Because he has no money, incompetent people above him and a football club can’t get by with 13 players. That doesn’t answer the question, he was shite and we and all Stoke fans knew it, so why buy him irrespective of not getting his target. That's not exactly right. Their forum was split pretty evenly with quite a lot saying he should have been given a chance under Hughes. Not that it matters really because as it turns out he isn't good enough for the Premier League.

We’d be daft getting rid of Shelvey given our current state.

Howay let it be us that gets a late winner for a change

Hope we put Kenedy and Muto on soon to inject a bit of life into us

Would have preferred Kenedy started despite his form but at least we’ve got a couple of options from the bench if it isn’t going our way.

Still Given for me but I don’t know if that’s because he was so prominent for us during our more successful period while I was growing up. So much so that when the announcer is reading the team sheet out and and says “number 1” part of me expects a booming “Shay Given” to follow.

Big fan of getting a shithouse win rather than being on the wrong end of one.

We’ve really had no luck with decisions this season.

I think “captain Ashley” has taken over from “signed the wrong brother” as the worst craic on the forum.

Not really keen on that lineup. Clark at left back and Atsu starting on that side doesn’t look that convincing. Harsh on Murphy given he looks like a confidence player too. Hope I’m wrong but I think we’d do well to get a point.

The criticism this lad gets is way over the top. Even from the highlights of the game at the weekend he’s usually involved in some degree with anything good we do but it’s overshadowed by his lack of cutting edge in the final third. I don’t think it’s much of a surprise that when he’s playing well we usually win and the opposite if he isn’t. That 10 position seems to be critical to Rafa’s system working but he simply doesn’t have an alternative to Ayoze. For what it’s worth I don’t think he’s good enough to be relied upon but I can’t think of a single example where a home crowd has turned on a player as much and it’s resulted in a positive outcome. We know who’s to blame.

Terrible news for us. He’s an awful manager and I’m confident he’d have taken them down.

Even when they’re shit Everton seem to always take points from us.

Comfortably our worst result for a while. It’s back to reality with a wallop.

Got a comeback and Joselu winner written all over this one.

Massively harsh! We only bought him for about £2m I seem to recall and he's more than paid that back for his performances in the Championship. He had some good games last year but clearly the off the field problems have effected him. I still think given his age, and if he can get sorted he's a useful squad player to have.

Uhhh

Waking up to 3 points rather than reading how everything is bad forever feels absolutely glorious.