Cf

Botman injured against Arsenal. Hall injured against Liverpool.

Have I got the thread for you today...

Overwhelming consensus on C for Barnes Next up Matt Targett...

Anthony Gordon scores a B joining Botman in that club. Harvey Barnes next who following Gordon's red card might be getting a bit of a run in his preferred position...

Jesus Christ lads. No-one's reading all this stuff surely?

Updated my vote to a B. I still have my reservations but agree with lots of the posts here.

This is probably true of quite a few in our team to be fair. For Murphy's strengths he's an obvious weak link which allows teams to focus their efforts elsewhere.

As for my grade... C. I got a bit of flak pre season for saying of all the purples we should potentially cash in on for PSR reasons it was him and that in some ways I saw him as a better Almiron type. I stand by this. When he's putting the work in he's great, but I find his technical abilities and decision making limited at times. Not bad by any means - it's why I consider him a better version of the Almiron mould. But when his head isn't in it or he's not feeling 100% he's just not the same player. Obviously when he is on it he can be really really good. I'd just like to see that more consistently.

Poor Callum Wilson gets our first E. Gordon is next. Whilst his red against Brighton will be fresh in people's minds and can of course be a factor in your decision try to not let it cloud it too much.

Tonali grades the highest so far with an A- Up next a player who I suspect won't score quite so highly... Callum Wilson.

I'm hoping we can argue for only a 1 game ban. Whilst stupid and he did push him it was pretty tame on the violent scale.

We could have had VAR in the 90s and 00s when football was reaching the peak of its popularity. There was a reason we didn't and it's not because we've only just invented replays in the last 5 years.

Just because Messi is an A doesn't mean players who aren't as good (i.e. pretty much all of them) can't be an A too. There's obviously a spread of ability in each grade which is fine. Unless you want the poll to read 100 99 98 97 96 95 Etc Etc And still I guarantee you someone would rank someone as 86.5 because he's not quite an 87 but he's not an 86 either. As far as my intention with this scale is concerned I see no issues with people thinking Sandro is an A even if I don't quite agree with the ranking myself

Joelinton comes away with a C+ which again seems reasonable to me. Up next is Sandro Tonali!

@OpenC casually dropping the only D grade.

The grading system guidelines were just to give a rough starting point. They're open to a certain amount of interpretation - everyone knows what A-E means. With enough votes it all comes out in the wash anyway. As for are we grading based on how a player fits in with us vs how they'd fit in elsewhere: there'll be an NUFC bias here of course as we'll primarily look to how they perform for us. The "any/most teams in the world" wasn't intended to be taken literally in that sense.

Jamaal Lascelles ends up with an E+ which is probably about right but feels a bit harsh to me but that's what doing your ACL at his age does I suppose. We get a break from defenders now for a bit and move onto Joelinton. I was torn between B and C here, and I think not long ago would have given him a C but I think this season and last has shown how much of an engine he gives us in midfield. Would he be what every team needs? No. And perhaps he suits certain games more than others for us. But when he's needed and on his game he's very very good.

I think prior to his injury i'd be between C and D. He was good backup when called upon and whilst he is limited in many ways he's a good defender. Based on the injury though I've gone with D. It'll affect him, and he's getting on in age too. Might even be an E at this point but that feels a bit harsh when he's not been on the pitch.

Oops. Have re-opened

Schar avoids the D and ends up with a C-. Next up we have potentially a trick one to rate in Jamaal Lascelles. When did he last play for us? A year ago?

This is pretty much it. We're at the point now where the "old guard" are on the decline. Your Trippiers, Schars, Wilsons, etc are reaching the ends of their careers. They're not overnight bad footballers but starting to become evident that they're not at the level of CL contenders no matter how well they might be coached. PSR is the obvious elephant in the room and I do wonder if this is why we've been very restrained the last couple of windows because we know a big refresh needs to happen.

Sven Botman earns our highest grade so far with a B. Next up we have Fabian Schar who for me is an interesting one. Even last season I think he was low key one of the better defenders in the league. Feels like we're seeing his decline at the moment, though perhaps not to the extent of some other players.

I don't get the controversy of the handball penalty. Did he blatantly stick his hand out and swipe at the ball "deliberately"? No. Did he do an unnecessary pirouette in the air which put his arm in the way of where a ball from distance was travelling? Absolutely. Handball is rarely "deliberate". The same way most fouls aren't "deliberate" but that doesn't make them not fouls. Your aren't allowed to handle the ball in football. As a player that means you have a certain responsibility to make sure you don't. If you want to start spinning in the air with your arms out and the ball hits them then that's on you.

After an early influx of Ds Trippier received a number of Cs giving him a final grade of C-. For maths nerds A = 5, B = 4, C = 3, D = 2, E = 1. Poll results then averaged which then map to a final grade. Anyway, next up we have Sven Botman. Potentially an interesting discussion given the injury problems he has faced...

There is no debacle! This is an efficient and clean operation!! I won't hear otherwise!!!