jonny1403

He's fine as a backup - people can never give balanced opinions on this place

From my colleague who is a season ticket holder at Norwich: Depends what you’re after. He’s an excellent ball carrier and can beat a player. Decent defender but needs improving at PL level, but lots of potential.

Gayle is an underwhelming striker but he's not dismal. He'll get 5 or 6 throughout the season and should ideally be third choice for us. Joelinton is dismal. Rivierie, Xisco etc. were dismal.

Fair point. Didn't include him as you say he didn't really get any game time. However a striker on the treatment table for a year is still going to score less than Joelinton. Then again Shearer on one leg would still get more just by standing around in the penalty area I'm arguing for the sake of it now but Shearer still had a fat handful of appearances in the PL that year. Anyway, we're all agreed that the current crop is a bag of shite. Joelinton and Carroll were hilariously bad signings for different reasons. Muto was a swing and a miss whilst Gayle's purpose has long since expired; it's a shame for him that he's still here stinking up the place. Could have left as a bit if a cult hero if he'd gone permanently at the end of 17/18. Incredibly harsh on Gayle. He's not a first line premier league striker but he's never let us down. If he has been 'stinking up the place' I'd hate to see how you describe all of our other current strikers given that he's scored more than all of them combined.

You've clearly not watched Leeds play. They're way better than us. Bear in mind we barely scraped past a weakened WBA in the cup. That's our level. Oh come on I've seen them play a number of times against Championship teams and Championship defences. It's incomparable. They might do well, they might not. As a reminder, Norwich finished 5 points clear of Sheffield United in their promotion seasons.

Only Norwich conceded more than us away, a whole season under Bruce, with Rafa's defensive know how finally expelled from the team. I've no doubt we'll have the worst defensive record, we'll be pigs to the slaughter under Lord Bacon. Why are you just focusing on away games? Looking at that we had the 9th best home defensive record in the league. Saying you'll have 'no doubt' we will have the worst defensive record is just wrong.

We might go down, but the odds are we won't. As dreadful as we are to watch we are still a level above WBA, Fulham and (probably) Leeds. We are a better team than Villa, especially defensively and probably on a par with Brighton who could go either way next year. Throw in West Ham and Palace (who I think will have a very bad year next year) and there's just too many teams who are equally as bad or worse than us in the mix. We can defend which goes a long way in this league unfortunately.

Isaac Hayden? - had his family issues but that was understandable given the circumstances. If we’re talking established first-team players we must be looking back to Duff? What? Duff was dreadful for us

Upson? 57 appearances in 6 seasons suggests he wasn’t great at the Gunners. That wasn't the mantra though, was it? Just "produce one CB worthy". Post never said they had to be great at Arsenal. That said I didn't realise they bought him from Luton as per above post. My bad- I took the ‘produce one CB worthy’ as meaning that player must be worthy, ie good, as opposed to merely producing a player. He didn't play for Arsenal but he was obviously a good player.

“Just” to keep another player happy is not what I said like. It’s a bonus, and for like £6m... easily worth the risk. Signing a player who has just had an ACL injury, before he is anywhere near to having recovered from that ACL injury would be ludicrous.

Could see him ending up at Juve either this summer or next.

Would love to see a comparison of our form in the first 19 games v the second 19 games in the last 3 season. Feels like every year we seem to kick off the shackles and start racking up wins before starting the next season horrendously again.

Top trolling as usual I just don't happen to think he's quite as good as most on here seem to think. This place does get a bit silly when anyone expresses anything but mainstream opinion. It’s not just on here though, teams Bigger than us are starting to take notice of him. But I agree on the hype, it’s hard to say what he’s worth, he could easily nose dive in form next season and be a £30m player instead of a £60m one, which he will be if he continues this form till this time next year. But we’ve been in this position before with player. Cisse, £35m rumours after that chelsea goal to chelsea. Tiote, £25m to manu. Bellamy, £30m to Roma Dyer, £25m to manu and Tottenham Lascelles, £30m to chelsea Enrique to Barca (can’t remember the fee but it was at least triple what we got for him) The only time we’ve actually struck when the stock is high is Carroll to Liverpool to £35m. It stung like fuck at the time but in hindsight a great sale for us. Sissoko?

He's available for less than that. Schalke said they'd be open to renegotiating the price if we were interested. Probably get him for £7m imo, which is nothing, but i do believe he's on a canny wedge. Not sold either way. His time here hasn't been great, but i don't think that's a fair reflection of his talent, he's better than what we've seen. I don't think he's on the wane either, its simply down to games and getting settled. If a manager needed a player like him then at that price its a good buy, if its simply to make up the numbers as we're a bit short, then its pointless for us and him. Agreed, except for the making up the numbers point. We need a squad player to replace Ki and at that price it makes sense. And as you say he has barely played for a year so there is reason to hope he can improve further. He hasn't been terrible by any stretch of the imagination.

He's available for 9.5 million isn't he? Assuming no takeover I think that's a no-brainer given he's only 25. Even if he did nothing the next season we'd get our money back for him and we don't have a wealth of CM options.

Surely it's 4-3-3 with Joelinton the left winger and 3 CMs?

No rumours, but the absolute simple logic of their financial situation, now and ongoing, is that administration is almost inevitable. Not sure how you've worked that one out like.

That video Absolutely laying into his own fans - they'll be fuming

I don't want us to win the FA cup, not because of Bruce but because I think it will feel hollow in front of an empty stadium. The atmosphere in our previous cup finals was unbelievable and I'd love to be part of that again as part of our first win since 1969.

That wasn't a foul in a million years

It would be interesting to see us sign an out and out striker ahead of Joelinton - Miggy - ASM. Let's face it, even if we get taken over we aren't writing off a £40m signing after one season. And we won't be getting bids for him this summer.

They have barely said a word on it, how on earth have you got 'arrogant' from the last few weeks

It's exactly what Pedro has done above tbh. If you know you are leaving anyway it makes no sense to stay an extra month and risk an injury that could curtail your last big contract. It looks worse because Bournemouth are in trouble but I understand it.

I dont think so, i think it can made public that theres another buyer waiting but official bid i dont think so Is this the dude ashley was in the states with? and why would you bid 50mil more than whats been accepted If their lawyers are half decent, there will be a long-stop date in there somewhere confirming that the deal is null and void if conditions precedent (i.e. PL approval) are not satisfied by a certain date. I have no idea what that date could be.

Agree, they talk a good story but not a chance on earth would they part with money to save themselves , let just sit back and laugh at them .Im actually stumped to think of anything to not laugh at them it’s actually a very boring rivalry now. Just a knowing snigger at them . And there we come to the crux of the problem with Sunderland AFC. They can bleat on about how the club is the literal lifeblood of their town, their whole identity, and how all they want is PL football in a PL stadium. Just as long as it's all funded by a weathly owner and they don't have to pay for it themselves. Bit of an odd insult having a go at their fans, living in one of the most deprived areas in the country, for not being able to afford buying out a club in some hypothetical scenario tbh - I don't think our fans would act any differently.