HaydnNUFC

Doesn't he look like a Super Mutant from Fallout? EDIT: Ah, no, that was Darren Curry who organised the fly over and looks like a Super Mutant. That Mark Curry is just a buffoon.

There's opinion with a backed up argument, and then there's just unmitigated wank. Those tweets by that bloke and some of the posts in this thread and just about Rafa in general recently have fallen under the latter category.

I think he was at the Spurs game.

What an utter bell end this bloke is. https://twitter.com/markcurry26/status/961070280453115904

https://www.physioroom.com/news/english_premier_league/epl_injury_table.php#c14

He can fuck off.

You genuinely think that that team, the one that at one point or another had Wijnaldum, Sissoko, Thauvin, and Townshend in it, wasn't quite clearly better than what we have now? I honestly don't even known where to start with that.

We expected to be after the summer window. If you didn't then you're a moron. When have we done that? We should've scored 2 against Burnley. We had a couple opportunities at 0-1 in the first half at Palace. Can't remember any of those off of the top of my head other than Perez on for Joselu in the Bournemouth home game. Completely disrupted our flow but other than that I can't think of any. Can't really do anything else when he's got fuck all to work with. These "negative tactics" have got us above the bottom 3 and with a superior GD to many of our relegation rivals. This can only really be applied to Murphy. I want to see him start too, like. But howay, mediocre budget gets you mediocre players. That's what we have. This point is moot, McClaren had a far better side. And I'm confident we'll pick up a few more points between now and the end of March. McClaren stayed on 24 points from the WBA home win in early February to the Bournemouth defeat in early March. He should not be above criticism when he gets what he needs. The people above him have been taking the piss for 3 transfer windows straight. And yes, he should take some blame if we end up going down (I don't think we will, mind) but 99% of it will be down to Ashley.

We "opened up" and went 4-4-2 in November and December when we literally had our run which has dragged us into the mess. I think we've only won playing 4-4-2 away at West Ham.

We had 24 points at this point last year but didn't increase that total until the 20th March. McClaren also had a far better side. Dread to think where McClaren would have this side.

I'd go with 54's team. Decent side that actually. Predictions on the minute for the first anti Shearer chant from their lot? I'll go with minute 1.

No. No what? I just disagree. It's probably 99.9% Ashley in reply to Sho'Time. Last season's January window was awful. Rafa identified we needed bodies in to solidify promotion in another 23 or so games and actually sign some PL players in advance for this season. And that was blocked by Ashley. The signings from the most recent summer being poor because he was given what is almost f*** all in this market you can't really put down to him. This talk of bewildering subsitutions, I can't think of any off of the top of my head. Perez for Joselu in Bournemouth (h) maybe? That's it. Regarding lineups, whenever people have lambasted it (West Ham away, Stoke away) we've usually won (or at least come away with a good result). The squad we have is the worst squad in the league imo. The fact that we are where we are is down to our approaches tactically and how well drilled we are. That's down to the manager.

No.

hahaha

We should've also won at Southampton. Had numerous chances, hit the post, had a goal wrongly disallowed against Bournemouth. Had golden opportunities against Swansea, Burnley, Everton. Should've really gotten a point at Huddersfield. Say we actually had invested in a striker that Rafa wanted who took those chances. That's 13 points we've missed out on. Blaming Rafa is f***ing daft, man.

What would you have him do differently then?

It all stemmed from Chelsea's failure to get Lukaku in the summer. Conte desperately wanted him but lost out to Man Utd & Mourinho.

Chelsea collapsed in 2015/16, as champions, under Mourinho, and are now doing a sort of slightly less shit edition of that collapse under Conte. I wonder if anyone ponders that it’s not down to the manager.

Go back to long posts, please.

Jesus Christ

That's that.

Ah well.

Canny.

Probably the same, maybe even a place or two lower. We'd have also been top 8-10 the following season though rather than fighting relegation. Agreed. I'm convinced that that 2012/13 season convinced Ashley that Europe was a bad thing. Pardew always used the EL as an excuse for embarrassing performances in the Premier League which Ashley presumably bought, despite the joke summer window we had. Bringing in only Anita, Amalfitano and Bigirimana for an extra 12 games in the season man. Love European nights man, so hope we're back there under Rafa soon.

3rd-6th.