SteV

Is that the craic with Ukrainian teams? Hadn’t really paid attention to that this season. What’s the fan situation there? Are they getting many ‘home’ fans, and still the normal restrictions on the number of away fans? Don’t think I’d fancy a half empty stadium like.

Anybody else starting working through various possibilities on SkyScanner? ?

The dream that we always knew was possible. We’re not a middling PL team that should be grateful for a fluke season where we qualify for the big league. We’re Newcastle United and we’re fucking massive.

Feyenoord, Porto and whoever from Pot 3 and we’d have a fairly reasonable chance of topping the group.

Lille have played Gent which I think is less than hour away.

#HeadsGone

A draw isn’t actually that bad for them tonight. Yes, it would mean it would be out of their hands, and I suppose you’d probably think Everton will beat Bournemouth, but Everton slip up and Leicester beat West Ham, they’d be safe.

They’ll absolutely time waste like fuck at the start of the match. They’ll have seen how we’ve generally been all over teams first 20 mins at home (probably Southampton aside recently), and they’ll be desperate to try and take the sting out of that. Thought the crowd did a good job of jumping on the Brighton keepers back when he tried that last week, resulting in the ref then getting on to him. More of that needed tonight.

That was bizarre. I know a lot of us on here cringe at a lot of the stuff he says/plays, but if you look around the stadium there’s plenty lapping it up, so I don’t think it’s a universally held view that he’s terrible, outside of here and SM anyway. But when it came to the poetry, you could literally see everyone thinking ‘WTF is this?’. Possibly Remembrance Day aside, a football stadium is not a place for poetry, as if that even needs clarified.

Pot 1 is actual champions (league winners of top 7 leagues) plus Europa League winners.

Indeed

People

Defended like one for the first 20 mins the other week.

Yes, obviously, I’m not necessarily questioning the legitimacy of the rule. More the fact, that you’ve got someone who is ’English’, plays for England, but because of circumstances, doesn’t count as home grown. I suppose it’s evidence that you need to look at this rule not in terms ‘we need to have less foreigns in the team’, and more ‘we need to have more academy players in the team’.

My mate was in Rome a few weeks ago and took a day trip to Naples. Because he’s a fucking idiot he decided to wander off the beaten track and ended up in the bum town part of town. He sent me some photos and this random housing area had massive banners of all the players everywhere. Looked cool and scary as fuck at the same time. Agreed that would probably be one I’d swerve if we (qualified and) got them.

Or Bayern. There’s PSG as well but they’re not really the same level of stature.

I think so. Mind that run of goals that Cisse got when he first signed was something else when you look back at it. Everybody obviously remembers the two at Chelsea, but you also had: - Raker into top corner v Villa on debut - Flying volley v Norwich - Mad scoop v Swansea - Great counter-attack v West Brom Not to mention various other tap-ins and headers. Felt like he could score all types of goals imaginable. Still nowhere near the overall level of player that Wilson is like.

No. The homegrown quota is something we need to consider going forward though. We’ll be fine next season and for the next couple of seasons, but once the likes of Wilson, Trippier and Pope start nearing the end, we’d have a problem if most of our signings between now and then are non-homegrown. edit: as an aside, I was looking up the rules on this, and discovered Dier doesn’t count as homegrown for Spurs, even though he plays for England, which is a bit mad.

Let’s wait and see if Forest stay up…

Thought the crowd on the whole managed to channel the understandable nervousness when they scored much better than in home semi against Southampton. From my seat in the Leazes it felt like the Strawberry Corner was really, really good and that spread. Nervous but massively supportive at the same time. Great explosion of joy and relief at Wilson’s goal.

Tbh, it was less than 18 months ago they were beating us 4-0 at their place, and although we had a bit of hope by that point, the gulf in class still appeared massive. To have a complete role reversal so soon is a bit mad.

The NYD fixture at home to these three years ago really did feel like an incredible low point. How times change…

The way he organises our press is something else. When you see it close up if the opposition has a goal kick or something he’s literally never stops getting everyone where they need to be.

Do a check on some of the lunatics in the NUFC RTG thread and see how bad >300 posts looks….