Thumbheed

Aye, I dont think £15m is a lot for a prem proven defender playing in one of the better defences in the league.

Clearly rated by the fans who actually watch him play every week. 

Not sure whats not to like.

2 minutes ago, DJ_NUFC said:

 

4th director? I wonder if that’s being imposed upon Reuben / Stavely & co. And I wonder how they’ll react to that. Anyone have the non-paywall version to paste in here? 

I think they'll be fully on board this move as I imagine he'll be the intermediary between PIF and the club that will speed up the decision making process for AS et al.

Nearly 5 months later and it's still all too surreal for me.

I hope I never get used to this. 

Even if Alli couldn't bring the goals with him, his quality on the ball would still be invaluable to us. 

Loan with option to buy could be a good deal for us. 

I think he was closer to Ginola than he was Messi. 

If this boy had better decision making skills he wouldn't be playing for us. 

Imagine an equally dangerous winger on the other side though....

Shades of Shola

Really pleased for him.

Said it in another thread but he's done brilliantly to galvanise the squad under these circumstances. 

Really good win today with some excellent individual performances, hope we can build some momentum from that.

Think the most pleasing thing to see was the team spirit, everyone was really fighting for that win. 

Said it for a while now but we do desperately need some attacking players in. 

No idea what to do within 30 yards of their goal, otherwise not doing too badly. 

3 minutes ago, SUPERTOON said:

Based of his comments regarding the Everton job, we had and have zero chance getting him without a proper structure in place 

Perhaps, and we're likely never to know but I do think we offer a completely different proposition to Everton as we're one of the few clubs in the world without a glass ceiling.

And as for structure,we'll don't have it yet, but it's clearly something we're looking to address. Our public pursuit of Dan Ashworth helps that's narrative. 

Final point is he's clearly prepared to go down as he's essentially I that position every season (or should be) with Brighton.

20 minutes ago, SUPERTOON said:

Other than Rafa who would we even get in here go he goes anyway ? We struggled to get anyone in before appointing him and if anything or situation is arguably worse now than it was then. 

I think Potter could be tempted. 

I honestly think we missed a trick not pursuing him. In hindsight of course. 

12 minutes ago, MarkyMark said:

If Howe has took us down after having three quarters of a season, I think he’s cooked.  It would mean continuing the same form as the first half of the season - I’d have serious doubts we’d suddenly start winning next season. 

If Howe was allowed to take us down, I think I'd be massively disappointed. 

12 minutes ago, Manxst said:

It’s simply that he’s loaned until the point he’s a free agent and can go elsewhere for free/signing on fee? (I.e a 6 month loan).

3 minutes ago, Inferior Acuña said:

 

Just that - you're on loan, then your loan ends and you're a free agent.

Why would the loaning side ever entertain this? Seems like they only lose from this. 

How does a loan work if you'd be out of contract by the end of it?

5 minutes ago, ManDoon said:

I don't know what law they are beholden to though, I'm sure they could ratfuck us out of it in some way. Maybe I'm paranoid but with the Super League, the big six meetings, all that shit just gives me anxiety

I thought about this too, but if ESL ever took off again we'd still not be invited anyway. 

32 minutes ago, Wolfcastle said:

 

Thing for me is whilst logic suggests we'd come back up since we won that league that last three times we were in it, this is football and I'd far sooner not take the chance. It isn't a certain thing.

Blackburn only scraped up by the skin of their teeth after throwing record sums of money at it and Derby did likewise and missed out.

Yeh obviously like to avoid it, but I can't envisage a scenario where we wouldn't be able to recruit with enough quality to get us straight back up. 

Then once we're back up....

44 minutes ago, ManDoon said:

I’m worried what the PL would do in our absence mainly. We’d piss the division like. 

Obviously can't speculate on that but I'd be massively surprised if there's anything that could be legally done that could ever restrict our ability to complete on any level, if that's what you're implying. 

I mean I'd love to avoid relegation but if we don't, pride aside it would be fun as fuck. 

It appears the recipe for survival is basically:

More defenders = less goals conceded

More strikers = More goals scored

Is it just me or is that not the most basic interpretation of how football works?

What about the midfielders??

40 minutes ago, Kid Icarus said:

So difficult to answer, but what I'd also say is that despite Howe not getting us hitting the heights we'd like, instant impact is definitely not one of Rafa's strengths, we saw that in 15/16 and then we saw how our full seasons with him peaked at the very end after months of the players having his demands drilled into them. He's much more a project man, than a galvaniser.

But there's an argument to be made that he wouldn't need as much time to get his ideas across or to get to know the squad in the 1st place as he already knows them all. 

14 minutes ago, TRon said:

 

 

Better football to watch long term. 

We haven't been watching the same team in that case but if we're taking the long view, who do you think stands a better chance of winning something? Because that's the criteria that should really inform your opinion. 

Rafa's managed Everton for 9 more games than Howe has Newcastle.

What have people seen in those 9 games - or the 10 that's Howe's managed - that makes them think that Howe is emphatically the better choice than Rafa?

As for "we shouldn't go back", well why not? I've not heard a single decent reason that doesn't border on just plain superstition. 

20 minutes ago, Shearergol said:

Two new midfielders in this team, drop Joelinton, put a proper number 10 in. Joelinton only really looks good at the moment because the rest of them are shite 

Drop Joelinton?!

He's looked very good against very good opposition too. 

9 minutes ago, Hanshithispantz said:

Again not seen anything to suggest this is the case at all like, it just seems like something we're jumping to. His passing range is probably no worse than Kante's anyway.

He's also the starting point for a fair few counter attacking moves we've seen these past few weeks too.