Kid Icarus

He had a bad game, I don't think that means he's bad overall and doesn't offer anything. Likewise Almiron who's very limited on his best days had a worse day than usual. Likewise Joelinton, Schar, Bruno, Targett, Trippier to an extent. Everyone was off it.

Willock's obviously the whipping boy on here like. I said it before but you're mad if you came out of that match singling out Willock as the problem, he was probably our best midfielder today. Bruno was off it and Joelinton put in the worst performance I've ever seen from him. Saying all that, I do think Willock needs a rest considering how much he's played and Shelvey coming in also means pushing Bruno forward where he's more effective.

FWIW, as poor as some of the crossing was, it was often fine but there was no one in there. Willock, Almiron, Trippier, even Murphy all played decent balls in in the second half and it was just Isak in there on his own.

Hard to argue considering I didn't give the first shit about our results for most of the Ashley era

Would you really have? We had 73% possession and Bournemouth sat off us knowing how dangerous we are. That alone was a pipe dream under Ashley

He's right though. If you can see a player doing things off the ball that the camera can't it's totally relevant.

Can't believe anyone could have watched that match and singled out Willock as the problem like. Absolute fairytale stuff but not at all surprising from the usual suspects.

What a game for me to choose to break my 8 year hiatus. Just back now and I have to say that the match didn't feel right to me even before kick off, something just felt off. I don't want to go overboard, it was very flat and despite completely dominating possession we rarely looked like carving anything out. I could single out individual poor performances - Schar, Joelinton, and Fraser were particularly bad, but the truth is that they were all either off it and/or the game plan wasn't doing them any favours. We looked slow, aimless, and without a real clue what to do to break them down. I know I'll probably get stick for this, but Willock was the only player doing anything with any zip and urgency going forward, Burn was probably the only player who didn't really do much wrong. The plan seemed too often to be to go through Trippier, overlap and cross, but the box was too often empty or the ball was poor. We missed ASM but tbh I'm not sure we'd have won with him considering how off it the likes of Trippier, Bruno, and Joelinton were compared to their usual standards. Having said all that, as poor as we were we still had the chances to win, hitting the post, the bar, and working the 'keeper all in that period at the end of the first half. It could have so easily been another one of those days where it was a 1-0 loss as well though, the penalty decision was extremely lucky and absolutely not a clear and obvious error by the ref who was fucking shit throughout. A bad day at the office and a lot of work to do on how to break teams down. Pope 6 Trippier 6 Schar 4.5 Burn 6.5 Targett 5 Joelinton 4.5 Bruno 5.5 Willock 5.5 Fraser 4 Isak 5.5 Almiron 4.5 Longstaff 5 Murphy 6

Exactly. It's blatant, and it includes the smug moralising that they supposedly hate. Projection at its finest.

Not only have we missed him for what he brings, but we've missed him for what he allows Bruno to bring.

Honestly got no idea wtf anyone's on about tbh Did I miss something yesterday? Looking back through the posts I can't see anything like what Heron, Whitley Mag, The Guv etc are alluding to.

He sounds an awful lot like those snowflakes and violent thugs in Antifa that I bet he hates. Absolute whopper

The idea that this place is loony left central is funny like. I've known some genuinely loony left people and this place is nowhere being that with the exception of a few instances over the years. There are very few old school lefties on here as well. Looking through the comments from earlier yesterday it's just people saying they don't agree with it and why. That's not moralising or saying don't do something or shutting down free speech, it's literally just people giving the opinion everyone's entitled to and explaining why they have that opinion - no different than someone saying they want a tribute to the queen and why. It's quite ironic considering the point some were trying to make was that people are desperate to be offended and shut down free speech. I couldn't agree more about how widespread that is, but I don't think you're any less guilty of that tbh.

Think of it this way, you couldn't have possibly won with everyone. The option you've gone with probably has the least collateral damage.

Divn't hoy liberals in with the left, neither group likes being associated with the other.

Yeah maybe the things to be proud of aren't heard enough but they are celebrated. There's not a gala in Durham every year for nothing.

Can understand the decision to not do anything and framing it as a mark of respect though. Would have hated seeing something pro monarchy/for the queen, so happy that the no flags thing is pretty much the same as a minutes silence.

That sentence fell off a cliff in the second half like. We're undeniably in the shit in loads of ways, I don't think you need to be anywhere near left wing to recognise that.

I'd put 2 and 2 together and thought it might have been that Howe didn't like the podcast sideshow or possibly that he just didn't rate him, so I'm pleased to hear that we went for what was a no-brainer at the time. Clearly the lower risk option to Karius, let's just hope it ends up working out alright in the end.

I'll be there and I don't want to whitey everywhere so I fucking hope not. Minute's silence then on with the football hopefully.

Villa 1-2 Southampton Forest 1-1 Fulham Wolves 0-3 Man City (double) Newcastle 3-1 Bournemouth Spurs 3-0 Leicester Brentford 1-2 Arsenal Everton 0-0 West Ham

To summarise, we already have Soccer Aid for that exhibition football stuff Soccer Aid>Soccer AIDS

They meant a north vs south team based on clubs rather than where players are from? I understand it like, everyone needs to be included, but it just makes it even more utterly pointless like.

Aye, but that has nothing to do with the format and everything to do with money and power. Changing the format of the league isn't going to be any kind of equaliser. Imo this how these things end up making it into conversations within punditry, because talking about fiddling with league formats and bringing in whacky rules is a way to avoid talking about the obvious inequality in the game.