Dr Jinx

Imagine him and Rondon up front together

With the players being linked, it seems that the penny may have dropped slightly about the state of our midfield.

It was a bit on the ambitious side. That’s the second big name French player to turn us down, we supposedly had a 35 million bid accepted for Soumare last year, even ASM couldn’t convince him to sign.

Well that was fun while it lasted ?

Carr being back throws serious doubt on Rafa ever coming back.

Can he get a tune out of Joelinton?

“Out of my way, I’ve got work to do”

So weird, like a different player in terms of pace, power and application. It’s almost like someone sussed out what his strengths were and then organised the rest of the team to play to them

He does that interrupting to try and control the conversation, he’s uncomfortable being exposed to hard questions so if he gets in ahead and leads the topic elsewhere he’ll never have to answer a hard one. Textbook sociopath move actually.

“I’ll answer that Steve” ?

His comment about what they worked on in training this week was telling.

I’m happy to get behind that. What an impact Jones has had within a couple of days. Bruce is surely no more than a mascot at this stage?

By pure accident as well. He (Diame) was never meant to play in that role. I’m not shitting on Rafa btw, but it’s nonsense to say that he had a midfield that were in control of things. Mostly due to Ashley not backing him properly but he still had overall yes or no on new players. He has about a 50% success rate with signings. Murphy, Atsu, Lazaar, Ki, Muto, Gamez, Hanley, Sels, Joselu. That’s 50 million spunked right there and that doesn’t include the cost of wages. Dubravka, Schär, Diame, Ritchie, Fernandez, Clark, Hayden, Lejeune and Gayle came in for roughly 55 million. Have been either very good or just ok Not counting Merino as we didn’t get to see him enough but we also didn’t lose money on him so can’t be classed as a bad move, but not a great one either. Overall Rafa got to make 28 signings including loans.

Aside from the Benitez comments I agreed with a few things he said. The squad are nowhere near good enough overall. The buck stops with Mike Ashley but there’s a bit of collective blame going back over 4/5 years. Our midfield for example, it’s been poor for so long and neither Bruce or Benitez made good transfer decisions there. Both work/worked with Shelvey on a day to day basis. He should have been out of the club after the promotion season, it’s clear as day to us, so why not them. The failure to control the midfield and keep hold of the ball there is and will continue to be the main reason why the defence is always under so much pressure. Rafa of course would squeeze extra from this bunch but not loads.

Dalglish totally fucked us. And remember, we could and did still spend money on players back then. He chose to get rid of Ginola, Asprilla, Ferdinand etc and gives his Liverpool mates one last pay off. Set us back 6 or 7 years. I hated Souness at the time but he was given a task of getting the brats either in line or out of the club while still trying to improve us as a team (which he probably wouldn’t have done anyway) signing Michael Owen ranks up there with some of the worst decisions the club ever made but in fairness nobody was saying that when we first signed him. His arrogance was on a different level to every other manager we ever had Bruce hasn’t done anything nearly as damaging as what those guys did but we still hate him more. He’s simply just a terrible manager. If Apple hired some fool as it’s new CEO and the company crashed and burned, you don’t blame the fool, you blame the people who hired him (or who let him stay long enough to do damage)

Something really weird with that deal. Like many of the clubs recent signings... He certainly looks like a player who should be competing for a place here? Maybe he was a naughty boy and was doping or something. We signed him as a favour to some agent and agreed to hide him away for a few years?

I think it’s probably 1) ? As I said before, he probably lives a very mundane life. This sort of attention will be doing all sorts of things to his ego in relation to his private life. Just can’t imagine his sourdough and Miles Davis parties are the stuff of legend.. He should stick to the lawyering when it comes to social media

Has a manager ever been sacked mid match?

“How do we make it die?”

He is overdue an enormous slice of luck He’s not though, he had more than his fair share of it last year. Luck runs out. What we’re seeing now is a core of Rafa’s squad who’ve had his good habits “coached” out of them and some additions who have had whatever good coaching from their previous clubs also coached out of them. It takes roughly a season and a bit for this to happen. This is the reason he’s rarely been at a club longer than 2 years. This is his getting found out phase. Getting found out? Crystal Palace, Huddersfield, Sunderland, Birmingham, Aston Villa, Sheffield Wednesday, Sheffield United, Hull, already found him out.... Got to wonder if Charnley pays any attention to football news in any way shape or form Yes, I mean the 2 year point in the majority of his jobs. Only Birmingham and Hull has he stayed longer.

He is overdue an enormous slice of luck He’s not though, he had more than his fair share of it last year. Luck runs out. What we’re seeing now is a core of Rafa’s squad who’ve had his good habits “coached” out of them and some additions who have had whatever good coaching from their previous clubs also coached out of them. It takes roughly a season and a bit for this to happen. This is the reason he’s rarely been at a club longer than 2 years. This is his getting found out phase.

I reckon it’s a total stand off between him and the club. He wants to get sacked, couldn’t be bothered even trying to repair the mess he’s been allowed to create. But the club refuse to pay his compensation. They have no idea how to get around it. And in fairness, he’s in the driving seat in that dispute. He’ll be getting paid either way.

I hate this chap more than Pardew, Carver and McClaren combined. Didn’t think it was possible but here we are.

The thing is he never would have been given the job in the first place if they weren’t banned from the transfer market. He’s certainly not finished as a manager but he’s probably a little too green at the moment. He could have done with another 2/3 years before getting a job like that. Chelsea hung him out to dry, not quite as bad as what this club did to Shearer but definitely used him to keep fans on side while they were regrouping

The opening paragraph of that article made me burst out laughing. How.. I mean fucking how does this chap keep landing jobs? It’s beyond me