St. Maximin

As in you get a lot of players who play for the countries of their parents/grandparents. In a way that seems odd to me too because they aren't representing the country that directly helped develop them.

I can appreciate these views. In a way it does seem odd the manager can be any nationality given they are clearly very influential on the team. I was more wondering what benefit it would have as I got the impression this was important to people rather than based on what international football is about. Thing is if the manager and coaches should also be English then I don't know where you would stop - kit man, medical staff, cooks? All clearly important to making the team what it is, yet like the managing and coaching staff they are differentiated from the people that need to be English because the latter are the ones who are on the pitch. Ironically Tuchel has probably lived in England a lot longer than a lot of players and their respective countries they represent.

Might be an ignorant question, but what difference does the nationality of the manager actually have? It doesn't seem to be as big an issue in other sports or the women's team for that matter. Is it because they should understand the mentality of the fans better? Will their patriotism inspire the players more or give themselves more motivation? I wouldn't say the players need any more inspiration and unlike Capello, we have a manager who has lived in England and speaks good English. At Newcastle we had a manager from Spain who seemed to understand the fans better than someone who grew up in the region. Surely playing and managing mostly abroad is a good thing too as he'll be more familiar with different styles that we'll be playing against.

Good appointment, this. He’s a successful manager and one that has played exciting football and that’s what England fans want really. Southgate deserved plenty of respect but he was neither of those. If I wasn’t a Newcastle fan I’d want Howe, but that’s a no go for me so can’t complain really. Time will tell ultimately, but at present I don’t buy concerns about how the British public will react to him because he’s German, or if he doesn’t sing the national anthem or wear a poppy. I’m pretty sure only a very small percentage will give a shit and ultimately you have to accept there is a toxic element to fanbases, country and club. We shouldn’t let a small minority of wrong’uns cloud our judgment of the England fanbase in general.

Tbh I reckon looking and sounding really gormless has made him a bit more of a laughing stock than the other no10s and held him back as a result, but I think he’s a nice lad really and imo arguably is better. He seems like literally all his intelligence has gone into football but it’s helped him become this good already, so fair play

Basically Arteta got a bit angry a couple of times against us and acted like a prat, then some of their fans started acting a bit weirdly on social media too. Despite that most of them couldn’t care less about us, while they seem to have become our rivals now.

I think that miss wasn’t as bad as it looked as he had a defender in the way of the corner too, but in those cases just whack it Sean. Gutted for him but he needs moving on still.

Yeah I agree the way they acted after our matches against them was ridiculous and no doubt Arteta doesn't help there. It all just comes from being pissed off at the lack of success in recent years though. Mentioned it already I know, but City fans aren't all harmless people - you just won't notice as much toxic behaviour because they've for a long time had very little to complain about. If they hadn't won the league in 20 years I'm sure they would react similar in such scenarios. Regarding Arteta's behaviour, I think it's a typical part of being a manager at the top of the league. Pep complains too and he'd do it a lot more when fewer things go his way. Same with Klopp, Ferguson, Wenger, Mourinho etc.

People always say thus but fans are more likely to act like 'utter shitheads' when they are not getting what they want. Not like City fans are all wonderful people. You don't hear about the annoying ones because they've had very little to complain about. If they get a big punishment and go a while without winning much, watch them start to annoy people in the same way as the rest.

I can understand this view but City are part of it though. They are one of the 'big six' that just happens to be better and more successful in recent years and were lucky enough that they were able to spend loads in the last 15 years or so, only now it seems they may have gained success breaking rules. I don't like a lot of Arsenal, Liverpool, Man Utd et al fans, but I don't really get the desire to see them annoyed as they're also a non-entity like City are. I've said before I have a soft spot for Arsenal, but mainly I just like seeing something exciting at the top of the table as a relative neutral rather than the same happening every year. If it means annoying fans or a manager that oversteps the mark sometimes getting something to cheer about it's not the end of the world to me.

I just can’t get this way of thinking. Leaving aside the potential corruption, it’s so bloody boring seeing them win every time. Those teams would hopefully win it by being the best teams. Their manager or some melts in their online fanbases annoy people, but they aren’t the team. They’d also be way less annoying when they do win too. You won’t see Arteta going on one of his rants about how hard done his team is if they win the league. Watch how annoying Man City’s fans become when they stop winning everything and get become frustrated. Surely we should be looking for a bit of entertainment and excitement at the top of one of the best leagues in the world, over relief a team no one cares about wins it for the umpteenth successive time just as it means the teams we hate more didn’t get success

I would definitely agree on the ‘them and us’ view but I don’t think it’s anything deeply ingrained in most of their fans - it just so happens they’re the ones you hear most from as they’re apparent online and as Newcastle fans we also notice them more as it’s been in relation to our matches of recent. I think if the SJP fixture was reversed and Havertz created a goal like Joelinton too we’d be fuming. There’s been no shortage of complaints at the Prem being against us when we’ve had lots of VAR calls go against us too. I genuinely don’t get how people seem to know so much about a fan base based on such small samples - they just seem to be a team Newcastle especially love to hate now, but they aren’t our rivals. Their manager is a complete prat but he’s just one bloke there at the end of the day. City have potentially done far worse but that doesn’t seem to bother people as much. At the same time I know people love to hate a team as that’s how rivalries work, so I can’t change that.

Some of the hatred for the fans here is pretty amusing . They’re one of the most supported clubs in the world; of course they have wankers in their fanbase. Now they’re getting there based only on speculation! I probably don’t need to say it but while I only support one team, along with other teams I very much have a soft spot for Arsenal and want them to do well. That doesn’t mean I approve of Arteta, but he’s just the manager and a pantomime villain. Far more toxic things in football.

Justice for all round nice club Man City. They may be facing countless charges of corruption, but at least they didn’t get angry a few times like Arteta did. He should be in jail. Imagine if we engaged in time-wasting tactics too. Wouldn’t be like us

I appreciate they are also targets of these rules, but so are everyone really. We’ve already had Forest and Everton punished, so it’s not fair that the big dogs that are winning everything get away with it, just because the rules are not appropriate. They have launched a separate lawsuit against the PL for that - I think it’s okay to support that while expecting them to comply with rules that everyone else has been required to and already seen smaller clubs punished. If they are not guilty and have successfully found ways around the rules legitimately, then of course they should not be punished and maybe we can take after them, but any breaches should be punished accordingly. As ohmelads said, they were still part of said conspiracy and looked to break away, so they’re no separate entity from the rest of the ‘big 6’. Interestingly it wasn’t even that big before the rules came into force, so the PL hardly became even less competitive. They had some fun with their crazy spending after the takeover anyway that wasn’t deemed illegal - they aren’t victims from what I’ve understood so far!