Abacus

Yes. More than harsh, exactly what sort of question was that? With what other player would it be acceptable to say something like that?

Absolutely immense, all over the pitch, and the only one you trust whenever he had the ball. Unstoppable right now. If only he hadn't been managed by the BFC for two years.

And how many teams could a Sunderland fan successfully mark on a map? Including Sunderland.

Botman and Rodon sound like just the crime-fighting duo our defence needs.

This lot have their quarter final against Arsenal in the current Omicron central, London Town tonight. Coming from a region which has very low Omicron rates to start with, I think it's a bit shabby that it's been allowed to go ahead. Not least because it means sending down a bunch who don't even understand how not to dive headfirst into a 6 inch concrete fountain, let alone how to wash their hands for 20 seconds.

What a comical team.

That's an amazing thread. They are arguing that they can't afford to give up £700, that the person who posted it must be a mag, that the people from Crook are all mags and that they are sick of being taken advantage of (probably by mags). It's as if they are so stupid that their heads have exploded, and I Iook forward to their ongoing rivalry with Crook Town, and the North Sea.

No, and a loan doesn't count as income anyway. So they could inject all the money in the world through loans, and it would make no difference to the ffp spending cap.

There's no easy way of establishing the market value of a sponsorship, so many factors to consider and it's a unique market. It's basically unworkable, I reckon. The concern is that it needs to be agreed by the PL lawyers, who will indeed take their time and try to tangle, block and obstruct for as long as possible. So I'm agreed with the idea that we just sign something and let them pick the bones out of it after. I mean, what can they do? A points deduction? Well, I'm fairly confident that's a bit like threatening Kojack with a hair deduction.

They should just put Peter Walton on VAR. Then he can simply agree with every refereeing decision anyway, so it's like it wouldn't be there. They could even change the name to the See-no-evil Waltonometer.

Really think we need at least a point here - not for the league table as much as for morale given the games coming up. I know we're not really expected to beat many of them, but we're on the up right now and a series of drubbings could turn that into reverse. But something here, something at Everton, and some fighting performances against the rest would put us in decent shape come January.

Could it not put Shearer in a bit of a conflict with his MoTD role? But yeah, get KK in all day long.

It's dated 7 October, takeover day I think. So old news, and yes, a way to raise cash from the owners by selling new shares (to themselves) rather than by taking on debt.

I thought it was interesting hearing Shelvey talk about his fitness levels already being up by 5%. I'd say it's more than that, but even so, tiny margins make a huge difference in the game. And he looks interested again, taking a few shots putting himself about. He's the first player I'd have dropped and called a waste of space before Howe came in, so I'm glad to eat my words so far. He's on my own team sheet again now.

It's been about 3 out of 4 games now since Howe took over where he's been excellent. I'm really rooting for him. If only he hadn't been managed by a big fat cunt.

I've no idea, but as a player who gets all over the pitch and never stops running, it's maybe worth a try!

Can you imagine a Joelinton chant? As redemption stories go, that would take the cake.

If that guy is the same Chris as Chris Weatherspoon, he was bang on the money last time when he said the chancers had bought Sunderland with their own money. Grumpy Narcissistic Old Fool said he was wrong, and Sunderland fans piled on to abuse him. In fact Methven, one of their chancer owners, encouraged this. He was essentially right, though. And now he is simply asking who owns the club, because it seems like ownership has gone to an offshore company whose ownership is murky / hard to work out. And might mean that Donald and Methven still own quite a lot of the club. Haven't looked it up myself, but that's what they're arguing about from what I can gather.

Avoiding technicalities, to me it's a bit weird how they've treated this. Anyhow, no interest on the loans or dates or conditions on the repayment date. Utimately, he could just write it off and not require the club to repay it because of how it's treated. It's described as a loan but not treated as a debt - it's been treated as equity, somehow. That being the case it means it's likely to be the owner who stands to lose rather than the club. I reckon. What can't be changed either way is their annual losses, which is what has stopped them spending more and probably will do for a while. Next accounts (to June 21) are due out this month. Would be amazed if it wasn't just as bad.

I just spent a few minutes scanning their 19-20 accounts (which run to June 2020). Holy cow they are a mess. Over the two years covered by that, they made a combined loss of c.£250m, their net assets more than halved to £70m, their short term borrowings shot up as well. The way I see it, they have essentially been propped up by interest free loans from the owner of about £350m.

Doubt it's a popular view, but one thing that's hard to deny about the apparently meticulous Benitez is that his decision making is pretty poor or under-thought when it comes to the jobs he takes on. Going to China was a daft choice. Fine that wasn't why he left Newcastle, and so that's not my problem with it at all. Going there can only have been about the money and can't have been well researched. Oh but Covid! Nah. Always excuses for him. It was a shit choice even at the time. Going to Everton was presumably as much about being near his family home as it was fixing a squad with no money, so presumably he didn't either understand the problems there to start with or isn't good enough to fix them. The point being, neither being nearer to home nor just money aren't great reasons for joining either of those two clubs if you're still ambitious, for all of his talk of 'projects'. Likewise, Newcastle was a terrible career choice for him. He can't have understood how much trouble we were in or the state of that squad when he took over in that relegation season. And he can't have done his research on the owner if he actually believed Ashley would stick to his word or have a single shred of ambition when he did stay on and get us promoted. Nor can he have any people skills to imagine that playing power games with Ashley was going to work or would end in any other way than it did. Before even that, Real Madrid was the wrong choice and arguably Chelsea too - prestigious jobs, but both short term and never the long term project he claims to crave. I'm grateful for the job he did at Newcastle, but I wouldn't be surprised if he's sacked from Everton and I couldn't blame them if he was. If they did, which other PL club would take him on now? His stock has fallen quite far and that's all due to his own decisions about who to join the first place.

Liverpool could be 2 or 3 up. At the minute, Benitez looks defeated on the touchline to me.

I think just kick it to the big man, whilst the crowd make air raid siren noises. (I actually do idly wonder that, because I don't know what other team does it now. If everyone is passing like Pep or pressing like Klopp then you can't do the same or they'll win since their players are better man for man at doing the same thing. I still remember how prime Stoke used to constantly rattle Wenger by sticking ten big men on the pitch, hoofing in corners and doing long throws. It's often the team that does something different that means the rest don't know how to react. Like how Japan played in the Rugby World Cup a few years back, by inventing a completely different style that nullified their opponents' strengths. That's the longest thing I've ever written in brackets.)

Shearer's man of the match on Prime, and too right at well. So many tackles, always running and making himself an option. Without him we lose that game. Good on him.

Minor quibble, my memory is that we sort of fluked that championship title since Brighton went on holiday for the last few games, having already been promoted themselves. It certainly never felt as easy as the Hughton promotion. But in either case, it's no easy job to turn around a team in freefall. I actually think Hughton's promotion was better, since there were so many stinking attitudes in the squad he inherited. But then again, maybe he had a better squad to start a rebuild with as well.