TheBrownBottle

I do too mate - but I’m struggling to think of someone who I’d comfortably put 3rd otherwise. It’s somehow forgotten that he also inherited one of the five richest clubs in Europe. It took years and a LOT of money to get results - and even then, the most consistent players when he left were already there when he arrived.

Yep, that’s what keeps him there for me. Eddie won a trophy for the club Keegan built. Howe is comfortably no.2 for me - Robson is a fair way behind in 3rd IMO

He’s still above Howe for me.

Keith Barrett’s flags were unbelievably exciting to me as a young’un back then - they just weren’t a ‘thing’ in England

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-northern-ireland-60157409.amp https://www.irishpost.com/history/on-this-day-in-1997-prime-minister-tony-blair-apologises-on-behalf-of-britain-for-irish-potato-famine-213605

You’re being a silly billy now. Barton has been playing the old ‘can’t say nuffink anymore, I’m being oppressed because I’m a straight white bloke’ shite for some time now - which is what a fuckton of privileged fuckers say when they spout racist and / or sexist shite. It isn’t of course that white people can’t be oppressed - the vast majority of them are (the vast majority of them are working class). It is that Barton cannot possibly be in that number, given his privileged status in life (wealth, platform, fame). And the one thing that working class white folks are not normally oppressed by is their skin tone - it is because of their class.

He was in Blu Bambu one night early on buying rounds - Christ that place was horrible

I’ve always wondered why the edgelords who want Die Hard to be a Xmas movie never add Lethal Weapon to the list.

It’s undoubtedly poverty porn. My old man (who is from Walker) flicked it over to me the other day. I hadn’t seen the bloke’s videos before. All grim stuff.

NB I think it is desperately sad what has happened to Scottish football over the last few decades - as it is for any smaller European country (and especially the decimation of the leagues in Eastern Europe). Money and TV broadcasts have concentrated eyes and exposure on a handful of countries - and even there in a handful of clubs. The game is far, far poorer for the loss of general competitiveness - though Celtic and Rangers have of course contributed to the plight of Scottish football

If Rangers and Celtic entered the PL they’d have the same issues as us - they would struggle to make up the financial ground on the ‘Big Six’. They are nowhere near as big globally as Man Utd, Liverpool or Chelsea. I know they think they are, but they don’t have anything like that worldwide reach. To get it, they’d need many years of success in the PL and in Europe. The ‘social media’ followers thing is always interesting - Leicester are obviously there as a hangover from their surprise title win (people tend not to ‘unfollow’), but Rangers and Celtic have followings about the size of Burnley. A few decades ago they were undoubtedly in any conversation re ‘big clubs’ in British terms. Now they have neither the reach nor visibility of Bournemouth. Sure, joining a hypothetical British PL would give them a boost - but there’s nothing to suggest they’d outperform Everton or Villa or Leeds. If anything, the sad act glory seekers in their support would disappear - as would the even sadder ‘second club’ brigade from south of the border. It would be interesting to see just how deep the support is, shorn of success for an extended period.

Haven’t listened to that for yonks!

Agreed - Man City, Bayern and Real have CFs; Liverpool, Chelsea, Man Utd, and Arsenal wouldn’t have the FFP headroom; Juve, AC Milan, Inter, Barcelona and Man Utd don’t have the money. The odd one out is PSG - not sure if that would appeal to Isak.

Having said that, my suspicion would be that he could end up in a destination which never gets mentioned - he gets sold in the next couple of years to a PIF Saudi club for an insane amount of cash, and earns himself a million a week tax-free. Funny how this one never gets mentioned in the press - but I reckon there’s more chance of that than him joining fucking Arsenal.

No - if he goes, it is for a transformative fee to one of the world’s genuinely biggest clubs. And if he stays - we’ve got one of the best forwards on the planet.

While nothing will ever beat Taylor Parkes’s review of Tim Lovejoy’s book for WSC, any Steve Bruce book review citing quotes will run it close

I posted the video he did in Byker and Walker earlier today in one of the Chat threads. It is truly bleak stuff - Hendon doesn't look any worse tbh.

As a former proud owner of the Steve Barnes trilogy, I'd say I'd recommend them. Problem is, they go for a bastard fortune on ebay these days, which is a shame, and also means I regret the fact that I lent them out to my mates a couple of decades ago and have no idea where they ended up. I'd have been rich if I'd kept them.

Fucking hell, looks like another thing we'll have to apologise to Ireland about. At least most of the previous sins were before my time.

I'm still embarrassed that he's associated with the club at all, and I was at the time he was here.

Can't understand him with that thick Scouse accent. I'm convinced that the worst Liverpool fans are sad-sack glory-seeking wankers like the home counties twat in the video.

I’m not convinced we’ll be in a title race next season - and we don’t know how long three of the Sky Six will remain broken. I can’t see Man City remaining this way, too. We’re at least four first-teamers away from that at the moment (GK, at least one CB, CM, RW) - not allowing for any departures.

We were going down in 21/22 without Howe & the buyout, deffo

I still find it incredible that anyone actually watches the qualifiers at this point. There is zero peril. It must be a couple of decades since the last time they were interesting - and further bloating of the WC to 48 teams renders the whole spectacle pointless.