TheBrownBottle

Oof unlucky with the bounce Barnes there

Back three, Murphy wingback, Anderson covering and dropping in on the left

Looks like three at the back, which makes far more sense in terms of personnel

Ho’way united

Murphy LB on worldwide feed

The salaries and agent fees are a problem. Clubs are being brought in line with 70% outgoings to turnover; but you can bet your bottom dollar that the agents and players won’t pay the least bit attention to it. A worldwide cap is likely impossible - I could easily see it being challenged in most countries as restriction of trade.

They will as it doesn't breach the existing regs

It is on at sensible o'clock over here in Sydney - 9:30pm kick off. I always feel more confident when I'm not sat with matchsticks in the eyes to keep them open! (I'm trying to forget that this is the dreaded 12:30pm KO time back home in Newcastle. I genuinely can't remember walking away from SJP after an early KO being a happy bunny - though it did usually mean that I'd stotting by mid-afternoon ...)

Got you. Makes sense, then

Yeah, I agree - the fewer players out of position the better for me. Still scratching my head that Hall doesn't start LB and Krafth RB. Aye, it is hope rather than confidence for me. But that team is still capable of getting something today - just need to keep howlers at the back to a minimum

Hard to see this finishing 0-0 like. I still think we can outscore them.

We'll be alright, as long as the ball doesn't come into our final third of the pitch

They weren't 20-30 quid for those adidas ones; mine was 35 quid. With inflation, that would be 85 quid today. Most of the kits were manufactured in sweatshops in Turkey, not the UK. And I seem to remember a former chairman boasting to a News of the Screws fake sheikh in a Spanish brothel about just how much they cost to make; just how quality they were; and just how much we were stupid enough to pay.

Most will disagree because it wouldn't be a good thing for the club. It would actually impact our earnings and seeding in the CL if we qualified next season.

Yeah, weirdly a red card would be better than one yellow in terms of suspension time

She's actually taking the moral high ground

Prediction: Newcastle win, and Bruno at the end of a MOTM performance gets booked in the 89th minute for something completely daft after about ten games of being a good lad.

With a van, it's like you've got an MBA, but you've also got a fucking van. You're not just a man anymore - you are a man with a van.

Chelsea's income will continue to be high for the foreseeable, even if they remain mediocre on the pitch - the commercial revenues are effectively baked-in; long term deals, plus they've got a sizeable 'global fanbase' at this point. Plus the usual benefits of being in London. I reckon they'd need a decade of consistent mediocrity / failure - i.e. what Chelsea was for pretty much its entire history pre-Harding - to take a real knock on the income levels.

I can remember singing ‘Nayim from the halfway line’ when playing Arsenal. I don’t recollect a time when it was any different (though English clubs were banned from Europe when I first started watching football. So maybe pre-Heysel it was different)

I read this thinking ‘it wasn’t long ago Ipswich were in the top flight’, then realised it’s been over twenty years. Christ I feel old

I can’t argue that tbf. Doesn’t mean I have to like it, though

It’s not about entitlement nor impatience. It’s about being owned by one of the vilest regimes on planet earth, whose presence at the club is a stain on it. What they’re doing - and what they’re likely to do - could be achieved by any wealthy, competent owner. So why do we need a Faustian pact with them?

I think they’d get more than that tbh. I also don’t think we’re at peak investment

It would mean that the SOS‘s official attendances would actually be reflective of the number of people in the ground. Well, at least 19 times per season, anyway