Matt1892

If they score early then we could be in for a second half like the first half hour.

Hopefully we can keep the same intensity this second half but we should play scared of anyone.

I thought it took a deflection but it didn’t, the shot was that good.

Beautiful ball and finish!

Embarrassing

City will see how desperate we are in this and put the loan fee up for Phillips.

Stupid from Bruno.

Only Pope and Joelinton missing from Howe’s preferred starting eleven here.

?

I didn’t say that though, you know that too but want to continue with the contrary opinion rather than admitting that having the ability to attract and sign better players plays an important part in the long term success of a football club.

I am not saying the right manager isn’t important; however, having more money so that you can sign better players by paying bigger wages also plays a pretty big part in the equation. They are not seen as the big six because they have a really good knack of appointing managers, in fact some have had some poor managers but have still qualified for the Champions League.

Nobody is saying that these clubs won’t face difficult periods in the same way that a club outside of the established six cannot climb in to one of the top six positions in the league for a season or two; however, the advantages that they have in terms of finances due to their standing in the English game when financial fair play was introduced will always give them more of an advantage to rise back to the top. That is what the problem is and why people are complaining about it. They see their natural position as being the top six with the likes of us, Villa, Leicester and West Ham as having a natural position of seventh to thirteenth.

Chelsea look like the away team here.

The two things I would support is a is a luxury tax, where if rich owners want to spend more than the cap on transfers then they would need to pay a tax on the overspend which could be distributed evenly for academy spend between the 72 league clubs outside of the Premier League. That would support the continued development of youth players in this country. I would also look at a salary cap, not on individual players but on the whole squad and that cash amount would be the same for the entire league.

He would probably be back playing now if he had the operation when it happened.

I did a stadium tour with my boy last season and from memory they said Arsenal corporate boxes go for a million each per season, whereas ours go for less than £50k.

You are right, I was talking from a cash point of view.

If they fall outside of the FFP window then amortisation isn’t an issue, we can lose as much as we like then.

It isn’t a rolling 3 years though.

The first window under this ownership will fall off in terms of FFP so that will free us up more than we had last summer, where we still spent a fair amount. I think the signing of Pope falls off too due to being completed before July 1st.

What makes you think we won’t spend much?

About £150 million.

Good news.

Clubs have figured us out now, they know that if they can either man mark Bruno or press him hard that they can shut down a lot of what we do in possession, so the logical thing to do is to change things up, either with the formation or the tactics. A switch of the triangle midfield to go with a traditional midfield two would not only counter the issues highlighted by LFEE, but would benefit Isak by having a link up player so he doesn’t have to drop deep for the ball as much, which I think would help create him more opportunities.

Do people think VAR would have overturned the decision and given us a penalty, presuming it was in the area?