Kilcline

Yeah that's fair on Haaland, I think he's a bit of a strange case in that he's ridiculously streaky aswell, I'd much rather have a Kane/Shearer type who scores most weeks than Haaland who'll score 20 in 15 and look unstoppable but then score 5 in 20. He's always been like that though, it's what's stopping him being a top, top striker in my mind. Although obviously he's still very good! The wrestling is weird aswell. He's surprisingly easy to bully out of games so I don't know why Pep encourages it, just get the bloody ball into his feet quickly and on the half turn and, as you say, let him run at people. Apparently with this new formation they play though he's creating more chances for others than ever before. Suppose Pep gonna Pep isn't he

I have just seen someone suggesting we should buy back Darlow and I'm not certain they're joking

Leg looked alright there

Italy are awful

N-O and NUFC socials are going to be incredible when this summer's PSR/SCR transfer fiddles are Tonali to Man U/Ugarte here and Woltemade to Chelsea/Delap here

Like most forwards not named Haaland or Mbappe at the minute, he'd look miles better if he had players closer to him. Plenty of times when even Isak looked useless for us when he was stood up top by himself and we were just lumping balls at him. Albeit of course he did have a bit of magic in him too. We probably can't make him run quicker (although apparently we worked with Sandro on his pace but he was rapid anyway, so presumably a bit of a marginal gain) but he can: learn not to take as many touches of the ball, get stronger, learn how to be a shithouse, improve his movement and what he does in and around the box. I think for the latter point we probably massively underestimate the difference between playing upfront alone and in a two. If he's used to being the second striker and making his movement into the box off what the main number 9 does, it's incredibly difficult to adapt in a league you're used to, let alone one that is new and where everything is happening at 100mph. Particularly so when our team in general isn't great at supporting into the box either, so if he's not where the ball goes the reaction is "he's shit" but where was the movement off what he did? Whether he can suss out the bit that he's in control of and be effective in the box on his own will ultimately determine the answer to the second question for me. *Usual note that I think he's absolutely class.

I thought this was going to say we should have had a pen on Sunday and was about to lose my rag again

Any chance if we give Arsenal Gordon they'll give us a free run at Kvaratskhelia

Was loads of the silly bastards during the summer and around the time we played them at home, as you'd expect they couldn't help themselves and lasted about five minutes, even the ones who started off pretending to be genuine and not masquerading as one of us. Cunts

Not this year, would normally do a game or two in or around London but coming home between England games for a change. Might try and get a few of the Northern League "Easter Groundhop" games in next weekend though, few games and a few pints, what's not to love?

Strongly suspect a sad mackem bastard logic of Man U were the only team that could stop us, therefore they must also be supported. They peaked on my street the week Man U beat us in the cup final then won the European Cup, fucking pack of cunts the lot of them. Never sure which way to swing on the parenting though. My old man was/is a dickhead, and he's also a sad mackem bastard. So while he'd never win a nurturing kids award I am always grateful that he never took me to Joker Park or I could have been one of them awful cunts.

I grew up and went to school near/in Washington, was probably 45% us, 45% mackems, 8% Man U then the odd Arsenal and bindippers fan. Few weird cunts at comp who seemed to support both Man U and the mackems depending on which way the wind was blowing and if either had just beaten us. Only other clubs I can recall lads supporting is if they'd moved from elsewhere.

Were you too young for 5 past Schmeichel in 1996? Or just fortunate to not go to school with or live near a load of glory hunting cunts

Yeah teams seem to get a lot of joy running off his blind side while he's tracking back, although what I would say in mitigation is that Tonali is often running to the danger (whoever has the ball) so in some situations there's a case that someone else needs to pick up Sandro's job, be that one of the centre backs or a midfielder as he's almost there as the "in emergency break glass" option when we get caught with the full backs high. So there's an argument that if he stays with his man, someone else will have to commit to the player with the ball, but that's another tactical discussion entirely. I'll forgive him getting drawn to the ball and passed around in the middle of the park for whatever number goal for Barcelona it was last week, he was fucked and we were gone.

I believe we stand alone there. Based on a quick Wiki while procrastinating the closest I can see are Blackpool (scored four twice, went down with the most goals for a relegated team with 55) and the smogbeasts in 96-97, who scored six in one game and four in another two.

I'd rather we stick to what we know and hope the one game a week makes a difference given that we're still well in with a shout of Europe and what would be a "par" finish in the league. Of course the danger there is that it leads to a doubling down and nothing changes next year. DM me the podcast if you remember what it was - sounds right up my street. I broadly agree with the arguments against you've mentioned, the reality is that 4-3-3 can be/is a pretty flawed formation unless you have the squad to rotate players out and everyone knows their jobs, depending on your interpretation and how you play. I think we're the perfect case study of that where we can look unstoppable when everyone is on it and can even compensate for the Grand Canyon between the defence and midfield etc, but when it's not working it falls apart and looks worse this season because, as someone mentioned in here or on another thread, we've stopped doing the "half space" runs in attack so we're predictable and easy to defend against unless we're physically dominant. The Champions League group stage home games against Benfica, PSV and Bilbao are a great example of that, we didn't play particularly well in those games, but we absolutely beasted them all physically and they couldn't live with us.

Where's the bit where he's wondering?

I've had the fear for a while that they're going to bring in Alonso, he'll play them together in a 3-5-2, and they'll be absolutely incredible

With any luck he burns whatever bridges he has at Liverpool and then Barcelona sign Harry Kane

My "Something bad has recently happened at Newcastle United Football Club" bingo card is filling up quickly. Keys ragebaiting saying PIF want to sell. The Mag published something about wanting Benitez to come back. People wanting various combinations of Staveley back, Howe gone, PIF gone. Hopefully I'm not in a public place when I see someone calling for us to bring Keegan in, not sure how people react to blokes randomly and loudly shouting "HOUSE!"

8 fouls is fucking pathetic like. We're soft as shite these days when teams play us that way. Their 19 fouls is the highest against us this season in 90 mins, even Bournemouth only got to 21 in the cup with ET and they're proper shithouses. Another team we shrink against, we only made 7(!) fouls in 120 minutes that day

Not sure about a name slip-up, but I'd pay a lot of money for Peter Drury to come out with something grossly offensive that gets him fired and never to be heard from again about Adolf saving the Jews this time or something like that. Otherwise, it'll just be the likes of Tim Sherwood making snarky implied jokes about his name and sitting there with a daft shit-eating grin on his face while the presenter awkwardly tries to move on

Shame on you and everyone else there that day that allowed the Metro Centre to fall without a fight

My ChatGPT image from the time, because why not. I think someone on here chucked it on Twitter to the DeludedOf account aswell

Oh aye, them two are the pits. I think WK comes out with far worse every week at the pressers, where she is often a disgrace. Interesting about the potential new coach, not sure I'd read that anywhere else albeit a lot of us have said it might help.