TheEntertainer

Some people think football is a matter of life and death. I assure you, it's much more serious than that.

Same, round after looks grim! It is the Champions league though so I guess it's all hard once you get deep: So many moving part's it's impossible to truly predict, fun to do though! Who would have predicted City to get tonked.

I think he's made a rod for his own back by actually looking sharp and scoring a couple as soon as he came back. He was dreadful against Man City and looked miles off the pace, in fact he looked very much like someone struggling for sharpness following a long layoff. Was just weird that it was almost a delayed reaction.

There was a good article about this on the BBC the other day, over and under performers, we're roughly where we should be based on XG, a few of the other teams not so much.

He makes a big difference to how the opposition have to play, when he came off against Man City, it let them press us more and get much tighter, which let them start to control the game. Obviously we got tired as well, but just the threat of his pace makes the opposition team position differently (even though he actually did very little). I agree he's not been great this season, but I think the team looks more effective with him in it just because of how the opposition have to change how they play. You can step into Barnes much more aggressively because he doesn't have the pace to punish you (despite him being much more effective in and around the box).

Sure it's been said already but easily our best player last night and best player on the pitch till he ran himself into the ground in the last 20 mins. Literally looked like a man playing against boys in the first half against Man City who aren't bad! just did whatever he wanted, whenever he wanted. Crazy stuff.

I was at the game last night, in the East stand corner again nearish the away fans and for most of the game I couldn't hear the City fans at all and there was a fair amount of singing from the home fans, however, I was sat a bit further along the East stand than the last two times and there wasn't much singing from the people directly around me, including me there was 3 of us joining in every song and a couple of kids behind me getting involved as well, but that was probably only 5 from like 20 sat around me, so definitely felt quiter than when I was sat right in the corner. The only time I heard the City fans over us was directly after the goals. It got very subdued at 0-2 obviously, but game was over then anyway pretty much. I didn't hear any boos for Elanga, but the collective groans every time he does something wrong must be really hard for him if his confidence is already down, not that I don't get it, but it really can't help.

I'm disappointed if a goal scoring forward isn't trying to score when he gets the ball on the penalty spot. I do see the layoff re-watching the goal, but I want my goal scorers to be trying to score from there. Woltemade tries to lay it off too often from that sort of position (though it does sometimes work as we saw with Barnes' other goal), I'd like to see him try and be a bit more aggressive and selfish when he's in the box.

There's no-way he's played himself out of the squad. I do agree he's unlikely to start though unless he has a massive upturn of form. There's not a huge number of top level left wingers trying to displace him. You get 26 players so we'll take 3 players who can play that position I imagine. Rashford is 100% in I'd say, then who else is there? Eze kind of plays there and Grealish, but they are very similar players and Tuchel doesn't seem to like Grealish. I'd be amazed if he isn't in the squad if he's fit.

It is very weird phrasing, I guess he means he's struggling to get back to fitness following multiple injuries and can't train properly as a result of that as oppose to actually being out with a current hamstring tear for example. It does make it sound weird though, like there's something going on behind the scenes.

Yeah, if we don't do any business in this window, I'd expect a fullback, a keeper (maybe Ramsdale if he's happy to stay as second choice?) and a centre-back in the summer and would think everything else would be either speculative or depth/development. Obviously things can change if we lose anyone ourselves. I'd be surprised if we don't give Schar another year unless he really doesn't want to be backup.

It's got to be Keegan right? He took us from 20th In the second tier and almost relegated to the 3rd tier, to two second place finishes in the top division at a time when Man Utd were miles better than everyone else in the league, so without their incredible dominance we'd probably have won the league. 42nd best team in England to 2nd. Completely insane achievement and not a one off as we finished high every season under him. Played fantastic exciting football as well. Probably coloured by the fact that he came in when I was 9 so that whole period was when I was really starting to understand being a football supporter. Fantastic time to be a Newcastle fan. Robson and Howe have both been great as well, but I don't think anyone can come close to Keegan for me. I don't feel the same way about Howe as I do about Keegan and Robson though, although looking at it completely objectively in terms of achievement, Howe is probably number 2. Robson is 2nd in my heart though. I don't hate Pardew though so that probably makes my opinion null and void.

I fecking love booing, one of the most fun things to do. Suggests disapproval, but is also hilarious. You sound like someone who's never seen the Princess Bride. That being said, I'd not boo my own players or staff, love a good boing of the other teams villain in a game though.

I think it depends where you sit, I've been to 2 games this season and both of those games were in the Leazes East Corner and there was loads of singing there, I always feel a bit silly if it's complete silence around me, but love to get involved if anyone else is, so have come away from both of those games having lost my voice. Lot's of urging of the team forwards as well.

I've not been to a huge amount of games this season (just Bradford and Barcelona I think), it's not always easy to get tickets, I enter every ballot, but it's luck of the draw really, so sentiment might have changed, but at Bradford there was one absolute melt sat a couple of rows in front of me absolutely raging about everything, every mistake from our players and every decision the ref made, full on losing the plot and screaming about everything. I just took from that, that he was an idiot rather than the fanbase as a whole being dissatisfied. Everyone else seemed fine, some quiet muttering as always when someone did something poor, but no-one else actually having a go at the players or booing decisions. There's always idiots, best to just ignore them. I am from Durham originally though, so am now worried about how I sound at games!

Sure everyone is already well aware of this, but the table this season is insane. 5 points between 5th and 14th at pretty much the halfway point. 3 points between 7th and 14th! Everyone is simultaneously Champions league and lower table chumps, crazy season. I think Burnley have been decent (they obviously aren’t great, but they also aren’t Wolves, they’ve been competitive) so I’m pleased with the result today. Definitely a bit dicey, but will always take an away win.

An e-martyr? I was replying directly to a post claiming people had become entitled, not talking about any other posts or any other commentary, not sure why you've taken my one directed comment and attached it to every comment in this thread?

I really hate the constant commentary that anyone who expresses any concern or thinks we maybe aren't doing brilliantly is seen as an entitled brat. We've been taken over and are one of the the richest clubs in the world (even if we can't spend it all, you expect to do better than relegation fodder in that scenario), as you say we've finished 4th,7th and 5th and had Champions league football 2 seasons out of the last 3, the expectation has now been set that we are battling for European spots. I don't think anyone is claiming we deserve Champions league every season by default, but based on investment, the owners vision when they came in and past performances, it's reasonable to expect us to be battling for Europe. We're currently 13th. Doesn't mean that's where we'll finish and doesn't mean Howe needs to be immediately taken out back and shot, but it does mean we're underachieving this season (based on the last 3) and I don't think the owners, the fans, or the players are happy with a bottom half finish as us reverting to type after 3 seasons of overachievment. It's reasonable for people to have concerns and completely unreasonable to just try and shout them down as entitled 'bad' fans because they have a different opinion to you

No true, away form is shocking, only Wolves worse than us of the teams who have been in the league the entire time so maybe it's just that, that makes it feel so bad. 6th is roughly where I would expect us to be based purely on expectation. Interesting that only 3 teams have been consistently good for that period.

It's not short term bad form though, it's been 9 months now with a couple of bright sparks (appreciate some of that was the offseason), I honestly don't know what the answer is and I definitely don't advocate making a change now, but it's been a long time that we've looked rudderless.

I think calling him a 'useful squad player' at Villa is very unfair, he was unreal in the 21/22 and 22/23 seasons, he was unlucky with injury and then got pushed out of the team by a player who is currently keeping Jude Bellingham out of the England team (even then he still played a lot last season). I've not been impressed so far, though he has been better recently. I was very excited when we signed him as I remember how good he was in 21/22 and 22/23 so hoping he can get back to those heights. The midfield is crying out for someone to add some creativity to take some of the load off Bruno. I think his possible upside is very high, not sure he'll get there but he's got the potential to be really good for us.

The team have been playing poorly since the league cup final bar a couple of bright spots. It’s insane to say we can’t ask what’s going on and question the manager. Like it or not we’ve set expectations now that we’ll be aiming for Europe (and hopefully the Champions league conversation) every season. Current form suggests we’ve regressed to a mid-table team with some serious heart/confidence issues. Of course question's should be asked of the manager. I’m not suggesting he should be fired now, but we should be seriously planning for a change in the summer if this continues. Yes he’s been brilliant for the club, but we’ve been poor without any real answers for a long time now. I expect us to throw games away every week now, it doesn’t feel like he’s taking us forwards anymore.

I think anything more than fullback cover would be weird, we signed 2 forwards, a right winger, a CM, a CB and a GK in the Summer, I can't see us basically giving them a vote of no confidence halfway through their first season by buying someone else in the same spots unless it's young potential.

I'd 100% agree with this, losing Isak was obviously a massive blow, but not much we could do about that. Woltemade and Thiaw have been good, Elanga and Ramsey have been bad, Wissa hasn't played really yet, Ramsdale has been OK. I'd say it's pretty average so far, though the out of our control loss of Isak probably pushes it to negative, but outside of that I'd say it's pretty average with more opportunity for upside than downside. I expect Wissa to be good long term and I honestly don't think Elanga can continue to be as bad as he has been as he was genuinely really good at Forest. I also think the Elanga criticism has been a bit harsh, yeah he's been poor, but then so has the whole team almost every game, he gets slated for his touch, but I don't think he's been any more or less effective than anyone most games as we've been collectively poor.