Nordic Saint

He must be absolutely terrified of the Lincoln attack. There are 8 defensive players in our starting 11.

That was the greatest World Cup Final, bar none. An absolutely magnificent game of football.

It will be a problem if the new manager doesn't suit any of the players. When they look at his background and especially what happened at the only biggish club he's managed so far, Stoke, they're bound to be a bit sceptical at first. He's going to have to win them over by winning games. It's lucky he's got a very easy run of fixtures to start with. If we don't win some of them, I can't see him lasting much longer than his countryman Mark Hughes did.

From his point of view, nobody wants a relegation on their CV.; from ours, he's been a part of the management team that's got us into the bottom 3.

I agree with you, Pilchards. Grealish for Bellingham looked such an obvious change to make. I know he's a very talented player but all Bellingham did in this game was keep passing the ball to the French. Some of our players were just too nervous to give of their best, as was Kane when he skied that second penalty several yards over the goal. The occasion got to him. Sometimes you need a player like Grealish who plays for fun and doesn't worry himself sick about every move he makes. Credit to Saka who tore into the French at every opportunity. Perhaps with Grealish doing the same, we'd have won. But, a better referee might have made the biggest difference of all.

He was certainly a great buy for Villa at £20 mill. He's 30 now, the age at which goalies reach their peak. The top goalkeepers are nearly all in their early 30s but because of their age, their resale value isn't usually very high. Pound for pound, a good goalkeeper over 29 years of age is the best buy you can make and will win you more points than any other player on the pitch, other than a top striker, who will cost you a fortune. McMenemy knew that when he bought Shilton.

Well, Michael O'Neill did. With exactly the same squad he achieved much better results and saved them from relegation. Mick Harford also got better results at Luton with the same players when Jones went to Stoke, and got them promoted to the Championship. Stoke 2019/20 season: Jones W 2 D 2 L 10 points per game 0.5 O'Neill W 14 D 6 L 12 points per game 1.5 So, basically, O'Neill was able to get three times the tune out of that squad that Jones did.

They probably remember where Nathan Jones left Stoke: 11v11 league table generator

LOL at Graeme Souness. I hope his half-time bit of know-all punditry from the Japan game gets played over and over again, especially if England win the World Cup. "That's how you win the World Cup. "🤣

You only have to look at what he did to the Stoke and Luton players to see that. He'd have Boufal playing like a Luton player in no time.

Pat Nevin: "The skills of Sofiane Boufal are fantastic." The problem, as we know, is that he only displays them in 1 game in 10. Admittedly, that first half was one of those occasions, when he looked the most skilful player on the pitch.

Don't tell her. Let her put out a missing persons alert. She'll appreciate you even more when you come back.

Maybe we got the wrong player from Birmingham City when we got Jock Adams.

We're going to have to do better in the second half if we want to win this 6-0.

I didn't know Mount was on the pitch. I'm not sure he did either. At least we've got Tunisia vs Australia to look forward to tomorrow.

Conor Coady for Stones would make a difference.

England look tired/lazy. Only Harry Maguire is saving them at the moment. If England get through this, the rest of the players owe him a massive debt. Southgate needs to make the subs now, before it's too late.

Red Bullsh!t?

Well, it looks like it's going to be the final we all expected: Saudi Arabia vs Japan

That's shut the Qatari fans up. It's unlikely the Saudis will hang on to their lead but it would be great to see the Argentinian cheats defeated.

The Argentinian diving before that was comical though. Twice in the opening minutes Argentinian players dived screaming to the ground when there was no contact whatsoever from the bemused Saudi players and on both occasions the ref gave a free-kick. If England come up against them, their cheating is going to be as big a game changer as Messi. There are more Qataris supporting Argentina today against their bitter rivals Saudi Arabia than there were supporting Qatar in their opening game, although Latin Americans, especially the Mexicans, seem to have travelled to Qatar in huge numbers so there are a good number of Argentinians there too, hence the Argentinian shirts on all four sides of the ground and their flags behind both goals.

Mick Channon's at the Dell v Coventry in 1971. Unfortunately, it wasn't televized as not many games were in those days, or it would still be being shown on TV. He took the ball from his own goalkeeper and then ran the length of the pitch, deliberately attempting to dribble past every player in the Coventry team. Half of them tried to tackle him, before he beat the goalkeeper with a shot into the bottom corner of the net. I've never seen any goal come close to that at top flight level. It was even better than the famous Maradona goal v England. Saints introduced a Goal of the Season award for the first time in the Club's history, just to commemorate it. The second best I saw live was Le Tissier's at Blackburn in 1994.

Don't be so shortsighted.

It looks like that was Nathan Jones' agent's first post here. If it was a Luton fan, they wouldn't be praising him to the hilt, hoping that we'd take him off their hands, or perhaps, after their recent poor run of just 1 win in 5, they would. This is where Stoke were when they sacked him: Pos Team Pld W D L GF GA GD Pts 1 West Bromwich Albion 14 7 6 1 26 17 9 27 2 Preston North End 14 7 4 3 27 16 11 25 3 Leeds United 14 7 4 3 17 8 9 25 4 Swansea City 14 7 4 3 18 13 5 25 5 Bristol City 15 6 7 2 24 21 3 25 6 Sheffield Wednesday 14 7 3 4 18 10 8 24 7 Fulham 14 6 5 3 23 14 9 23 8 Queens Park Rangers 14 7 2 5 24 26 -2 23 9 Charlton Athletic 14 6 4 4 21 16 5 22 10 Nottingham Forest 13 6 4 3 17 12 5 22 11 Birmingham City 14 7 1 6 14 16 -2 22 12 Brentford 14 6 3 5 18 12 6 21 13 Hull City 14 5 4 5 20 20 0 19 14 Cardiff City 14 4 6 4 19 20 -1 18 15 Millwall 14 4 6 4 16 19 -3 18 16 Derby County 14 4 6 4 16 20 -4 18 17 Blackburn Rovers 14 4 3 7 17 21 -4 15 18 Wigan Athletic 14 4 3 7 12 19 -7 15 19 Luton Town 14 4 2 8 21 25 -4 14 20 Huddersfield Town 14 3 4 7 16 21 -5 13 21 Reading 13 3 3 7 14 19 -5 12 22 Middlesbrough 14 2 6 6 11 17 -6 12 23 Barnsley 15 1 6 8 14 29 -15 9 24 Stoke City 14 2 2 10 13 25 -12 8

They could play videos of him that we could all laugh at, twitching on the touchline, biting his fingernails, looking like he urgently needs to go to the toilet.