CSA96

It's a bit of both I think. Silva has been touting himself about for all sorts (which he has a rep for already), and so has his agent, but that Fulham contract is difficult for another club to get him out of. Was pretty keen on going to Saudi by all accounts and was the top target for the Forest job too

Psychotherapist. Not physiotherapist

BBC reporting that Gary O'Neil, Will Still and Jon Dahl Tomasson have all had initial interviews with Norwich

They asked you to take off stickers or the tags? You switched midway through I mean, I could understand a security team asking for the previous, old security tags to be taken off if you're walking around with a load of old bag search tags still on there

Oriol Romeu: "I feel lucky to be back, and motivated to push as much as I can. I've felt around the club and the city how much respect and love I'm getting. It's special. I want to give it back with good games, good performances, and with professionalism and respect."

Thierry Small says hold my beer...

Probably needs a freeze from a little earlier too, the ball is already in flight there. Whereas the below is as the pass is hit

Appreciate they are as relieved as we are, if not more, and I am splitting hairs a bit but I didn’t enjoy the reaction from our staff on the bench at FT. The standards should be higher than rapturously celebrating that at the whistle. Looked like a lower league minnow celebrating an FA Cup upset. I noticed Lallana didn't really engage with it while the others were all hugging and bouncing up and down in delight, which makes me think he thought it was a bit much too. Hopefully we look externally for someone to come in and raise the bar

Saints (3-4-2-1): Bazunu; Harwood-Bellis, Stephens, Wood; Fellows, Jander, Downes, Manning; Scienza, Robinson; Armstrong Bench: McCarthy, Roerslev, Edwards, Quarshie, Aribo, Bragg, Matsuki, Azaz, Downs

Who knows. It's how our U21s play but our U21s always play however the first team play, as is common at an awful lot of clubs, with the logic being that it's easier to then integrate the young guys into first team training and help their understanding of match roles

If someone's a loud mouth, I'd like them to not be shit. Nobody moans about Ryan Bertrand because although he clashed with Ralph (and other Saints staff) he was fucking good at his job and kept it professional enough With those other names, he didn't bin those guys off though, did he? Bertrand chose to decline a contract offer and move to Leicester and earn over £100k pw, which was a mental financial decision by them and very quickly apparent as a bad idea by their hierarchy Ings was sold for big money and was never the same player again, while Forster was a shadow of his former self anyway. He hasn't had a starting gig since leaving Saints. Bednarek shouldn't have been required to start at PL level in any case, as we've all established many times

Gerrard will have a hefty tax bill to pay if he returns from the Gulf before the summer of 2026, apparently Carrick did take over with Boro in 21st and lead them to 4th but then followed 8th and 10th placed finishes Worth noting that during that period, Steve Gibson’s investment was being questioned somewhat by supporters as it seemed he was running out of capital to invest in the club and they look better this season after selling a handful of top players and replacing them well, plus using the additional funds to round the squad out better than it was before

Stephens was binned off at all costs by Ralph at a time where we didn't even have much by way of resources and for certain he repeatedly challenged his authority and would do so in front of the wider group I know a few players have since come out and criticised Ralph's people skills and said they had run-ins, but Captain Jack was the only one who pushed it enough to get shipped off to Bournemouth just to get him away

Tony Mowbray is actually my clear #1 pick but I can't see it, especially given Spors came in and sacked his brother Darren as pretty much his first act as Sporting Director after taking a watching brief for a bit

Gary O'Neil is going back in at Wolves so can scrub his name off the list if there was anyone who thought he might be a viable or desirable option

Even Will Still, we were waiting on RC Lens and the appointment was only confirmed after Lens put a club statement out saying they'd signed a financial agreement with Saints to release Still from his contract

There's a few points on which you could argue Carrick makes a lot of sense: + Has experience of this division and English football + Took over Boro when they were in the shit mid-season and turned it around, led them to the playoffs + He has coached Azaz and Archer before and got a tune out of them, both performed to a high level with him + He's out of work, available immediately and won't cost us compensation + He has the playing career/medals to deal with any of our petty fuckers who want to question him + Has a good network within the game, seems well-respected, has worked with younger players/loanees etc + He'll play the system that suits the players, he prefers a 4-2-3-1 I think at this stage from the names I would consider realistic options, he is probably my favourite So it won't be him

8 min interview by Adam Blackmore with Leo Scienza: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p0mczrwq?partner=uk.co.bbc&origin=share-mobile Can't remember a player sounding this fired up, especially in a pre-match interview

Sorry, but it's only a Beta in name It's more like an Alpha, a product in the middle of its development cycle rather than approaching the finessing and full launch stages. I'm waiting and I'll take the plunge once it seems to have its issues ironed out, but I'd be surprised if that happens very quickly I have a couple of friends who are former SI employees, one a QA analyst, and they have several people they know still working on FM. I've seen a few messages and even people inside the building don't feel like the game is anywhere close to their regular standards and is littered with issues that make it tough to enjoy

Yep, definitely feels like they've repositioned the game as being for console/tablet users and away from its roots. It's lost some of its immersiveness and the new UI is hard to grapple with and particularly intuitive. Clearly they've been put under huge pressure to launch because even for a Beta, the game is an unfinished project right now, a fair old way from being finished to usual standards