Saint_clark

Really feel for him, after the highs of the world cup he probably thought a move to the Prem was a sign he was going to progress and be an internationally renowned star. Gone from bad to worse for him since then. I saw some clips of the World Cup earlier that involved Croatia and he was heavily involved, looked really good...we never really gave him any chance so makes you wonder why on earth we signed him.

I've always hated the mismatched sides in pre-season. I'd much prefer we do first half first choice, second half reserves. At least then our strongest line up (if the manager knows what it is) gets plenty of minutes together.

What a miserable couple of years for him, just after the highs of the world cup as well.

Mbappe for a billion Euros, anyone?

This is the stat that sealed it for me. Our defense looked leaky, sure, but they still protected the keeper better than 13 other teams in the league. Bazunu let them down because every time he faced a shot it was essentially a coin flip as to whether it went in or not.

Yeah, I guess that's fair.

Not really comfortable with the discussions of peoples private lives and personal identities I have to admit. Sure there isn't anything nefarious in it, just don't think it's necessary. Pretty sure this forum (or one of its iterations) had a "play the ball, not the man" mantra in terms of responding to posts before, which I think is worth trying to stick to.

He's probably referring to me. I've never said that our relegation is entirely down to him. What I have said many times is that if we could go back and change one single thing about our season to give us the best chance of staying up, I believe signing a more experienced keeper instead of Bazunu would give us that chance. I also believe had McCarthy played all season we would have stayed up, as we did with him as first choice previously. He was chucked in way too late, massively lacking match sharpness and bereft of confidence from having to watch Bazunu flap at the ball every week, dive out the way of shots and throw the ball in his own net and still get picked ahead of him.

Surprised he isn't tied down already given his impressive performance V Liverpool.

He meant cost less. Leno went to Fulham for £4million, was excellent for them. Navas went to Forest on loan, we could have got him. Bournemouth signed Neto on a free transfer - his return for injury is what turned their season and kept them up. Sam Johnstone signed for Palace on a free transfer. What was most interesting to me whilst looking at goalkeeper transfers is that there was about 15 goalkeepers aged between 19 and 22 who were signed by premier league clubs last summer...and then promptly loaned out again to gain experience. We signed a 19 year old and stuck him in as number one.

Fair enough, I admit other than one half of the first game I haven't actually seen anything myself.

I reckon he easily cost us 10 points last season with the mistakes he made. We finished 11 points behind.

Not the point at all.

I haven't seen us win in person in years at this point.

But he didn't, he was our first choice keeper signing costing more than Nick Pope did for Newcastle.

I agree, feels like it's an unpopular thing to say because nobody likes to pin it on one person, team game etc etc but I honestly believe we'd have stayed up with Leno, Navas, Henderson etc.

Listen, you're not wrong. But the point is that the one position in the team that should always be as dependable as possible is goalkeeper, because you can't afford to take risks. Everyone else in the team has someone else to fall back on - except the keeper. It's why going for youthful promise coupled with inexperience was suicidal when so many experienced heads were available, and in my opinion is the single greatest contributor to our relegation, to the extent that just changing that one signing I believe would have kept us up.

To be honest, the description i've heard from people of patient passing between centrebacks and midfield doesn't sound all that different to me.

So far this pre-season, yes.

If you're costing your team a minimum of one goal a game then it really doesn't matter how many saves you make in between.

I agree, not really a fan of it, but the idea isn't for the fullbacks to be an attacking threat it's to allow the midfielders to bomb forward more often. I think it's a tactic that can only work if you outclass your opponent as it leaves the flanks exposed on the counter attack, but we'll see.

A true legend, gentleman, stand up guy...haven't got enough good words to say about him.

Quality of the tournament as a whole so far is pretty poor, the Euros was much better. Probably a consequence of the expanded teams. Reckon it'll pick up as we move into the knockouts.

Not a clear and obvious handball? Are you mental? She tried to bat it away like she was playing volleyball, you could see it bend her fingers.

Think it was a fan that blew a whistle the first time but not sure why she restarted just to blow her own whistle immediately.