sandwichsaint

three defenders ball watching and Mitrovic helps himself, completely free header in the 6yd box

https://www.theguardian.com/football/who-scored-blog/2018/nov/22/premier-league-analysing-when-teams-score-their-goals Pretty damning on the preparation/fitness/mental-strength front. Black and green graphic at the bottom of the article. In terms of goals F and A in the first 30 mins of all PL matches this season only Fulham and Wolves have been poorer than us, in the middle 31 to 60 minutes we are almost normal (only 9th worst, although presumably the other team often has a lead by then!). In the final third of games 61-9o mins only Fulham are worse than us. Combine it with various other charts knocking about which show us as having had 'easier' fixtures than some others and it doesn't look good, for Hughes or for us!

There is no ‘evidence’ either way, we haven’t actually secured cheaper shoes/food/clothing yet but don’t let that deter you, everybody to the English barricades to fight for cheap rubbish food and cheap sweatshop clothing and damn that Johnny Foreigner too. On the other hand I’m pretty sure our new uber lords aren’t in it to increase the share of the futurist unicorn cake going to ordinary people (they don’t believe in that), nor to improve public services (they openly don’t believe in them), nor to increase environmental standards (they don’t believe in those either). I know it was a while ago that you were in the fourth-form Les (it's a bit of a giveaway really, that terminology went out of use 30 years ago) but were you away when they did reading the writing on the wall?

Not entirely sure cheaper clothing, cheaper food and cheaper shoes will make up for poorer public services, lower wages/employment protection, reduced employment opportunities, possibly increased pollution and lower environmental standards? Guess we are going to find out over the next 50 years.

Quincy Promes on the telly box tonight, is he still a goer? Brilliant game last night SUI 5-2 Belgium. Loved those 5 officials with their synchronised hand clenches!

Extraordinary, you can leave tomorrow if you want, the EU aren't stopping anybody from leaving. Pay the money we owe, agree on how much for future payments we owe for projects/pensions we've already committed to and off we go. Hard border in Ireland, no frictionless free trade, 1m expats cast adrift and stateless in the EU, no idea what we would do with the EU citizens that happen to be here, probably keep the economically worthwhile ones and put the rest on trains. No agreement or deal on euratom, medicine testing, aviation but who needs those things. No security link-up or info sharing. We can start trading on WTO terms tomorrow, bend over and ask Trump what sort of deal he can do for us. Watch the money and the mobile pour out of the country. Watch the collapse of the NHS and care sector due to huge staff shortages, watch food rot in the fields without anybody to pick it. The EU aren't stopping us doing any of these things, if it's the will of the people then why the hell aren't we just getting on with it?

Is Brexit still red, white and blue?

Privatise the profits and socialise the losses? That'll never catch on.

Unfortunate name too.

Operation stack refers to outbound traffic!

Look forward to Hughes rolling out his radical 2-3-2-3 formation on Saturday (2 that can't mark, 3 that can't tackle, 2 that can't create and 3 that can't score). Not sure we could beat Watford with a 5-5-5 formation.

Hopefully that would see Hughes back to another of his failed spiritual homes. Infamy, infamy, they've all got it in for me; looks like David Squires has got his number with this take on last week's training! https://www.theguardian.com/football/ng-interactive/2018/nov/06/david-squires-on-a-european-super-league-and-other-life-affirming-stories

Paul Gilchrist.

What choice did the FL have when 18 teams walked out to form the PL? Life went on for the FA and the FL,UEFA can kick the rebel teams out and continue as they are now, or they can suck it up, get the best deal they can and carry on with a second level of European competitions etc and preserve the best players in international football etc. My money is on a messy compromise.

Unlikely to go completely outside the current establishment imho, that would be the end of international football/world cup etc. How would players transfer in/transfer out etc? More likely to be a messy compromise with the new EL throwing crumbs to the remains of UEFA. When the PL was formed the FA had no choice but to go along with it, this will be the same, FIFA/EUFA won't want to excommunicate 500 of the world's best players out of the world game.

Why do people assume they would leave the domestic league? If this was instead of the CL the big clubs could easily play their domestic lge and then the 20-odd european games on top (no domestic cups); they keep 25+ first team standard players on the books now and they could afford more. I would suggest they will continue to play their B team in the PL. No incentive for the PL/FA to exclude the big 5/6 from domestic football.

I'll bite, is it 12 a-side where you come from?

Add in Mark Wright Alan Ball Keegan Channon winners!

The lack of interest is almost total, ten or a dozen people on the match thread on a Saturday afternoon. (and a few of them are the same person:o). I've been listening at home on TalkSport while doing the ironing:lol:. Sounds grim, no confidence, no leaders, no goals. Comes to a pretty pass when mowing the lawn or doing the ironing trumps watching a stream. We'll win 1-0, which will paper over the cracks for a few more weeks.

One of Rupert Lowe's things was a PL2, prob 10 or 15 years ago now. Remember at the time hearing a piece where he said we were a 'top 30' club and bracketing us with Watford, Ipswich, and possibly Forest too. Guess the only diff to the current set-up would be they divide the TV money more widely, so less money for us and more money for the 20 teams below us. Big 6 would continue to dominate but a more competetive field below. I'm sort of coming round to the idea of a 16 team PL1 and a 20 team PL2 with 6! up and 6! down. The Big 6 can beat up a different set of minnows each year, the dug outs can stay as permanent mid-table mediocrities, everybody else can play for their place, none of this limping to 40 points/happy to stay up nonsense. In PL2 with 6 up and maybe 4 down, just about every game would have something on it. More time for European football, International breaks, overseas tours, a proper mid-winter break, etc. Fewer league games, more room for a focus on the cup comps. Never happen but it would be a better model for us than where we are at the moment!

Cahill is 32:mcinnes:, did you mean signing a 27-28 year-old of similar experience?

Duh, but that would mean he has to play every game. I'd take Chris Perry to give us some leadership and PL know-how. Quicker than Hoedt and better in the air than Vestergaard; hopefully he's kept himself in good nick, I'd get him straight in next week.

This has gone a bit under the radar, at least for me. Does 'groupon' refer just to the Brighton game or was it in place for the Chelsea game too? Presumably no database history is needed so have we officially now got ourselves a 'neutral section'? What stops Brighton (Chelsea?) fans buying tickets in home areas - as far as I can see 'nothing'. Are the groupon tkts all in one area or do they allocate them randomly amongst the seats that are available? I think we should be told.

Agree with all of this, yesterday was a dismal advert for the 'best league in the world' and yet another indication of how far we have fallen and how fast. Hughes is getting pelters (rightly, the players aren't fit/aren't motivated/aren't coached to play in any sort of structure or system/can't defend collectively or individually etc etc.). All said and done what was a par score yesterday? 0-2 or 0-3 probably ... exactly what we got! It was one of the most uncompetitive prem games I've ever seen; Chelsea so superior in every dept, they won easily without really getting out of second gear. We had not one player who would get in their starting 11 (or their match-day 16) and probably not in their 25 listed players either. It was like watching a cross between a one-sided school game, Scottish football or a mismatched cup tie. At least in a cup tie the under-dog usually fights! I'm astonished the number of people who will still pay out to watch a mis-match like this. Not sure where we go from here? Do we keep chopping and changing or do we go for some semblance of continuity? We seem to be reprising the end of the Lowe era, a squad full of very average players, lots of who are stuck on long expensive contracts. Maybe we will hang on by our fingertips again, maybe we won't; just don't see financially how we will survive relegation, we won't be able to pay the wage bill and we will struggle to off-load players like Forster, Hoedt, Carillo, Davies, etc. Anybody that can go will go, leaving a team of has-beens, never-weres, and kids. Happy days, at least we will get rid of the tourists and the happy clappers but we won't be seeing world-class players at SMS anymore, which for me would be a decent swap!

Calling BS on this, how many Lazio fans have even heard of Seabourne let alone seen him play?