The Kraken

That was fairly obvious; but that never stops Captain Pedantic from acting the tw*t.

Have you never read a post from MLG before?

I'm not the one saying "look at this game, and that one,, and that one..." when it comes to judging us. I see we finished 14th last season; done, we finished where we deserved. So we move on. You need to look more inwardly to see where the looking back is coming from. Again, looking back. Never mind where we finished and where we could have finished. We didn't. Next season is a whole new year, and to improve on last season the best way is to bring in better players and improve a squad that were only good enough to finish 14th. Obvious. Resting on laurels, blaming luck, and "looking back" simply isn't the way, its a pointless exercise. As for the start of the season; we finished with 4 points from 6 games. So "looking back" at games in isolation is equally pointless.

Because it came at a time when many fans were talking about our unstoppable march into Europe; it was a shot in the arm for the fact that we weren't even a top ten side, and got totally undone by a team who was. If you'd prefer I could also point to our last 6 games of the season where we took 4 points and ended the season with a whimper. But we didn't. We came 14th. We had good luck and bad luck along the way. So its entirely pointless saying that we could have done this or that; we didn't. And quite obviously the best way to ensure we improve is to go actually go and and bring in players who improve us as a squad, rather than lament our poor run of luck that deprived us from a top ten spot which we didn't actually achieve by some distance.

Yep; getting humbled at home to WBA was an indicator of the fragility of the side and how we weren't (aren't) a top ten side. It's all very well saying we weren't far away from 10th place, but we didn't finish in 10th place, we finished in 14th, 5 points off 10th. You can pick the bones out of it and rue how unlucky we were in some games to finish that low; but every other team around us can do the exact same, to some degree. So we finished where we deserved to finish, and need to strengthen to have a realistic chance of improvement. 12th - 16th is the minimum I'd hope for with this squad; below that would be a disappointment. 10th is achieveable with the signing of Lovren, though I'd consider it a fanastics achievement with no more signings. Throw in a few more players in vital areas and top 8 would be great.

6th with a realistic expectation of 10th. Or something.

Cardiff tried to sign JRod last summer and we had to outbid them to get him. So unsurprising big Malky still rates him.

We should be playing four four foocking two.

Which means that in today's money the lethal replacement strike force of Dixon and Speedie that we recruiteded would be worth around £17M. *shudders*

A very good player but a terrible cheat, he'd be an embarrassing player to watch at times. So "torn" would be my answer. Plus worried about where we'd be finding the cash to fund having him.

Christ alive.

Can't agree with that entirely. Adidas have been extremely generic but the most frustrating thing has been seeing how they can get it spot on for some clubs but not for others, like us, where they've used a standard template that really means nothing. The Ajax shirt is an absolute beauty; simple but classic. Both West Ham's home and away kits have been done very tastefully and have gone down very well indeed with their fans. Aside from the lopsided badge and logo setup, the Sunderland kit is actually very nice. There have been other adidas striped efforts from the PL and round the world that have looked good; but there have been too many have been lazy templates just thrown at the clubs. Dare I say it, adidas seem to be reallyt cornering the market of the PL teams, there's loads of sides that now use them and without a bigger catalogue of available templates, aside from one or two sides who've come out of it well its really been overused as an advertising tool for adidas than for creating a little originality for the teams.

I thought tradition started last year? I'm so confused.

While the season ticket part may be technically true, a number of staff get given a couple of comp tickets for every home game for friends/family to use.

As opposed to what? It remaining in the family's hands and fans not being able to see it? And who needs top see a cup final winner's medal anyway? If the family want to sell it, fine, no problem with that. Just don't expect the fans or the club to fork out for it.

He certainly has much to prove. And depending on what signings we go on to make, there's a potential difficulty in seeing exactly where he fits into a role that is a progression for him from last season.

Never mind all this fancy scientific sh*t, these overpaid primadonnas should be busting their lungs running up sand dunes. Strachan wouldn't have put up with this namby pamby treatment, he knew how to get the best out of real try-hards like Paul Telfer. Gaston would have sh*t bricks if he'd ever have had to run the way WGS had them going in pre-season.

That's actually a really nice kit

Fair play if he wants to sell it, no problem with that. But I wouldn't expect the club to fork out for it. There is obviously precedent set with Peter Rodrigues, though (without wishing in any way to denigrate or prioritise some contributions over others) I'd suggest PR's along with Bobby Stokes' would be more of an obvious case for the club to fund it. Difficult one, but I wouldn't choose to criticise the club if they decide to give this one a miss.

Well those socks have made a return; 1 out of 3 ain't bad....

Hmm, you seem to be another person suggesting that a majority of people who like the kit might not have been polled both on here and on the Echo website. I don't deny for a minute that it'll sell pretty well; but as a shirt that the majority of the fanbase will like, I don't know why you're so keen to look past the numbers. No, it isn't.

The way it was railroaded through was indeed complete bully tactics; essentially a "take this deal or we'll do it anyway and leave you with nothing". Its led to clubs who aren't exactly minnows like Wycombe deciding that its no longer financially viable to run their own youth academy scheme. And you're right, Crewe are a great example of a club with a fantastic youth setup down the years who will now be much more vulnerable to the advances of the big clubs and will receive relatively little in compensation. The end goal is commendable; to get more top PL clubs with a brilliant blueprint of coaching. I just didn't see the need to sh*t on the smaller clubs by insisting upon a vastly reduced compensation structure to get there.

I think the point is that the compensation structure within the new Academy system is inherently low. While it is in PL club's interests to maintain an academy for bringing players through, it's a revenue stream for lower level clubs which has been massively capped and allows bigger clubs to snap up young players for a pittance of a fee. Which is why some lower league clubs are no longer bothering running an academy, which IMO hurts the game overall.

The idea that you think "class" can be achieved by wearing a football shirt with a monochrome badge is quite amusing. Bless.