SaintBobby

We are getting pummelled here....

Hmmmm...not a great opening 15 minutes

It's an absurd situation. In some ways, it's so bad that I'm starting to fear staying up on goal difference even more than going down. At least the latter delivers a reboot and a wake-up call of sorts. It's beyond insanity that Pellegrino is still in his job and probably speaks to a much wider dysfunction at the top of the club.

Still worth sacking him?

Great start

Yep, I'd agree with that. Given we have won only 5 games out of 29, if we can win 2 out of 9 (which would be a much higher win rate than for the first 75% of the season), we will probably just make it.

This is so desperate and frustrating.....

I agree with that. Branfoot was ghastly and wrong, but at least he had some sort of footballing philosophy, however rudimentary or neanderthal. The current manager is just totally clueless.

Total shambles. Probably too late to avert relegation now.

Excellent player. Worthy of the armband. Has played well.

I actually think something like 2 wins and 2 draws will be enough for us to stay up. Just.

Yeah, but it's not really the way to measure it, is it? I'm more worried about points than position - at least assuming we aren't bottom three. We've gone from getting 60+ points, to 49 last season, to now being in a position where I'd rip your arm off for a final tally of 40. It's a poor trajectory, even if we got an unlucky "non-decision" in one match a couple of weeks ago

I put just under £1,000 on us to go down at about 10/1 on Betfair Exchange (think it averaged out at 11.2 ...so 10.2/1). That was after the Huddersfield 1-1. My rationale was that I'd need about £10,000 to compensate me for the misery of relegation if it happened. My secondary rationale was I genuinely thought there was a much higher than 10% of us getting relegated. All in all, though, I hope I lose my stake. Not sure you can really work out how much you need to offset the misery!

Phew. Felt ill for that whole second half.

Why do I feel sure we are still going to lose? When was was last time we had a really good second half?

At least we might finally sack the manager

I'm sure you're 100% right on staged payments, but my question is "does it matter?" We won't receive a cheque up front for £75m for VVD, but were we to sign, say, Theo Walcott for £30m, we wouldn't be expected to pay that up front either. Our outgoings would be staged in the same way as our transfer income. On the history, Osvaldo and Ramirez were obviously very bad misfires, but on aggregate we seem to have been very smart on the transfer market, with the good acquisitions easily outweighing the bad ones.

Basically agree with all this. My only rider is that our situation is now so dire that I'd gamble. We are on a clear trajectory to relegation, so I would now start throwing mud at a wall and just hope something sticks.

You keep predicting we will come 17th. So if we are relegated, you'll be wrong!

They will say "We need to look forward, not backwards, and get back into the Premier League as soon as possible"

He has to be sacked now. This is getting absurd.

Also, big thumbs up to the travelling fans. Must have been more in hope than expectation, but their voices came over loud and clear on the TV. Top job.

Kelvin won it.

This. Huge call. Paid off.

Any thoughts on how/if it might work playing both Theo and Gabbiadini as a front two?