Jimmy_D

The coach she 'sacked' was on a temporary contract which wasn't extended. He has his own interests with other up and coming players and a school which take up a lot of his time. While I'm sure he'd have been more than open to continuing to coach Raducanu, that would have meant making sacrifices on his part to commit to a full time role, so the split wasn't entirely one way, but I guess that wouldn't have sold as many papers. It's certainly not unusual for tennis players to try different coaches at the start of their career, but most don't have anywhere near as bright a spotlight on them. Between injuries, catching Covid, and having been on the professional circuit for barely more than a year, no one would be batting an eyelid at her results had she not caught lightning in a bottle and become the first tennis player in history to win as a qualifier. It took seven years for Murray to win his first major before going on to become one of Britain's most successful tennis players. Dealing with that sort of meteroic rise wouldn't be easy for anyone, but it seems to me that at this point, people are mostly complaining that she's not caught lightning in a bottle for a second time (before she's even had a chance to repeat it at the same tournament) and complaning that she should have done things differently so that she did.

If nothing else it’ll reduce pressure on Odessa and the rest of the south coast of Ukraine. It also reduces support for the Russian forces occupying Kherson.

It's not so much that Ukraine would cut off the water supply, but more that denying Russia's control of it would weaken Russia's negotiating position and ability to claim any sort of victory. Still, never mind all the war crimes that Russia have actually committed, and that's just counting yesterday... just stay quiet about them and pretend they're not happening eh? The instant Ukraine might potentially have the option of using something as leverage against Russia in the future though... well obviously we need to be up in arms about that eh?

Really like the new kit myself!

It seems telling that Russia’s rhetoric is now worried about losing territory they’ve occupied since 2014. Kherson is looking more and more likely to be liberated soon, which might explain Russia being worried about Crimea. If I’m not mistaken, that would give Ukraine control of Crimea’s water supply.

Turkey now supporting Finland and Sweden’s bids to join NATO, doesn’t look like there are are more real hurdles to stop that happening now.

They had a strategy that they had no reason to change. Until they were given a reason.

Looks like they didn’t prepare long enough.

Best example of that at the moment are Russia themselves. Their conventional military has been shown to be far weaker than anyone thought, and they’ve got a truly evil leader that’s treating the Geneva Convention as a checklist, but even the ghost of a suggestion of any sort of counter invasion is so insane that no-one would consider it viable for an instant.

Our donations to Ukraine so far are around 3% of our military budget, and less than the increase in military spending announced last year. Much of what has been sent has already been replaced, some due to being obsolete, some old enough that it would have required being disposed of had it not been used, some as a result of the increased production in response to Ukraine. We’re not anywhere near sending our most capable stuff, and yet it’s been used to hold back what, just a few weeks ago, would have been seen as one of the biggest military threats we could have faced. We’re already using battlefield information from Ukraine to identify what’s been most effective and adjust. The direct quotes from Stoltenberg here seem to disagree with your assessment on the UK’s capabilities. https://www.express.co.uk/news/politics/1630833/british-troops-ukraine-russia-putin-military/amp Do you really think a leaked report of a military leader wanting increased military spending, while there is a war actively taking place in Europe, indicates we didn’t have a capable military before?

https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2022/04/08/statement-from-the-president-on-delivery-of-air-defense-systems-to-ukraine/

If Russian troops really believe that they’re getting their arses handed to them by a force they outgun 40-1, their morale must be through the floor.

It's also over a week out of date at this point.

We're the second biggest contributor to NATO. If we ever have to fight to defend Britain in a conventional war, we wouldn't be fighting alone.

I have one too, although I use it to make cider. The Waltham Forest one they do is excellent.

Saw The Killers at Wembley years ago, and at St Mary’s tonight. Utterly incredible both times!

Especially as neither cup final match goes down as a win for Liverpool in the record books.

Courtois MotM surely?

Like I said, it's not how rich Russia is that's hurting their war effort at the moment. There's a massive budget surplus because things that Russia need aren't being supplied to them, and there's nowhere else for Russia to buy. Huge swathes of Russia's economy have just... stopped. Even more swathes are running on reserves that aren't being replenished. Oil and gas are important, and the paper value of the rouble reflects that, but the range of services and products those roubles can be used for has been severely restricted, and is narrowing all the time, especially as further sanctions are being imposed. This isn't a situation that is improving for Russia.

That doesn’t quite mean what you seem to think it means. https://www.ft.com/content/22bd612b-c5d9-4f8f-98b8-5f5b69a1da37

The economic impact on Russia has been significant, even if the paper value of the rouble is inflated at the moment. Regardless of that though, it doesn’t matter how rich Russia is, one of the main impacts of the sanctions is to make it impossible for Russia to source materials and components required to maintain their military capability, for example, microchips for precision munitions.

Rhetoric that Ukraine should cede territory isn’t anything new or different. Russian shills have been peddling that line from the start. Russia and Ukraine have different short-medium term aims at the moment. Ukraine are fighting a war of attrition aiming to make the cost for Russia so high that they can’t fight any more. Russia are fighting to gain territory as quickly as possible, throwing everything they have left at holding the East of Ukraine, despite the immense unsustainable losses that they’re incurring doing so. This is likely because Russia know they’re on a clock. The presence of T62s and expanding their recruitment requirements shows that a combination of Ukraine’s tactics and sanctions are preventing Russia being able to maintain their current level of military capability, and it’s becoming more and more degraded. Meanwhile Ukraine have been training over a million soldiers that were drafted when Russia invaded, are receiving more and more NATO equipment, and are training on more advanced NATO equipment than they’re currently using. It’s getting to the point that Russia will be starting to compromise the conventional defence of Russian territory. Russia’s best option at this point is to capture the Eastern regions, unilaterally declare a victory of some sort, hold a sham referendum, and threaten nuclear retaliation if ‘their’ territory is ‘invaded’. It’s still not a good option because they’ve overused the threat of nuclear weapons, and the cost will be immense, but preventing this is likely the reason Ukraine are defending Severodonetsk so resolutely.

JWP seems established now? The PL Player of the Season nomination probably means Southgate almost feels obliged to include him in the squad. He obviously offers something to England that no other player does as well. KWP is unlucky. He did well during England's games, but his position has a few players that are already established and Southgate does tend to show a bit of loyalty to players. That combined with Saints poor finish to the season probably did for his chances. He probably needs a poor run of form from one of the established players if he's to get a realistic chance of keeping an England spot.

Ref pulled the game up while we were in possession for an injury, then gave the drop-ball to Leicester. They went ahead and scored while we were waiting for them to give it back.

Oh FFS.