malcolm waldron

Not sure he'd come to us next season, but good value at - as you say £20M - and he might see it as a chance to rebuild his career. Think you're being a little harsh in calling him useless given his England career but I admire your desire to drive high standards into the club. No Dell size mentality from you and we need more of that. You've got my vote for fan on the Board next season......

I'm not sure but has anyone thought about James Milner? He'd be worth a look if he doesn't think about going to Brighton.....

There was no logic other than we were screwed financially the minute Jones didn't work out (which was arguably at half time on Boxing day). By mid Feb we were paying off two managers' contracts, plus had forked out £4 million - if reports are true - to Luton to prise Jones away. So with Marsch unwilling to take a short term contract, Selles was the low risk financial option, but the high risk football one. My regret is having watched loads of risk averse, slow build-up possession for the sake of it football - if only we'd have gone for it in games like West Ham, Bournemouth and Palace etc. There again maybe we'd have lost all those games 3-4 too......

That just about sums it up for me. I felt that after about 15-20 mins (after one of their players was 'injured' - and O'Neill got them all together) last night Bournemouth gained control. And that for me was it - not once after that did we look anything like a team that believed in themselves and played with purpose. We need a focal point up front - to at least keep hold of the ball, and Che coming on gave us that. Why not start with him? He'd miss one or two from three yards out but he might at least bring others into scoring positions. Then he can go off after 60 mins and after that it's a roll of the dice to replace him. Lastly I'd welcome a comparison between Bournemouth's January spend vs impact on the first team and ours. I'm guessing not pretty reading. Bournemouth FFS!

Really? I find that hard to believe. I've got a memory of Les Reed feeding his pet journalist (Wallace at the Telegraph?) the line that we were "relaxed" or comfortable about the Mane situation - only for him to go a few days later. I'd be surprised though if more than one 'fan' said they'd drive him up there.

I always felt it was wrong to be playing in a cup final at Wembley wearing blue...

What was that you said back in December - '.....all aboard the daftee express.....' 😆

How frustrating, and potentially terminally impactful, have all those one goal defeats against teams around us been.

Sometimes its easier to take out the emotion and look at a situation without our own bias. So Liverpool are playing Man Utd this weekend I think. In a tense 0-0 draw full of emotion and with loads at stake, in the 88th minute a high ball is played over the top towards the Liverpool goal. chased by Weghorst and Robertson. It carries through to Alisson, but Weghorst (who has been battling with Robertson all game) treads on the defenders ankle (by 'mistake'). Robertson, having been wound up all game, slaps Weghorst lightly across the chest and a 10 man handbag scuffle follows. This ends up 2 mins later with Robertson booked and the referee calmly awarding Man Utd a penalty. They win the game 1-0. There is no media coverage other than about Ten Hag being a genius and Klopp losing the plot by picking a tired VVD. Doesn't look any better in that scenario does it. And fair play to Grimsby by the way.

Oh i agree completely. I'm just wondering why the double standards on the fouls. My frustration is mainly on how massively predictable and slow we are moving the ball forwards. Leeds I thought gave us a lesson on this at the weekend, and no doubt Leicester will too. To not be able to do so against a L2 side is unforgivable. Anyway, back to the ref last night......

Can someone help me out here. Was the WWE forearm smash by the beardy geezer in the first half on Moussa in the box? I'm guessing not hence no VAR review. But that seemed a far worse foul then the CC faint slap and yet no action taken. Why? Referee and assistant unsighted or just lulled into this one's all about Grimsby narrative. Don't get me started on the assault on KWP's head....

Anyone hear the JWP post match reaction comment on Solent after the Chelsea match? I'm fairly sure he used the words front footed and aggressive in his opening line. it was as if he was letting our former manager know that that's how you set up and play to win a football match. Interested to know if others heard it or whether i was imagining it after 3 tough months.....

Were in talks but the Board at the time deemed it too expensive to get rid of Ralph - and so the rest is history. They (i.e. Semmens) couldn't possibly be thinking the same again could he, or does he now have no say in the matter??

Those nine words and and the way he said them I really picked up on when I heard the interview over the weekend. It's like he was saying - look at what I'm capable of, if only I had the time, the money, the players, worse opposition, L1 expectations and no pressure..........

I'd like to know where this has come from as the idea has been floated around on here for some time now. At the Brighton game you could see it was a nasty one and we thought immediately that it looks like an ACL - from Tino's reaction and Shane rushing over etc. That injury as far as I know is not caused by being over-played.

Thought it was worth this having a bump back up again. More convinced than ever that this is either direct from NJ himself or from one of his team on his behalf. Knowing what we now know after EIGHT weeks of him being here a lot of it is fascinating (to me at least) - particularly a re-read of why the Stoke failure is now recognised as allegedly being down to the players' attitudes and the general atmosphere of the club. I suspect we might be hearing that again soon - and while there may be an element of truth in that, for £4M a year it should be something a capable, top level coach can swiftly address and start to put right. So ultimately many of the issues we now face were hiding in plain sight all along.....

Fantastic reference - and the first thing on here for 36 hours that's brought a smile to my face. You'll need to share a link for the younger ones (son-in-laws? 😉) on here unfamiliar with its origin.

He's only 27.....? (Is that how the quote went??)

That would have been a great way to preserve the legacy wouldn't it.....

I have to wonder who is the random Luton fan who wrote this piece originally? For a start it's very long - and why would a Luton fan be bothered to go to this length of analysis having just lost their saviour to us? Absolutely glad that he did though. For me the interesting piece is how much they know about relatively low key players we have (or have loaned out). I understand that many football fans live and breath it every day (and I'm the same during transfer window closing week and the Ralph situation over the last few days) - but how many Luton fans really know about Larios, Mara, Smallbone (I get the Stoke connection) and above all Thierry Small. I'd blocked him out of my mind after Coventry and yet a Luton fan has the awareness to select him as one for the future NJ team. I'm very impressed! I'm a little out of touch but have now seen TS is coming back....when regrettably according to Port Vale he didnt get the game time he might have wanted? So - very grateful for the 'Luton fan' to have given us such a huge insight into Nathans career over the last five years - and it sounds a potential good match for us. I just wonder how much of the above text was lifted from Nathans first conversations with us back in the summer.......

I noted that too. Can't remember the exact passage of play, but I think it was our usual shovel it around at the back under increasing pressure before it goes back to the keeper for a punt downfield (and lose the header). Only this time Bazunu looked up and drilled the pass (to Armstrong I think) through a crowd of about 4 Arsenal players. More of that to come hopefully. We were trying to imagine McCarthy trying to do the same.

I thought the same - especially after his first start against Liverpool. Prove us all wrong tonight Moussa.

Interesting to see if the third Dean Smith games follows the pattern of the other two. In the first one, my memory is that we could have been out of sight in the first half (and Villa down to 10) - but that the second half was pretty uncomfortable for us, especially the first 15 mins or so. At Norwich I think we were less dominant in the first half but let in a poor goal just after we scored to keep Norwich in the game. The second half Norwich came out going for it and my sense in the away end and from those around us was that if a goal was coming - it would be a Norwich one. Step forward Alex to give them three points. Did Theo miss a great chance in stoppage time having said all that? I feel we're now moving on from Ralphball 1.0 (first half great, second half poor) but tonight will be a big test as Norwich are desperate for a result.

The Conte post match interview was fantastic. I know its not his first language and so we should give him some leeway, but it was just a series of mumbled words with no meaning. Great that we reduced him to rambling incoherence....

I think this series of pictures says it all. Broja was clearly taken out and I'm convinced that if that was Bednarek on Kane it's an immediate free kick and a yellow card. Anyway play continues very quickly and a goal is scored. In my view the reason the referee didn't stop play for the head injury (wrongly of course) is because of how quickly play developed - and he simply bottled making a decision to stop the game. The madness then occurs as VAR rules the original foul was too early in the phase - or words to that effect? So we have a ref bottling a decision because of how quickly Spurs threatened our goal - and yet the VAR ref decides the contrary. How can that be possible??