S-Clarke

Bit like Messi though isn't it? Obviously different universes, but these sorts will always be targeted and hacked down. The thing with Messi, and hopefully Leo (as he's shown) is that they've got this resiliency to just bounce up/bounce through them and ignore those tackles/bites and carry on. Plus being 10x better than the opposition means you can often think a few seconds ahead of any potential hack as well.

He is to them looking at their forums, I think it's because he's had a couple of serious ACL injuries with them which have restricted his mobility hugely.

I wish they'd focus on un-breaking and stabilising the clubs they currently own, before launching onto others. Everything they do screams incompetence.

Agreed, and of all the struggles we have had in recent years with our scouting I look at Jander, Leo and think hang on.....have we actually got some successes from abroad here? Downs excepted, as we're all rightly frustrated by that one, but the other picks from Germany look like steals at this stage. Early days though, but with Leo he's happy to take the ball and go forward every time. He's not one of those irritating wide attackers who will receive the ball, stop, send it back, and run forward without the ball. He actually runs with the ball, under control, into the danger area. He's got the pace, agility and balance to do so - and I hope he keeps that, I don't want any pass back nonsense coached into him.

Throwing the arguments around that ''Well McCarthy is better' ''Well no Bazunu has actually been involved in more wins, he's better'' etc etc, is akin to asking if you'd like to eat dog shit, or human shit. They're both shit. We've got into a situation with 3 shit goalkeepers on the books, and that needs to be sorted before we before we do anything worthwhile over a consistent period.

I think most of us felt the same back in 2022/2023...patient, give them time etc. But we're now almost 2026, we've had two relegations and churned through 7 managers. There comes a point where you just realise that actually they haven't got a scooby and there's nothing left to be patient about. We'll see how it pans out for you in a year or so, I'd have suggested a bare minimum for you this year was promotion. I don't see how you can afford another season at the level you're at with your resources, you're the most valuable club at that level and are sitting 12th.

Maybe this is the new tactic - blow away teams in 20 mins, and then we can afford the 1 or 2 Baz drop ins without harming our game. Yesterdays goal was your typical Bazunu goal really, not a howler at all - but another one which you go away thinking could he have got to that. It's the constant theme throughout the 4 years.

It's funny to watch. £389m spent on Eketike, Isak & Wirtz to 'bolster' their attack. But after 12 games they're 11th with a negative GD. For £120m or whatever it was, I've never seen a player as bad as Wirtz - everything about his game is awful, touch, pace, strength. He's just a non-entity and will never acclimatise to this league. Looking at their summer, I didn't realise they lost so much in attack. Obviously they lost Jota which was awful, but they also moved on Diaz (who I think was excellent) and Nunez - whilst pretty annoying not not amazing quality, did ruffle up teams. You can also include Harvey Elliott as a loss, as he did contribute for them last year.

Their fans are in a similar boat to us, we've all had similar starts to the season (Ipswich included). Very stuttering/stop start, not convincing. Yesterday was our first convincing day of the season so far, Leicester are still stuttering along - but they are winning. The general vibe from their fanbase is that of a negative one. They want their manager out, and they were fortunate to have Begovic in goal yesterday to stop Stoke scoring more than 1 apparently. Could just be fan emotion talking, but I haven't seen the highlights. This isn't the same Leicester side from 2 years ago though, not anywhere near. They're more venerable through the middle without Ndidi and less potent without Vardy up top. Fatawu isn't the same after his ACL apparently in terms of mobility. In addition they'll be without LB Luke Thomas in this one who is suspended, so their thinking is the OAP Ricardo Pereira comes in at LB with Hamza Choudhary at RB. They're gettable, and if our movement is as sharp and quick as it was yesterday then we 110% have the legs on Faes, Vestergaard, Pereira and Hamza & Skipp. There is the potential there for Leo/Fellows/Armstrong to run that 4/5 ragged.

Still no need to rush into any decision, I hope the club still hold their cards. It's been a good 3 games, and it makes you really wonder what was going on before - but we really need a bigger sample size to come to a true conclusion. If this does work out, SR haven't masterminded it - they fell into by accident. So they still don't get any real credit from me, but we still need to bide our time in my eyes.

We haven't had enough of these games, not in many years. The game was over on 15 mins, it was done. Charlton were just shellshocked. The movement of the front three, Azaz, Armstrong & Leo created so much space in behind for runners - either the wing backs, Fellows/Manning, or late midfield runs as we saw from Jander. Charlton probably won't play as bad as that again tbf, not in that first 20 mins. The space they gave us was crazy, they stood off us and made it so easy - and they didn't track any runs. It was a really weird performance by them, they just weren't there. You can only beat what is in front though, and we put them to the sword - we didn't wait for them to wake up, we kept at them and finished it off. It's still early days though, and this win doesn't go away and fix all the issues we've had to deal with in the last year/18 months. But it's as good as we've played in 18 months, that 1st half spell was as good as Swansea away in our last Champ season - we just didn't kill them off like we did to Charlton. I thought this would be a tricky game, as they've had a solid home record - so credit to everyone for coming here and killing it off as quickly as they did. There is still fragility in the side, and had we gone into the 2nd half with just 2-0...it would have probably been very different, but we did what we needed to do in that 20 mins.

What the actual fuck was that? What is happening? 5-1 flatters them, easily a 7-8 goal score line had we finished all our chances. The fluidity of that front 3 is impressive - Azaz - Armstrong - Leo. Pulling them all over the place, which is creating an insane amount of space in behind for late runners - which we've timed perfectly. Fellows providing the width from the right back position is something they cannot handle either, he has been epic. I don't know what Charlton were drinking between min 10 to min 20, as they were literally not there - but we took every opportunity we had. One swallow doesn't make a summer and all that, but it's as well as we have played for 18 months.

Why does that matter? What are you trying to dig out here? It's clear that every aspect of this club is shit, stop trying to be so contrary about everything.

Given that both Larios and ABK have both played around 20 games between them, so far this season, is quite a big indicator. We couldn't even get half a game out of Larios. The medical team in my eyes are complicit in the sanctioning/risk assessment of the Ross Stewart situation in the first place. Then they've struggled to get him or keep him fit since.

Even if he struggles, I don't think they'll act incredibly quickly. You can tell how desperate they are for him to get the job, so I think they'll even let him fail for a while before doing anything of note.

Not writing him off at all, that's just the reason he's been parachuted in - Eckert knows him and trusts him. In ahead of experience is the strange call though, as we have very little experience. He's not a wonderkid though. He's 21 years old, he's not a kid and his loans at a lower level have been pretty low-par. We're not dealing with an Ox, Dibling, Bale style prodigy here. Just a bog standard lower league player. There are a couple of other kids in the U21's who play with bragg - Whitmarsh and Romeo, both purchased from Ireland with big fanfare for around £1m. Why not use those?

It gets even clearer by the day to me. Lallana is going to manage the U21's. If Eckert fails, they'll let him fail over a long period of time before acting, and then act by saying they had no choice and he'd likely be sacked - similar trajectory to Selles and Rusk, it will be no difference. We'd then get your Mowbray sort in to stabilise into the summer, and go through another round of charades then. It will follow an almost identical path to everything which has gone before.

I still think our Sports Science/physio dept is another area that is non-league in quality though. They couldn't get Larios fit, they couldn't get ABK fit (if it was truly fitness), and they signed off on and obviously cannot get Stewart fit. I wouldn't trust them with my nan's dodgy hip.

Of course he's going to pick his U21 mates, no brainer. He knows this guy, so he'll pick him. But a half fit Downes or a half fit Aribo is a better option than Bragg, we all know it. He'll be plying his trade in L1/L2 in a year (probably with us to be fair)

Don't forget the impact Theo had. In all seriousness with Oriol, he hasn't played for a while - so I guess they're building him up. He hasn't shown any injury issues in the last couple of seasons.

When you've got the fans of one of their other clubs, posting this, on our forum....it just shows you how bleak it is. They will never change, they will never improve. They simply do not have the ability or knowledge to manage a professional/elite sports setup at any level. They have the reverse Midas touch on everything. They just have to give it up and sell both of us.

Dusic/Saint_Charlie is a proper wum by the way, not to ruin his fun - but everything he's been saying about the managers is trolling and trying to wum people. Pay no attention, and just laugh at it. Have a look through his post history, he's even at it during the transfer windows linking us with players who retired 20 years ago. Sorry for spoiling your fun Dusic. Anyway, as expected we lurch into Charlton with an even weaker first team coaching setup than we had against Wednesday, and given that they've had the entire international break to sort that is quite something. In essence, the first team is being coached and managed by the entire U21 cohort, there is no remaining senior coaches at the club. We are being coached by Ben fricking Reeves and Jimmy Newton who have forever been with the U21's. It's a mess. The club try to dress this up as being 'calm and relaxed about the situation' - but this is a fucking mess. How a club with the finances we have this year, and the money we've spent, have ended up with the entire incumbent u21 coaching team managing the first team in November, in a season where promotion was required, is nothing short of horrific. Fuck off SR. Just go. Nothing will change my view ever.

We are going to need to be several levels better than we were against QPR or Wednesday. We got very, very, very fortunate against QPR. Charlton have a decent home record and seem to be consolidating themselves, they'll be up for it and if we play like we did at QPR we will be trounced.

As far as I can tell, we are in that dangerous holding pattern which equates to ''The club are comfortable with the current situation'' - so you won't see any news, and zero rumours. The club want Tonda to get the job, that much is clear. At this stage I don't expect any new manager this side of Christmas and we'll bumble along with Tonda, until it becomes obvious the job is too big for him and the season is effectively done and dusted. We are witnessing the next SR masterclass of club management unfold in front of our eyes.

Wages would stop us doing that. We can't pay anyone 100 odd k in the Champ. If Newcastle do dump him back, we will have to find another taker for 6 months pretty sharpish (or a sale)