S-Clarke

I read something that suggest club sources feel he is too 'light weight' for the Championship. It should have been obvious when they were scouting him, no? I think he's a good player with time and space, but it looks like he could snap in half with a bad tackle.

I think there are a few options out there. Vieira is one I've mentioned a few times, I'd make a big play for him. A former elite-level player who'd bring instant respect, the sort of gravatas that Koeman carried when he came in. I'd have even made a play for him before we got Martin in 2023. Not at the same extreme, but Ole is another one who'd gain respect from those around him. But Viera is the one I'd push for. There are interesting parallels because Eckert was his assistant at Geona and Spors appointed Viera AND Eckert at Genoa.

We've all seen this script before, it's been 3/4 years of this same script. We all know exactly how it will end, so there is no point in waiting. We knew Bazunu would be shit, there was no point in waiting. We knew Stephens would be shit, there was no point in waiting. We know that Eckert is Selles Mark II so there's no point in waiting. It will end with him maybe stuttering to a couple more wins as we sniff to the edges of the Top 6 and everyone wets their pants, they'll announce him as manager until the end of the season. Come the end of the season, we'd have fallen off and finished bottom half of the Championship. We are then going to sack him or do whatever with him, and be in the market for a new manager once again. At that stage we are a much less attractive proposition. Less money, less competitive as stronger teams will be in the league, and the usual 'no pre-season to plan, as we're looking for a new manager' nonsense. Now is the time to appoint the manager who can raise the standards and instal the experience this squad needs. Not next year, not in the summer. Now.

Did you ever have any PM exchanges with those charlatans? Those were interesting times during a pretty bleak period, in footballing terms we're back where we were when those two were whoring themselves around actually. Maybe they'll come back to life? I've been waiting for the monkey petting zoo for decades.

I see the usual small cohort of ''It will be fine, why is everyone up in arms, he's won 2 out of 2'' have come out in their droves this morning. It's the same cohort who said ''Bazunu is fine for the Championship' and that 'Stephens is fine for us'. Head in sand and fingers in ears spring to mind.

Then they shouldn't have removed Will Still in the first place.

It shows that they also have no idea about football if they consider those two wins, which the local journos now seem to be proclaiming as a good start, as any form of benchmark. They were shit. QPR particular was non-league quality from us. How we played in the final 15 mins of that game would have scared me away from any manager.

They like to think they're clever, but they are actually thick as absolute shit. Probably the thickest owners in the world. They haven't got a clue how to run football clubs.

They are desperate to give it to him, you can tell. They are absolutely chomping at the bit. But they are scared of fan reaction. So they'll delay it. Hope he keeps picking up results, then they have the ammunition to do so. If he stops picking up results, starting at Charlton, they'll flap and appoint Tony Mowbray until the end of the season. You watch. Basically there was zero point in sacking Will Still. Absolutely no point. If this was there direction, then they should have just backed him properly.

I've listened to snippets of it. Was this the one where he proclaimed Newcastle were in a false position under Pardew at the time, and that they'd fall off due to the GD extreme? Like you say, there are merits in what he says...but there are also some real positives to take away from how a team like Newcastle (at that time) could compete as high as they did, with such a low GD. The chances of teams like us being able to compete in the PL with a consistently high positive GD is slim to done, so you have to find other ways.

Probably, works out quite well timing wise. So, we now have a GK Coach, performance coach (fitness and analysis?), assistant and first team coach roles vacant. Any new manager can now build his own team around him, as we have the space. The only hanger on would be Lallana at this point. So even less reason, in my eyes, that they'd go for Eckert with such little experience around the place in the coaching setup. But talk about failing upwards. Trollope and Edwards were both a part in the relegation of Luton to L1, yet they've jumped back up to the prem.

Brings back memories of the days of Jamie Cureton and Chris Iwelumo ripping it up at Colchester in 2006 ish. Proper little guy playing off big guy vibes, I'm sure we were linked to Cureton the season after that.

Not too sure about Sesay - he seems a bit highly rated in game compared to his output for us in real life. In my save he was worth 8-10m, and had West Ham and Everton interested in him. Not entirely sure why, as that was in pre-season without any appearances. I did use him in game and he replaced Charles as my starter, so that's the only one which feels a bit off. That's when I stopped playing as none of it felt right.

I thought I'd give this more of a go over the weekend, I just can't get into it. They may have improved other elements of the game such as scouting/tactics etc, but for a start you can't find them and secondly the UI just renders anything rubbish. Even stuff like 'going on holiday' was a chore, it took me 10 mins to figure out where they'd moved that. And it didn't work, as soon as I clicked go on holiday the entire game closed. Amazing. The 3D match engine isn't perfect either. There was a moment where the goalie was floating at the top of the goal, and they scored. To be fair it's probably fairly realistic as Bazunu was in goal. The UI is just awful though, skins and mods can't even fix this and I've tried. It all just looks a bit too zoomed in for me and 'paint by numbers' in visual quality, it's like they've totally misunderstood how people played this game - they expect you to be playing full screen and not doing anything else. But I used to do it in window mode, minimise, do other bits, come back etc. Doing that now though looks utter rubbish. I'll skip this year and hope that things improve next year, but we're kind of relying on the modding community fixing this rather than SI.

I think he's on borrowed time. They debated sacking him in the summer, but stuck with him and let him build into the PL. Their fans have had enough now though. But as you said, they're still light a days above what we were last year! I do think they will get rid by Dec though.

He resigned from his role at Lens as far as I remember. Fairly sure there was no dealing with Lens, that was purely between Still and them.

That's just how it goes though, I'm not saying I'd be one of those vocals who would do that - but you just know how it would play out. He wouldn't have any rope and it wouldn't create that 'unity' I think we need, there would still be division with someone like him as our manager. Outside of all the skate connections though, I don't really think his credentials are what we need right now. He's another somewhat inexperienced/young manager who is still starting out and would still be learning on the job, rather than putting over his stacks of experience to our squad.

We have burned through 6 managers in what feels like a few months, we really have to get the next one right and any new manager will still have to go through some wobbles and adjustments to get there IMO - would the fan base provide Gary O'Neil any rope to afford a bedding in period? Absolutely not. A couple of bad results, and he'd be getting hounded out - and we're back to square one. I look at it fairly identically to Steve Cooper rocking up at Leicester. On the outside it looked a fairly sound appointment, but from the outside you don't appreciate the utter hate Leicester fans had for him - and that was just because he managed Forest for a couple of years. As soon as he hit a bumpy period, the place was toxic and he had to go. He had no time there because of his connections not allowing him any rope what so ever. In our current situation we need someone with appropriate gravatas, experience and non-connections to rivals in order to allow them the best possible chance to succeed here.

Albert Grønbæk

I've got a suggestion for Sports Republic based on that. Given where your reserve team sit, and where our reserve team sit...it may be prudent for SR to just own the B Teams at their clubs, and let grown ups take charge of the first team's at their clubs.

Marco Rose ticks all the boxes that Spors spoke about in the summer, he's your typical Red Bull style manager. I personally don't see any chance in this one, he'll have much higher expectations than 19th in England's 2nd tier.

Yep, he's another shout. I was just making the point that there were even freebie signings out there who'd have been an upgrade.

Exactly, I've not seen any difference in how we give up space, chances and how panicky we are at the back. Fundamentally I think we have a poor spine and that will always hinder us until we change that up. Eckert has simply had what Will Still never had on his side - luck.

But even that argument was flawed, because they didn't need to be a world beater and nor did we need to spend a million dollars to bring in anyone remotely better than Bazunu. Mat Ryan for example was a freebie. 1 year contract, option for a 2nd once the Ramsdale situation is finalised next year. Job done.

The club missed the opportunity in the summer to replace. Bazunu had returned to the club after his loan and a long lay off, not necessarily at that time seen as number 1. McCarthy was getting on, Lumley had left and Ramsdale was off. So rather than bring in some genuine competition and make a case for it, we added George Long as a pointless novelty squad addition. We didn't need a 3rd choice keeper, we needed a 1st choice who'd demote Bazunu to 2nd choice. It was really that simple, yet a lot on here lapped up the George Long addition in the summer saying it was sensible and that Bazunu was 'fine for the championship'. He really isn't and we're now in an almightily mess with 3 utterly horrendous goalkeepers.