S-Clarke

Where is Dalek? This is absolutely made for him.

Good point, he won the super cup over there.

So, Poch went to PSG, the league at which they've dominated for years. I think everyone accepted he was finally going to get a trophy once and for all. But once again he'll finish a season without a trophy as manager as PSG have just blown it tonight. Weird career Poch has had.

Didn't think about Fulham, that's confused me a bit now I've looked at their loans. They have Lookman, Lemina, Aina, Areola, Lofus-Cheek, Maja, Andersen all on loan...and I'm fairly sure they've all been in the same match day squad on multiple occasions?

He was alright, he's still oretty poor though, wouldn't be against seeing the back of him tbh. He was 'decent' but still didn't actually do anything. Agreed on Theo, he was dross yesterday.

I'm fairly sure you can only loan two players from the PL - both have to be from separate clubs. There can be another 2 brought from outside in Europe. West Brom bought in Okay, Diagne from Europe. And then added Maintland Niles and Gallagher from the PL clubs.

You're very optimistic! I hope you're right, but I can only see a maximum of 4 players. 2 full backs, one on loan and one for about £10m and an attacker (probably Theo on a free) will be what we do in the main. The 4th will be whatever pops up at the end of the window. I'm assuming we're keeping everyone else as well.

8 players??? a £20m striker?? I hope you're ITK!

Oh dear.

Gave it a good go tbh. Only out on GD in the end. They'll be a decent outfit next year I think

I do know where you're coming from. These people are trolls, they are doing what they're doing for the reactions and the buzz that gives them. Like you said, the constant highlighting of it is providing them that buzz over, and over and over again. The best thing to do is just ignore it, delete it, report it...but don't make a noise about it and silence these idiots. At the moment they have the stage in a weird way.

Oh yeah for sure, I read some of the Man City forums yesterday and Christ what a bunch of moaners. Pulling Pep apart for the team, throwing Augero under the bus etc. It's a very impatient society and everyone wants everything tomorrow, not just related to football, but it has kind of flowed over into that. Generally fans don't want to wait for their club to 'build' over seasons, they want it now and they'll moan until they get incredible success. The reality is that we are in our true position for a club of our size, probably punching a bit when you factor in the no investment factor. That Claude bloke did have a rant after most games tbh. He actually died last month, saw it on the news the other day (most of that Arsenal fan tv lot became 'celebs')

Always will be, hiding behind a VPN never to be traced. Social media companies will respond and get the account closed down. But it's ever so easy for them to do it all again tomorrow under a new guise and via another VPN.

I think they're destined for this level for years and years to come, probably even slip down again at some point. Bolton are back, Wednesday are down, Charlton still around and finished with some momentum. Some decent clubs at that level now, will be a big struggle for them to remain competitive. Will be funny to watch.

That was a laugh. Great sunday afternoon viewing.

We wouldn't be able to sign him perm, but a loan could be a viable option - maybe? He needs a regular season to get himself going again, we could give him that. I have been thinking similar as well - could be a potential deal to be done there if Liverpool were willing to help us with the financials, as they did with Minamino.

I don't think there is any. I'm not sure if you heard the fans forum? It was pretty eye opening I thought. Martin was candid and said that there is no investment, there is no money put in my the owners. Not a penny. Anything we want to do has to be self-generated through commercials and player trading, that's what they said. They kind of painted that as a positive in that they were allowed to reinvest that money and the owner didn't 'take it back' - I'd be fucking fuming if he did try and take money! They were pretty clear that we need investment, Martin said he was surprised it hadn't happened yet and didn't think it would be too far away. That's what we've got to hope for. I don't think it'll be in time for this window, so we've got to try and be clever to raise as much loose change as we can to bolster the squad and keep our head above water.

People keep saying ''the board'' - they have no power on where we go or what we achieve, they are just keeping the lights on in light of no outside help or investment. They deserve credit for doing that in my opinion. On the fans forum the ambition was clear - they said they know we cant' compete with Villa, Leeds, Everton, Wolves etc - so we try and focus on competing with the likes of Burnley/Palace to see if we can squeeze top half, that's pretty much what they said. Some people might not like that, but this is the reality without any owner involvement. We just need to keep our heads above water until we can hope to secure new ownership which actually has a plan. Keeping players like Adams i'd say is a good idea for us at the moment....we're not going to get better than him as a second striker in our current guise.

I somewhat agree with what you say, let's just see where we finish first though. If we do manage to finish in the mid 40's points wise then it wouldn't be a shambolic season for me, it would be perfectly acceptable one for this squad. Like you said, the lack of quality beyond two or 3 is glaring. It's freighting how much we've regressed over the last 5 or so years in terms of starting quality anf depth. I certainly do feel that the injuries had a big impact on us, smaller clubs at this level like ourselves, Burnley, Newcastle etc cannot absorb injuries to key players. Look at the cluster fuck Burnley endured when they had all their injuries at the start, similar to Newcastle when they are within St Maximan and Wilson. The injuries to our key players is highlighted even more because we have no depth. Having to revert to square pegs in round holes just to fulfil a fixture is self defeating and has been a major problem for us. We're probably on course for a normal season with a squad such as ours, so it'll be hard to call it shambolic overall.

I'm certain I heard this from the club, either in an interview or a pre-match feature. I don't think I've made it up! But Davis as one of our coaches full stop has never felt right tbh.

That's my fear, think we need another forward even if Ings stays, but I know that won't happen. If we lose ings though and try and be clever/cheap with a replacement, then we're done for.

Yeah, that's my main frustration from tonight. They were gettable but we just didn't have the quality to do anything about it. Worked ourselves into good possessions through our decent players, such as JWP/Armstrong/KWP etc but we are blunt as hell.

Keep Ings and cross your fingers he stays fit!

I thought Tella played well to be fair, stretched them and got in behind well. He just lacks that final touch, he's still very raw and you can't put expectations on him yet. It's a shame it all has to fall on him as we have nothing else. I think there is a player there though, one of the big pluses to come out of this season for me.

I waiver so much between yes, and no with him. At the moment it's a no, but I think we are all pretty much accepting that it's happening. The club seem to have tied this up already, so there's no debate here anymore. He's ours for probably the next two years, so we've got to suck it up I guess. For free this is about all we can do until we get investment. He was absolutely awful today though, passing dreadful, touch poor. Ineffective press, poor decision making. It's like playing with 10 men when he's like that, sadly it's been more often than not.