S-Clarke

That's how loan deals work, every loan deal has a fee attached to it.

But Sky Sports will probably dedicate an entire day to it, and lose their minds when Liverpool sign Davies at 11pm.

Williams is staying at Utd. "Brandon will stay," Solskjaer said after his team’s 0-0 draw with Arsenal. "He played (for) the under-23s against Liverpool (on Saturday), he needed the match fitness. “He has been working really hard. We don't have any more players that we feel should be going. We need a strong squad.”

I hope this isn't because we tried to rush Romeu back! Ralph feels quite downbeat about Theo, states it looks like a serious/long one (ditto for Diallo). If they are both hamstring type injuries then you're looking at weeks in the normal circumstances, but if they can't use the facilities we have at the moment, then you could probably double that recovery time into months.

I think VAR is an okish idea...but you need people running it who have a clue what they are doing. In my opinion VAR should be used for clear yes or no decisions. It's getting involved in borderline decisions that could go either way depending on the judgement of the official running it, and that's not fair - that's not what VAR needs to be used for. I will say though, VAR didn't take those goals away from us yesterday - the on field decision was never overturned, so even without VAR we still wouldn't have had those marginal decisions. Overall, it's a decent idea, but it's being implemented very poorly in this country by a bunch of stuck up official who believe they are always right, even when they're not.

I'd be very surprised if we get anyone in, I don't think we even have the cash for a loan. Maybe the conundrum was to let Jankewitz go for a couple of million, which would then allow us to move for a loan? (hence the chat about the transfer request etc). Maybe Ralph feels it would be a waste going that way, and we're going to give Jankewitz a chance and use a midfielder to cover full back.

Newcastle, I hope!

Thinking about it, there was also that crazy offside decision, where no one was actually offside - not long before Villas goal. All in all, tonight was an officials cluster fuck.

No dramas, footballs about opinions. Like you say, I don't really think our wide players are consistent enough generally. Armstrong is our most consistent outlet I'd say, but he comes from inside most of the time.

That sub said it all for me....Moussa at RB rather than Valery. Ralph has wanted rid for a while I think, when we have a fit squad he's not even near the bench.

What was the third one? The 'foul' on their keeper by Romeu? I'd have been surprised to get that in any situation, goal keeper protection and all that!

That's what I mean, our situation isn't just because of COVID! This has just made it 10x worse, we probably have to sell 5 to bring in one now!

Really? I'm not sure what people see in Redmond, honestly. He just runs to no where or goes backwards, he offers nothing other than breaking down attacks or slowing it down. Moussa at RB gave us more of an attacking outlet than Redmond did all game.

I honestly thought the delay over it was them deciding if he'd denied a clear goal...(so red card or not). I assumed the pen was a given, but obviously not. It is more insane every time you see it really. I'm struggling to see how it hits his thigh either. Weird one. One of those shitty things though. Sometimes you get them, sometimes you don't.

He just runs into blind allys doing very little. It's been his game since he's been here to be honest. Goes backwards more than he goes forwards. He had a little purple patch during Mark Hughes time and at the start of Ralphs tenure, but he's gone back to sort now.

I know it is? But we seem to be in a bit more trouble than most at this level, that's all I'm saying.

Because they're richer than Ralph.

Good point, forgot he went off. Could have to go to the depth's of valery at RB again then! Joys.

What's the point though? He'd only end up getting himself a 20k fine as 'officials are never wrong'. Seems a bit pointless arguing as you know you'll never win against the officials army.

You can have two. West Ham had to turn Benhrama's deal into a perm so they could bring Lingard in on a loan, as they'd also already had Dawson on loan from Watford.

JWP still at right back then? Assume KWP, Diallo, Theo and 1 other out - Not sure who the third player is? I can't remember anyone else hobbling.

Seems daft to loan players out if we still can't bring anyone in. It feels and sounds like we are on the brink of financial oblivion. Hope I'm wrong.

Damage limitation here. Just hope we come out with our goal difference still in the positive zone. This could be ugly, don't see anything positive with us at the moment. Onwards to Newcastle really, everything on that game to 'try' and restart and get something out of this season.

We were getting VAR decisions earlier in the season, we weren't complaining then. We're now having them go against us, you have to take it as it's part of the game. I don't like VAR and I don't think it really adds anything in it's current incarnation, but we've benefited from really iffy decisions so we were due a couple like that. Ref was dodge all night but these things happen and you just have to hope your quality comes through. At the end of the day, we didn't do enough. VAR or not. Entire attack is off form, unfit, not in sync. We're dead in the final third. Redmond is probably the only attacking player in the world who focuses his game on going backwards. If that was a requirement for a team, he'd be worth a fortune as there's no one in the world as good as him at that. Adams did improve things when he came on, but Ings has just lost his touch, he's a yard off it. He's been our only source of goals for the last 18 months/2 years, so when he hits a barren patch we are clearly going to stop scoring. Reality is...this is probably us, we overachieved over the last 40 games - helped somewhat by a curtailed/weird season. We don't have the squad to do any more than we are at the mo. We are in that realm with Newcastle/Burnley etc - middle of mid table. Villa just have more quality than us, they moved their squad forward depth wise. Not much we can do about that.