S-Clarke

Exactly, this one makes sense. Covers for everything.

From what I read, AMN wanted to push for a chance in midfield for England at the Euro's - that's where he sees himself. He wanted regular football in midfield, but it seemed quite clear we were going to use him exactly as Arsenal used him - a squad player to add cover to numerous areas, currently full back.

Can't see that happening myself. They'd be mental to replace King with Long

It's not 'just because of COVID' - it's the in fashion excuse for most things at the moment. Our situation was exactly the same before COVID. We had to sell Targett for the exact sum of money we needed to pay Birmingham for Adams for example. We couldn't bring in KWP on loan until we'd loaned out Cedric for a fee etc. We have been run like this for several years now, whilst it can be called sustainable, it's also like operating with your arms tied up behind you with no flexibility when problems such as now occur. Obviously as with all clubs we have been further hit by the 'football pause', but it's not fair to say that we are like this just because of COVID. We have been run on a shoestring for sometime now, but we've been lucky not to have been hit by injuries as we have now. Let's hope we can pull some rabbits out of the hat before the closure of the window.

Will find out today, but Ralph was fairly sure Diallo and Theo were 'long ones' - whatever that means! Not sure on Romeu, maybe he'll make it. Might be too quick of a turn around though.

Will need to be quick for them to be registered in time. We've got 30 mins poss?

Can't see that, who plays in midfield? No Romeu, No Diallo, no JWP who is at RB......armstrong and the kid Jankewitz? Seems incredibly risky.

We must be very confident of getting a player who can cover both sides, if we are loaning out both of our full backs!

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.