S-Clarke

He's a skate, just ignore him.

Albania look quite handy.

They've got Florenzi there, very highly rated. Manolas the CB, who is wanted by lots of clubs. I think they have (or had) our old friend Astori too..! Then they have Nainggolan in midfield, Pjanic (well, they did), Strootman (when he's fit). I think they sold Lamela and Osvaldo when he was manager there. They also started the season with the best defence in Europe, we weren't far behind either at that time... And for what it's worth, Southampton appointed Garcia in my FM game after Koeman was sacked. It's in the stars.

Here is a write-up on Garcia's time at Roma http://www.sbnation.com/soccer/2016/1/13/10753816/rudi-garcia-fired-roma-manager-style-draws-struggles-transfers

These are his season stats... [TABLE=class: grid with-centered-columns hover, width: 668] [TR=class: alt] [TD=bgcolor: #D0D0D0, align: center]Apps 38[/TD] [TD=class: minsPlayed, bgcolor: #D0D0D0, align: center]3245[/TD] [TD=class: goal, bgcolor: #D0D0D0, align: center]Goals 6[/TD] [TD=class: assistTotal, bgcolor: #D0D0D0, align: center]Assists 11[/TD] [TD=class: yellowCard, bgcolor: #D0D0D0, align: center]-[/TD] [TD=class: redCard, bgcolor: #D0D0D0, align: center]-[/TD] [TD=class: shotsPerGame, bgcolor: #D0D0D0, align: center]2.2[/TD] [TD=class: passSuccess, bgcolor: #D0D0D0, align: center]86.6[/TD] [TD=class: aerialWonPerGame, bgcolor: #D0D0D0, align: center]0.7[/TD] [TD=class: manOfTheMatch, bgcolor: #D0D0D0, align: center]2[/TD] [TD=class: rating sorted, bgcolor: #D0D0D0, align: center]7.31[/TD] [/TR] [/TABLE]

I wouldn't be surprised if Blanc is dragging his feet a bit, getting as much compo as he can get. He's been royally stitched up there.

Always liked Hamsik. think he's been at Napoli for 10 years or so now, which is kinda surprising. He's done this regularly in Serie A. Still only 28 too, so bang in his prime.

Good draw for us. Home first, home last, home over xmas. Perfect.

What a sensationalised load of tripe.

Huge goal! Where did that come from!

And another body part, I'd imagine.

Imagine that, we turn up to face their team of superstars (Dann, Dunk, Gibson et all) and we turn them over. No one would give us a chance. Galaticos.

Some people are also too quick to ignore how we develop players. He has all the tools, and maybe our coaching staff believe we can make him even better. It's something we seemingly do with pretty much most players, they always leave us as better players than when they joined. I'd assume that last season doesn't factor in the overall decision of the club, they've probably got stacks and stacks of info on him as we were interested back in his Brum days too. If it's true, we obviously feel now is the time to take the punt.

TBF he wasn't giving him games until his hand was forced and Pelle was injured!

Newcastle spent 80/90m over the course of last season, I don't think that even includes wages/signing on fee's and agent's fee's. So quick fire money doesn't buy you success.

Absolutely this. the idea is that 'top managers' will be scared of hurting their reputation by coming here, and not doing as well as the previous manager, says more about their confidence than anything else. Not sure they'd be the right person for the job anyway.

I think he's obviously ****ed the club off a lot, but we do come across as petty as hell sometimes. I personally think we got what we wanted, if he wasn't going to commit, we wanted to look elsewhere. As much as it won't be reported, I think we took advantage of Everton's interested and called Koeman's bluff a bit. The fact it's taken so long isn't due to paperwork, I genuinely think he's probably been in a bit of a ''WTF do i do'' situation. We've obviously managed the exit to point all the blame at his door, when I think the exit was orchestrated as much by us as it was by him. Just my two pennys.

We need to replace Gaston and Juanmi as attacking third options, so a young, English U21 player sounds like a plan. If we sell Mane, we'll replace him. FWIW I like Redmond, I think he's been a club target for a while. It's easy to say he didn't do much at Norwich, but he was surrounded by ****. If they had a proper goal scorrer up top, I'm sure he'd have had more assists. It's just that Cameron Jermone likes to miss sitters. Look at how good he is in an U21 shirt....definitely a future England international and we seem to be heading back onto a path that we kind of discarded the last couple of years (good English players)

He's not going to decide to stay, way too long down the line. Just want it done and confirmed so we (and everyone) can move on.

I've just been playing FM and noticed Koeman got sacked by saints at the back end of last season. Southampton appointed Rudi Garcia as his replacement. I think this confirms any speculation. I'm ITK.

Doesn't say much about the confidence of managers if they're worried about a Top 6 club damaging their reputation.

FF will not be leaving.

He's just signed a new 5 year contract, I'd say the chances of him leaving this summer are slim-to-none.

Awful game to be honest, such low on quality.

Lallana is a bit of an almost player to be honest. Almost scores a great goal, almost provides a great assist, almost makes a good pass. His finishing and final product have also been incredibly powder-puff to be honest. But he looks pretty in the buildup before almost playing that pass.