benjii

This is obviously what we should do. I'm not being sarcastic. It's obvious. No idea why we don't.

No, I'm sure we'll sign someone but it will be towards the end of the window and a waste of money given the useless manager they will play under

My friend makes bespoke luxury toilet tissue and he's had an order for 500 rolls of three ply butt-luxe aloe vera with gold "MB" embossed motif, to be delivered to the Winchester area.

Well, he's been a winger most of his career and also played up front when out on loan. The only reason he plays full back for us is because he can't get a game in another position. No idea what your point is. Do you think he should be starting? If so, in place of Bertrand?

Due to our careful strategy and long-term planning, we're in a great place to write the next chapter of our history with a strong, largely homegrown Championship squad. We're confident Mauricio is the man to lead us storming back into the Premier League.

A big strength. A great and big strength. Really strong. OK. Wibble.

There have been a number of matches where we have taken the lead after a first half barrage of shots and then barely mustered an attack I'm the second half. You're right that a lot of our players have been playing sub-par but we have been far too passive once leading in a lot of games and that has to come down to the manager. Either: i) that's what he wants; or ii) it's the players fault but he's unable to get them to change. Either way, we can't change half a team in January so our only chance of improvement looks like getting rid of the manager.

Good point. I forgot the Spurs result! Somehow those two goals didn't really stick in my mind!

By "rescue" manager, you just mean one of the no-nonsense British stalwarts that do the merry go-round of underachieving Prem teams. If you think they are the only people who could improve on the useless incumbent sufficiently to keep us in the league then I find that odd. Pochettino had an impact on how we played from his first match. There is any number of potential managers who could improve on this guy.

By my reckoning we've managed that three times out of 24 matches this season. Utterly awful. #PellegrinoOut

If we win this, still need to get #PellegrinoOut trending.

Like selling no one in the summer and signing Hoedt and Lemina, you mean?

She wrote off £33 million of loans FFS.

Looks pathetic.

I have a feeling it will be a draw too. Hopefully the replay is a chance for a new manager to take a look at some players.

Yeah, we definitely would have finished top 4. No doubt about it. None at all.

Don't forget Adama Traore.

She wrote off tens of millions of debt so Christ knows what you're banging on about. She clearly wanted to sell up because when no longer wanted, or could, own a football club but suggestions she was drawing money out of the business before the sale are backed up by absolutely no evidence but are countered by a bunch of verifiable public information to the contrary.

Good post. I have reservations about the new owner but the OP is too reductive. The current predicament is due to a bad managerial appointment. As Bearsy says, at the start of the season we took a stand with VD and added some good signings. The only area of the squad which still looked thin was striker but if we had upgraded our manager, having sacked the previous one, we could well have had another good season. The new owner may be a disaster but half a season of a bad manager is not evidence in that respect.

Basically, we've made a mistake with a managerial appointment. Ridiculous to start making valedictory pronouncements. As all historians know, perspective is key.

He did look good to begin with. Played in wins at Old Trafford and the Emirates. When we had our dire run under Korean he got hooked off early a couple of times and he had a poor game against Sheff United in our cup defeat, getting sent off towards the end. Then he got injured and has barely been seen since. I'm guessing he's still not fully fit given the way he hasn't had a look in at all.

Pedro is 30 and Willian is 29 so maybe the idea is to integrate Barkley with a view to replacing those over a couple of years.

Eh? Pied played right back and was one of our best players on the night. If McQueen wants game time he needs to show he is better than Bertrand or Tadic/Boufal/Redmond, which he hasn't done.

To be clear, I'm not including Gardos or Bednarek in that as they are clearly viewed as sub-standard by management.

We have one decent CB, one average one and one below average one. Pretty poor.