benjii

That's ridiculous. Bale was throwing in Man of the Match performances as a 17 year old at left back. Target is going to have a good career but he's never going to be near Bale's level.

We played three centre backs so they didn't really switch, we just decided Fonte should be the middle one of the three. Makes sense because the wider ones tend to have more space to advance forwards and VVD and Bertrand are much better passers than Fonte.

I prefer Sergio Georgini.

Tadic in for Targett, otherwise no changes unless fitness / condition driven.

Who are our best looking players? My top three are: 3 - Pelle Some would be shocked to see him so low. I know he's the archetypal Italian Stallion but if you meet him close up he looks about 50. 2 - Shane Long Cheeky little smile, neatly groomed, nice physique, plays guitar, bound to have great craic (he's oIrish, you see). He would clean up on a night out. 1 - Gazza Pure muff magnet.

Your mum.

Who is everyone's player of the season so far? There aren't many candidates. I think only the following have played enough to be considered: Stek Fonte Virgil Bertrand Wanyama Davis JWP Tadic Long Mane Pelle Everyone else is a reserve or has struggled to hold their spot for enough starts through injury or rotation (ie. Cedric, Romeu, Classie). So, my top 3 would be: 3 - Virgil Still learning and makes mistakes but has slotted in well and shown massive potential. 2 - Mane Always entertaining and has been by a distance or best player in quite a few games. Just missing a few more goals. 1 - Tadic When he plays well and we get him on the ball we look like a much more complete team. He creates loads of chances. Outside those, I would say Bertrand and Pelle have been decent and Fonte pretty solid. Long and Davis - consistent (not always in a good way).

Villa, Swansea, Sunderland.

Reed looks like our best player. I'd rather see him than Vic the **** in the team at the moment.

Hi Matt, **** off! Best wishes Benjii

Leicester work hard but I never want to see a Saints team habitually surrender possession and hope to get a lucky goal on the break. That's what they do, week-in, week-out. Because the Premier League is so poor they are getting away with it at the moment but they won't achieve anything at all.

Arsenal were absolutely dreadful, which helped quite a bit.

3/1 Watford. Thanks very much!

He's been **** all season. Awful tactics in Europa, no ideas, weird subs. And today, 352 with Martina and Targett. Pointless. He has no clear vision and I wouldn't be upset if we got rid.

Don't disagree but I bet we won't sign a right back. We've signed two this season and won't throw the towel in. Just a striker, I reckon. Assuming no one leaves.

Let's just assume without qualification that Koeman is actually correct. Now, is that at all surprising or a negative on the academy? I would say, "no", because quite simply this current generation has already produced some quality players; it's just that they don't all play for us any more. Shaw and Chambers are similar age to the likes of McQueen, Gallagher etc. So is JWP. Reed has quite a few first team minutes. Targett has lots of first team minutes. So actually, there are five players there from the same generation, more or less, how are either good enough to be signed by Man U and Arsenal or good enough to get minutes in mid-table Prem team. That's not bad at all. If Shaw and Chambers weren't so good they would be in our team now. The key is for the younger members of the U21s to keep developing. Realistically, the older ones won't get a chance here. We are bound to have the odd dip but how many academies have produced a current quality pool still in prime playing age as good as: Bale, Walcott, Shaw, Oxlade Chamberlain, Lallana, Chambers, Targett, JWP, Sparv, Dyer etc...

Chill out love. I'm sure he would have also said, "a bit rapey", if they were bumming chaps.

PS. pretty sure the protective award only applies to collective consultation scenarios (ie. mass redundancy). As you are going to speak to a lawyer anyway though, get them to confirm!

Clearly they have not followed legally mandated procedure and so the dismissal is automatically unfair. They are required to give appropriate notice of meetings in writing, permit a representative to attend etc. "Polkey" is not a defence. If you bring a claim, based on what you have written above about their failure to follow correct procedure, you will "win", ie. there will be a finding of unfair dismissal. "Polkey" is an argument around quantum. In other words they will ask the judge to award you a smaller compensatory element because, following "Polkey", it was inevitable you would have been dismissed even if the correct procedure had been followed. There are two elements to an award: basic and compensatory. The "basic" is the one related to length of service, age etc... "Compensatory" relates to, for example, time spent unemployed whilst looking for a new job. It sounds as though you have decent grounds and it also sounds as though your employer is inexperienced or just plain dodgy in their approach to these things. Remember that you do not necessarily need to go through with a claim to "win" - you just need to extract a decent settlement offer. As Tim says, I would definitely seek a free legal consultation if I were you and in addition to your basis legal rights you (or your lawyer) need to carefully check what your contract says about redundancy. There's a fee to bring an Employment Tribunal claim so you need to carefully weigh up the risk / reward; if, for example, they are genuinely skint then you might not get any money if you win. The lawyer can advise. Also, don't hang around because limitation periods on employment claims are quite short (3 months I think). There are various legal directories that you can use to source an Employment lawyer. Legal 500 and Chambers are two of the better known. Like any business, lawyers aren't going to send you a bill for just answering the phone (no matter how they are portrayed sometimes) so don't be shy in picking up the phone, saying you want to speak with an employment specialist in relation to unfair dismissal claim and asking for a free consultation to enable you to consider your options. Unless you have been through a client verification process with them (providing ID etc.) they aren't going to be billing you.

Me!! I would win £2k and would probably enjoy watching both us, and the Premier League as a disinterested observer, more next season.

Shelvey would be a good signing I think.

Whether it's bad luck, poor management, poor playing or whatever... this season has been rubbish and is looking more likely to stay rubbish than become good. As has been noted above: i) we made a mess of a rare European campaign - a bad cup result happens from time to time but our tactics and execution were terrible in both games against Midgetland; ii) we got absolutely thrashed in a home cup quarter final (although we seem to be the only team in the world that ever has to actually play against Daniel Sturridge); iii) we have regressed in terms of league performance (despite the general quality of the league being abysmal). Obviously a relatively bad season happens to everyone from time to time but it's natural in a rubbish season to speculate as to why it's rubbish. Taking the Midgetland tie as a case-study, Koeman has been outspoken in the past about opponents playing long-ball. Puzzling then that, in that tie, we went for Pelle and Rodriguez up front and a "hit the big man" approach (especially as it seemed to play straight into their methodical approach). It was a complete abandonment of the norm and quite odd. It made me wonder if the Koemans had got caught on the hop a bit with the season's preparations for some reason. I don't think Ronald's injury helped and I wonder if some focus was lost. We won't be going down (although I win two grand if we do so I don't really care either way) because we only need four wins and a couple of draws and we will get those but we do need a reassessment as to what the first team will stand for next season and what we want our manager to deliver when it comes to an identity and a vision.

I didn't realise Twente were in such financial difficulty. It does make you wonder if the Martina deal was part of something bigger!

Morgan was a one million Euro player when we signed him. Just saying.