Pamplemousse

If he does come in and some of the signings made don't hit the ground running, I hope our fans don't shoot the Chérif

Yeh I'd go along with that.

He already owns three sports teams - Seattle Seahawks, Seattle Sounders and the Portland Trail Blazers, purchasing Chelsea is a logical step for him

There are quite a few here who will be thrilled. He seems to be this season's whipping boy.

I think the first take would be to try and placate the fans, I'm not sure they'd take too kindly to a French grapefruit being announced as manager... Batman will have already created a 'PAMPLEMOUSSE OUT' thread so I'd have to try and create a couple of fake accounts of here and propagate some fake news. On the playing side, tactically there isn't too much I would change. The midfield and attack is fine, but defensively we need solidifying. I'd allow Hoedt and Vestergaard to form a partnership, but if it wasn't working out I'd sign a central defender as a priority. Clearly mentality is an issue, so perhaps a psychologist would be needed to try and raise their confidence levels. Get rid of some of the deadwood - Stephens, Gallagher (on loan perhaps), Davis etc. Scouting wise, I'd target more English players from the Championship. It worked quite well, signing the likes of Clyne and Rodriguez, so that would be my main transfer strategy, alongside trying to bring through existing players in the youth team, and go for quality over quantity approach. The real issue though is the board, and that's something beyond the control of any manager, so I'm not sure it would be possible to insist upon mass changes being made upstairs.

Indeed. If he had the squad and team that Koeman had at his disposal, we could've made the Champions League. We might even have pipped Leicester to top spot.

Just goes to show how easy La Liga is compared to the beast that is the Premier League

Took them to a Champions League semi-final, even PSG with their mega billions can't achieve that, an amazing feat for a French football team.

Do we need another striker? A defender, yes please.

I don't understand why we didn't sign him anyway, we only have one right back. Have him as back up for a season, sell Cedric in the summer.

Fantastic post

None of our "fans" are in any position to mock Puel considering how far ahead his team is at the moment. You can mock Marco Silva though - a relatively easy set of games and Everton have not made a good start at all. Early days though, I know they've had a few injuries and suspensions.

Admit it, you'd take 8th and a cup final all day long if it was offered to you right now. I do agree with you though, it'll take us many years to recover from the decision to relieve Puel.

I'm convinced that our problems are more a mental one rather then a personnel issue, on paper we have the manager and the players to at the very least compete. I blame Pellegrino personally.

I like Dave, he has a nice soothing voice. Who else would they have, it's a tough gig doing radio commentary, not to mention the long hours travelling (they have a third trip to Liverpool next week!) Adam and Dave work well together.

When's the next fan forum? Might be a bit lively if our form doesn't improve.

I've said this before, Long's most effective position is out on the wing. If we're playing Redmond and Elyounoussi on the wings, then someone else should play - Ings and Austin or Ings and Armstrong. If Mo is still injured then Long should come in.

The Leicester game you can sort of excuse, because we were down to 10 men. I don't think we would've lost with 11 on the pitch. The Brighton game was the one that we should have seen out. Obviously we did see out the Palace game but it wasn't straightforward.

The players need a confidence boost and are obviously low on morale. Lambasting them won't do much to help them. It's good management IMO.

Most accurate prediction so far...

Uh oh, back down to 2nd. Wheels coming off? I am clutching at straws here, yes.

I believe

I would fully support some sort of protest against the board. A second season of failure would be unacceptable. To go from 8th to 17th could be considered a blip if in the next season things progress, but another relegation battle and heads should roll at the top.

We'll score against them, the question is whether we'll be able to keep them out at the other end. A draw I reckon.

Won that second half 0-0 Let's look at the bright side, it could be worse like Cardiff and Bournemouth. Or Portsmouth conceding a last minute equaliser... Need to get something at Wolves next week really