Lighthouse

Ricky Martin will be distraught.

That’s lovely and all but it’s nothing to do with the point I was referring to. We aren’t ’Southampton nil’ at St Mary’s.

People care more about the most recent games, we haven’t drawn a blank at home for three months and before that we’ve done it twice this season. Whatever your criticism of the team, we aren’t ’Southampton nil’ at home.

We've scored at home in every game in all competitions for the last three months, how is that being selective?

We haven't failed to score at home in any competition since we played Man Utd in September, and even then we missed a penalty.

I'd have said he deserves a pay rise and a substantial bonus but not an all new contract, with a longer term. I think that's perferctly reasonable and if his agent had refused I'd have said, "f**k off, you manage Swansea not Juventus." We were quite clearly the bigger attraction than he was in the Championship last year.

Just the small problem of the fact that if we did that, nobody credible would ever want to manage us again, knowing that we hand out contracts not worth the paper they’re printed on and basically say, “yeah, we’re not going to bother giving you that.”

If you kill them all it’ll only encourage them.

The seeds of this were sown when Kat sold to Gao, which was followed by years of stagnation and lack of investment in the squad. SR were just the ones holding the parcel when the music stopped. We were sliding down the league long before the SR takeover. Basically they needed to get their first summer here spot on to steer us clear of a relegation fight and they didn't, then they sacked the guy who'd kept us up for four years and the writing was on the wall. I'm not defending SR but let's not pretend the bought the club which finished three points off the Champions League under Koeman and took them straight down. We had years of MoPe, Carrillo, Hoedt, Boufal and Forster's bizarre new contract in between.

It was memorable but it was also one of the very few instances of a Puel team attacking with pace and purpose, and against a team who'd gone gung-ho trying to find an equaliser from a corner. We'd have lost that game quite comfortably nine times out of ten.

This West Ham - Wolves game is dog sh*t.

I wouldn’t want Marian’s legacy here to be tainted by any kind of associated with this shower of sh*te, not that he’s a realistic candidate.

Don't forget it was independantly verified by a guy on Twitter with 'ITK' in his handle. If that isn't the hallmark for authenticity on any sports related news, I don't know what is. Personally I still expect an 11.30pm, transfer window style announcement.

It’s about 50% above where the actual cutoff is likely to be, not that it matters we won’t make 15, let alone 51.

Although apparently not linked to proof reading and grammar.

Moscow it is for Assad. A bit of a bummer, I had Gosport in our sweepstake at work.

He really is quite the schizophrenic, according to this forum. Apparently he doesn’t care about results, only possession stats, because he doesn’t really want to be here and we’re just a stepping stone to another club, but we’re also one final big paycheque so he never has to work again.

Every news outlet I’ve seen has been perfectly open about the fact that they’re an Islamist movement with links to Al Qaeda and ISIS. They’re calling them rebels because, in this context, they’re staging a rebellion.

I think they will. Russian leaders have always survived on a projection of absolute power. If they get driven out of Syria by what basically amounts to a malitia with a load of AK47s and Toyotas, separatists all over their sphere of influence will take note.

Doesn’t look like there’s much stopping this rebel movement, with Russia seemingly doing little to continue propping up the Assad regime. Looks like Damascus could fall some time in the next week.

West Ham have just updated to say that he is ‘conscious and communicating’ which does sound a little more positive. No further details given.

We’re not going to sack him now. We’re going to spend £15m on a cultured, ball playing, 5’6" CB in January, THEN sack Martin on February 12th and replace him with a lower league long ball merchant. It’s the sport republic way.

Meh. No point bringing him on at all TBH. Gives the fourth official something to do I guess.

https://x.com/WestHam/status/1865433805609205801 ‘Thoughts and prayers’ would suggest it’s not a minor dent in the bumper. Some photos are going around social media of a badly wrecked Ferrari, completely unverified at this stage, in any case we wish him all the best.

I have no idea what their respective issues are, just like both of you.