Lighthouse

I genuinely can't tell if this is a wind up. You're both absolutely fine with the idea that defenders should jump for a cross with their arm above their head, on the basis if he wasn't fouled his arm would have been ABOVE the ball and therefore wouldn't have hit? If that's the case then Cardiff should just stick in a bunch of crosses which are 6 inches too high. Then they will go over everyone's head but one of our defenders will punch the ball. I can see the argument that a shirt pull is a foul but for the life of me I can't even begin to comprehend what JS may have been thinking. Until VAR gets brought in, shirt pulling will remain. It's too widespread and refs know that if they see one they will miss about 30 in every game and get slated for being biased and inconsistent; so it's safer just to bottle all of them.

Watching MOTD, both stonewall penalties. Not sure how Stephens’ arm being vertically up in the air is the result of a shirt pull. Need VAR ASAP.

I want to watch good football, played the right way, like we had up until summer 2016. I don’t care if we’re 10th, 8th, 6th or whatever, I just want to be entertained. I like seeing young players develop but only if they’re good enough. As for Stephens, I’m not quick to turn on him. In fact I have consistently thought he wasn’t a Premier League player since he played under Puel. I’ve no idea how he gets off so much lighter than Hoedt if I’m honest.

Fulham are irrelevant, they are hopeless defensively and won’t be making up 7 points on the rest of the pack. They concede 2 in every game and are nothing special going forward.

Stephens isn't a scapegoat but he is a f**king idiot. Every game he seems to do something ridiculous and drop us in it.

Well, obviously.

Fair enough. Feels like hours.

Why do people say this, it’s going to be at least 8.

Must have been a screaming, great left footer.

He’s been fit for nearly 2 games already, he is due another injury.

Would probably take it personally.

Here please. Yellows!

Interesting team. Good to see Armstrong starting, guessing that’s JWP at RWB.

Palace are level on points with us, I don’t see them as being any safer than we are. The difference is that they are pretty much a 1 man team and if Zaha doesn’t turn up they don’t win. If we hadn’t made about 4 silly mistakes in a row, they wouldn’t have scored against us on Wednesday. They’re the kind of team that can easily lose 6 on the bounce.

A draw for Fulham against Palace would be handy.

More wilful misunderstanding here; it was your fictional account of Swansea winning 5 games before the end of transfer window (they won 3), assuming they were safe (they were 19th) signing nobody (they spent a fair bit on Ayew) loaning out a bunch of players (they were mainly kids who weren’t getting in the team) and complacently sliding into the drop zone (they were in it already) which we can all live without.

He has a point, regarding both the decline in quality of football and the winter break.

Simple choice between someone who is useless and runs a lot or someone who is useless and jogs around. A bit tragic really.

Disappointed with the window. We desperately needed to strengthen up front and instead all we did was sell Gabbi. I’m not sure where this leaves us if... sorry, when Ings is injured and Valery is suspended. I was confident we’d be well clear of the drop a couple of weeks ago but that was partly based on the assumption that we’d make a decent signing or two. Oh well, in Rabbit we trust.

Never in the history of the internet has so much been discussed by so many about so little.

What do you mean ‘if’? It’s Deppo

Longs only real talent is running around in spaces. Palace were sitting deep and there were no spaces, therefore a tidy technical player was the correct choice. Yes I am aware it’s Moi we’re talking about and that we are essentially comparing a kick in the nads to a paper cut on your todger.

Oi, I call dibs on this one.

Nope. He would still be crap in my book. Had he scored against Burnley, Cardiff or any other team except Arsenal, instead of being useless, then I might hold a different opinion.

No he can’t. The only goals he has score have been on an empty pitch at Wembley and against Koscielny, who hadn’t played in 6 months, was blatantly unfit and had been on the pitch 85 minutes compared to Austin’s 20.