Sly

Same. He’s not at the level required but he can’t be blamed for yesterday. He was horrendous the season we went down and should have been dropped far sooner. However I’d be more worried about playing alongside Faes if I’m honest, than Ward.

Is this a relegation match? Jeez

Plenty of football and a transfer window yet! A long way to go

I’ve got my fingers crossed they relegate Man City! So we only need to worry about 2 others

I’m assuming the plan was to sell him. Unfortunately without a driving licence, unless he employs a driver, he’s stuck with us for the foreseeable.

Neither Iversen or Ward are ideal first choices.

It was a “could” survive! It’s touch and go if we will.

I’m sure @StriderHiryu will give mic better analysis than me, however…. The first two goals in the 2nd half were very similar. 3rd Goal - takes a deflection off Coady. He gets in front of Vestergaard. Ideally we want to stop the cross. 2nd goal -back post. 4 Newcastle players queuing up at the back post. Kristiansen watching on his own. 4th goal - Kristiansen comes across to support the two centre backs. Leaving Murphy free again. He’d already missed a chance like this from a similar move.

The one that went through his legs was a one on one. Terrible defending from Kristiansen. The forward should always score from that position. I’m not sure he can be blamed for that.

Nothing official from what I can see, however he was ill before the game apparently.

None

I thought he might end up at Wrexham to be honest when his contract expires at the end of this season.

Although Ward made some truly awful gaffs and should have been dragged sooner to take him out of the spotlight, I actually think Bazunu was worse for Southampton in 22/23, than Ward was for us. Taibi is surely the most notable “worst goalkeeper” in premier league history. Although I’m sure they’ll be some randoms who Have had nightmares and luckily the clubs didn’t play them repeatably!

Stolarkzyk is just coming back from injury who is the number 2. Iversen boots the ball out of play at every given opportunity.

Yesterday wasn’t on Danny Ward to be honest. When you watch those goals back, the defensive shape is horrible. Isak gave Coady and Vestergaard severe headaches but the full backs were all over the place. Okali should have started as we needed his pace. I’m not sure how anyone can say the defence looked shot of confidence after Ward came on? Surely as a professional you protect the goal more, like you would with a more youthful goalkeeper if that is the case? Newcastle created better chances in the 2nd half and punished us.

1. Not much between Southampton, Wolves, Ipswich, Everton, Crystal Palace and ourselves. Only three of us can get relegated. 2. Manchester Citys court case has finished with the results hopefully this year. If they are relegated, we’ll only need to be better than two of those other teams. 3. Hermansen, Vardy, Fatawu, Buonanotte, Winks, Ricardo and maybe even El Khannouss get into every other of those teams match day squad when fit. I’d argue they’d maybe even start games.

You know what, when he first broke through, similar to Thomas, he had some really good games for us. He has ability but I question the mentality. He’s had some stand out moments but hasn’t ever really nailed down a place in the team. That’s because he isn’t consistent. Yesterday he was honking in a team that was particularly bad. It’s the mentality side ….. Now some of the Twitter stuff, you could argue that’s on the club and maybe they should have monitored and cleaned up the socials when he broke through into the public eye. When people are younger, they do stupid stuff. Some of his tweets though needed taking down. This really goes for all professional footballers that need social media teams. ”Why are Black people to fast. The Slow ones are in prison ”. “That has to be the worst advert, sums up women’s football really” . “Sorry but I don’t feel for people that self harm or commit suicide”. ”From the River to the Sea”. However, it’s the off the field alcohol and partying related incidents that should have made us consider moving him on. It’s harder though if he can’t drive! Drink Driving and being twice over the limit isn’t great. Error of judgement maybe in the split of the moment? However the alleged Covid house party with Perez, Morgan, Barnes and Maddison was just massively unprofessional and maybe plays a part of what is wrong with todays squad. To have eighteen people around during that time, then turn off the lights when police arrive to try and hide. Not very clever when you are all high profile. The club were pushing for Champions League football and we’d already lost Soyuncu to covid. So if you’re asked to isolate and don’t do anything daft to jeopardise that, then you do everything you can. It’s also massively disrespectful to the rest of the squad that worked hard to get us into that position. Stuff like that causes divides in any working group. It shouldn’t have happened. Elite players are different and that’s what gives them that extra 1%. Look at how Vardy treats himself off the field. Ability wise, I don’t think we are any different to most clubs in this league. It’s mentality and commitment to the cause. Rodgers got it for two years then it fell apart. Maybe he needed to remove the bad apples and couldn’t? Maybe this is why Perez and Choudhury were loaned out in the relegation season. Who knows! I get that not everyone will have that drive. If you’re being paid £60k per week though ….. maybe that’s an error of judgement by the club.

It’s been a challenge for some time I think. As someone rightly pointed out, losing big money signings on free transfers is going to hurt us from a financial rules point of view. I don’t see Tielemans, Perez, Iheanacho, Soyuncu, Mendy etc as bad signings, as they were part of a very good team. Allowing them to leave for nothing is criminal. Congerton has done okay at Atlanta and in reality, Lookman was a shrewd bit of business. He was already proven and it’s bonkers we don’t sign him. I’d suggest the jury is out on Glover, as the recruitment this season has been nothing short of horrendous. If they saw Skipp as the KDH replacement, then something has seriously gone wrong. Coady has regressed ever since he’s signed for us. He’s a good leader but he shouldn’t be on the pitch. Mavididi looks like a different player to last year. Injuries to Winks, Fatawu, Ricardo and Stolarkzyk don’t help this squad, as it’s paper thin. Soumare has emerged as a more suitable player in midfield. That’s unthinkable two seasons ago. Every club gets transfer wrong, however it’s the amount we’ve gifted up the wall. Ayew and Reid aren’t bad in terms of they add experience at this level.

I think this needs its own topic. We’ve made some awful signings in recent years. Just read through this lot. El Khannouss - £20m Skipp - £20m Buonanotte - Loan Edouard - Loan Fatawu - £15m Ayew - £5m Golding - £5m De Cordova-Reid - Free Winks - £10m Cannon - £8m Coady - £8m Hermansen - £7m Mavididi - £6m Akgun - Loan Casadei - Loan Doyle - Loan Faes - £15m Souttar - £15m Kristiansen - £13m Tete - Loan Daka - £28m Soumare - £20m Vestergaard - £15m Bertrand - Free Lookman - Loan Fofana - £30m Castaneda - £20m Under - Loan Tielemans - £40m Perez - £30m Praet - £15m Justin - £5m Bennett - Loan Maddison - £23m Ricardo - £20m Soyuncu - £18m Benkovic - £12m Ghezzel - £12m Ward - £12m Evans - £3m Iheanacho - £25m Silva - £20m Iborra - £15m Maguire - £13m Dragovic - Loan Jakupovic - £2m Diabate - £2m Slimani - £28m Musa - £18m Ndidi - £16m Mandy - £14m Kaputska - £4m Zieler - £3m Hernandez - Free Wague - Loan Okazaki - £10m Kante - £8m Inler - £8m Benelouane - £6m Amartey - £6m Gray - £4m Huth - £3m Fuchs - Free Dyer - Loan Ulloa - £8m Kramaric - £7m Simpson - £2m Lawrence - £1m Cambiasso - Free Albrighton - Free Hamer - Free Schwarzer - Free Upson - Free Mahrez - £0.4m Hammond - Free Wasielwski - Free Miquel - Loan Phillips - Free Bakayogo - Free Slowly we’ve raised what we pay for lesser quality players. We had a system that appeared to be working quite well. Why did we change our approach?

I wanted Cooper gone before a competitive game was played. It was clear we didn’t have a plan. RVN has a plan but I’m not really sure he has the players for it. You could look at the stats for the last three games and suggest that’s been coming. It happens though. Real questions need to be asked why we purchased Skipp as he’s dreadful.

Dreadful. Questions needs to be asked of Ruud to be honest. We can’t keep chopping managers though. That was every bit as bad as the worst of Cooper.

Vestergaard is a good player. Not sure why he’s being singled out here. Far worse players on the pitch today.

I’ll give you that in fairness …..

He literally played in goal for Huddlesfield when they got promoted

He’s not the world’s worst backup goalkeeper. Hermansen is just one of the best in the league. The game has levels and Wards is the Championship.