Guest

You could say that about any position though. Depending on how Stolarczyk is getting on we are potentially a Hermansen injury away from Wardageddon but that doesn't mean we should be prioritising signing a keeper. As much as I think everyone would be happy to have KDH back, if we're spending the £30m+ the (almost certainly bullshit) article claims Chelsea want then it really needs to be on a player who undisputedly improves the first eleven and looking at how we set up so far under Ruud, I don't think he necessarily does.

He's having a pretty decent loan spell and for the first time in his career seems to be nailed-on as first choice at Stoke so unless we think we can sell for a decent profit in Jan or we have our eye on a really good Prem loan and are able to sack Edouard off, leave him where he is. His development is not going to be served particularly well by dragging him back here to be our third choice.

If Cooper is in that neck of the woods for a job then I would think it's more likely Corberan is off to Wolves and he's the replacement at West Brom. Surely even the shittest Premier League teams aren't going to be looking at someone with two sackings under his belt in less than a year

Or West Brom for that matter. Spells at Saudi-owned Newcastle and the chaos that is INEOS Utd with their legions of directors and executives are probably not indicative of how he would perform here, though of course it's all academic because there is seemingly no chance Rudkin leaves or sees his power diluted

Pleased for him. Much as I never like to go all armchair psychologist/body language expert, his reaction to the equaliser doesn't seem like that of a player who isn't arsed and doesn't want to be here. Of course it will take a lot more decent performances to win people round but it's a start. I think with him we probably just have to accept that there will always be those inexplicable moments where he seems to forget he's participating in a football match and hope they're outweighed by the moments he turns into part Vieira part Zidane.

Personally if getting home a bit earlier was more important to me than seeing the game in its entirety, I would probably just not go in the first place. Never mind avoiding the worst of the traffic, you get to avoid all of the traffic and also don't have to spend loads of money on tickets and travel. In the same way a lot of our fans seem to go every week not because they actually enjoy it but just because it's part of their routine, I imagine many of those leaving early don't really have anywhere to be, they just leave early because they have always left early. Obviously if you want to do that every week irrespective of how the game is going then that's your right but it's also everyone else's right to think that doing so makes you a bit of a bellend.

Yeah same, just about to enter the last area of the first act. Went Monk and though it's a lot of fun I am tempted to start over as either Witch or Sorceress which I think are slightly less hard work

I find it quite hard to believe that they've found out for certain they're getting relegated without it subsequently being leaked anywhere

Say what you like about him but the man loves an inquest

They were rank against Bournemouth and if you support them the inconsistency must be maddening and depressing in equal measure but are Spurs actually that far off where you would expect them to be? Their squad it seems to me is much closer to e.g. Newcastle, Villa and Brighton than it is to Arsenal, Chelsea and Liverpool. 6th would be about par and though it looks bad being below some of the teams above them, they're two points off and that's with a pretty heavily depleted squad that isn't exactly stacked with quality to begin with. Their fans are understandably desperate for trophies and success but Levy and co. either don't give a shit about that or have no idea how to attain it - unless they bring in someone genuinely world class, what is a new manager realistically going to produce that all the others under that ownership haven't? Maybe that is all nonsense and the equivalent of when thicko pundits/neutrals give us the "well what do they expect? Be careful what you wish for" treatment but they're always talked about as a team who should obviously be Champions League regulars and trophy winners and I can't see it.

I have a suspicion that video is probably the result of something being wrong with the roof/drainage rather than a sudden and dramatic rise in sea level

Well yeah obviously when he scored he was a terrific signing but now he's put one in his own net he's a total dosser

Because a cross hit him and went in?

People always talk about the importance of succession planning and that's part of it. Be pretty stupid to sack a manager without having any idea whether or not the replacements you've got in mind are actually interested.

Needless to say I want every player to do well for us but I can't think of one I've wanted to succeed so desperately as lovely Patson. The way he's talked about is absurdly disrespectful at times and way out of proportion with what he's actually contributed during his time on the pitch. Hopefully working with Ruud brings the best out of him.

That is my concern with him - he can strike a ball very nicely which is obviously a good quality for a striker to have but it seems like if he's not scoring he might as well not be there and really needs someone up alongside him to do the link work.

Yeah I haven't played PoE but I remember seeing some footage of 2 last year not long after Diablo 4 had come out and it piqued my interest so I signed up for some waiting list - got in one of the private betas earlier this year and was absolutely blown away by it, been waiting impatiently ever since and easily my most anticipated release of the year. Had an email this morning inviting me to another test from tonight until Friday which was like reliving the Cooper sacking announcement all over again.

What's he being made a scapegoat for exactly? I don't think anyone's blaming the result or performance on him, just pointing out - correctly - he isn't very good which also presumably has quite a lot to do with him never getting a run of games.

Unsurprisingly there is not a great deal happening this month but I will definitely be playing Path of Exile 2's early access which starts on Friday. Marvel Rivals is a free Overwatch knockoff out the same day on PC and consoles, which I can't say I'm particularly excited for after having tried the beta but your mileage may vary. Then on the 9th there's an Indiana Jones game for PC and Xbox (coming to PS in Spring next year apparently) and that, as far as I can tell, is about it. January looks even more quiet so let's get that out of the way too while we're at it - there's a new Dynasty Warriors on the 17th for PC and consoles if you like that sort of thing and a Sniper Elite spin-off for the same platforms on the 30th.

I would rather he saw out the season with Stoke personally. Better for his development and while he can obviously finish I don't think we've really seen anything from him to suggest he's going to be the difference between us staying up or not - chance conversion is not really our issue. I might have liked Nelson back but that's not happening.

That's all well and good Steve but we have also taken the fewest shots and shots on target, have the longest average shot distance and are above only Ipswich for xG and touches in the opposition box. If you think they are indicators of a functioning attack that over the course of a season is likely to produce enough goals to keep a team as leaky as ours afloat then fair play.

I don't think they've been adjusted for today's games yet so Coady's are obviously enormously skewed by having only played a few minutes beforehand. But per 90 minutes Okoli makes marginally more clearances than Faes (I mean so marginally as to be insignificant) but he also makes more tackles and interceptions, more blocks and fewer errors leading to shots. Faes is better in the air but defensively that's about it. Ideally I don't think you'd want any of them starting games but for me the best pairing is Vestergaard and Okoli.

Per 90 minutes, Okoli and Coady

I'm not convinced of that just yet. Everton managed 40 points last year after having 8 deducted with a group of players that I don't think is noticeably better than ours, though admittedly Branthwaite and Tarkowski are a level above any centre back we can call on. Ruud has a job on his hands for sure and it's not a good squad by any means but it shouldn't need to be to finish above three of Ipswich, Southampton, Everton, Wolves and Palace.

I agree with the sentiment but i dont expect either of them feel any sense of responsibility for it whatsoever