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Overachieving compared to the estimated market value of our squad maybe - I believe total wage bill tends to be a better indicator of performance and the figures for that I can find put us at 13th-15th. Estimates sure, maybe not even semi-accurate ones, but at least a player does actually have a wage rather than a theoretical market value. I'm not sure what it is you're actually upset about and the idea that Top has appointed Steve Cooper to get us playing like Man City then sacked him for failing to do so is completely mental so I think I will leave you to it.

Right but that says they think we could be higher up the table had we managed to beat either Everton or Ipswich and not been playing so badly in basically every game. It is very clear to me and I would imagine most other people that league position is not the primary factor in his dismissal but if you believe otherwise then fair enough.

I can't say I've seen that anywhere. John Percy reckons survival is our sole focus and Cooper was told as much when he joined but I would be interested to read anything of substance to the contrary.

Realistically, he's not been sacked because the board or supporters think we should be higher up the table, has he? The aim is to stay up and I have no doubt whatsoever that Top and co. would snap your hand off for 16th at the end of the season if offered it, as would I. He's been sacked because the performances have given little reason to believe we're likely to finish that high and both the fans and more importantly the players have been left totally unconvinced by his methods and tactics.

Guess he maybe means in terms of our willingness to look abroad or at anyone without prior experience in the league, which I'd agree with. We're perfectly happy to pick up unproven players from relatively weaker leagues but when was the last time we seemed even vaguely likely to appoint a manager who hadn't already coached in this country? It is an inherently risky thing to do obviously but equally it's not as though someone like Cooper or Smith is a surefire success because they've demonstrated they can be at best mediocre here. People are regularly underwhelmed with the names we're linked with and our unrequited infatuation with Potter, understandably so, but that's partly because we make the pool of potential candidates a lot smaller than it needs to be.

Christmas party in Copenhagen is a regular thing isn't it, am I right in thinking that's where they were in 2015 when we saw the pictures of them all in fancy dress? Doesn't look great after a defeat obviously but if they had waited for us to win a game they might have been waiting a long while and if it helped to lift spirits then good for them.

Is setting up to defend all game every game regardless of opposition when you've got some of the most talented and exciting attacking players outside of the elite clubs at your disposal - Paqueta, Kudus, Bowen etc. - especially pragmatic?

Definitely. You could argue there was a disconnect between Maresca and a pretty sizeable chunk of the fanbase but crucially the players were largely behind him and believed in what we were doing. I dread to think what it must have been like going from that to working under Cooper.

Yeah so they could have spent a week working with the other half and then the following week getting the squad ready for Chelsea couldn't they? That would probably have been quite nice

Full credit to you for getting this over the line mate

I am staggered, thought he'd be here a good few weeks yet. Not sure why we'd wait until after the international break but better late than never. Could tell from him lashing out at the officials again that he was well out of ideas and if Vardy's reaction when he came off was representative of the how the squad were feeling then that probably pushed him over the edge. For all that he is obviously a bit crap and his whining about referees made him look like a bell, I struggle to muster any real negative feeling towards him. We decided to give the job to someone who isn't very good and surprise, he wasn't very good at it. It was like having Dean Smith back.

They went from not qualifying for any major tournament for a decade to being ranked no.1 in the world for ages and smashing their qualification groups every time. Even if you don't rate some of those players above as world class or whatever, a golden generation is relative to the players you've had previously and on that basis I don't know how you could argue it isn't one.

If you think the squad is that bad then it also kind of undermines the entire 'Cooper In' argument because in that case it is going to take a much better manager than him to keep it up, unless you think it's so awful that nobody attainable could hope to do so in which case we might as well have just not replaced Enzo at all and saved the money.

Obviously a player like Rodri is always going to be a huge miss and they have players who can fill in all over the place but how has a team with that much money and such a good record in the transfer market ended up with a squad containing one defensive midfielder and one striker?

Aside from the very obvious point that plenty of others teams have played that way and not been relegated, having a defined and consistent style is not about possession or playing out from the back. Bournemouth under Iraola, Brentford under Frank, Wolves under Nuno or more extremely Burnley under Dyche are good examples of teams who had/are having success while being direct and having relatively low possession. The complaints about Cooper's style aren't that we aren't sexy enough or we don't have enough of the ball, it's that there is no discernible style, no real philosophy or plan that guides him and that the team can work towards perfecting every week other than vague notions of working hard and trying to stay solid - that is not enough at this level.

He's mastered the art of the fronting up interview where he says something along the lines of "that's on us, we'll hold our hands up" and then goes on to complain about all the ways it was not, in fact, on us. Like a lot of people I assumed Forest's victim complex around officiating came from the owner but maybe that was not entirely the case.

Some of the problems yeah but the problems of the team visibly being awfully coached and having very little belief in/idea of what they're being asked to do, hopefully not. I won't argue for a second that he's been dealt a particularly brilliant hand but nor do I believe for a second there doesn't exist somewhere in the world a willing replacement who could play it better - we're not a plum job but we are a pretty well-known club in the richest and most watched league in the world and currently our expectations are pretty low. For me if the squad isn't up to it (which I might debate) and neither is the hierarchy (which I wouldn't) then it's even more important to get in the best manager possible but the argument always seems to be that everything else is crap so we need to keep our crap manager to complete the set.

Something something pragmatic something something give him time something something but who would you get in

He may not be the biggest underlying problem but that doesn't mean he isn't a problem, and it's quite a bit easier to solve the problem of the manager not being very good than it is to change the ownership or entire squad. I do back the team and I do largely blame the board but I also think that as a Premier League manager, Steve Cooper is not up to it and there's not really any point in perservering with him on the basis that the people above him also aren't.

By the way, how many ****ing yellow cards is this ***** on now? He must have more than most players

Our preparation for Brentford should be having the whole squad spend the week digging the biggest hole possible and then chucking this twat in it

I wish I could see it but I can't, especially now we've scored and made it look respectable. Even if Palace and Ipswich somehow both win and we go 18th I don't see them having the appetite to get rid

Then as Fernandez is getting onto the rebound he's stood there shrugging his shoulders, top work all round

I've got good news for you

The ones that stand out as probably being worse in recent years are summer '21 and then the double whammy of summer '22 and Jan '23 - the former for Ryan Bertrand and ultimately not improving the first team at all despite being our record net spend, the latter for heralding the start of Project Danny Ward and seeing Fofana replaced with Faes while we sat on money that we then spent anyway only to still get relegated. Buonanotte on loan and Ayew for not much redeem this one slightly but spending £35-40m on two players in Skipp and El Khannouss who aren't regular starters is pretty ****ing silly, and that's before you look at us selling one of our best players from last season and giving Vestergaard a three-year deal after losing the only manager to get anything out of him.