Finnegan

There are literally... well, about five of us. Including Foxestalk owner @Mark who is actually a bigger post rock nerd than anything else! I get about half my music recommendations from him

Stop doing it to yourself. Even five years ago, we weren't a club that buys players like Facundo from Brighton. We were and need to be the club that buys Facundo from Rosario. Once another Premier League club had gotten there first it's too late. His next move will be to a Champions League club. Us having the money is irrelevant, he won't want another stepping stone. We got Mahrez from the French second tier before people realised his quality. That's our market, yes we're not active in South America and that's disappointing but we've done well out of France.

No, I understand the vagueness, I'm all for it. In fact, they should probably be a little bit more vague. The Athletic used the term "a leading figure in Premier League football" which is accurate and appropriate. I'm possibly being unduly cynical but to me "Premier League boss" as a headline reads like wanting to draw attention by implying a manager. It's somewhat less of a surprising or dramatic headline than an unpopular pornography mogul with a terrible reputation and shady history has been seen coming out of a police station shortly before both of these stories broke, last year and this.

Edit: removing this because it's just occurred to me, far too late really, that "club boss" could mean an owner or executive and not necessarily a manager which is oddly hazy language to use but also very possible. Somewhat disappointing if the BBC are being deliberately vague to create a more click baity story on such a sensitive subject but still.

In fairness, the Leeds game rattled a few players and it obviously took a bit of coming back from. The Mavididi and Daka misses when we were still 1-0 up and hammering them will live long in the memory. That said, everyone's already forgotten the frankly bizarre hattrick Vardy left on the pitch the game before when we lost at home to Boro.

I'd ****ing love a point quite frankly. Think we'll get smashed.

His finishing last year definitely wasn't his norm, he's 26, he's played a lot of games of professional football and scored a lot of goals. Finishing from a technical point of view isn't his problem. A composed and confident Daka is a decent finisher in front of goal. Unfortunately, he's not been that for most of his time here. He got off to a horrific start with Rodgers extremely poor squad management and he's only ever really recovered in shades. He probably needs to leave. He needs to go somewhere he's The Man again, go build up some confidence where he doesn't have to cope with Vardy's shadow. I'd love him to still turn it around here but I think it's probably too late. This latest injury feels like it came at such a horrendous time for him.

Honestly, that's not the case. I was very critical of his finishing last year. Previously, despite the public perception of him, he'd always matched his xG and his accuracy shooting was actually pretty decent. He just looked pretty scruffy. Last year he was way off the mark though and some of the misses were genuine howlers. Patson Daka wouldn't even make a top 5 list of my favourite players in the current squad, I just think he's an interesting case study of a player that gets targeted for over the top criticism by a certain section of the fanbase because he fails their "eye test" whilst actually the underlying stats and performances are decent. Players like that give me a chance to talk about stats and the folly of the eye test, before Daka it was Iheanacho, Maddison and even Vardy. I think a majority of the games he started last year his all round contribution to the team was solid? You could probably pick most of them and find good passages of play he was involved in. At the point he first came back in to the team we'd been struggling for goals, as soon as he did we went on a streak of goal scoring. Not only did he start with an alarming goal and assist per 90, the chances and goals we scored as a team improved which is largely my point. All of this said, even with his undeniable drop in form from about Leeds away onwards, he still finished the year as the second highest G+A/90 of any player in the league to play over 1000 minutes, something like 0.01 behind only Jamie Vardy and way out in front of the rest of the field. It genuinely amazes me that people still think he had a bad year.

He really surprised me last year in how good he was dropping in to the space and linking up play, receiving the ball from Vestergaard. His pace and fitness to then turn and run from deep really gave defenders a lot of trouble not knowing whether to follow or when to pick him up. It created loads of room for KDH, Mavididi, Fatawu and Ndidi. Thing with all of that, though, is that Cooper doesn't really have our strikers doing this now. Mavididi is cutting in narrow and we've usually got a 10 occupying that space. To that end, we benefit a lot more from Vardy's sense of timing and his movement in and around the box than we would from Daka's link up. Last year I think there was a good argument that we were a better team when Daka started even if his finishing was more wasteful than Vards. I don't think the same would be true under Cooper, personally. Still better backup than Edouard on current evidence though. Edouard looks likes someone that drew the short straw to be here. I get that that's probably closer to the truth than we'd like but he's not going to inspire any manager, here or elsewhere, to play him if he doesn't pull his finger out somewhat.

Except it won't happen

Next time there's a Brighton fan on here banging on about how good their buying and selling is and now they won't be mugged off over Facundo, remember to remind them they sacked Gyokeres off to Cov for less than a mil without giving him a kick. Mugs.

I accept that most of the teams Wales play wouldn't be good enough to be Premier League teams but he's always consistent for us. I'm assuming he isn't for his clubs because he was seems to be a squad player. I'd definitely have him here currently, infinitely better option than BDCR.

I'm obviously intensely biased but I think Harry Wilson is honestly one of the most under-rated players in the Prem. Certainly most under-rated home grown / British players in the Prem.

Is Chelsea vs United the single most boring fixture in football? I swear no matter the era, no matter the managers or players, it's always, always a boring game.

Pau Torres doing his best impression of Daniel Amartey.

They'll probably be alright.

Don't think that should ever be forgotten to be honest. Everything about it was nasty. He got out muscled in a 50/50, got petulant about it, had a sulk, ran back and deliberately swiped the guy from behind then acted like the victim when he realised he'd broken another human beings legs. Should have had a much longer ban and universal condemnation. Horrible little ****.

Isn't he fresh back from an injury? They've got Europe mid week. Not just managing the game, gotta manage the squad hasn't he. We've got no idea what the doctors / physios have told him about howlng Son should play.

Imo Son is the most unlikeable footballer in world football that most people seem to think is likeable. I appreciate that's a slightly niche category haha. But everyone I talk to seems to like the guy. He's a diving, cheating, moaning, whinging, dirty little bastard.

Doesn't take a huge amount of investment and footballing intelligence to go from zero to hero in Scotland though.

Why

Without the 4 points we've picked up from red cards, we'd be 19th with those two teams above us. Ha. The paper on the cracks is so thin it's practically transparent.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/articles/c3e9v5l07zpo @Miquel The Work Geordie Ah shit. ****ing jambos gonna take off.

What was the agenda this week?