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I live in Manchester so made the most of the lovely weather and popped down to Old Trafford yesterday. Thought Leicestershire look excellent throughout. Moving Ahmed up the order looks a masterstroke, he is obviously a confident lad and really set the pace at the start of the innings. Looks to be plenty of batting depth right down to Van Beek. It’s pretty miserable here today sadly so I’d be surprised if there is any play.

I remember thinking when we'd won the league that our ambition should be to establish ourselves as the Leverkusen, Villarreal or Atalanta of the Premier League. Established top half sides that regularly qualify for Europe, built on foundations of a strong academy and positive connection between supporters and heirarchy. There's no reason this couldn't have been achieved, particularly after we'd built on 2016 by qualifying for Europa and winning the FA Cup. "There's no way we can compete with Man City, Liverpool etc" is a total straw man argument - no one thinks we can or should be trying to compete with them, but there's a level below that that is achievable for clubs of our stature and recent history.

Great interview with Guy, well done lads. Thought it was a really good example of a phenonemon you see in many industries - institutionalised employees who have been in the same organisation or industry for several decades and can't see the wood for the trees. He couldn't prescribe any solutions to the problems we have because he is unable to identify and diagnose the issues in the first place.

The beatings will continue until morale improves.

Felt a sense of lightness going into this weekend. A weight off my shoulders. A spring in my step. Couldn't work out what it was. The weather, perhaps? The longer days? And then I realised. It's because Leicester City aren't playing this weekend.

I have a passing interest in this stuff because of my job. The option leaving Rutland as a seperate council looks like a non-starter - it's too small. The North/South/City division looks more likely but where you draw the city boundary isn't straightforward.

If Victoria Station in Manchester is anything to go by, that transparent roof will be filthy and grey within about 6 months.

Sounds familiar. Some Chelsea supporters remain standoffish with Enzo Maresca, even after seeing their side creep back into top four. The sense remains that Stamford Bridge regulars will take some convincing on the merits of the careful, possession-heavy nature of Marescaball. It is not exactly setting pulses racing at the moment and it was telling that the mood was far from harmonious during this win against Leicester City. Maresca seemed to be letting out a lot of frustration when he reacted to Marc Cucurella breaking the deadlock after an hour of stodginess by gesturing angrily for fans to make more noise. The grumbling about his team’s backwards and sideways ­passing had struck a nerve. Then again Maresca could hardly ­complain if there was dissatis­faction about Chelsea ­labouring against ­opponents who look certain to return to the Championship after losing 12 of their past 13 games. https://www.theguardian.com/football/2025/mar/09/chelsea-leicester-premier-league-match-report

Farage's fellow Reform MPs would be mad to try and topple him. I can't stand the bloke but he's clearly got an appeal to a part of the electorate that others on the populist right don't have. His successors after he left UKIP were either ruddy faced mustard trouser wearing aristocrats who wanted to bring back the British Raj or skinheads flirting with Tommy Robinson. I reckon Farage's appeal tops out at about 25% of voters but that's well above what Rupert Lowe or any of those other goons would manage.

Yes I wasn't suggesting they all had the same focus on the academy. MON did use Heskey pretty effectively. Big Nige wasn't particularly focused on the academy in his second spell but then he had plenty of cash to splash. We've invested in Seagrave and the academy over the last decade and we should now start reaping the rewards. Nelson, Alves, Evans, Monga and Stolarczyk should be central to our rebuilding plans next season and any new manager should buy into that. That said, as you say, the main thing is to have a clear plan and structure from the DOF to the scouting team to the coaches. It doesn't matter who we get in as manager if the DOF can't ship out unwanted players, continues to burden the club with enormous salaries for players over 30, and has an inward transfer strategy based around relationships with favoured agents.

Came here to suggest Rosenior. He's done well everywhere he's worked. Was very highly regarded as a coach at Derby under Rooney as well. Dyche is a relic - we need a young, progressive manager who can utilise the academy. Our most successful promotion-winning managers have been in that mould: Little, O'Neill, Pearson, Maresca to an extent.

I understand the logic of starting one of Ayew and BDR, but if they're both in the first XI tonight I think I'll watch the new series of The White Lotus instead.

Not sure it's as thought through as that. He just thinks the larger, richer country has the right to overpower smaller neighbouring nations if they want to. His comments on Greenland, Canada and Panama come from the same worldview. No reason to think he'll see Taiwan any differently if China makes its move.

Makes me laugh when people criticse "MSM propaganda" then go on to repeat a bunch of Kremlin talking points pretty much verbatim.

It's not too far a walk from the city centre really. 35-40 minutes from Lime Street. Certainly easier to get to than Goodison and Anfield.

There's a pretty good food hall at Media City, 15-20 minutes walk from Old Trafford. It's called Central Bay. The Imperial War Museum is very close to Old Trafford if you're at a loose end during the day. As the previous poster says, Chorlton is good for eating and drinking. Plenty of places to go. If you like beer, there's a place called The Beer House which is owned by Marble - one of the best breweries in Manchester.

This would require agreement from the UN Security Council - of which Russia is a permanent member and therefore has a veto.

Moldova seems more likely. Not a NATO member, and Russia has been trying to increase its influence in the Eastern Balkans for years. They already occupy much of Kherson so this could enable them to put the squeeze on Odessa and control the Black Sea.

Even if you support their agenda (I don’t), maybe it’s worth waiting more than the three weeks they’ve had in office to see how it plays out before deciding they’re doing a ‘good job’. But then smashing stuff up is much easier than doing things that actually helps improve people’s lives I guess.

With Ndidi and Okoli in we looked more solid, and Coulibaly did well. But we were absolutely toothless going forward. Buonanotte has to start the next game. Daka is a headless chicken in front of goal but he at least will stretch the game more than Vardy is capable of now.

TNT spent about 2 minutes talking about the protests as a result of the chanting. As one of the objectives was to raise awareness, I’d say it was worth it.

I enjoyed when he said our priority during the January transfer window should be to sign a goalkeeper because we'll have three of them leaving in the summer.

Even if energy generation is 100% carbon free, carbon will still be emitted through industrial processes. Eg. steel manufacturing creates carbon emissions. The idea of CCS is you capture that carbon, reuse it for domestic industrial production and, as you say, export it.

It does cause problems when the government and central bank are working in different directions. This happened in September 2022 when the Bank of England’s main objective was to dampen inflation, while the Truss/Kwarteng budget aimed to increase consumer spending by cutting taxes. In the scenario you outline the Bank’s actions would likely be similar - their aim would be to make sure the currency doesn’t weaken too much, so they’d buy up government debt to shore up the price and maybe increase interest rates.

The creation of GB Energy is perhaps the most significant thing this government has done so far I think. We're starting from way behind other nations and as you say it would have been easier to do this stuff 10-15 years ago when interest rates were rock bottom. But nations who can provide for their own energy needs (and ideally export some as well) will be more secure over the coming decades than those who can't.