Dan

This is why any talk of a rebuild is just air. It's completely pointless until the club is in different hands.

That's exactly how I feel. I'm probably massively overreacting but this is all feeling very familiar.

The most England second game in the history of England second games. I didn't think Ghana would have the discipline to pull it off, but the 0-0 in the second game is inevitable. Most worrying is the familiarity of that game. That was as vintage England as it gets, and that never bodes well in a tournament.

I actually kind of agree with this in a way you know, particularly watching the World Cup. He was neither good or bad in England. His Canada side are far more entertaining than anything we've played in a while.

Oh god not this lot.

First impressions really do matter too much. You have a good few months and you're set for life. It isn't just our fans either. I can't imagine the level of brain rot to get behind this ***** again. Feel sorry for those who are still going if they have the likes of him inflicted on them for another year.

Don't know what you're talking about. There were clearly 25,000 in the ground for the Fulham U21 game as per King Power reporting.

At least it's the southern section so it won't be Forest U21 and Coventry probably won't enter theirs yet. Playing either of their U21 in a competitive game would be the biggest embarrassment in our history, the biggest nothing to gain, everything to lose game we could possibly have.

God I forgot all about this garbage.

Change in ownership. I'll say this though, Martin will be by a mile the highest paid manager in the division. So if that's the level they're aiming for, then winning the league is the minimum.

Same old Turkey.

Yeah I'm binning this. Neither team trying.

Yeah Martin's a spineless loser as expected then.

We're massive underperformers. 11 knockout wins outside of England ever. Southgate was over half of them!

I think Southgate probably wins that game yesterday but he'd play to not lose vs Ghana, subconsciously placing the fear into us. I fully expect us to beat them handily.

And wouldn't you just know. Absolute vacuum of a player.

As for England I thought that was uncharacteristically entertaining and a pretty encouraging sign of things to come. I would ordinarily say that our defence will cost us and I still sort of believe this to be true because Croatia managed two goals out of very little, but we look like we can really score goals. Can see us being the tournaments top scorers. Croatia are a peculiar side. Physically strong. Technically strong. But they're just a slow team and that's felt like an issue of theirs for years. They're a bit stodgy.

He's absolutely awful. Should retire after this tournament.

If this isn't the tournament England get 9 points I don't know what is.

This game looks like it could disprove me here but go low on cards. 7 games from 22 have been cardless. 14 of the 22 have had under 2.

Listened to WYS with Mike Stowell on it and find the comments about Tom Cleverley interesting. How he went for a possession heavy approach and it was on course to take them down for a second season running. He switched things up around December and they ended up missing the play-offs due to a last minute goal. Interestingly their strikers form massively improved, Aribim Pepple scored 15 times after Christmas, Lorent Tolaj scored more consistently throughout the season but did get more goals per game in the second half of the season as well as he had a run out injured. Doesn't bode particularly well IMO. Now a lot depends on the recruitment but I think we've really got to get it right for this to work. If we go to Plymouth early season, given Martin's generally slow starts I expect us to be beaten quite heavily.

Managers generally have a default setting that is very hard to ever really overcome. I don't think he views what he does as arrogance or idealism but more how he genuinely believes the best way to win is. Personally I think he's well wide of the mark. It's the same with someone like Sean Dyche, you'd see plenty saying how he "may have changed" but they very, very rarely do. My biggest gripe with this appointment is he's fundamentally not what this fanbase actually wants. I think he could have a good six months here for example but he will never be more than 2/3 games from everyone turning on him, and that is why this appointment is silly.

Winks can do no wrong in the eyes of some honestly. Proper halo effect.

I reckon he'll actually be here in a years time. As big a clown as he is he's probably likelier to win more games than he loses and as long as the possession is high they'll be happy. Can see this lasting a while unfortunately. Hopefully this is the final pang of the Aiyawatt regime.

Whatever happened to him. He was a good poster.