I agree 100%. I think he's looked decent in flashes. He needs regular game time to show that he can be consistent, but I think it would be a risk to give him that here at the moment. Getting that game time at a lower level should highlight his quality if he's genuinely as good as people say he is and he'll come back stronger for the experience.

Wouldn't have thought we'd want to pay much more than £1.5m to bring in Cunningham. Cardiff need to be a little more realistic there I think. If it's a loan to buy arrangement, whatever fee we agree is to effectively sign him this season, as opposed to paying to loan him for a season and then he's free to speak to whoever in the summer. As we've already seen with Downing & Bauer, we can't hedge our bets on signing up players when they run out of contract. If he's the guy we want at LB, we're better off getting it done now.

I started to get triggered by his interviews last season but now I take them all with a massive pinch of salt. Whenever he talks about competition, I genuinely think he means he wants to improve the starting XI, but doesn't explicitly say it so that he doesn't piss anyone in the squad off. It's annoying, as it just ends up pissing the fans off instead!

I feel like he's the one missing out there. If he'd signed on, he'd probably end up playing the majority of the season for us. If we recruit well at LB & potentially a CM if funds allow, we won't have a need for him in those positions, plus we have plenty of young lads coming through (Chapman, JRC, Dolan) that can play on the wing. I'll go out on a limb and say that he won't be signed up by anyone before the end of the transfer window.

Would love him back.

Because he was out of contract and no longer earning £35k a week.

It would be OK to say something if there wasn't some sort of obsession around taking to twitter to confirm the rumours with every journalist going and/or brag about it.

Is this meant to be getting announced today then?

Based on current reputation & perceived value, I'd prefer Kipre. If we went for Lindsay and could get a tune out of him, he could be a shrewd signing.

Definitely the way I understood that. It's tight but hopefully enough to sort out the GK, a CB and a LB.

Sounds like you're banking on him having a poor game. If only to justify your views on him.

He's had a few outings for United, so they must think he's decent despite his age.

Centre mid. Seems to be highly rated.

If we can get a few quid for him, thank him for his efforts and move him on. You'd imagine that would be a decent wage saving if you replaced him with Wharton.

Yeah I agree with that. He does tend to be out a fair bit of the season. We probably wouldn't be worse off if we got a small amount of money to play with and have Wharton step in as a back up CB.

I think he's better than most people give him credit for. I think as a back up, he's a decent option.

During the Prem years I went to most of our away games in Newcastle from 2004 and the crowd certainly wasn't as loud/vocal as they're made out to be. I also went to quite a few Newcastle games during university (2008-2011) & through the years and have been disappointed in the crowd/atmosphere if anything. They tended to get vocal when things weren't going their way, as opposed to genuine support for the team.

I can definitely see where you're coming from in terms of his quotes, but given that the club site (when the retained list was released) and several LET articles & tweets refer to him being offered a deal, I think it's safe to assume he has been. It may well be the case that given the current circumstances (COVID & the budget limitations we appear to have) we've offered him a deal on terms lower than he was anticipating, so he's keeping his options open. I'm taking Mowbray's comments that Downing may still sign that deal - but they aren't necessarily expecting him to - and if they get to a stage where they've done their business in defence, they could look to offer him improved terms should he still be available and we have the budget to do so.

It states that he has been offered a deal.

I could swear I counted him offside at least 3 or 4 times, which is a lot for one half of football. I wouldn't want to watch it back and check though. Not the easiest half to watch.

He was caught offside countless times and his pressing was lacklustre. He didn't create or do anything of note, so I'd personally class that as awful. The penalty miss was to be expected. He was walking away from it before he was told to take it. The lad isn't a goalscorer. Would love it if he proved me wrong. In the same token, you could say that we don't need Dack as we looked really good without him. Fair enough if you don't like Gallagher, but I don't see why he should be written off before he's kicked a ball this season.

Agree with everything up to the last paragraph. Seems needless to dig out Gallagher. He deserves as much chance as the rest of them to show what he can do before the season starts. If anything, you could argue we could've done with him in the first half as Brereton was awful. He certainly wouldn't have been any worse than him.

I'm not enamoured by him but he is neat and tidy with the ball. I also like that he's quite good at knicking the ball back. It's not a trait you tend to see from a more attacking midfielder.

Thought both Chapman and Wharton came out of that half with a lot of credit.

6ft3 apparently.