DE.

Mowbray will probably want to keep Smallwood around for emergencies, especially with Evans out and Johnson's fitness and commitment questionable. Bennett and Tosin could play CM but Bennett is often needed for RB cover due to Nyambe's own fitness issues (although personally I'd rather play JRC there) and we need Tosin at CB due to the lack of decent cover there, too. I suppose theoretically Mulgrew could play DM in an emergency as well, but he has his own fitness problems and with his legs gone I'm not convinced he'd be able to adequetely protect the defence if put in that position.

I'm sure I read somewhere (possibly on this thread) that Mowbray and Brereton have the same agent which if true lends more credence to the idea that it was Mowbray's decision with perhaps some influence from his agent. As for why Brereton isn't being loaned out - the only reason I can think of is that Mowbray doesn't want to lose face by loaning out a guy we paid a lot of money for only a year and a half ago. Not a good look for him to say the least.

The nostalgia brings a warm feeling to my chest. Good memories all around. The peak of the Venky era, no doubt.

If Brereton is still here at the end of the window then IMV that is a failure on our part to help this kid out. He clearly needs to get out of here for a bit and rediscover his form. Keeping him here for u23 matches and playing the odd match here or there, largely out of position, isn't protecting the player or our significant investment. It's just making a bad situation even worse.

I'm certainly not writing off the season at this point as thanks to the division being incredibly inconsistent we are still very much in the mix. However realistically I'm not anticipating a top six finish because we are one of those inconsistent teams who goes on very good and then very bad runs of form. Until we stop doing that (and there's no evidence of that issue being solved this season) we most likely aren't going to get into the playoffs. There's obviously also the fact that under Mowbray we're yet to get into the top six even momentarily. Even under Bowyer we only managed about three hours in 6th briefly. Breaking into the top six, even if only temporarily, and stopping a bad run of form before the rot really sets in will be indications to me that we might be ready to make a genuine challenge.

Yep I'm pretty sure all the quirks and silliness that are part of what makes FF7 so loved will be gone, replaced by a slick but largely soulless production. Barret's dialogue is basically just sound bytes from Mr T, but who cares? Everyone loves Mr T. Now granted I wouldn't be against a bit of a translation clean up as the original translation was adequate at best and often made no sense or mistranslated entire portions of the plot making the story impossible to follow. I'd be okay with those problems being fixed on the proviso the tone of the original is retained. In fact I'm sure there's a fan patch for the PC version that pretty much does this.

On a game that is literally a remake of something from 1997 I would have preferred them to retain the original battle system and tweak it for modern sensibilities (ala Persona 5) rather than adopt FF15's battle system which to me feels completely out of place in FF7. It's funny but I think the thing that bugged me the most on FF15 was the translation. I pretty much always have the original Japanese voices on, and even though I speak practically no Japanese I still know the subtitles are incorrect as they're just repeating the English voiceovers. It's something small which really annoyed me.

It seems like the battle system as a whole is basically lifted from FF15. Unfortunately turn-based combat in general seems to be obsolete these days with a few exceptions such as Persona 5. Funny thing is P5 was wildly successful so clearly turned-based combat is not a deal breaker to many people.

Technically yes although it's the same "new" battle system, you can essentially just pause/slow it down whilst you're deciding what to do next. I feel like it kind of defeats the purpose as the whole point of this newer combat mechanism is to make fights more fluid and realistic.

Appreciate the sentiment but the best thing to do if you feel a thread is veering wildly off-topic is to either hit the report button to alert us, or send one of the mods a PM. We can then either move the posts to a more relevant thread or advise posters to continue the conversation elsewhere.

I don't think it's pessimistic, it's just looking at things realistically. I appreciate that there's a bit of a high after the Sheff Weds result and that's understandable, but the reality is we see-saw in form and results throughout the season because we have an inconsistent squad that mostly belongs in mid-table. That's just where we are right now and to improve on that we either need a significant amount of recruitment across the board or to hope that we have a hell of a lot of young talent coming through that can hit the ground running from day one next season. I don't think either scenario is likely so I am expecting another mid-table finish next season unless we have one hell of a summer recruitment-wise.

You could argue we'd need two left backs as I don't think Del or Bell are up to it as back-up for a club with serious promotion ambitions, and we're also weak at RB as Bennett is really not good enough even as second choice and even though Nyambe has improved a lot he seems to be fairly injury prone. We also have Dack out for at least the first six months of next season with as of yet unproven replacements within the squad for his position, although if we change our regular formation that may not be a pressing concern. There's a lot to do so yes you would have expected us to try and get a jump start on the summer with at least a couple of permanent additions this month. It may still happen but the clock is ticking. I'm not sure one permanent and one loan does a whole lot to prepare us for the summer, unless the loan is a genuine first team challenger with the option to buy at the end of the season.

I don't have iTunes but I assume he's just talking total shit as usual. Not sure I've ever heard somebody say so much containing so little value as Shebby Singh.

We all look forward to the Leeds post-Christmas collapse.

I don't mind the thread taking a temporary detour as there isn't much transfer activity going on (as in none) but I agree that any further discussion on TM and his performance relative to our club's size/expectations should probably go in the Mowbray thread going forward!

If it's the same as Mowbray's agent then it was probably him who recommended the signing rather than Venky's tbh.

I think he had the money to spend, was running out of time to spend it and believed whoever told him that Brereton was a star in the making. Probably figured that after a season or two of decent performances we could sell Brereton for at least double what we paid, making it look like a masterstroke. Clearly he realised pretty quickly that he screwed up but can do little now other than repeat that Brereton has 'attributes' and is still young enough to improve. Regardless of what actually happened though it's a huge amount of money we will likely never come close to recouping, and if Mowbray is putting his hand up and saying 'my fault' then we have little choice but to put the blame at his door.

Pretty much agree with your comments. Not sure if the longer runtime is permanent or just a one off, but I'm happy to watch an extra half an hour personally and think it helps the show feel less rushed. Just don't stretch out segments like Question Mark/Stevens/Starks. When is the women's version of Powerrr starting? With the length of the show increased I don't know if it's really necessary. Still not convinced the NWA women's division has the quality or star power to run its own show.

Plesase stop bringing politics into football threads folks.

No comment on the £12m spent on two forward players who should be helping towards that?

We've seen with Mulgrew how quickly age can catch up with a player once they get into their 30s. A year's extension would definitely be the wisest move. Giving Mulgrew 2 1/2 years in retrospect was a huge mistake.

Yep, pretty much. We're consistently inconsistent. Some weeks we look like we could beat any team in the division, other weeks we look like we'd struggle to beat anyone in the division. Unfortunately thus far Mowbray hasn't been able to solve the root cause of that issue and until he or somebody else does we will remain firmly entrenched in mid-table.

Best pure footballer at the club, versatile in a good way (the anti-Bennett), extremely professional and still has good fitness for a player his age - unlike many players at the club he's rarely injured. Definitely wouldn't be opposed to a year's extension.

Good thing Holloway isn't on there any more, he'd be demanding we rename the club Tony Mowbray FC.

That second goal... lol. Like something you'd see on Football Manager.